Looking Back: COVID at its Start
February 2020. The last month when we lived somewhat normal lives. The month where we were able to walk around restaurants and meet friends without any worries. Also, the month when our lives changed and we had no idea when we would return to a state of normalcy.
COVID-19’s presence has forced all of us to adapt and realize that wearing masks whenever we leave the house and being conscious of contracting the virus is the new normal. No one including myself thought that over two years later, we would still have to deal with COVID-19. Now, over these two excruciatingly long years, how exactly did our attitudes toward the pandemic change?
Let’s start at the beginning of the pandemic. At the time, the number of COVID cases in South Korea was very low with the number of cases each day rising by only single digits. Everyone was aware that COVID existed, but we didn’t let that stop us from living our lives. We still came to school, some wearing masks as a precaution while others didn’t think it was necessary. Unfortunately, this quickly changed as South Korea became one of the leading nations in the world with COVID cases, just behind China.
After asking a few friends, they all remember the whole Shincheonji debacle which started the spread and exponential growth in cases. Shortly after, we would need to start virtual school as it seemed unfit and dangerous to attend school. Frankly, we were ecstatic when virtual school started; we could wake up at 7:58 AM, crawl over to our laptop, log in to Schoology, and join class right then and there (and for some of us extra lazy folks, in our beds). It was a new way of pushing through our stressful high school lives, and we didn’t want to see this come to an end. No matter how annoying it was to deal with FitnessBlender for virtual PE or having to play our instruments for virtual orchestra or band, we needed this break from our draining routines of waking up early to go to school every day.
Of course, we eventually made a return to school and it felt almost surreal. It was honestly great being able to see my classmates in the flesh, rather than through subpar webcams for Zoom. It was like going from 480p to 4K on a Youtube video; of course, you want to see everything in 4K. However, the introduction of rules and regulations for COVID protocols meant that school was no longer the same as pre-COVID times. In the following school year, it felt like the list of rules had gotten even longer with the emergence of hybrid learning. Half of the grades would have to do virtual school and the other half would come to school physically, and we would rotate through cycles so that everyone could come to school every other week. Teachers had to adapt to this hybrid learning as a lot of classes would be made up of a mix of grades. And this obviously meant that club activities mostly came to a halt as half of the club would be in school while the other half would be online. Furthermore, sports were also heavily affected by these changes as students could no longer compete against other schools, disappointing many student-athletes. Many of my peers quickly got sick of having to accept these new rules, and even virtual learning became a nuisance with how stressful it was having to stay confined within our houses. I personally missed being able to eat lunch with all of my friends at the cafeteria.
COVID’s impact on our lives was immense, and we still haven’t returned to life before February 2020. It’s hard to imagine us living the carefree lives we once did, but the lifts on quarantine and outdoor mask mandates have definitely been welcome. Hopefully, I can experience at least one month of normal high school life before I graduate and move on from KIS.