FREE FALL THOUGHTS

Day 10 & 11 - 3rd and 4th April - A Helping Hand As promised yesterday by PM Modi, in his address at 09:00 AM on 3rd April, a new task was announced - 9 minutes of candle light vigil at 9:00 AM on 5th April. It was a call for solidarity, to remained united as a nation for a greater cause. घर की सभी लाइटें बंद करके, घर के दरवाजे पर या बालकनी में, खड़े रहकर, 9 मिनट के लिए मोमबत्ती, दीया, टॉर्च या मोबाइल की फ्लैशलाइट जलाएं: PM @narendramodi #IndiaFightsCorona — PMO India (@PMOIndia) April 3, 2020 When PM raises a call, the entire nation responds. The night of 5th April 2020 turned into a mid year mini Diwali. No body knew why others did it, every one did for there own reasons. For some, it was call of PM, for some it symbolized a ray of hope in desparate times and some participated with a thought that if it would do no good, it would not be any harm either. But I feel, for majority of the people including me, it was a show of solidarity and togetherness, consciously o

1st and 2nd April - A to Z of Corona Vocabulary Morning shows the day. The corona crisis was worsening across America and Europe. Global total of Daily deaths crossed 5000 and a whopping ~65k-70k new cases were being reported everyday. Globally more than 1 million people had been diagnosed positive with covid-19 and total death toll had crossed 50k by 2nd April. US by now was the new epicenter adding ~25k new cases and a thousand positive cases everyday. Back home in India, number of corona positive cases had exploded after the Markaz crisis . As test results of the Nizamudding Markaz attendees started pouring in,  most of the new cases were directly or indirectly linked to the attendees . In related incidents, foreigners who had attended the religious event on tourist visas had been black listed and a FIR was also lodged against the maulana of the Markaz. Days were being spend in updating the blog, preparing food and watching news. One of the ideas that had flashed while wri

30th and 31st March - Mayhem in the Markaz Sleep was disturbed early in the morning - not by my wife - but a cat. It was 04:00 AM in the morning, a cat had entered our kitchen. Poor cat, her search for food must had been in vain as there were no eatables out in the open on kitchen slab. After seeing off the cat, dozed off peacefully for couple of hours. After the routine round up of news and social media updates, I began a second round of sanitizing all spots which were frequently touched by hand - door handles, window latches, taps, mobile chargers and what not. Globally, the corona crisis was worsening. The situation which appeared grim and hopeless few days back, now looked a much better situation to be in. India however looked in slightly better shape, Government had reported that the curve may had just started to flatten . With help pouring in from all quarters of the society, relief had finally started reaching many of the poor workers caught in the double disast

Day 5 - 29th March - Mann Ki Baat The habit of getting up early continued, woke up at 05:00 AM, thankfully fell asleep again. With last 4-5 days of overdrive, nothing much was left for cleaning or sanitization. After going through the morning routine of checking news and social media updates, it was time to pay attention to my physical and mental well being. For last few days, even before the lock down started, lower back pain had been increasing. So I put out the mat and hit the floor after a break of almost 3 months - to practice yoga exercise. It has helped me a lot. In fact, put a watsapp status encouraging everyone to practice yoga. Check out the video below, these exercises have really helped me a lot. Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi addressed the nation today at 11:00 am in his monthly radio broadcast - Mann Ki Baat. This was PM's third address to the nation since 19th March 2020. Prime Minister publicly apologized for hardships people had to face due to the

28th March 2020 - Day 4 - The Corona Migration Crisis What is it with me and weekends & holidays that I wake up so early. Today it was really really early, may be around 04:30 AM. May be it was a bit too early from my standards as well. But I did not regret. Here is what I woke up to. Use earphones, this was a rookie attempt. Covid-19 pandemic was getting worse. It had claimed almost 20 lives in India and almost about 1000 were infected. Infections have crossed 100,000 in US while global death count was ~25000. While going through the routine of morning updates on twitter, face book and corona contagion, I made tea today. Nothing for the first time, but yes for the first time in many days. Then followed the cleaning drive. As already planed, today it was ceiling fan and a comprehensive floor washing exercise. Take a look below. Phone started ringing early in the day. Seems like my younger sister was running out of some groceries and she discussed with our parents over ca

26th and 27 March 2020 - Day 2 and 3 of the National Lock Down in India Continuing from the previous day, the weirdness continues. My wife woke up by 05:00 am, again. Thankfully I had been spared today and got up only around 06:30 am. I know that's way too early for many of you. The inquisitiveness to know the daily outbreak status was now turning into a habit. US had added almost 10k new cases and the global death toll reached 20k+. On a global level, 60k+ cases were being reported everyday. If one wanted to look for data, it was all over the web. But the way it was being reported, specially in news channels across the globe, was exposing everyone's biases. Left wing, right wing, fundamentalist, nationalist, socialist, pseudo-secularist - the inclinations were clear. Which category you belong to or you too are just a god-fearing, law abiding, hard working, helpless citizen. On the other hand, the government was disseminating data - its websites, twitter, press