I felt so overwhelmingly numb, I had to stop in the corner of an alley, with panic-stricken people outstepping me, to force myself to breathe. And as I breathed in the oxygen that was so desperately trying to keep me alive, my nerves lit up with the smell of death and destruction, and that was enough to keep me moving again.
I tried so hard to purge my mind of all thoughts that’d blind my judgement, but anxiety and grief weighed heavy on my shoulders. I was barefoot, stepping on shards of glass, and a huge gash ran from my right shoulder to my elbow, and even though I wasn’t the one to take to pain quietly, having seen that I was one of the few relatively unharmed ones was enough to make me keep the whimpers and complaints inside.
As I stepped into what used to be a beautiful street, alive with life and joy, now mere debris and rubble of what it used to be, I felt it echoing the painful whines of my heart. Carts had been overturned, a building had fallen down. There were shards of glass everywhere, pieces of broken windows and broken hopes. A man was propped up against a nearby wall, and despite no visible specks of blood, his listlessness and incongruous placidity radiated lifelessness. I had to turn my head away, lest the image haunt me forever, but I had a feeling that that would be the case either way.
I rushed ahead to help a woman struggling with two babies, and offered her my cardigan to keep their faces covered. It felt like giving away a piece of myself, like I would never be the same without that cardigan. I saw a man, struggling to walk with a leg so horribly disfigured, it might have to be amputated, and another man rushed towards him, lent him his shoulder, and the two of them rushed away.
Empowered with a newfound determination to help those worse hit than me, I pushed all the worries about my loved ones to the back of my mind, to be carefully dissected, sliced and cried over later, for I knew I was helpless at the moment. I took in the situation around me: panicking, grief stricken people, children whose lives were falling apart, and a few feet away I could hear the siren of an ambulance, or was that the fire brigade? The local hospital had fallen over, so there was no emergency medical treatment. I found a man, struggling beneath heaps of rubble, I helped him get out. His arm was bent at an awkward angle, so I tore off a piece of a shirt hanging by on the door of a miraculously standing building nearby, and tried to use it as a makeshift splint, but my hands were trembling so much, someone else ended up taking over the task.
Suddenly, there wasn’t enough air in my lungs. I did not know that it was possible to feel so terrified yet unnervingly numb at the same time. Yet again, I did not know that the situation of a country experiencing political riots, an economic crisis and rising graphs of coronavirus could get any worse either. No one knew what happened, and I was alone, no familiar face in sight. I crumbled down on that street, but unfamiliar arms held me up. Everything else was a blur. I could vaguely make out being ushered to a relief shelter, with medical professionals trying to help people.
I begged a kind looking lady to lend me her phone, so that I could check up on my family. My mum was in a similar shelter across town, but she couldn’t get a hold of my brother and my father. It was all too much, weighing down on me, cutting off my circulation. I couldn’t handle so much destruction and misery. The broken, lifeless bodies, the blood, the helpless cries. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. Life isn’t supposed to be so full of death.
We had been surviving starvation, power cuts, increased COVID-19 cases without even basic medical healthcare, and now we were homeless. With the spread of coronavirus, my home had come to be the safest place in the world, and now I found out I wasn’t safe at my home, and I had to deal with the possibility that there might not be a home for me to go back to. It was overwhelming.
That was a week ago, and today, as I’m overlooking the remains of my city, watching volunteers clean up, I’m renewed with a new sense of hope. This disaster took the life of so many people, some of them now dead, some forced to trudge through what used to be, but it brought our community together, with people selflessly and devotedly helping anyone they can, and joining hands to rebuild our homes.
But with hope, comes anger. Anger at those who were supposed to protect us, those who were supposed to make sure that this doesn’t happen, and at those who are now sitting at their homes without a care for what has been brought upon us as a consequence of their lack of responsibility. But I have no doubt in my mind that this strong community of resilient individuals won’t let them get away with it. This will be the event that’ll trigger the fight for a better tomorrow. This will be the beginning of the end.
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