Faced with fear, uncertainty, and doubt – FUD, usually used as a destabilising marketing tactic, but very real today – Delhiites have found surprising ways to turn a bad situation into a blessing. Contrary to the city’s get-up-and-go attitude that seeks noise and distraction, the lockdown has helped residents find solace in quiet spaces within homes.
Realigning routines
For people who are working full time, days are longer, but also filled with interstices that give valuable breaks, reflecting the work style of the future.
Sundreysh Sarup, a Gurugram resident, who heads Logistics Plus India Pvt. Ltd, a U.S.-based company that operates in 26 markets across the world, says it’s like a throwback to the time he was growing up in the 1970s and ‘80s.
“I eat all three meals with my family – my wife, son, and mother,” he says. He’s able to catch a short nap on occasion, play with his dog, and engage in a game of carom with his family in the evening. “I remember my parents and grandparents would sit together and play bridge and I learnt the game early because of this,” he says, recalling the good-natured banter that would go with the evening ritual.
Work days that begin at 9 a.m. can sometimes extend for 13 hours, because Mr. Sarup tackles calls and does meetings from both the East and the West. While his job profile hasn’t changed, he feels there seems to be more work and employees are putting in more hours. “It’s probably because in office we were able to solve things faster – the EQ is higher when you’re face to face.” He leaves unarticulated the fact that people could be nervous about losing a job, hence are looking for ways to express the indispensability of their roles.
Looking at little things
At the other end of the spectrum is Sweety Shalini Guria, whose day begins at 3 p.m. with cleaning the house and then some college work. A student at JNU, in the department of international relations, she couldn’t make it home to Ranchi, and misses her family. “We have three dogs, and one has just given birth to four pups; I wish I could be there,” says the 23-year-old, who shares an apartment in Katwaria Sarai with two friends.
To pass time, “We take videos of random things, and a lot of black and white photographs. We have four guitars and my friend tries to show me how to compose music.” The boys and she are in the process of setting their lockdown videos about everyday life at home, to music. It’s the little things that seem to make sense she says, echoing Mr. Sarup, though their lives couldn’t be more different. “One day it was raining and I walked to Mother Dairy early in the morning. I saw a man riding his scooty with a dog on the footboard. It made me happy.”
Rediscovering connections
Many in Delhi run their own businesses, and Viraj Mahajan is one of them – he manufactures furniture and has an interior design firm. A single father of two sons, 7 and 6, his day has become all about the kids: their morning Zoom classes (“I’m running between two rooms”) with The Shri Ram School, an afternoon ritual of drawing the curtains and putting on a movie, and an evening of badminton.
At their home off MG Road, they cook together daily, a life skill Mr. Mahajan feels is a necessity but wasn’t possible in the earlier go-go-go time. “We’ll make pesto from the basil in the garden, or pizzas from scratch; we bake bread every other day,” though they haven’t yet got into the sourdough territory that’s all the rage on social media.
“Yesterday we made an orange-chocolate cake and the boys read the recipe and measured the ingredients out,” he says, as he instructs his sons on homework, while on the phone. “The teachers are doing a wonderful job.” For instance, they’re recreating stories with background music and animal sounds.
Starting something
A few people are alone though, with work only in the interludes. Namrata Joshipura, a fashion designer with her own label, says she does have team meetings online, and they try and develop artworks and layouts, but “our stores and factory are shut. The lockdown started on a very disappointing note with multiple cancellations internationally.” To add another layer of what is already a stressful situation, Ms. Joshipura’s husband Vivek, and her daughter, Ananya, are stuck in Vancouver, Canada, where the latter goes to school. “I haven’t seen her since January,” says Ms. Joshipura, who chats with her twice a day.
With a great deal of time on her hands, she has taken up baking, and she’ll often do a tea party for one. She’s tried variations of chocolate-chip cookies, tea cake with buttered cinnamon glaze infused with Grand Marnier, and more, with suggestions from her daughter. “I have never baked in my life, because I didn’t have the time, and I thought it needed some special skill, though I did cook a lot.” She’s enjoyed learning to make a moist cake and tweaking recipes. “It’s about small, meaningful successes,” she says, adding that she delivers the goodies to neighbours often, and to hear people fighting over a last cookie is what gives her joy.
Staying engaged
For Ms. Joshipura and Mr. Sarup, fitness, in the form they were used to, has taken a hit. Both are endurance athletes, used to running long distances. Determined not to let the lockdown push them onto the couch Ms. Joshipura, who doesn’t own a television, decided to practise doing a headstand. Mr. Sarup, as the co-founder of the Delhi Runners Group, is part of a WhatsApp team of about 186 members who decide on a distance to run within the home. “It’s more fun than a run; we don’t want people to get injured inside the house,” he says. The day they got their 186th member, for instance, they decided to do 1.86 km inside the house. They also have squat and lunge challenges.
Anupriya Kapur, who lives with her father and son in Gurugram, is also putting her CrossFit training to use during the lockdown, with on-the-mat workouts. A social media influencer and also a small business co-founder of Imbue, a personal hygiene company that makes products for women, she likes the flexibility of being able to exercise any time anywhere at home. “I wear a sports bra and shorts all the time,” she says, to normalise the comfort of it in the hot summer months, something she never did before.
She also finds time to connect with people on matters of intimate hygiene to further her brand’s social connection and to engage with her close to 1 million following on Instagram. She does live sessions with experts, or organises small groups of women over Zoom. “We recently had a group from Purulia, Bengal, who were using the medium for the first time,” she says. With brand work almost coming to a standstill – she has in the past worked with Airbnb, Amazon, Jeep, and several others – she is now on TikTok, experimenting with the potential of making fun content. With the lockdown, “I have let my inhibitions go in every way,” she says.
