COOK MAGAZINE - May 2020

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It’s been weeks and we’re still stuck at home. If you’ve managed to plan and stock up on food and essentials in the first week of March, I’m pretty sure your stocks would be low within a month. I didn’t get to fully stock up. I also didn’t want to be part of those selfish few who hoarded carts and carts, others be damned. I shopped for maybe two weeks’ worth of food, some alcohol and toiletries and that was it. As expected, we went through the supplies in just over a week and I had to go to the grocery. As someone who frequents the supermarket for work, it was the first time I experienced fear of doing groceries with the COVID-19 lurking all around us. With mask on and sanitizer in my pocket, I picked a supermarket that I knew would have the least crowds.

Not everyone is as lucky to have the same “problems” as I had. I still have a job where working remotely is the norm, so the lockdown hardly affects me. So many people live on daily wages, with food dependent on the money they will bring home daily. What will happen to them? Even if the government provides a few kilos of rice and some canned goods, for a family of five, that may only last 3 to 4 days at most. The P5,000 to P8,000 assistance can last maybe 2 weeks, probably even less, and not everyone is getting their share of that. But even the less fortunate who are fighting hunger can still be considered lucky compared to those at the frontlines. The doctors and nurses are literally facing death head on, some armed only with makeshift protective gear. These are the people who we pass without notice on a daily basis. People who studied for many years in order to save lives but are always underpaid and rarely appreciated.

I never imagined anything like this would happen in my lifetime. Our world will never be the same after this. All we can really do is pray, keep our faith in humanity, and strive for a world that’s less greedy. Keep safe and see you around, hopefully without masks.