Like most people, I did not anticipate the events following March 13, 2020. When I hugged my teachers, signed my friends’ school uniforms and begrudgingly forced myself to take notes in IGCSE physics, I did not know that it would be over a year before I had the privilege of walking through the hallway of my school building. 

I could have never predicted that what was originally a two-week lockdown to suppress the spread of a virus would morph into a pandemic that altered the lives of many across the globe. I adhered to the warnings, masking and confining myself to my house, thinking the quarantine would soon end. It had to, didn’t it? But the pandemic continued with the case toll in India, where I lived, peaking at almost 400,000 new cases a day. 

It would be years before the world could even return to a semblance of “normalcy.” 

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I remember my aunt, a surgeon, agonizing over the overcrowded hospitals, knowing that patients often had to wait hours before they were even admitted. I remember international students stranded in a foreign country with no family and no way to return home due to government restrictions. I remember both the fear and the grief that many felt over losing a loved one. 

Now, only five years later, many people have forgotten the devastating effects of the virus. The internet has been remembering the trends and aesthetics that emerged during quarantine, neglecting the actual horrors of the pandemic itself. This weirdly selective amnesia has led to many wanting to go back to a time when they made dalgona coffee and watched “Tiger King.” 

TikTok user @not_mama_stef characterized the lockdown as a time when stress and work were replaced by online shopping and bike rides. Another user, Tiktoker @kristenandcalil, echoed the same sentiment in their comment, discussing they missed quarantine. 

Moreover, a study in England found that two-thirds of youth aged 14 to 23 in the United Kingdom missed lockdown, citing that it improved their lives. This trend of pandemic nostalgia has been prevalent since 2021, with many reminiscing about the slower pace of life that quarantine provided. 

However, quarantine was not just limited to sourdough starters and dancing to “Supalonely” for a viral TikTok. 

The World Health Organization reports that over seven million people have lost their lives to the COVID-19 virus, with many still suffering from the long-term physical and mental health effects.

At the peak of quarantine, approximately 23 million people lost their jobs, 2.6 million people contracted the virus, and ventilator shortages and hospital overcrowding became increasingly common.  

It is easy to pretend that quarantine was a utopia of free time and self-exploration because most of us today are lucky enough to be a few years removed from that period of our lives. Nostalgia has a strange way of warping reality so that we wistfully long for the past. 

I don’t know when people began forgetting the misery and devastation of the COVID-19 virus, but romanticizing the pandemic is both insensitive and hurtful to those who were deeply affected by it, whether it be those who lost their jobs or lost their loved ones. We must remember the irreparable damage that the pandemic caused. 

Riding bikes around in a park was not feasible for most people, and the lack of social connection led to a spike in loneliness. It seems that people neglect these aspects of the pandemic when reminiscing about it.

It is important to acknowledge the damage caused by the pandemic and keep in mind that most people wanted to get out of the quarantine bubble. Even though there may have been some happy memories during the pandemic, it is insensitive to completely disregard the loss and upending of livelihood it brought on.  

Glamorizing life during the pandemic is a product of privilege and not a reflection of reality. We must reconcile our nostalgia for the past with the actual truths of what happened.