Lockdown Sunrises: Pandemic Times in the Land of Spectacular Sunrises

By Mohan Nair

There are 52 letters, one written each week of a year starting from March 2020, when strict lockdown was declared in South Africa. Accompanying the letters are the photographs of the sun rising over the Indian ocean that the author took from the balcony of his apartment in Durban. The resplendent beauty of the rising sun became a powerful symbol of hope and inspiration at a time when the world as we knew it was crumbling down all around us.

The main objective of putting together this book is as a gift to the younger generation of his family. However, the content of the letters are of a universal nature and so can resonate with everyone. While it was originally created to help cope with this pandemic, going forward, it can also assist in navigating the challenges of the emerging new normal. It also unabashedly promotes Durban as a city of stunning sunrises.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mohan Nair
• Release date: Aug 8, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005770051

Book preview

Introduction

Dear Reader,

Lockdown Sunrises – two words, oxymoron-like, conjures contrasting images in our mind. Lockdown creates images of pandemic-induced closure of activities, shutting us in isolation, uncertainty, fear and loneliness. Sunrise, on the other hand, is all about opening up, breaking free from darkness as the first blush of a new morning sun illuminates our world. Hence, Lockdown Sunrises is all about the golden yellow rays melting away the lockdown blues.

When lockdown was declared in March 2020, our daughters were stranded all alone in their apartments – one in Madrid, Spain, and the other in San Francisco, USA. We, their parents, live in Durban, South Africa, while the rest of our extended family were in yet another corner of the world, India. It felt as if we were all marooned on different islands after a shipwreck, with dangerous unseen creatures circling in the waters surrounding us. It got even more worrisome thinking of all the older (and so more vulnerable) members of our family. That’s us parents for our children ! And we worry that they worry !

I am a habitual early riser, so even when hard lockdown was declared, forcing us to stay home 24 x7, without any work to do, that first morning I still found myself seated in our balcony that overlooks the Indian Ocean. Like most parents, my first thought of the day was about our children, wondering how my girls were coping, locked down in their apartments. I wondered what I, as their father, could do to keep their spirits up. Just at that moment, as if in divine response, the sun peeped out of the shimmering ocean. It was a watershed moment, just like the moment Moses suddenly saw God face to face in Mount Sinai, and received the ten commandments. I too had met our saviour, became an instant convert and a hardcore sunrise watcher… sowing the seeds of this book.

Durban was recently voted as one of the ten most underrated cities in the world. I believe I may have discovered one more reason why this is so: since none of the city’s tourism related marketing campaigns mentions its gorgeous sunrises. Located on the east coast of South Africa, Durban is blessed with 12 -13 miles of pristine beaches, together with its clean air, clear blue skies, mild tropical climate and ever-changing cloud formations, makes it ideal for witnessing stunning sunrises all year round. Hence I began taking photos of the sunrise using my mobile phone from our balcony to send to our daughters, so that they also could see the unique beauty of each new day, especially at a time when every day had begun looking the same inside our apartments during lockdown period. Natasha, my younger daughter, suggested posting the pictures on Instagram instead of using WhatsApp. I started doing so, and wrote in the bio: Dear daughters, consider this as a father’s gift especially for you. So that you can sleep late and still not miss the beautiful sunrise and the energy it exudes. These pics also serve as a reminder that while you are busy fighting today’s battles, Lord God is also busy creating the next inspiration for you – as if selecting flowers to create another bouquet to place at the horizon next day morning. Your dad, performing the role of a courier, will have it delivered to your virtual doorsteps when you wake up a few hours later.

Along with the pictures, I began writing a few words to go with the pics, in the old-fashioned letter style, that always began with My dear daughters, …. That’s how my father wrote to me many years ago, when I was same age as my girls today. Just like them I had also left home then and was staying in a different city at the start of my career. Back then, we had only handwritten letters that was sent via the post office. I fondly recall the excitement we felt when the postman came home to deliver the letter. It was opened and read immediately, and then read aloud a second time in front of the family. This was followed by hours of dissecting, debating and discussing the contents of the letter. Letters back then informed, instructed, amused and brought families and friends together, and sometimes even connected us with strangers we called pen friends. Letters brought the joy of writing to ordinary folk. Many hours were spent searching for the right word and the right expression. Letter writing was cathartic, clearing the mind and calming the psyche. In today’s age of instant communication, we are sadly losing the simple joys of letter writing. Like losing the joys of travelling many hours in a train cause of air travel. Today, since lockdown has pulled the brakes on our incessant rush through life, I thought that it’s an opportunity to go back to that bygone era and indulge in this beautiful, albeit dying, art of letter writing. The result is this book.

While this book is primarily compiled as a gift to my family, its content is universal. I wrote on whatever topics came to mind, always with a rising sun in my foreground. Have tried making my letters informative and inspirational about topics that was always refreshingly random. I hope this book encourages you to also start your days appreciating the rising sun and receiving your morning dose of excitement and energy. It’s an age-old practise that has helped our forefathers enjoy long, healthy and contented lives. And with the additional hours that waking up early will provide, you can also consider indulging in writing such old fashioned letter to your loved ones and make mornings a memorable part of your day. Finally, while this pandemic will soon be fully behind us, our struggles in life is bound to continue. Hope this book serves as a gentle reminder that there will be a rising sun tomorrow as your infallible ally, bringing with it new hope and a refreshing new way of looking at things.

Date: 24th March 2020

Just Us Chickens

There is no one here except us chickens is a line from Thaddeus Golas’s book, The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment. Behind our impressive façade we are all the same, with the same set of emotions. And so, as we enter these strange lockdown times, let’s begin by acknowledging that we are feeling a bit lonely, vulnerable and lost. A bit scared as well.

As I write these lines watching the Indian Ocean in front of me, with its many stranded ships, it reminds me of something noted author E. B. White once wrote back in 1973:

Sailors have an expression about the weather: they say the weather is a great bluffer. I guess the same is true of our human society – things can look dark, then a break shows in the clouds, and all is changed, sometimes rather suddenly. It is quite obvious that the human race has made a queer mess of life on this planet. But as a people, we probably harbour seeds of goodness that have lain for a long time waiting to sprout when the conditions are right. Man’s curiosity, his relentlessness, his inventiveness, his ingenuity have led him into deep trouble.

We can only hope that these same traits will enable him to claw his way out. Hang on to your hat. Hang on to your hope. And wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day.

Mankind is certainly in a lot of trouble today, mostly due to our own making. I have no doubt we will come out of it soon. I am also reminded of a speech by Abraham Lincoln:

It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him with the words: And this, too, shall pass away. How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! How consoling in the depths of affliction!

And so it is, my dear children, that this pandemic too shall pass. Until then, can we please just stop over-thinking and over-analysing things. Avoid dwelling on all that can go wrong, and trust that the universe has a plan and a purpose that will unfold itself in due course.

Until then, appreciate the many things in life that we have taken for granted. Think of the homeless and those living in shacks without the luxury of social distancing and sanitising, before criticising our own homes for being prison-like today. Spare a thought for the blind before complaining that there is nothing new to see. Think of the boy we heard about in school, who cried because he had no shoes, until he saw a man with