In 2020, there was a 3-month quarantine mostly around the world... Here in Albania everybody stayed home, you could only go out to get groceries, run, and there was a strict curfew. I live in the center of Tirana with my brother, Andrea, and my parents. The small problem was that my other brother, Leon, who lives in Rome, came to visit for the first time and ended up getting stuck here for 3 months. He was supposed to be here for a week and then go back but apparently Covid-19 wanted us to experience this pandemic all together... Let’s just say it wasn’t the best year of our lives.  

When I say it wasn’t the best year of our lives, it’s because those three months had some very nice moments, for example, living all together again, having brunches quite often etc. There were also some bad moments such as getting into unimportant little brother fights, not enough space in the house, and so on.  The first couple weeks were probably the best out of the whole quarantine since it was new, and we didn’t have to wake up early or dress up to go to school. My brother Andrea and I both had online classes, so we took those during the morning, and then the rest of the day was spent in the house, some days doing all sorts of things and others doing absolutely nothing.  

After some time, we started getting really bored and annoyed at each other. Over the whole 3 months, we had many “phases” such as: Netflix, soccer, cooking, videogames, basketball, and table tennis. I think my personal favorite was cooking because we learned to cook so many new things and expanded our palates. One day my mother and I sat down and had a talk about what to cook for dinner that day... 

“Ma, what should we cook for dinner tonight?” I said. 

“Pasta?” My mom responded with no hesitation. 

“Really?” I said, “Don’t you want to do something different like pizza or sushi?” 

“Sushi sounds great, we’ve never actually tried making them before...” 

So just like that, we found out what our favorite thing to cook was. It is hard to make because you need some tools, you need to wait a long time; so overall, the process isn’t great but, the result was completely worth it.  

I remember the first time I went out after three months, I was with my parents on a bike. We were all so pale from not seeing the sun often because our house isn’t facing the right way. Another nice phase was the sports one in general... We mostly played soccer, basketball and ping pong. For soccer we have a terrace where you just need a ball and basically start playing depending on whether you want to pass or juggle it. For basketball we put a basket on the highest point possible and then take a ball and act like you’re in the NBA. I also put up a half circle on the wall with cardboard which really left a mark on the wall. For ping pong, I really used my head on this one. I took the tablecloth of the table, put three books on each side, and then put the stick over those books connecting them together and making a net. I know right? Very impressive. 

In conclusion, quarantine was somewhat of a good experience. There were some rough patches throughout the 3 months but that’s normal with a family of 5. I think those weren’t the best months of our lives because life is to explore the world and discover new opportunities for yourself, except you can’t do all that if you are stuck in an apartment in the middle of a world pandemic. Even after the quarantine, life isn’t the best because of masks, restrictions, rules and the fact that everyone is talking about nothing else but that.