Has anything good happened in 2020?

Many of us feel stuck in our lives, with various pressures coming from different sides making us toil like the Greek mythological figure, Sisyphus. Some of us are tired of working constantly and fighting to survive. Others are sick of the mundanity of their day-to-day routine. 

As if that weren't enough, we were struck with a terrible pandemic in early 2020, making the year historic for inflicting unbridled uncertainty, paranoia and fear upon the world. Compared to previous years, it is etched in our memories as a completely different year.

But as they say, difficulty is what wakes up the genius and opens new ways to reinvent ourselves. 

Ali Bestas, a 29-year-old professional, who has worked in different national and international institutions including a foreign embassy in Ankara and the Turkish parliament, is one of them. 

“During 2020, I have been at home most of the time. Being at home enabled me to be with myself, making me read more books and think more,” Bestas, who is now also a project coordinator for an NGO, Surec Analiz, tells TRT World.

“It was a great opportunity to develop an introspective about my life. For example, in 2020, I decided to go for my PhD. Previously, I had some doubts about how I could spare enough time to do that. But now I am searching for different PhD programs, recognising the fact that I have enough time to do that indeed,” Bestas says. 

“My mindset on Phd has previously appeared to be messy, but through thinking in time, it has become more clear, discovering which things I really love and I am truly interested in,” he adds. He has already applied to some programs. 

2020 has also had some positive impact on Bestas’s life. 

Before the pandemic, Bestas and his girlfriend were in a long-distance relationship. He worked for a foreign embassy in Ankara and his girlfriend continued to live in Istanbul. 

Covid-19 made the long distance even harder, as it prevented them from visiting each other. To contain the virus, the Turkish government imposed several lockdowns and restrictions on intercity travelling. 

“Pandemic lockdowns pushed us to recognise that we need to live in the same city,” he says. 

While the pandemic forced them to delay their marriage plans to another spring, it has also facilitated a new rapprochement process between the two. Bestas eventually found a job in Istanbul, moving back to the metropolitan city a few months ago. 

Need for introspection

“2020 has worked very well for me, making a positive effect on my career. I found a better job. After I thought about not social issues but Ali Bestas, myself, I found a better job,” he says, crediting the year of the pandemic to develop a good introspection about himself. 

“2020 also helped me meet with my lover, persuading me to relocate [in Istanbul]. If Covid-19 did not happen, we would probably wait two or three years to get married,” he says. 

“In total, I decided to begin implementing things in my life I have long delayed,” he concludes. 

Gokhan Ovenc, an academic in the faculty of economics at the Istanbul University, has a take similar to Bestas's, although he expressed his 2020 experience in philosophical terms. 

“Our perceptions and evaluations of our lives have so many deficits. If you look at from a perspective where the pandemic has forced us to rethink about our understanding of each other, 2020 was a good year,” Ovenc tells TRT World. 

“Ontologically, 2020 created a psychological atmosphere in which we can reimagine and rethink certain things in our lives. After all, we recognised that humans are indeed very weak,” the economist views.  

While states like the US, Russia and China have recently developed more weapons, signalling a new arms race across the world, the virus has made them bow down to a new reality, in which the global community has recognised that cooperation is inevitable to defeat the pandemic. 

“Despite living in an age, when the advanced technology dominates every aspect of our lives, we have been forced to live in our homes with our masks on. It is a kind of warning to the humankind to recognise its limits. It’s a good thing that taught us how fragile human existence is,” Ovenc says. 

But he also recognises that many people do not like the reality of the pandemic due to its restrictive nature of many freedoms. 

“When we lose our own routine like going to work and eating at restaurants, we think that’s bad. But the pandemic also makes us question what’s actually good or bad for our lives,” he says. 

“As a result, we could say that 2020 has been a good year,” he concludes. 

Kaan Berk Tac, a young psychology student at TOBB University, also finds good things in 2020, when classes go online. He now lives with his single mother, a manager at Turkey’s justice department in Izmit. 

“I have found more time to spend with myself,” Tac tells TRT World. “While it’s sometimes boring, we need some loneliness in order to hear our inner voice,” he says. 

Like Bestas, the 20-year-old student also thinks that 2020 has helped him know himself in better terms. 

Since he was able to spend more time at home, he says his relationship with his mother has also improved, enabling them to have more family time. “Under restrictions, the meaning of home has also deepened for us.” 

According to Tac, at home he was able to study better, an aspect many parents and teachers might find laughable. 

He could now follow more seminars online at home. “I could not go to many seminars when I was in school honestly. Usually, seminar schedules were overlapping with our class hours. But now because everything is online, seminars are also being arranged according to our class times,” Tac tells TRT World. 

Generally speaking, besides his life, he believes more negative things have happened than positive ones in 2020, making people feel that the year will never end.  

Working from home

Despite the year’s endless restrictions, almost everyone agrees that working from home has been a positive aspect of 2020.

“Possibility of working from home has shown us that which people are essential and which people are not,” says Onur Candan, a Turkish software developer and the founder of Palamar, a company, which has gained ground in 2020, according to Candan. 

“Many have understood that you do not have to come to any particular office in order to finish a job. As a result, I believe a considerable number of companies will let their workers work from home after the pandemic-controlled work experience,” Candan tells TRT World. 

Candan also thinks that some bad work habits based on psychological games like “I am the best” or “I have connections” or “I have these many years of experiences” might also disappear if working from home becomes a powerful trend across the world. 

“Working from home has increased awareness that being productive matters. If a worker or a manager produces what he or she is tasked to do by working from home, I guess no one could question the integrity of that person and the quality of his or her work,” Candan says. 

Ovenc, the economist, agrees with Candan. 

“From an economic perspective, in some sectors, a new reality has emerged that things could be done by working from home. That’s a good thing,” Ovenc says. 

“Both employers and employees have recognised that to do certain things people do not have to go to work. Under any economic measure, that’s a good thing,” he adds. 

Ovenc also thinks that 2020 has encouraged many to use virtual gatherings like Zoom to do their regular meetings and to realise other tasks. 

As a lecturer, he is happy to have the option of virtual education despite its shortcomings. 

“Even after the pandemic is gone, I believe we will use virtual education opportunities more in situations where either the lecturer or students could not show up for school,” he says.