I am currently at home in Seoul, South Korea, which has been lauded for its hyper-efficient approach to testing and quarantining COVID-19 patients. Two weeks ago, we hit zero new cases in Seoul. This seemingly miraculous breakthrough coincided with three national holidays in South Korea. The two events gave birth to a rampant sense of false security. By the end of the week, every phone-owner in Seoul got simultaneous text alerts from the Korean government about a super spreader, who had gone on a club hopping bender. I feel like a part of an elaborate, precarious balancing act, wobbling between feeling discouraged and feeling hopeful; being fed up and being resilient; craving old normalcy and finding new normalcy. But to get a full idea of how I got here, I have to backtrack and tell the full story.

The morning I was due to take my first of three flights back to Seoul, the flight got cancelled. My mom called me in a panicked frenzy, and we planned strategically to book another flight that was less likely to get cancelled. We ultimately decided that Pittsburgh was the safest option, and I set out at 7 a.m., checking my Delta app every 30 minutes to make sure it was on time. When I got to the terminal, I was one of two passengers on my flight from Raleigh-Durham to Pittsburgh. The pilot personally informed me that both toilets were broken and the flight was delayed for maintenance. There was a sense of somber camaraderie that clung between us as we sat together in the empty airport. The safety announcement usually broadcasted to the whole plane seemed to echo and bounce between the flight attendant, the one other passenger, and me. I consoled myself by jokingly texting my mom about the private plane that she spoiled me with. This flight was followed by another, equally empty.

When I touched down in Korea, I was herded into a line. When I got to the beginning of the line, I was watched as I registered and downloaded the self-quarantining app onto my phone. I was handed a cheery yellow piece of paper, which outlined the not-so-cheery guidelines I was to follow for the next two weeks. I was expected to report symptoms (or the lack thereof) every day. The first 24 hours without a report would be followed by a warning, and the next 24 hours would earn me a lucky police visit. I found myself constantly looking around the airport, hoping for a familiar, comforting sight, anything that would remind me of the old “normal.” I was not lucky. Everywhere, I saw a pair of eyes peeking out over a mask: cold, identical, and sterile. Everyone was anonymous to me, and I to them. I tried to read their eyes. Did I sense fear? Tiredness? Sadness? Grief? Relief? Apathy? I tried to express something along the lines of sympathy or solemnity with my eyes. It was a foreign experience but also weirdly familiar, as I had spent the last 14 hours on the plane as an opportunity to manifest the saying, “the eyes are the windows to the soul.” It was a constant physical reminder that life would be on pause, just like the old, stagnant air trapped against my face.

I arrived in South Korea a week before quarantine protocols tightened, and I was allowed to self-quarantine at home, reporting my symptoms daily on the government-issued app. While I could violate the suggestions without any legal repercussions, I stayed home. I’d like to think that I let my imagination run wild during this time; some could call it delusion. I gazed at the potted plants on my verandah, pretending it was a lush green rainforest, or waltzed over to my coffee machine, partaking in the treat that is my daily coffee that I usually would have had at a café. Some days, I didn’t feel so hunky-dory, and I drowned out my worried, anxious thoughts in a new mediocre Netflix Originals series.

The world after two weeks of self-quarantine felt like complete rebirth. The sunlight felt warmer on my skin, the grass a little greener, every semblance of a human encounter a delight, whether it was actually delightful or not. Unfortunately, the world had not miraculously healed itself in the two weeks that I was self-quarantined. I had stepped out of my house to a truly different Seoul. However, with the curve flattened, we are allowed the luxury of walking our dogs, taking out coffee, and even relishing in meals at restaurants. When I go out, I see couples, families, and small groups of friends out together, all wearing masks and remaining distant from other groups walking on the streets. Every single restaurant and café offers hand sanitizer, and some even require temperature checks before customers enter the premises. At gyms and fitness centers, people sign in and log their temperatures before they start their work. There are talks of a new QR code system, through which the government could track who, when, and where someone scanned a given code.

Of course, masks are a must. This is a stark contrast to the America that I hear about during my daily morning podcast ritual. It seems that South Korea’s culture of propriety and conformity was the perfect vehicle to implement social distancing measures. After all, Koreans wear masks when they feel under the weather, whether it be the common cold, the flu, or just allergies, out of respect for the people they interact with. I can’t speak for everyone, but many people here seem to be happy to download a tracking app, sign a log, wear a mask, or wash their hands more frequently, to keep other people healthy and preserve the integrity of other aspects of their life. Taking a moment to consider that every one of these daily acts are a deep footprint that can be watched, recorded, studied, by the government seems eerie. But whether it’s out of pressure, habit, passivity, acceptance, it has become a duty rather than a choice.

My own neighborhood was victim to the aforementioned club hopping incident. The week before, the streets had been full of people, to the point where I would have believed it if someone told me they had found a magical reset button. And all within a couple hours of a two-line text my neighborhood looked like a ghost town. The twinkling lights of cafés blinked off after dinnertime, the library didn’t even bother to wake up. The vigor and hustle that filled it the previous week migrated into a safer neighborhood with no confirmed cases.

Every day, it becomes clearer to me that normalcy will not return all at once. Instead, I see glimpses of it, like pouring water in a raging fire. The fire is put out for a split second, in a little hopeful patch, until the fire overwhelms it again. Only when there is a vaccine, or even better, a cure, will we be able to enjoy the freedom of pre-COVID-19 life. Until then, we will walk on the tightrope, teetering between the comfortable past and an unpredictable future.

WORDS AND PHOTOS BY ALYSSA SHIN