We Will Overcome This Too: This Short Film With A 91-Year-Old's Take On COVID-19 Will Win Your Heart

A short Malayalam film, Memoirs of Devaki - Oru Amoomakaalam, made by Vinu Janardanan, has recently gained attention on social media. Vinu, a Kollam native, is a known name in the Malayalam Film industry. This documentary gives us candid moments from a day in the life of Devaki, who is the grandmother of the filmmaker. The camera follows Devaki as she recollects her childhood memories of outbreaks of diseases like cholera and smallpox in Kerala. Edited by Karthik Jogesh, the short film was released through the YouTube channel Leafy Stories.

Back then, it was cholera; it was also contagious like this (COVID-19). If one person gets the disease in a house, others will surely get affected

The film opens with the voice of Pinarayi Vijayan, Kerala’s CM, announcing that the lockdown has been extended in the country for another two weeks. The camera then moves to capture familiar everyday-scenes in the courtyard of a countryside house- flowers, ants, and tulsi leaves. Just as this visual ends, the 91-year-old grandmother walks into the frame. Walking slowly around the courtyard, Devaki starts to recount her previous experiences of witnessing deadly outbreaks of diseases in the state.

First-Hand Narrative of Previous Outbreaks

“Back then, it was cholera; it was also contagious like this (COVID-19). If one person gets the disease in a house, others will surely get affected. Even if one stays away from the house, one might get affected,” Devaki says in the documentary. She adds, “People even died from this disease.” Recalling her parent’s warnings, she says, “Those who died were only cremated late in the night. Nobody dared to cremate them in the mornings.”

She then recounts the time when the children of her neighbours contracted smallpox, and her family couldn’t leave the house, not even to buy food. She can be heard saying, “This (COVID-19) is just a contagious disease like those. But now, we are being very careful. It is good to have faith and confidence that we won’t get infected. But being careless and roaming around is wrong. One needs to have slight fear to stay strong.”

Also Read: KK Shailaja Speaks To BBC On How Kerala Is Containing COVID-19 Cases

Even while speaking of those dreadful memories, Devaki is seen to be continuing with her daily rituals. We see her walking, reading scriptures, boiling rice, talking on the landline telephone and even shuffling through old pictures. It is almost reminiscent of the fact that even within pandemics, life goes on. Near the end of the five-minute-long documentary, Devaki adds that people have overcome disease outbreaks in the past. “We have seen all these, and I hope and believe that we will overcome this too,” says the 91-year-old, closing the short film on a hopeful note.

The Wisdom of Past

Speaking to The News Minute, Vinu Janardanan revealed why he felt it was important to make the documentary. “Though many are not too interested in lending an ear to aged people, we realise the value of their wisdom once we are away from them. When I came home during lockdown, I asked her about her experiences of living through disease outbreaks. She is very well updated about the present COVID-19 situation also. As she narrated about the past days of epidemics, I recorded her voice. The film happened just like that.”

We have seen all these, and I hope and believe that we will overcome this too.

Also Read: Women changing the face of the Health sector in India

What is perhaps the most touching part of the documentary is the reassurance it gives us through the voice of a 91-year-old. It fills us with the hope that ‘this too shall pass.’ Undoubtedly these are difficult times that most of us don’t know how to deal with. But as we sit down to listen to the generational experiences, we realize that the problems have only changed faces. Disease outbreaks are not new in Kerala, and this holds true for the whole country. The old have lived through those times, and successfully won the fight against such outbreaks. And only by listening and learning from the wisdom of such pasts can we emerge triumphant through the horrors of the present.

Image Credit: YouTube screenshot

Dyuti Gupta is an intern with SheThePeople.TV. The views expressed are the author’s own.