War and Pandemic in Aleppo

Danger during the war in Aleppo was marked with sound and smoke. During the pandemic, danger is boundless. It can be everywhere and anywhere. The most fashionable and well-off person can carry the virus and pass it on to me, while on the other hand, an armed person walking next to me on the sidewalk could be harmless. The invisible danger is what makes the virus lethal. In war, if the sound is far away, then I can assume I am safe. That means I could go anywhere without even worrying. Sometimes, the odds of being safe to being in danger would shift rapidly when the bombing came closer—the crushing sound of steel over buildings, cars, and streets, where we shook inside our homes like sunflowers before the wind.

One day I met a friend for coffee and shisha. The sun was tracing the edges of the city; men and women were in small groups enjoying each other's company. Minutes after we sat down in the coffee shops, the shelling intensified. It was the battle of Alzahra in western Aleppo, the last hold of the rebel groups in our city. Within thirty minutes, the building started to shake and the coffee cups rattled over the glass table. We decided to cut our visit short. I heard a very loud explosion—it sounded like columns of steel were dropped not too far from where we were.

During the epidemic, a simple handshake is more disturbing than the missile launcher near our home. People start to panic about handshakes and practice physical distancing vigilantly, in some cases avoiding unnecessary visits altogether. In wartime, danger was more visible. We were able to sense it, we were able to see it, and we were able to hear it. If the sound of artillery didn't startle us, that meant there was nothing to worry about. The virus made us panic more because we can't sense it, and we don't know when we need to take precautions.

In war, even the artillery needs to take a break. There were hours of quiet and, if we were lucky, some