Living through a global pandemic, we’ve been forced to lock down, learn new behaviours and constantly adapt, amidst a never-ending barrage of hurdles, out-of-nowhere curveballs, and an unclear and forever changing finish line.
We learned to be permanently flexible and our lives were quickly revolutionised as we all had to suddenly master the art of remote working, home schooling, virtual exercising, online shopping, video socialising and even ‘travelling’ in the digital world.
We even learned a whole new Covid-inspired vocabulary to keep up with the swift evolution of pandemic life. The year 2020 saw new words like ‘social distancing’, ‘self-quarantine’, ‘super-spreader’ and ‘contact tracing’, officially added to the dictionary.
Difficult times, unfailingly, bring out a unified sense of humour as a way of coping. We often rely on humour to get us through stressful times, so, not surprisingly, in addition to previously-unheard medical terms, a whole new Covid slang has emerged too.
Our lockdown lingo took on amusing words like ‘Covidiot’ (someone not taking the virus seriously), ‘coronacoaster’ (the ups, downs and mood swings of pandemic life) and ‘fattening the curve’, which needs no explanation.
These 10 Covid-inspired travel words are inspiring wanderlust and shaping the world’s post-pandemic travel plans.