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6 April 2020

I don’t do much inside the house. I watch reruns of movies on television. Sometimes I clean the house and cook food. I was told to stay active so it will be easier to give birth. This had been my routine before the lockdown. The difference is there’s no school and all my nieces and nephews are home. They’re the children of my two brothers who were killed in the government’s drug war in 2017. My brothers were not addicts but they killed them anyway.

I’ve been helping my mother take care of [the children] because their mothers have left. They can be rowdy sometimes. They want to go out to play. I can’t blame them because it’s too hot inside the house. Even the electric fan is useless because it’s blowing hot air. But I tell the children they have to stay inside or the cops will take them. They believe me because the other week [the police] dragged an old man out of the market near us. He lived in another neighbourhood and wasn’t supposed to go far. The video is viral online. It’s heartbreaking. The old man was crying when they took him. He said he always bought food in our market because it’s cheaper there.