 The Triumph of Death by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1562, Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain As of 23 March 2020, more than 350,000 people around the world have been infected by coronavirus, and more than 15,000 of them have died.(source: worldometer)  Triumph of Death, 1446, Palazzo Abatellis, Palermo, Italy Italy, the first country outside of China to implement lockdown, has 59,138 people infected and 5,476 deaths, and its Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has announced extension of the national lockdown instead of the original ending date of 3 April. Spain's prime minister Pedro Sanchez has also requested to extend the state of emergency for another 15 days, until 11 April. And France is very likely going to do the same.  The Death of Sardanapalus (detail) by Eugène Delacroix, Louvre, Paris, France We have no choice. We will have to stay at home longer. But we can choose to be happy while at home.  I am staying at home, are you? No. 1: Take care of yourself Music, meditation, massage, an indulgent long bath, hundreds of candles, lavendar infused pillows, a cup of the best white tea in the world..... Pamper yourself, you are worth it!  The bath, 1867, by Alfred George Stevens (1817-75) No. 2: Cook for yourself or someone you love  No matter what happens, we always need to eat, and eating and cooking can have healing effect at a time like this. Of course, we need to be careful not to make the food delicious to get too fat to celebrate the ending of coronavirus pandemic. No.3 Dance  Flaming dance by Leonid Afremov Dance. Dance alone or with someone else. Dance quickly, dance slowly; Dance vertically, dance horizontally; Dance on the floor, dance in the air; Just dance. "When we move, our state of mind changes." someone says So dance, dance to be happy.  The singing butler by Jack Vettriano No. 4: Learn a new language  Bella, a Russian mini polyglot who can speak 7 language when she was 4 years old Her name is Bella Devyatkina. This adorable little girl is from Russia, and she can speak Russian, French and English when she was 2 years old, and when she was four, she can also speak Spanish, German, Chinese and Arabian. If we assume Bella started to learn language at 1 year old, that would be one languge per 5 months; and if we are going to be locked down for one month, we can at least learn 1/5 of a language, and the longer the lockdown, the better our new language skill, very good trade-off. And we can still beat Bella at one thing: she does not speak Corean! By now we all know South Corea is becoming a model in the fight against coronavirus, without any lockdown. So it will not be a bad first travel destination post-coronavirus. Besides, the hugely popular serie Good Doctor featuring Freddie Heymore actually is a remake of the South Corean serie of the same name. So it seems South Corea does have really good doctors. Let's go to Seoul and be safe!  The Good Doctor (South Corea) vs The Good Doctor(American) No. 5: binge watch movies or tv series  Now it is the best time to do it! We have time, and we have popcorn! Only to remember washing our hands for 20 seconds before popping any porcorn into our mouth! And, yes, we can start by watching The Good Doctor, which is really good and really addictive, and very scary and healing, like a visual chicken soup of the soul.  No. 6: Start a new project or even new business  Amazon is crashed sometimes after shoppers around the world who have to stay at home order online; Netflix Europe has to lower its digital quality because two many people are watching videos at the same time; People working in offices are working from home remotely; Classes of high school to universities are moving online; Classes of language learning, yoga, pirate and other sports, are conducted online. We think we are living in digital age, but now we are being pushed toward the digital village. If you have thought about any project that is digital, you can start now, it will be the future. Even after coronavirus, nothing will be the same again, some of the classes will not be moved back to physical classrooms, some of us will continue to go shopping online only, some of the tasks and jobs will contiune to be conducted remotedly, become optional or even disappear completely... No. 7: Entertain your neighbors  French opera singer Stéphane Sénéchal singing for his neighbours from his windows in Paris From Paris to Neples, singers and musicians are using their talents to entertain their neighbours from their windows and balconies, you can do the same, too. Who knows, you might be the next viral balcon talent! To make us feel even more happier, we can also enroll in a free class called The Science of Well-Being offered by University of Yale for free, which is taught by professor Laurie Santos and is the most popular class in Yale's history. So perhaps looking for happiness has become our priority even before the outbreak of coronavirus.  University of Yale Stay home, stay safe!
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