Dear 2020, 

I wanted to wait till we had ‘safely’ crossed over to 2021 before letting my true feelings about you known because after everything you threw at us, I wasn’t sure you wouldn’t pull one last twist from your diary or planner, assuming you had one! Kicks of a ‘dying year’ if you like, and those final seconds before the clock finally struck midnight to usher us into the New Year seemed like eternity! But we made it, thank God and our hope is that 2021 is nothing like you, although poor thing is already having a tough time cleaning up after you.

Pretty much like those irresponsible tenants who leave the house messy for the new occupant! Don’t be fooled by the endearment. I’d love nothing more than to bash you the same way you bruised, battered and tormented us over the course of the last 12 months, but this being a family-friendly paper, I’ll refrain from doing that. Know this though; you’ve been such a pain and let down.

You repeatedly tried and tested us but had the shoe been on the other foot, your test results would’ve been mostly Fs or as millennials would say, one ‘epic fail’. You’ll go down as the year everybody lost something, directly or indirectly. Some people lost everything - jobs, businesses, loved ones, hopes, dreams, their sanity... and it’s going to take a while for us to fully recover. You’re the reason many people’s vision boards remain blank because they’re reluctant to make plans, fearing they may not come to fruition. See how you’ve turned us all into sceptics? And not just that, you forced many to downgrade or downsize and reduced ambitious workers to destitutes.

Highly regarded people lost credibility as they defaulted on loans, rent, mortgages and other financial commitments. Relationships, marriages and friendships have been strained or damaged over the same issue, with some bitter they reached out to those they thought would help and got no assistance, while others did help but now regret having done so as the borrowers are yet to pay back. Others swore they’d only stay on the couch for a few days but that turned into weeks and the weeks into months! See all the undue stress you’ve caused? Malnutrition, eating and sleep disorders, substance abuse and suicide rates all up as your victims, rich or poor, young and old, male and female, black and white, are all still struggling to cope. Too bad we can’t sue you for emotional distress and financial loss because we would win! Few will have fond memories of you and when future generations ask about you, there won’t be many nice things to say.

You snatched several of our favourite people including Kobe, Maradona, Kenny Rogers, Sean Connery and our incredibly brave and talented King/Superhero/Wakanda Forever, Chadwick Boseman. You also took not one but two former Burundian Presidents in Pierre Nkurunziza and Pierre Buyoya along with Kenya’s Daniel Arap Moi, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, Tanzania’s Benjamin Mkapa and Ghana’s Jerry Rawlings. Plus millions more who didn’t survive Covid-19 and other afflictions.

You’ve not just been a dead year in many people’s books but also the year of death and maybe we should just replace the dictionary definitions of death and destruction with 2020! I’m Christian so I don’t really buy into astrology even though I’ll read the horoscope from time to time, and I also happen to be slightly superstitious! However, I feel like we need astrologists, astronomers and meteorologists to work together to give us credible readings and projections of years to come because how could we have missed signs of a turbulent 2020? I remember how we feared the worst heading into the New Millennium in 2000 as many had predicted mayhem and apocalyptic scenarios, computers crashing, basically doom and gloom. In fact, for many years prior to that, there’d been talk of the world ‘ending’, Jesus finally returning to Earth, Judgement Day etc. and none of that happened.

Still can’t believe I fell for it but anyway, fast forward 20 years later with none of the trepidation and anxiety, rather great expectations and lofty dreams for 2020. Sadly, all many of us have to show are worry and stress lines. Not quite the end of the world but the end of many things; norms, freedoms, traditions and mundane things we took for granted before last year. Oh it feels so good to finally be able to say that.

The ‘last year’ part! I’m reluctant to give you any credit but to be fair to you, most of the crazy things and storms we had to weather weren’t your own making. You just happened to be the year they did and we needed someone or something to blame. So yeah, some amazing things did indeed happen, like Master KG and Nomcebo’s monster hit ‘Jerusalema’ which helped lift lockdown blues for many early on as nearly everyone attempted their own renditions or the ‘Jerusalema Dance Challenge’. My dancing skills are non-existent so I didn’t even attempt it but I’m pleased to let you know that I tap, nod and sing along every time the song comes on. More importantly though, you pushed us out of our comfort zones, and in doing so helped many reinvent themselves or discover skills they didn’t even know they had and you only have to look at what they’re doing on platforms like Tik Tok.

Others have written books and we also have Zoom, such a welcome alternative for those of us who’ve always dreaded the traditional boardroom or meeting room. My high school friends and I had a slightly different definition of Zoom though, which to us meant heading to or running somewhere fast.

Not too far off, right? If only one of us had had the foresight to patent the idea, we would be millionaires now! Many other things have been invented or revamped that probably wouldn’t have been if not for the tough times, and that creativity and innovation extends to agriculture, education, banking, healthcare and other sectors, all of which are now more streamlined and functional as everybody quickly realised they had to adjust and adapt to survive. And as cross-border, regional and international travel, tourism and trade activity slowed over Coronavirus fears, domestic tourism picked up and more, consumers have been buying Made in Rwanda, which is great for our local entrepreneurs and producers.

Concepts like the Cashless Economy are also catching on so I guess we can thank you for all that. As great as all that is though, it’s not enough to redeem you and we’re just glad you’re long gone. So on behalf of everybody, good riddance, I mean goodbye! Very few will miss you. I know I won’t. I’d ask you to tell the years to come not to dare emulate you but I’m not even sure I want to maintain any contact with you so no, bye for real!