Mr. Tan Aik Wen flew to the United Kingdom in October 2020 aiming to commence on his first term at the University of Oxford. With just 3 months into the term, he had to return to Singapore due to the rapid escalation of the Covid-19 pandemic.
As the UK has entered into its 3rd national lockdown in the last week, infections have steadfastly continued to rise with an alarming 59,937 persons testing positive for the virus on the 9th January 2021 itself. There are new reports of an even more potent strain of the corona virus in the UK now.
During these hard times not just in one country but globally, Mr. Tan felt racism against Asians was also on the increase in the UK and this is since the country’s Tier 4 restrictions were imposed. He was subject to man fling a shopping basket and cast swear words while he was grocery shopping himself.
In addition to the recent Tier 4 restrictions, Oxford University has moved on to on-line lectures and with limited access to library facilities.
Mr Tan says that “now the balance has shifted because there’s no more in-person teaching, the limitation of library facilities, it is evident that most of the first year Singaporean students are re-locating back to Singapore. The students who have opted otherwise and have chosen to remain in the UK will not be allowed on Campus property at least until mid-February and it is envisaged that it will most probably be extended past that date”. Mr. Tan said stated that this has been the “tipping point” for most of his peers.
First-year student at University College London Emma Huang said cost and safety were the two main reasons she would be returning home at the end of January.
According to Emma Huang a first-year student at the University College London, the two main reasons for her returning to Singapore at the end of January is the cost factor and safety reasons. She further commented that it would be cheaper for her to present herself for swab test and pay her way through to Singapore rather than continue to pay rent and stay in London.
The 20-year-old added: “The cases here spiked over the December period and don’t seem to be going down. Even though London has two vaccines it’s rolling out, I’m not sure how fast they can roll out to the major population. At this point the lockdown is going to be till the end of March, so my parents want me to be back home, as Singapore is much safer.”
On the other hand there is Mr Donovan Sim, 21, who is planning to stay back in the UK because of safety.
Mr. Donovan Sim who is a first year student of Cambridge University found himself in a hard place at the beginning of January unable to decide if he should return to his home country Singapore. On the 9th January he finally decided against returning to Singapore.
As Mr. Sim is not living on the campus property at this very moment “and in order to fly back to Singapore I would need to pick up some items at my college first” he is of the opinion that the best idea is to stay where he is and minimize movement.
He also believed his university’s administrators would prefer it if he remained in the college to study.
Mr. Sim is also of the opinion that the College Administrators would prefer for him to stay in college and continue with his studies.
20 year old Ria Bhargava, a Second-year student at King’s College London Ria has also decided to remain in the UK despite being worried by the rising infection rate.
“The changes are sudden and there’s a lot of uncertainty to deal with emotionally,” she said.
Despite having to continue with the rental on her flat even if she returned to Singapore, her decision was to remain holed up and continue with the lectures and wait for the situation to improve. This was a cheaper decision for her.
She was concerned about the risk of exposure on the flight back and there was a concern of the time difference making it challenging with her studies.
Mr Choo Yan Ru from the University of St Andrews, who also decided to stay and this was his reasoning.
“If the classes are online only, the tutorials will be mostly at night if I were to study in Singapore, so it might be hard to focus when the rest of the house is already relaxing,” said the 27-year-old.
His university is in a small town in Scotland and its administration has discouraged students from other parts of the UK from returning at the moment.
“For now it’s still quite feasible to live an isolated lifestyle,” he said.
Ms. Bhargava said the vaccine rollout in the UK has given her hope that things and the situation might improve.
However, she added that if numbers continue to rise in the near future, she will may change her mind.
“(I know) if I were to get Covid, the help I’d get here is not as great and efficient as I could have gotten in Singapore,” she said.
