Recently Kim Kardashian West found herself at the centre of a meme storm when she told the Covid-hit world that she celebrated her 40th birthday on October 21 with her “closest inner circle” on a private island in Tahiti where they swam with whales. All this, so that they “could pretend that things were normal just for a brief moment in time”. She really rubbed it in by reminding people that this was “so far out of reach now” for most and how “humbly privileged” she was. Ouch.

No one likes a humblebrag, less so in 2020. Netizens erupted with mockery and memes. That party is still on. When sister Khloé defended Kim’s private island bash, the backlash was swift. Kim’s husbands Kanye West’s lavish birthday gift of a hologram video message from Kim’s dead father Robert didn’t go down well either.

But in truth, a private island isn’t half bad as an idea when there’s a virus on the loose. Unlike Kim’s, though, it can be anywhere.

And many of us, too, have our own whales to swim with. It can be adding two drops of ylang ylang essential oil to the home-pedicure routine or stocking up on liqueur chocolates. It can be a playlist of songs and movies or growing lemongrass and cilantro on one’s balcony. It can be learning a new DIY like baking bread or reviving the lost art of writing letters in longhand. It can be a Zoom poetry session. It can even be online shopping or a web series. No judgement here. It’s your private island amid the pandemic.

‘Keeping up with the Kardashians’ doesn’t seem all that bad, really.