I’m sure the COVID-19 virus, or as most would call the ‘Corona Virus,’ has changed your life to one almost unrecognizable to the way it was when March started. I know mine has had a lot of changes. However it’s a crazy time we’re living in now. Not as crazy as it was in March or April, but still crazy enough and showing no signs of immediate relief. A virus that seemed to exist in a city half a world away has now infected six million people worldwide. Here’s what I noticed over the time.

I know this will be the wordiest blog I’ve ever written, but I have to get all this off my chest.

The Pandemic Looming

The news of COVID-19 was catching our eyes as far back as February. It made brief news in January, but the news in February was about a pandemic in the Wuhan province of China that was looming. There was the fear that it might be carried to the outside world. Eventually it did hit the outside world and we’re now still fighting it!

News had already hit Canada of our first cases. Our first death happened in the second week of March and it was a 78 year-old in a Richmond hospital. It was evident that our lives would soon change. That would become the case the following week. It was then when things like social distancing, working remotely and the closure or limit of non-essential services. I even remember the last time I ate out. It was a get-together of former employees of my job at a pub just a ten-minute walk away. It was on March 14th and pretty much the last weekend where people could meet inside a restaurant. Then everything changed the following week.

This was a concern for me. For a long time, I’ve compared to COVID to other pandemics or epidemics of the past like the Spanish Flu or the Bubonic Plague or the Plague of Justinian. When we had our social restrictions– actually there are still regulations in BC as I speak– I often wondered “Did they handle it the same way back during influenza?”

Cancellations, Cancellations, Cancellations

To the disappointment of almost everyone, it appears every event worldwide had to be cancelled because of the pandemic. At that dinner with former co-workers, I remember the pub had their television on one sports channel and one golf channel. The news of first the NBA cancelling the rest of their season and then the news of the NHL cancelling the rest of their season sent a message about how serious this problem is. Even the golf channel talked of PGA and LPGA events that were cancelled. Interesting how nowadays, the sports channels have been replaying past sports events. That has been successful in lifting the mood of things, to an extent.

More cancellations were on the way. The Eurovision Song Contest was cancelled, the Euro 2020 football event had to be postponed for the following year. Pressure became a case that the Tokyo Olympics that were slated this summer were also postponed until 2021. Cancellations are also happening locally too. In Greater Vancouver, events like the Scandinavian Midsummer Festival in June, the Celebration Of Light in July and the Pacific National Exhibition for around Labor Day had to cancel out as there’s no certainty the pandemic would end around their times. Winnipeg’s Folklorama had to cancel out their festival for August completely. It’s a pain and a headache, but it’s best to do so as right now no relief is currently guaranteed for their times.

Occupational Shock

I’ll bet there may be just 10% of the world where COVID-19 has not changed their job situation one bit this whole time. They must be few and far between or just plain hermits. If you haven’t lost your own business, or lost your job because of a temporary layoff, then your work setting will definitely have changed.

How many of you have had to move your desks from your office to you own home? How many of you still working use Zoom to communicate with your meetings? If you work for a small restaurant or even a big franchise, has it shut down or is it now just strictly pick-up or delivery? That’s what the normal has been under this time.

As for me, I was informed through my job that I would have to work from home. We would have to have all our computers set up with the right VPNs and the right communicative software to work from home. I remember my supervisor drove me in the afternoon to my home with all my computer equipment in a box. It was a unique three-week experience using all the software. The most I’ll say about my job is that I work for a financial agency that works on behalf of various clients. One thing is that the work slowed down because of restrictions placed in dealing with customers. We all noticed the work getting less and less as the Inbox had little work to do. Eventually I received the call I was placed on a Leave Of Absense. My banked vacation time had to be paid out before I could go into the unpaid part four weeks later. As of now, I’m still waiting for the call back to work. I’m not expecting things to resume once clients want us working for them again.

Right now I’m not too worried about my job. My work computer has been shut down and I have it sitting in a box. I still have my work badge. I also still have my medical and dental happening. Also, I don’t know if your country gives out emergency benefits during a State Of Emergency, but Canada has a wide variety of assistance programs implemented during this time. I applied for the CERB (Canada Emergency Response Benefit) which is a monthly income supplement for people that have been either laid off or receiving less than $1000 in a month’s period. Currently that’s my income. We’ll see what time holds.

Social Distancing: You’re Lucky To Get Around

You hear it all the time nowadays: lines like ‘Stay Home’ or ‘Stay two metres apart.’ To think at the beginning of the 2020, there was no such term as ‘Social Distancing.’ However that’s one of the things about this outbreak. Most of us never had to wear a surgical mask in public. That all changed when health officials made speeches recommending us to wear them.

Businesses sure changed. I mentioned about my time in the pub. That was the last dine-in weekend. Now restaurants have either closed completely or they make it strictly pick-up or a delivery service like Skip The Dishes. Fast food or coffee chains like McDonald’s or Starbucks have closed their restaurants and only allowed for drive-thru pick up. Few stores were open, except for those with essential services. Grocery stores and pharmacies were open. Furniture stores or clothing stores were not. Hair salons were closed off completely. Drop-in doctors offices were closed and they could only be a case where the doctor phones you. In some cases, you would have to send a video of your condition or ailment to your doctor. I know I had to do an appointment over the phone when I had a case of gout in my foot and it was too painful to walk.

Also how many of you go into a store and see lines or marks on the floor requesting you to stand 6 1/2 feet or 2 metres apart? I saw that in stores right in the middle of March just shortly when my work-at-home situation started. Even some entrances placed limits on the number of people who can be inside a store and had markers outside signaling where in line to stand. I’m sure there are some buildings that would demand you wear a mask to enter, like hospitals I’m sure.

Bus transportation is still there, but it has limited capacity. For two weeks, I would not get on a bus until I was invited by a family member to visit them. I was nervous when I got on. I didn’t have a face mask so I used my scarf if I had to. Plus I would almost always go outside wearing leather gloves. Buses in Greater Vancouver are free until June 1st. Skytrains and Seabuses are still fare paid. The buses would only allow for entry on the side door and were half-capacity to limit the number of people riding and the space in between them. There were even markers on the chairs which were not to have people sit upon. Skytrains and Seabuses did not have the same signs on seats to limit people, but the capacities were smaller than usual.

Playtime Is Over

The crazy thing about all these social distancing measures imposed by civic, regional or even federal laws is that they kept on getting stricter and stricter as the numbers got bigger and bigger. That’s the nature when a ‘state of emergency’ is declared. I remember leading to the end of the second week of March, the law was that places should have no more than 250 people gathering in one place. Then it became a case of no more than 50 people in one place. It’s not as severe as some places that demanded lockdowns or even a limit of 10 people in one place, but it was still crazy enough to put a limit on things.

I also remember when I went for mass at a Ukrainian church that weekend, the priest gave the option to use a disposable wooden spoon to put into the mouths of people. He was willing to use the common metal spoon used for everyone, but their mouths had to be opened wide. Also at the Roman church that Sunday’s evening, the church was half-filled with people sitting far apart from each other. That was the same in the Ukrainian church with only immediates sitting close to each other. Since then, churches have limited their services to online services. That was the case even during Easter. I know because I’ve watched many a mass online.

However the biggest area you’ll notice it most is in parks and playgrounds. Ever since the pandemic, swing sets, spinning wheels, monkey bars and sandboxes have been closed off. If anyone is to be in a park, they are to do it in the natural areas or on one of the benches. The pandemic was that much of a threat. Even now the swing sets are showing no signs of reopening.

Shopping: All You Can Hoard

It never fails. A pandemic or a problem happens, and then people flood to grocery stores to hoard all that they can. I got my first experience of this type while living on my own not during a pandemic or outbreak, but of a water crisis. Many years ago, Greater Vancouver had a problem with E-coli in the drinking water. People had to boil their water for some time or buy bottled water. You can imagine people would rush to stores to hoard bottled water during that period.

Now we have the COVID-19 outbreak. As a result, a lot of stores have had their shelves ransacked for various items. The biggest of this pandemic pandemonium was three to four weeks ago. There was the hoarding of drinking water, of pasta, or rice and of meat. However the hoarding that got the most notice was toilet paper. People rushed in to hoard toilet paper more than any other item during that period. The hoarding of three to four weeks ago got so bad, stores posted signs that said ‘Limit 1 (or 2) per Customer.’ Even then, that was still not enough to prevent the hoarding. I remember going into a pharmacy looking for paper towels two weeks ago. Even a set of two rolls of ‘PT’ was enough for me. When I got there, the store had the ‘Limit 1 per customer’ sign, but a two-pack of paper towels was the only paper product on the shelf! That’s right! All the toilet paper and facial tissue were sold out and this two-pack of paper towels was all that was left. Talk about lucking out!

Now things are a far cry from the hoarding. Toilet paper have found their way back on the shelves, but they still go quite fast as well as paper towels. Cleaning products are one item that aren’t necessarily hoarded as much as they were in March but they still go faster than they did before. Leave it to a pandemic to change everything!

Attention To The Statistics

It’s a question whether paying attention to the daily COVID-19 statistics is a smart idea or not. It could be smart because you need to know where you’re area stands in terms of probability of infection. It could not be smart because it can promote fear and panic. As if this pandemic hasn’t caused enough fear and panic already!

It first started with the live facts on YouTube back in the middle of March. I came across a live video from NAV MED VIDEOS which features live videos of COVID-19 statistics that were constantly updated once each nation released more facts. The NAV MED VIDEOS live video is still live and is still active in updating. However over time, I switched to the Worldometers site. I find a site with the stats more convenient than a Youtube video. Worldometers also gives constant updates about the latest statistics and the latest numbers. They’re also still active. They do a good job of updating the stats for Canada, but I don’t like how they don’t break it down province-by-province the same way they break it down for the US state-by-state.

The biggest reason why I pay attention to the statistics is to get a good sense on how soon things will get back to normal and how soon the numbers will go down. Another reason is also to see just how big of a threat the virus would be. Numbers of cases per population is very telling. I admit the numbers during March and April looked very distressing. However the number of new cases reported on a daily basis have showed an unsteady but sure decline. If there’s one positive thing to say about the overall statistics, it’s that there are more cases of people fully recovered than active cases. Another positive thing is in terms of closed cases, we have an 87% survival rate. Nevertheless we can’t be sitting pretty yet. Actually there’s no such thing as ‘sitting pretty’ as far as COVID statistics go. In fact right now, Canada ranks 11th overall in terms of total number of deaths. All of us have to wait for numbers of active cases and new cases to get lower to resume more activities we used to do.

COVID In My Dreams

Now this is something totally crazy, but it should be seen as eventual. You know a pandemic or an outbreak is a part of your life when it’s in your dreams at night. It happened to me twice during the third week of March:

• During the evening of Monday that week leading into the morning of Tuesday (St. Patrick’s Day), I dreamt I was traveling by automobile through various areas of the city of Vancouver. I then found myself about to enter a library in a new building in South Vancouver. When I enter the library, I found it very hard to breathe; almost impossible to inhale. I think I struggled in taking three breaths. Then my alarm clock went off. I woke up and I was breathing normally. You can imagine my relief! Looking back, I don’t think it was exactly a dream about me having COVID-19 exactly, but shortness of breath is a COVID symptom.
• The evening of the Friday that week leading into the morning of the Saturday, I dreamt I was going to a community college of various buildings and floors. The whole time, I attempt to practice social distancing despite having to move fast from place to place. I’m by the elevator of the second floor of some building. The door opens up and a young woman comes to me in a hostile manner: “You! You bumped me! You jerk! Don’t you know it’s dangerous? You could’ve infected me!” You can imagine my relief when I woke up.

I haven’t had any other memorable dreams of COVID-19 since then, but it’s interesting how an outbreak can be part of your dreams so soon.

Those Risking Themselves

For the first 2 1/2 months, almost everything was closed down or in limited function. The biggest business that did not see business decline with the pandemic is the health system. Now more than ever, nations need health officials and hospitals functioning like never before. The problem is it’s extremely tiring for health officials and nurses constantly tending to patients. I’ve heard of hospitals reserving a single floor as a COVID ward. Those nurses would be working the most hours, be under the most stress and would be under the most threat to catch the virus themselves.

Nurses aren’t the only ones who face threats of COVID on the job. Despite seating restrictions on public transit, bus drivers also face threats of contagion. That was especially highlighted in April when Detroit bus driver Jason Hargrove died of COVID. Just a week and a half before his death, the 50 year-old Hargrove posted a video where he talks of the difficulties doing his job during this pandemic. He even talked of a female passenger coughing without covering her mouth. I was upset with his death but I was most shocked to hear of a full-grown adult not covering their mouth when they cough.

Grocery stores, pharmacies and convenience stores still operated during the pandemic, but they had to take precautions and limit their hours. Cashiers would have to work behind a plastic protector or wear a see-through visor to protect themselves. They would only handle cash if they wear gloves. If you have a credit card, you had to run it through yourself with no putting it through any plastic. Some places won’t even allow paper or coin money for fear of contagion. Also at convenience stores and gas bars, no more self-serve coffee. The cashier does it for you. That’s what happens when a contagious disease hits.

The COVIDiocy Of COVIDiots

I don’t know what you’ve been doing for precautions. As for me, I’ve been doing my utmost. I think it was the dreams I had that most did it to me. Or it could be because I know a COVID test involves inserting a cotton swab far into your nasal passage. I sure as hell don’t want something like that! That explains why I’ve been doing my best to keep 2 metres apart. When I meet up with people, I keep the space standard of 2 metres. I try to be preventative instead of afraid. I take my vitamins as I normally do, I still go out shopping, I still jog down the sidewalks of Burnaby and New Westminster, but I make sure I’m a good distance away from others each time. Plus I still wear my leather gloves when I’m outdoors.

I will admit I do get nervous especially if I’m in a crowded area with a lot of people. I’ve seen it many a times. I see groups of people at a beach or park. Whenever I see that, I think ‘I hope they all live together in the same house.’ I also still see people either crowding or too close to each other at bus stops, I see some grocery stores with too many people inside. Whenever I’m in such a place, I make sure I get away from it as soon as I can as well as avoid close contact to others. Even when a single person goes in the same direction I’m going in an indoor place, it makes me nervous. I impulsively think they have disregard to social distancing measures and I feel like saying to them: “What the hell is wrong with you?” I don’t say it to them, but I’m tempted to.

And then there are those that are either careless, ignorant, or defiantly rebellious. Those are the subject of the new word created for 2020: COVIDiot! Some of the most noteworthy is young people. Now don’t think I’m knocking this generation of young people; the belief of ‘Live fast, die young, leave a pretty memory’ has transcended generation after generation. However the constant belief of being young and invincible doesn’t even change during a pandemic. We see it as groups of young adult crowd close together at a beach or public place. Just two weeks ago, I saw a group of twelve teens meet together outside my apartment building door. Only two live inside any of the apartments.

However the biggest news of the ignorance of COVIDiocy has to be during March when spring break in Florida still continued and beaches were still crowded. Further firestorm came when one of the partiers said in a news interview: “If I get corona, I get corona. At the end of the day, it won’t stop me from partying.” The news stories also showed how the reporter was talking to the partiers about the possibility of contagion. The young man said “Well, let us handle it in our own way.” I know young people don’t want to stop partying, but a pandemic should make one think twice.

And COVIDiots include the pundits, the fringe media and conspiracy theorists. They’re a class of COVIDiocy of their own. They include American religious ministers who say this pandemic is God punishing America for tolerating abortion and same-sex marriage. Please, COVID is a virus! Not a punishment! There are even people that are denying COVID exists and that it’s all a conspiracy to hoard rights. Alex Jones must be desperate for a crowd. It’s sick he brings his own children to the rally and hugs supporters. Besides, some that claimed it to be a hoax have made themselves sick of COVID, and some even died. There are those that stormed state halls to protest the social restrictions, claiming it’s unconstitutional. There are a lot of right-wing types that believe that state and federal laws protecting from a health hazard is a threat to constitutional rights. And finally there are religious ministers who violate state regulations on indoor gatherings and open their doors to their churches. Some number to over 1000 and there’s no social distancing at all. I take it they forgot the scripture “Thou shall not put the Lord God to the test.”

First Signs Of Relief

This past month of May, we’ve been seeing the statistics of new contagion go down steadily. The daily statistics are still high enough to keep certain restrictions active, but allow some restrictions to loosened. This week, churches will reopen, but to a maximum capacity of 50. Transit will resume to regular fare paid, but with seating restrictions still implemented. Hair salons are reopening, but some will charge a COVID tax and all will demand their clients wear a mask. Some non-essential stores like Winners opened last week, but with limitations on how many can enter. The number of people allowed depends on the square footage of the store. Dental offices will reopen starting June 1st. That’s beneficial for me because I have a cracked tooth and I will get it fixed on Friday the 5th.

Reopenings are not immediate. In a pandemic, they have to be gradual. I’ll admit it has been annoying having such a limit of places to go to and waiting outside. I’ll admit it’s annoying not being able to have a haircut. I even dream of the day I can return to dining in at a restaurant. However I will gladly comply as this is about preventing a pandemic from reaching devastating numbers at home.

Despite all the chaos and bad news that has happened, there has been a lot of good during this pandemic. People and companies have become more charitable and groups have supplied food donations to others. There have been nations during frightening contagion rates put under lockdowns or confinements to their homes and buildings. The confined responded by singing from their balconies or even doing aerobic classes to other tenants across to the other apartment. The human spirit won’t die!  There’s also a greater appreciation for nurses and health professionals. They, more than anyone else, have the hardest duty of fighting the pandemic up front with the patients they see. They have to work longer hours and under harsher conditions. Here in Canada, we have a habit of thanking them every evening at 7pm when we go out and bang the drum or clank the pots. We want them to know how thankful we are for them. I’m sure there are other salutes of ‘thank you’ done differently around the world.

So for my concluding paragraph, I just have to say the COVID-19 pandemic continues. It shows signs of waning down, but reopening things will be a slow steady process. Despite things not being as bad or as fearful as it was in March, it’s still something worth taking seriously. We may not have the same big numbers of daily new cases, but the new case rates are still worth taking seriously. Plus it’s only now they’re testing out possible cures or vaccines for COVID-19. It’s frustrating trying to protect yourself. It’s also frustrating for the doctors, nurses and hospitals too. It’s most frustrating for those with the COVID-19 and their families. Nevertheless it’s important to stay strong right now. The statistics of COVID-19 have been ugly and are still worth keeping an eye out for, but we should remember all this is to protect ourselves until a cure and a vaccine is found. We also shouldn’t forget that the human race has been through worse. There was the Influenza epidemic of 1918 to 1919 that killed around 100 million. There have been smallpox epidemics many times in history including one in Japan in the 8th Century that killed 1/3 of the nation’s population. There were Cholera pandemics in Asia in the 19th Century that killed millions of people. There’s especially the Bubonic Plague or Black Death in 14th Century Europe that killed 1/3 of the continent. Or even the Plague of Justinian that ended the Roman Empire.

We all have to stay strong and be as preventative as we can. We have the chance to prevent COVID-19 from claiming even its FIRST million lives. There have been excellent efforts of people doing their parts and there have been people acting careless with a false sense of invincibility. We should all work to make this pandemic a thing of the past. When they stay at home and you live in a high-risk area, you stay at home! All I can say right now is whatever the situation is in your home country right now, stay cautious and continue to protect yourself.