Items

• 
  2021-02-25

  Jewish Melbourne

  As a Yiddish teacher the plague year was marked by a shift to online teaching. Of course this involved inconveniences and accomodations but mostly I was so grateful to have a job that meant I got to stay in contact with people throughout 2020. In classes I worked hard to support students in a difficult time, but also found myself energised and reassured by the regular social contact they provided. I've chose two pictures of my classes - one, a kids class featuring members of my family and the other, a screenshot from one of my long running classes at the Kadimah. The kids class was often fairly chaotic on zoom, marked by kids disappearing, scribbling on the screen or more interested in making faces in the camera than anything else. But it still represented a weekly engagement with Yiddishkayt for these kids, who all live in the North of Melbourne and attend state schools. The image I chose of one of my adults class is from a night when there was a blackout in my street - all the lights went off and my connection cut out. I realised though that I could teach using my phone for internet - it just meant sitting in the dark! I remember a strong feeling of "the show must go on" in a time when so much else was uncertain it was important to me that every Monday evening was the same - Yiddish class with my longtime students. Throughout lockdown students have been so patient and understanding of everything that has had to change and even now as I am extremely over teaching online I am honestly so grateful for what they've given me - meaninful, interesting, engaging work and social contact! We should all be so lucky.
• 
  2020-09-16

  Jewish Melbourne

  Reflection and Resilience
• 
  2020-09-08

  Jewish Melbourne

  Rosh Hashana 2020 Style - Achieving Inner Peace, Spirituality & Connection: Discussing Rosh Hashanah in a Covid world, the redefining of Rosh Hashanah 2020 Style! As part of our focus on Spiritual Health, the JCCV welcomed back two professionals who shared their insights on how to make the most of celebrating Rosh Hashanah this year, and offer ideas to achieve meaningful experiences for you and those closest to you.
• 
  2020-07-07

  Australian Health Worker quote on reactions from patients' families

  We limited visiting completely, not just to patients with COVID 19, even the nicest families became really aggressive. Quote from Female aged 54, Intensive Care Nurse. Image created by the Health Worker Voices project: https://mspgh.unimelb.edu.au/healthworkervoices
• 
  2020-07-27

  Australian Health Worker quote on families

  It's really tough for families that need to see their loved one in their last few days and they just can't be there. I think that's really rough. Quote from Female aged 45, Intensive Care Nurse. Image created by the Health Worker Voices project: https://mspgh.unimelb.edu.au/healthworkervoices
• 
  2020-10-26

  "Get on the beers" Dan Andrew

  Victorians saw their freedoms and their complacency eroded as the Andrews government introduced a second lockdown. As it continued past the expected four weeks, many found enjoyment in the meme of the Andrews government allowing Victorians to “get on the beers”. The meme started during the first lockdown after Daniel Andrews stated on the 22nd of March that the closure of the pubs was not an excuse to “have all your mates ‘round to home and get on the beers…”. Since then, it has become a joke on the internet about when Daniel Andrews will finally allow Victorians to get back on the beers. Since the easing of restrictions, the joke has morphed from a desire to get out of lockdown and back to pubs, into a celebration of the success of the second lockdown. One musical duo, MASHD N KUTCHER, made a remix of Andrews from different press conferences from the second lockdown to be played at bars and clubs now that Victorians are able to go out. Through the creativity of such people, an admonishment by the premier has evolved to a shared joke, and then into a celebration of the persistence and patience of Victorians to go through a second lockdown successfully. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0NFqOHFJvw
• 
  2020-09-30

  Living through video games

  During the first lockdown, my flatmate introduced me to Sims 4. The Sims is a life simulation game wherein you create a character and live their life, making certain decisions such as where you will live, what career you will have, who you are in relationships with and so on. In the second lockdown, friends introduced me to Stardew Valley. In this game, your character lives on a farm and has to manage the land to make a living. There are also mines to explore and mystery to uncover. I would play this game with my friends online, hanging out virtually when we could not in real life. These games provided a reprieve from everyday life in lockdown where I had little control over my life, allowing me to live vicariously through my characters.
• 
  2020-10-30

  Victorian sporting pride

  I am not a sport person; however, during the second lockdown I became increasingly invested in the success of Victorian sporting teams as their finals started taking place. Victoria saw three major wins in October: victory for the Melbourne Vixens in the Super Netball competition on the 18th; two Victorian teams competed in the AFL Grand Final on the 24th with Richmond ultimately prevailing; the Melbourne Storm defeated the Penrith Panthers on the 25th in the NRL Grand Final. This string of sporting success from Victoria gave a sense of pride to many Victorians, including those of us who do not normally follow sport. This pride came as success from the second lockdown was becoming evident, adding to the sense of achievement for the state. The ability for sport to bring people together ought to not be underestimated as the sense of community and pride for Victorians, after going through a second lockdown, made many of us feel confident again.
• 2020-07-06

  Snow trip before the storm

  HIST30060 This is a photograph I took from the top of Mount Buffalo overlooking the Ovens Valley on the 6th of July, a day before Premier Daniel Andrews announced a second lockdown in Victoria. My extended family decided to take this trip during the first week of winter school holidays to enjoy the snow. We were especially keen to go to support the local economy as it had also been devastated by the bushfires. I recall a shared feeling of elation at being able to go on holidays together once more; however, there was a sense of trepidation at the increasing numbers of Covid-19 cases in Melbourne. When the second lockdown was announced, I remember being scared of going back into lockdown, and unsure of whether I should stay in Melbourne or move back in with my parents in Ballarat. Eventually, I decided to cut my holiday short to drive back to Melbourne, pack up my things and move back in with my parents in regional Victoria.
• 
  2020-08

  Walking through lockdown

  Like many, I’ve taken to walking every day to help move my body and feel active during lockdown. I was an avid walker prior to Covid-19, but now walking has become more than just a means of exercising. Walking has become a time to myself, for myself, where I can escape my flat and explore. I moved to South Melbourne at the start of this year and walking during lockdown has allowed me to explore my suburb and become more familiar with where I live. Being comfortable gives me confidence and a sense of accomplishment that I have “conquered” South Melbourne. While Covid-19 has limited me in other ways, the restrictions have allowed me to focus on my sense of place and cementing this area as my new home.
• 
  2020-10-06

  Jewish Melbourne: Jewish Care virtual 'news and views' session with residents

  "Not even COVID-19 restrictions can stop our volunteers from brightening the days of our Elders at Gary Smorgon House! Long-time volunteer Errol Rink has adapted his weekly ‘news and views session’ on Zoom, complete with trivia quizzes and lots of jokes. “The reaction from the smiling and laughing elders makes it all worthwhile,” says Errol. Elder Celsia Goldberg is especially thankful for the volunteers “constantly giving their time, showing love, respect and compassion” and for coming up with entertaining arts and crafts, Yiddish sing-a-longs, music and guest speakers for them to enjoy. “They have made the restriction period so much more bearable, even enjoyable, and for that I am so grateful.” We are so lucky to have such a strong network of kind and selfless volunteers helping across all aspects of our work."
• 
  2020-08-31

  Jewish Melbourne: CSG - Check on your mates

  This is a post by Community Security Group (CSG), encouraging people to look out for each other: "Humans are social animals. We crave connection. As we spend more time in our homes, cut off from friends and family in a bid to stop the spread of the virus, the lack of physical touch can be mentally challenging. For people who live alone especially, this extended lack of contact may be particularly tough. But just because we’re physically distant from each other doesn’t mean we can’t still be emotionally close. Maintaining regular human connection is more important than ever as we navigate these difficult times."
• 
  2020-08-16

  Jewish Melbourne: Chabad on Carlisle food for isolated seniors

  Chabad on Carlisle 'Cookoff August 2020': "A great team of very hard working volunteers cooked up delicious Shabbos packages today which will be delivered to isolated seniors. (Covid-safe protocols were followed). We may be physically distant but the love and care is always there! A big thank you to the awesome volunteers!"
• 
  2020-04-01

  Jewish Melbourne: Rabbi Chaim Herzog of Chabad Melbourne distributes shmura matza during pandemic

  In this photo Rabbi Chaim Herzog of Chabad of Melbourne is delivering shmura matzah to Claude Schwarz. In the period before Passover the custom is to receive hand baked shmura matza for the seder night.
• 
  2020-10-02

  Socially Distanced Formal Event

  HIST30060 This is a photograph of myself and three other final year Undergraduate students at Ormond College, The University of Melbourne, taking a socially distanced group photo before "Club Dinner." During non-COVID times, this is normally a major event for students and is one of the most anticipated events of the year. Given COVID restrictions, the dinner was not able to run as normal, but students still took the opportunity to dress up in formal clothing and share socially distanced dinner and drinks. Personally, this photo is one of my favourite to come from this year featuring my friends and I, because it shows an adaptation to abnormal times. It is, I suppose, an attempt to find normalcy.
• 
  2020-03-12

  COVID-19 Productivity Plan

  HIST30060: A ‘COVID-19 Productivity Plan’ in the making. In the early days of the pandemic, my girlfriend and I were excited about entering lockdown. An eventual lockdown felt inevitable in mid-March, so we sat down at our local café to plan all the things we hoped to achieve. The plan reflects the sense of novelty and strange excitement many experienced in the beginning.
• 
  2029-03-25

  Ormond College Student Update, 25 March 2020

  HIST30060 This is an email from March 2020, describing the introduction of strict new COVID restrictions at Ormond College, the largest residential College at UniMelb. As the document describes, this meant that any students who remained on campus went into full "lock-in" -- they were not allowed to leave at all, not even for essential shopping as per the rest of the state. This caused many students to flee campus and end up in unstable short-term accomodation, rentals, and sublet's (myself included). This email goes some way to demonstrate the impact of COVID on specific communities such as residential colleges, and on students more broadly. Beyond this, it's personally impactful to me because this email signalled that I had less than a day to make the decision between being homeless and remaining locked-in at College. Like many, I chose homelessness and eventually ended up in a sublet with friends-of-friends.
• 
  2020-08-01

  Staying close through zoom beveraginos

  During lockdown my group of friends stayed close through sharing videos and memes on facebook and participating in tiktok trends. We had a weekly zoom set up with people from Melbourne and Geelong where we’d talk about our mostly uneventful weeks, gossip about uni and celebrity news and little bit about Dan Andrews or as he was lovingly known Daddy Dan/Dandrews. Regularly having a zoom call was a comforting experience because before the pandemic we stayed in contact mostly by planning parties and lunches. The pandemic definitely made us closer through creating group chats and organising to play a game together, usually Among Us on Wednesday night. This post includes the tiktok beveragino trend where people have drinks with their mates and film them popping out from random locations. HIST30060
• 
  2020-04

  Family facetime

  At the start of lockdown it became clear that my family would not be able to see each other for a while. Most of my family lives in Sydney, some of us live in Melbourne, regional Victoria and Canada. In response, my sister initiated a Coffey Family FaceTime every night at 6:30pm with whoever was available. However, this meant teaching my grandmothers how to use Facebook and how to start a call. More than 8 months later and both my grandmothers still can’t turn their video on without direction and also can’t start Facebook calls. This call kept us together when we felt far away. Celebrating father’s day and birthdays and anniversaries on FaceTime made some moments more memorable and some feel more lonely. Face timing each other was fun until there was a family dinner in Sydney and you couldn’t leave the state. However, there were fun moments, stirring up my parents dogs by yelling “walkies” or “dindins” and then leaving the call, FaceTiming on empty trams and using the weird face effects to confuse my grandmother about who’s camera was whose. The call gave structure to the days spent inside and caused me to talk to my grandmothers and extended family more about the current world events. HIST30060
• 
  2020-05-01

  Street art in South Melbourne

  Outside my work the council of Port Phillip commissioned an artwork on Coventry Street South Melbourne by Bridgette Dawson who goes by Melbourne Murals. She remastered the renaissance creation of Adam masterpiece dedicating the work to physical distancing. This piece developed throughout March when social distancing was fairly new and the mural demonstrates the way social distancing impacted everyday life. During this period the council of Port Phillip organised an initiative for property owners to register their buildings to have murals painted on the exterior. This would give artists work during a hard financial time and would deter graffiti. Port Phillip council also created a map for viewing their new street art installations, encouraging new walking paths when life seemed on repeat. I see this artwork nearly everyday and customers continually comment on it and smile about it. It’s a reflection of how COVID changed our lives and the spaces around us in South Melbourne.
• 
  2020-08-09T21:28+10:00

  Digitally Traversing Social Distances: Zoom Trivia with Friends

  This photo depicts me and my university friends catching up over Zoom and playing trivia. We played trivia multiple times over zoom, usually most Fridays, as a regular way to socialise while we were all apart during university holidays and Melbourne's second lockdown. The rules of our trivia games were as follows: every player would contribute $5, different people would volunteer to make trivia questions on whatever category they choose (including memes, dog breeds, logos etc.) and the overall winner that week would use the prize money to buy alcohol of their choice (we are students after all). We also had dress-up themes like sports and beach-wear, and bonus points would be allocated to best-dressed. These nights were the highlight of my week and gave me something to look forward to, breaking up the monotony of university assignments and lockdown. At the time this photo was taken, I had left Melbourne and was in hotel quarantine in Brisbane. This is also why zoom trivia worked well, because whilst some of my friends stayed in Melbourne, many of us moved out of the city to do lockdown with family in places like rural Victoria, New South Wales, Western Australia, and Queensland. Social media and video chats like Zoom functioned to connect us in new ways during the pandemic, and shows how the barriers of physical distance could be traversed via digital realms. HIST30060.
• 
  2020-09-26

  Family Fights

  HIST30060 My family is pretty large: I have two brothers, a sister….and a whole menagerie of animals! Gracie dog is the best, but we also have another dog, several cats, a rabbit, and a variety of feathered friends. My siblings live interstate, so we’ve been barred from seeing them since February because of border restrictions. During lockdown, we’ve been keeping in touch by having consistent arguments on our family group chat about how to rank our pets from best to worst. My brother frames it like a ‘best and fairest medal’, as you’d receive in sport. The conversations remind me of when we all used to live together at home, and they’ve provided a nice reprieve from more ominous discussions about the pandemonium enveloping society. I think the notion of ‘reprieve’ is central to the power of animals in this plague year: they distract us from our pandemic woes and force us to take a sabbatical from our anxieties.
• 
  2020-07-21

  Pets in the Pandemic

  HIST30060 It’s been difficult not seeing friends and family, but one stalwart of this year has been Gracie: my beautiful four-legged companion. Gracie’s been a source of much needed support this year, accompanying me on my daily allotted exercise and stopping for regular belly rubs. She’s cut through the pandemonium and provided me with a constant supply of love and laughter. I think pets have outperformed themselves this year, especially when human connection has been sparse due to restrictions. ‘History from below’ might not literally mean below knee-level, but I think considering the experience of pets during the pandemic will be a valuable avenue of historical enquiry.
• 
  2020-05-12T17:30+10:00

  Finding Light in the Darkness: Sunset from a Melbourne Apartment in Lockdown

  This photograph depicts a sunset from my apartment in Brunswick West, Melbourne on May 12, just before lockdown restrictions begin to ease in Victoria for the first time since March. I had spent that time completely alone in that apartment, as my room mate left for Queensland before lockdown began, my family mainly lived in Queensland, and my friends lived outside my suburb so I could not visit them. This was isolating in multiple ways and led to boredom, sadness, depression, agoraphobia and loneliness. I captured many sunsets like this over the months in my apartment, which brought a small bit of light amidst the dark monotony of lockdown. From this view I could imagine what lied beyond the walls of my small living space, and look forward to a day where I could feel safe moving beyond home and my nearby grocery store. HIST30060.
• 
  2020-03-23

  Casual Racism Towards Ethnic Asian Diaspora

  This is a short video where I asked my friend Nikko Guan to share her experiences with casual racism toward ethnic Asians at the beginning of the pandemic here in Melbourne, Australia. There was a lot of panic and misinformation surrounding the coronavirus, and a lot of people attributed the origin of the virus (Wuhan China) with the cause of the virus and harboured distrust toward anyone who looked remotely foreign or Asian. Some of my friends and acquaintances who were Asian but not even Chinese also reported similar experiences. It's especially pertinent as this also affected Asian diaspora who were born in Australia and may have never even been overseas, but are judged purely on their appearance. My friend in the interview had not been to China, or anywhere internationally, for many years. It's important that a global disaster that is the result of natural catastrophe isn't judged on malice for political or racial prejudices.
• 
  2020-10-06

  Fear, Fiction, and Facebook

  (HIST30060) Content warning: suicide mention. As the pandemic has developed over the course of the year and Victoria has progressed through lockdowns, a Facebook friend of mine from high school has taken to discussing COVID-19 extensively. She posts very regularly (on average between 20 and 30 times per day) with commentary on the pandemic, ranging from sanctimonious to outraged, sharing posts from conspiracy groups, pandemic-denying politicians, and other Facebook users that downplay the existence or severity of the virus. The series of unsubstantiated claims and recurrent mentions of ‘breaking news’ from various unnamed rogue health workers results in some of her Facebook friends querying her content and questioning the validity of her sources. When they reply to her posts, her Facebook friends often attempt to share news articles and updates from verified, fact-checked sources, but when this happens she talks past them, avoids the question, engages in a range of logical fallacies, or outright denies the validity of the information with which she’s been presented. In particular, she received significant backlash from her friends when she shared a post about the Australian suicide rate in 2020, crediting an alleged (untrue) increase directly to the lockdowns: one friend responded to say ‘I’m swiftly losing respect for you and the misinformation you keep posting.’ Earlier in the year, her posts gained greater traction among her Facebook friends: people would react to them, comment with information, speculation, or gentle disagreement; by now (November), the engagement her posts receive has dwindled down to the occasional like, but usually nothing more than that. Seeing her posts when I checked Facebook began to remind me of a conversation I’d had with my housemate about the role of fear and a desire for control behind belief in conspiracy theories; namely that these belief systems might bring warped comfort on some level. In situations that are scary, believing in some nameless, faceless ‘them’, or connecting with other people who claim to have secret insider information hidden from the general public, might help ease a feeling of powerlessness by believing someone is in control. I would allege her Facebook posts stem at least in part from fear, which I feel is more than understandable given an underlying experience for many people this year has been a deep, semi-constant sense of paralytic uncertainty. While I empathise with this, and genuinely feel compassion towards her for what she’s going through, I can’t help but think the way she has responded to these feelings is irresponsible at best, and dangerous at worst. I find her advocacy of the importance of independent research and critical thinking approaches irony, as the ‘research’ she describes appears to consist of discussing factually incorrect information with other scared people who are also searching for stability and predictability. I don’t begrudge her the fear she feels in any capacity, nor do I want to pass judgement on how others cope with this experience, but I can’t help feeling that this does more harm than good; I worry it proliferates false information, and further demoralises those who read it. While individual conjecture, ideas, philosophising, and critical thinking are absolutely necessary and a healthy degree of scepticism is vital when reading anything, I believe there is a degree of responsibility one assumes to check, even cursorily, that the content they’re sharing has some basis in fact, especially in instances like this where people are quite literally dying. While the experience of the pandemic is undoubtedly having a severe effect on her, I feel irritated reading her advocacy of things that will objectively place other people at risk of illness. It seems to me insensitive to spread deliberately divisive misinformation, given there are people who are assume risk every day when they go to work (even in a country that has implemented measures to control the spread of the disease, when many countries overseas have not). I worry about the broader social repercussions of the division and polarisation that misinformation contributes to, both in the case of COVID-19 and in other contexts. When I look over the things she’s been posting on Facebook, I feel overwhelming pity and compassion for what she is going through individually, and what everyone in Victoria is undergoing as a collective. I understand that everyone is coping with an extremely stressful and emotionally taxing experience and is attempting to manage as well as they can. I’ve seen parallels drawn between the COVID-19 pandemic and previous pandemic disease outbreaks and major historical events in general, and the comfort people derive from a sense of shared experience during difficulty. I think in part the pandemic has cemented in my mind the confronting fact that being alive is just living through a series of major historical events; that history is not something that has happened to other people, in other places, at other times, but is happening now and will continue to happen, over and over. While this is incredibly confronting to think about and dredges up an overwhelming feeling of powerlessness at times, it seems to me by looking at both the past and the present that people working to mutually support each other make upheaval, fear, and uncertainty much easier to bear.
• 
  2020-11-09

  Getting a COVID-Safe Haircut

  With COVID-19, even things as simple as getting a haircut were never the same. The photo above shows what that looked like. In Bahrain, where I live, hairdressers were closed down in March and were only reopened months later. When they finally did, patrons and customers had to abide by certain restrictions. There was only a fixed number of customers allowed in. Body temperatures had to be taken. Contact details had to be provided for the purposes of contact tracing in case anyone was exposed to the virus. Masks and face shields were mandatory for the persons giving the haircuts. Moreover, many people seem to not want to handle cash, and as a result, cashless payments are more popular than ever. This reflection was submitted as part of the HIST30060 Making History project at the University of Melbourne. HIST30060.
• 
  2020-04

  ANZAC Day 2020

  Like many families we participated in a dawn service unlike any previously held this year. As gatherings and official ceremonies were cancelled people looked for alternate ways to commemorate ANZAC day. Across the country there was a movement to participate in a unified but socially distanced way. Lighting a small candle and observing the minute silence made us all feel a little more connected during the height of the Sydney lockdown.
• 
  2020

  The Warning Signs

  While COVID-19 restrictions became part of the everyday, it was at times difficult to keep track of their constant changes and revisions. Businesses started to put up signs outlining their policies for staff and clients to keep everyone safe. The first image is from a cafe in Potts Point, one of many local businesses put under strain by the pandemic. The second is from an aged-care facility in Woollahra in response to the beginning of the second-wave outbreak in Melbourne.
• 
  2020-07-22

  Not Wanting to Wear a Mask During a Pandemic

  HIST30060: Making History From 22nd July 2020, it became compulsory in Victoria for everyone to wear a properly-fitted face mask when out in public. This was indeed commonsense for a lot of people, many in the streets already starting to wear face coverings before the official ruling came into place. But just because it’s commonsense does not mean it is at all easy or comfortable or that it will not be the cause of what is now known as ‘mascne’. At first, the adrenaline rush of it all meant that wearing a mask felt kind of cool, and made everyone look like a spy, or at least made you feel like one. And it was quite entertaining to see people taking it all the way with their creative face coverings. But after a while, it was kind of annoying to put on a mask to take out your rubbish, made afternoon walks a bit more sweaty on the face (and noisy with the sound of your own muffled breath from being puffed, also caused by the reduction in exercise during quarantine). But with all the minor inconveniences of wearing a mask during a pandemic, you are mostly thankful it’s compulsory in your city, especially when someone on the bus coughs.
• 
  2020-11-09

  Covid-19 and Religious Observance

  Religious observance was one of the many aspects of daily life affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. In my home country of Bahrain, congregational prayers were prohibited in mid-March, in an effort to slow the spread of the virus. The Friday prayers were restricted to only a single mosque, Bahrain’s largest. Under normal circumstances, Muslim congregants would stand shoulder to shoulder in prayer. This was no longer the case as seen in the photo, social distancing and mask wearing was enforced. The Islamic call prayer (the Azan) was altered, the normal line summoning the faithful to prayer “come to prayer, come to good deeds” was instead replaced with the line “pray in your homes” (as seen in the attached video, which I recorded in Bahrain on). It was surreal hearing this for the time. The Covid-19 pandemic was the first event, at least in my lifetime, where this was done. Historically, this had precedents in times of plague. Moreover, the Muslim Hajj pilgrimage, which draws millions to the city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia every year, was this year limited to a symbolic 1,000 pilgrims. Having attended the Haj myself a decade earlier and been in the midst of the human masses that descend on Mecca, it was very strange to observe the images of the few socially distanced pilgrims which undertook the Hajj in late July 2020.
• 
  2020-07-20

  A Woman’s* Best Friend

  This represents what friendship means to me. My dog is my best friend and was the best supporter I could ask for during the 8 months Melbourne was in lockdown.
• 
  2020

  Jewish Melbourne: Bialik College Foundation fundraising projects for Covid-19

  Amongst its other fundraising efforts, Bialik College launched a special 'Covid-19 Relief' fundraiser: "Our goal is to ensure no child leaves Bialik College as a result of financial hardship caused by COVID-19. Help us make this a reality and support a family in need. We are all in this together." They also launched a fundraiser to create new outdoor spaces: "Help us transform our outdoor amphitheatre into a flexible event space. With current social distancing measures in place as a result of COVID-19, we need to think creatively to look for alternative ways to gather as a school community."
• 
  2020-03-16

  Virtual Campus

  I first heard my university would be transitioning to online teaching through the uni magazine's Facebook page on the 16th of March, an email from the uni following soon after. This felt appropriate for a time when decisions were being made in a seemingly hectic fashion and there was still so much speculation about how worried we needed to be and what measures needed to be taken. There had been 14 new cases of COVID-19 in Victoria on that date and the total number of cases in the state was 71. The photograph is of the deserted University of Melbourne campus in September when we were into our second semester of online teaching and Victoria was in it's second wave of the pandemic. It was eerie to see this area of the campus, usually filled with students socialising on the grass, so empty. (HIST30060)
• 
  2020-11-05

  Lethargic Lockdown

  HIST30060 - In reviewing this 'plague' year, I feel that there can be no simple way of explaining the whirlwind of emotions that seemed to fluctuate just as readily and sporadically as our daily covid- case numbers did back in April and May. My first uploaded image is a photograph I took of a note that was found in our letterbox in Balwyn, which we received on the 7th of April. Later we discovered it was made by two younger girls who lived at the bottom of our street, who had been writing similar letters for all our neighbours too! I felt it was very important in this unprecedented time to cherish the small acts of kindness, particularly given the emotional state of lockdown. Despite their relative insignificance, it is these small communal acts which I will cherish, which keep us connected to those around us, while ironically social distancing at the same time. Similarly, the young sisters who made the card are the same age as my niece, 9 years old. I often look at this card and think of how their youth has been irrevocably changed in this pandemic. My second image is a photo I took of Mills beach in Mornington on the 31st of July. I think it will always remind me of the occasion where I snuck down to the Beach, on the premise of doing some 'maintenance' at a family property, which was what I explained to the police who were patrolling the highway. My father has had his bouts with pneumonia in the past, so the family decided that if he could conduct his work from home, then it would be best to get of Melbourne. So my mum and dad were staying down the in Mornington from late March and came back to Melbourne around the start of November. Although we would routinely call eachother on zoom, this photo in a way commemorates the time where I had to sneak down to the beach in order to see them. Though a beautiful sunset at mills beach, there also is a sense of morbid beauty and unease to the photo. It was the only time I think I have ever seen such beautiful weather and calm water, with no boats or people in sight. The third image is a screenshot from a facebook invitation to a party which was created in early March. The guys that made the group event had originally planned to host a get together by December. I think in a sense this does give some explanation in regards to the expectations of corona, and the hysteria that was surrounding it in early March. I think as explained in the screenshot, although we didn't know what to expect, all we did know was that "the next few months are gonna be very long." Recently they updated the invitation from a party that will maybe happen in March next year. Although it may be some form of normality to look forward to, I think that this year more than any other we have learnt to prepare for the worst. Though it is currently listed to go ahead around March next year, part of me thinks it will be delayed again. My fourth image is a screenshot I took from an instagram page called "melb_lockdown," which was created in early April this year. It is an instagram page that features many artful collections of the Melbourne CBD area in black and white photographs. As one who often indulges in photography myself, I think the artist behind the instagram page is always trying to send a message with his work. I think what strikes me most is naturally seeing images of one of the 'most liveable' cities in the world, which is now devoid of the very things that have have given the city it's -claim-to-fame.' The once frenetic energy and vibrancy of the busy Melbourne CBD is now lifeless, colourless, and painfully mundane. My last image, is a meme that a friend of mine sent me. Similarly it is a an Instagram page called 'Covid 19 Funny Memes.' Though very funny, it also highlights a lot of the communal attitudes that have fluctuated and changed through out the pandemic. In late February/ early March, I believe that because it the pandemic was largely still a distant story that was affecting Europe more readily and Australia, it was something we really engaged in a kind of hysteria with. Because we hadn't experienced it, it was something we couldn't truly understand. Certainly these sought of humorous memes were not being created back then. But now I feel having lived with the pandemic for the last 8-9 months, people's attitudes have altered so much. I think because we are now more prepared to satirise, mock or create humorous memes is not to suggest that we have become apathetic towards the pandemic, but I think it shows that we are 'over it.' I think now living with this shadow over our lives for 8 months has taken its toll, and humour may be one way we can attempt to disassociate ourselves from this monotonous cycle.
• 
  2020-10-29

  Kmart Online Booking System

  My housemate and I looked in to opening hours once the stage four restrictions were lifted and retail could reopen. We were surprised to see that we could book online to get first preference in entering a Kmart store, which is a feature completely non-existent before the pandemic. Although necessary to ensure social distancing, booking online to enter a store further digitises our everyday lived experiences. This may not be an issue for people with access to the internet like myself, but it has the potential to further ostracise people with limited or no access to technology. HIST30060
• 
  2020-03-13

  The First Bomb Dropped

  I was on exchange in Edinburgh in the first half of 2020, and was forced to return home early because of COVID-19. These messages show 3 of my friends announcing in a Facebook group chat that they were heading home to Austria, which came as a huge surprise to the rest of us in the group. This was a sad, confusing, disorienting moment, which these messages demonstrate. HIST30060
• 
  2020-04-08

  Jewish Melbourne: The Plague Year Hypertext Haggadah

  An interactive hypertext haggadah I wrote for my family’s Zoom seder in 2020. I used Twine, a popular open-source, interactive fiction tool, to write a choose-your-own-adventure haggadah. It was the first zoom-based seder I had ever attended, and I didn't know how long my family would tolerate technological difficulties and the often awkward, fragmented conversation that some Zoom conversations/events can descend into. (Let alone the near-impossibility of group singing via zoom). Apart from this, it’s fairly common in my family, as in many others, that parts of the seder are skipped over, or their inclusion is contested, and I thought that trying to conduct a seder via zoom would only make people more eager to get it over with and reach Shulchan Orech, i.e. the getting drunk/ shittalking part and then call it a night. Writing/Compiling a hypertext haggadah was my attempt to facilitate a more fluid seder, in which parts could easily be skipped over on the night, among other reasons. In practice in turned out to be a bit of a shemozzle, which is partly due to some technological illiteracy among the mishpachah, and also partly because my hypertext haggadah is a rabbit warren (over 5,000 words spread over over hundreds of individual pages joined by hyperlinks), and so moments of anarchy would often ensue when people strayed from the communal path (which I enjoyed tbh, but were clearly frustrating to my uncle, whose ideal seder is basically the Two-Minute Haggadah: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2013/03/the-two-minute-haggadah.html)
• 
  2020-06-06

  Stop Black Deaths in Custody, BLM Protest - Melbourne

  An image from the BLM protest in Melbourne. A protest sparked by George Floyd's murder but rooted in issues in so-called Australia. Always was, always will be. The protest was a vindication for abolitionists. Several thousands of people congregating without a single case of transmission between protestors and all community-led, in spite of heavy police presence. Highly communicative organisers, quick-thinking marshals, and responsible demonstrators made it a powerful and safe day. It was deeply affirming to be surrounded by so many who see and are concerned about white supremacy in comparable ways to me, and also a time to listen to voices of the strong activists who ought to be centred in discussions around Aboriginal deaths in custody, decolonisation, and police/prison abolition. HIST30060
• 
  2020-07-14

  Access restrictions during Victoria's second wave, St Vincent's Hospital Melbourne

  A regular entrance to the hospital is closed and covered with posters with public health messages and information on access restrictions in response to Victoria's second wave of infections in July 2020.
• 
  2020-09-03T12:24+10:00

  Billie's House

  Over the past few weeks, my girlfriend and I have been watching the Australian TV Drama 'Offspring.' When I say watching, I probably mean obsessing. With nothing to do we would watch a few episodes a day and finished all seven seasons in around a month. We like the show particularly because it is shot in and around Fitzroy, a place where we would often catch up with out mates over a beer or in the park at Edinburgh Gardens, I think seeing the characters in Offspring be able to go for a pint at the Union Club Hotel gave us some sort of comfort, and the pub is top of our first visit list when they open again. As we tried to create entertaining walks we would look for some of the houses they shoot in and this photo shows one I stumbled upon on a run, Billie's house in later seasons. Like any show you like to be where they were, becoming part of the story yourself, and particularly when there was not really much of a story in our lives in lockdown, it was good to be part of theirs. Now that we've finished all seasons and are adrift in endless Netflix menus, seeing the houses returns me to that place of belonging I had.
• 
  2020-04-03

  Jewish Melbourne: Australian Jewish community management of COVID-19 pandemic – National Bulletin #3

  In the lead-up to Pesach, this update provides a summary of "the current status of Jewish community life in each State and Territory". It begins: "Jewish community organisations and leaders across Australia continue their efforts to manage the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Jewish institutions, families, individuals and, most especially, the elderly and vulnerable. We recognise with deep appreciation the continuing work being done by the Jewish community roof bodies in each State, the Crisis Management Teams of the Community Security Groups, shules, the Day Schools, the aged care sector, the welfare sector and volunteers, and commend them for the high sense of responsibility they have demonstrated. With the approach of Pesach, when families typically gather to celebrate the Seder, many individuals and families will be feeling the effects of physical isolation from relatives and friends. Perhaps in the future we will look back upon these times and appreciate all the more the joy of being able to celebrate Pesach with family and friends, and have all the more compassion for those who have nowhere to go on Seder night, and are all alone."
• 
  2020-04-29

  Jewish Melbourne: 'YG Melbourne Resumes Full Seder Virtually Amidst Coronavirus'

  This news update begins: "The Communists in Russia were not able to shut down Tomchei Temimim, and COVID-19 won’t shut it down either. The challenge today is different, but the mission remains the same, in what is surely Tomchei Temimim’s final frontier before Moshiach’s arrival. The Rebbe Rashab, the Frierdiker Rebbe, the Rebbe, and all the Temimim of old are looking to us, the final generation of Temimim, to carry the baton over the finish line. To that end, YG Melbourne resumed full Seder today via online platforms Zoom and Google Classroom, with the aim of supporting each Bochur in keeping a regular full day of Seder. Instead of reducing Torah study, YG’s full-service virtual Zal resumed Seder two days ahead of schedule. Seder was also opened up to all Bochurim enrolled in overseas Yeshivos who are stranded in Australia due to COVID-19 travel restrictions."
• 
  2020-03-31

  Jewish Melbourne: ' Rabbinical Council of Victoria (RCV) Pesach Guidelines regarding Covid-19 Situation compiled in consultation with the Melbourne Beth Din'

  This provides the Rabbinical Council of Victoria Guidelines for Covid-19 and Pesach, under a number of sections: Inviting guests for Yom Tov; Use of ZOOM for Pesach Seder; Yahrzeit Commemoration; Reaching out to the Vulnerable; Tzedaka – Charity
• 
  2020-04-11

  Jewish Melbourne: Pesach raid: police swoop on illegal minyan

  Newspaper article which appeared in the Australian Jewish News discussing the response to a group of "ultra-Orthodox individuals" who held a minyan on the first day of Pesach, despite social distancing laws which were meant to prevent such gatherings
• 
  2020-09-19

  Jewish Melbourne: 'Everyone wants to hear the shofar': ringing in Jewish new year in locked-down Melbourne

  article published in Guardian Australia, written by Elias Visontay, documenting Rosh Hashanah in Melbourne under lockdown
• 
  2020-04-03

  Jewish Melbourne: 'Zooming in on Pesach'

  Newspaper article by Rebecca Davis and Sophie Deutsch, published in the Australian Jewish News, explaining that "Religious organisations are reminding the community that they must not allow visitors into their homes for seders this Pesach, noting “these measures are about saving lives”."
• 
  2020

  Jewish Melbourne: South Caulfield Hebrew Congregation Kabbalat Shabbat and Havdalah

  During lockdown, South Caulfield Hebrew Congregation has been running online kabbalat shabbat and havdalah services, through zoom and streamed to facebook. One example of this from September can be seen here: https://www.facebook.com/SCHebrewCongregation/posts/2849524248601840
• 
  2020-09-14

  Jewish Melbourne: article in The Age - "Preparations under way for Jewish New Year - without synagogues and big dinners"

  This is a newspaper article by Carolyn Webb and Hannah Schauder, published in The Age on September 14, 2020, entitled "Preparations under way for Jewish New Year - without synagogues and big dinners". It covers what different rabbis and synagogues are doing for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur
• 
  2020-09-11

  Jewish Melbourne: Blake St Hebrew Congregation Shabbat Services

  Throughout the lockdown, as synagogues have been closed, Blake Street Hebrew Congregation has conducted Shabbat services via zoom, and shared videos on their Facebook page. At times this has involved singing with Moshe Hendel Feiglin for Mincha, which can be seen in this video.