Items

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  May 24, 2021

  Chronicles of the Plague Years

  [From the Introduction] For the students, faculty, and staff at Bronx Community College, March 2020 was a sucker punch to the gut. Our vibrant campus, a beautiful haven filled with vitality and life, became a kind of petri dish—ground zero for the COVID 19 virus to make landfall. Not only were many students and staff sickened in those early days, but the City University system was forced to close, then transition to remote learning in the space of a single week. It was a challenge, to say the least: for faculty who needed to quickly learn the tools to make it possible, and even more so for the students, who—cut off from socialization and in person learning—had to adjust to this new reality. Stranded in their homes, some students were forced to continue working frontline jobs, while others lost jobs and income, facing financial devastation. Students were confronted with their own illness as well as that of family members. Online learning was fraught in those early days. As a community, we improvised our way forward, without the proper technology and knowhow to do it. But two years on, our students have proven their resilience. In time, we adapted to remote learning, to new ways of doing things, of coping. 2020 was harder, and in 2021, the challenges continued. But, somehow, we got through. These student books provide a glimpse into the minds of the talented BCC Digital Design students who persevered, strived, and thrived.
• 
  2020-03-15

  Roller Coaster Ride

  The pandemic hit when I was in Saint George, Utah, for school. Being away from family and friends was by far the most challenging thing we had to go through. With everything shutting down and classes moving online, we were all confined to our rooms. Keeping in touch with our families through facetime and video chat, I was grateful that I still had the chance to talk to them. To make up for the lost holidays because of the pandemic, my friends and family began to send care packages. And one of my favorite gifts that my dear friend sent was this little plaque that I was able to hang on my wall during the shutdown. It says, "Life is like a Roller Coaster. It has Ups and Downs. You could either Scream or Enjoy the ride." It became my favorite thing to read whenever I was going through a rough time during the shutdown. Life is unpredictable, and so is the pandemic. I learned that I would either whine and complain about the pandemic and the shutdown or learn to accept it as another challenge in life. As the plaques said, I chose to enjoy some of the good things the pandemic brought, like self-meditation, catching up on my favorite shows, bonding with roommates, learning to cook/bake, and learning how to do tiktoks.
• 
  2021-04-22

  Hospice and hospitals during a pandemic

  This is a photo of my grandfather's glasses and a blanket given to him by one of the hospice nurses. He passed in April of 2021, not due to Covid. There were still a lot of Covid restrictions put in place by the hospital, and the hospice center. Everyone had to be checked in at the front desk, temps were taken, questionnaires filled out, and the number of guests at a time was limited. He was moved to a hospice facility down the road from the hospital that he had been in. I was spending 10-12 hours a day with him at this time. He passed very late in the night and the next morning I went to pick up his remaining items. Most I gave to my dad, but I kept the blanket and his glasses. This, I believe, shows a broader picture of the pandemic in relation to healthcare during this time. Everyday healthcare still was taking place, it couldn’t just stop, but they had to adapt. I’ve heard stories from social media and directly from healthcare workers about being exhausted due to the pandemic and Covid guidelines. All I can say is that even after being tired and working through horrible conditions for over a year, every person I talked to for the week that he was there was kind and caring. Healthcare for the last two years has focused a lot of Covid healthcare, which makes sense, but this, in my mind at least, serves as a reminder of the continuous healthcare that has always been happening. I am so grateful for the team of professionals that helped and cared for him that last week.
• 
  2020-04-24

  Gluten-Free Vegan Perogies

  My fiancé is vegan, so it's hard to find comfort foods that are also vegan and gluten-free. We spent a lot of quarantine days finding and messing around recipes that were gluten-free. We eventually ended up making the recipe, and even though the perogies were a little thick on the dough side (gluten-free dough can annoyingly do this sometimes). Many days were spent with my fiancé that I cherished, even though we never knew when I was going back to work. During this time, I'm sure most people felt like this. I think what was important was the reset we got when the stay-at-home orders were put into place. I think it made everyone realize the things we took for granted and the people that we saw every day.
• 
  2020-05-30

  The Two Sides of COVID

  COVID has a double-edged coin valuation for me. 2020 was one of the best years of my life. While that was true for me, the exact opposite was true for so many others around the world. The photograph that is contributed to this archive is one of me and my fiancé, who got engaged in March of 2020, with our two pets and our brand-new vehicle getting ready to drive cross country in May of 2020. I had been let go from my job due to the pandemic, but my fiancé received a promotion, but that promotion required us to move across the country from Los Angeles to Camden, Arkansas. We had been talking about getting out of LA for years and this seemed like a calling from a higher power that it was the right time. This picture symbolizes the pandemic from my personal perspective because this move was the easier move I’ve ever done because everyone was at home, rather than at the hotels, restaurants, and rest stops that we needed to travel to in order to reach our new home. However, it also gave us a unique perspective to see the country without all of the people in it. When we were driving across Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas it was shocking how little traffic there was and how there seemed to be no one around. When we took a flight to check out prospective homes, there was no one on it! It was very strange to experience the isolation of COVID-19 right at the beginning because when we moved to a new town, no restaurants or events were taking place to try and meet people. It became one of the loneliest years of my life. When 2021 came around, things got back to normal in Arkansas and life seemed to begin again. I look back at this photo and remember the excitement of something new, but also the loneliness and isolation it brought.
• 
  2020-07-17

  Going away to Paradise

  Going away to Paradise during the Pandemic was the most beautiful moment for me and my family. Connecting with nature and seeing the big blue sea of the Caribbean and its beautiful white sand beach. After all the hectic moments of surviving COVID and saying thanks to mother nature for its amazing glory. Thank you, God, and thank you to the great family that I have. #REL10
• 
  2020-03-26

  ITALY Covid-19 Lockdown

  In the summer of 2019, I officially went to Italy to live with my significant other. The transition to a new country was difficult, but I eventually made it. Throughout my adventure, I've met some wonderful individuals and seen incredible sights that I never imagined I'd see. The year 2019 was full of happiness, adventures, and meeting the most incredible friends whom I will remember for the rest of my life. My best friends from the United States came to visit me at the beginning of 2020, and we had no idea that as soon as they left, the entire country would be put under lockdown. Everyone has been talking about the COVID-19 and how it is affecting Asia as the beginning of March 2020 approaches. There was a word going around that we had a couple of cases in town, and those cases grew and swelled. Individuals did not possess masks, so everyone used whatever they had to cover their mouth and nose. The government announced a lockdown out of nowhere, masks were required to be worn inside the building, and people did not own masks. The government then declared a total lockdown, with people only allowed to leave their houses for essentials like the hospital, grocery store, or job. Except for grocery stores, nothing was open; whenever we leave our homes, we must fill out a paper stating where we are going and why, as carabinieri (police) are stationed throughout the city to stop those who leave their homes. Being stranded at home has its ups and downs, and it was critical to maintaining our emotional and physical health during this trying time. The lockdown lasted nearly two months, during which time Italy was placed under complete lockdown and declared a red zone. Everyone was suffering as a result of not being able to travel anywhere, much alone take a walk outside. It was a difficult situation, especially because we were in a foreign country and our families in the United States were concerned. When I went to the grocery store and stepped outside one time, it felt as if no one else existed; the roads were deserted, the air was still, and I felt as if I was the only one in the town.
• 2022-04-26

  Time Machine

  As many have most likely stated, living through the COVID-19 pandemic is like living in a time machine, or fast forward. At the beginning of the pandemic, I was an eighteen year old who had no idea where she was going after high school. I had about five outstanding college decisions at this point. I know - I applied to a lot of schools. Since then, it has been two years that flashed before my eyes. I am in a completely different state and a completely different person. However, it does not feel like two years have passed since I graduated from high school. I remember the last time I stepped foot in my high school. It was March 13, 2020. I was so stressed out about exams and was just ready to get out of there. I know now that if I knew it was my last real day of school, I would have lived it very differently. My graduating class (the class of 2020) was referred to as the pandemic class, or the champions of senior skip day. Believe it or not, my graduation was a drive through that took place in my high school’s parking lot. My senior prom was canceled twice. The second time, I was getting ready and Idaho (my home state) went back a COVID recovery stage. So, they canceled the dance two hours prior to its scheduled start time. Beginning college during a pandemic was a weird experience. We were not permitted to have guests in our dorms and had to eat our meals outside or in our own dorms. Making friends was so hard. My only friends were my suitemates until second semester. All of our classes were on Zoom. This made my parents question why they paid for my dorm. I still think it was worth coming to school last year because I made my life long friends here.
• 2022-04-26

  The Digital World and COVID-19

  The pandemic caught us all by surprise. At the end of the year 2019, a global event started that none of us were prepared to confront. A new, unknown virus was killing people all over the world, and it was making its way to the United States. As we prepared in whatever way we could, with what we knew at the time, the world started to shut down. Local mandates were advising us all to stay at home and to only leave if we needed to get necessities. With this, we all had to rely on technology to stay connected and to know what was happening in the outside world. We were all connecting through various platforms to work from home, attend classes, or simply to talk to our loved ones. The comfort of doing everything from home turned into a personal prison for many that were not used to being isolated. As the days turned into weeks, and the weeks turned into months, people were anxious and desperate for a sense of normalcy. With technology, we also got information and found resources that would help us navigate through this pandemic, and at the same time, we received misinformation that would eventually turn deadly for many. There was a huge focus by certain political parties to diminish the severity of the virus. In the United States, the conservative population (lead by former President Trump) believed that the virus was not dangerous, and they kept comparing it to a common flu. This conservative population was asking the rest of the population to not believe what the media was informing at the time. This created different perspectives linked to conspiracy theories that spread quickly through different social media platforms. For example: like COVID-19 being a production of the government to control the population, or simply that the virus did not exist at all. At this point, there was a huge part of the population that did not trust the guidance provided by local health authorities. There was information regarding a vaccine that could minimize the damage caused by the virus, and this was great news! Unfortunately, the vaccine encountered the same type of resistance that the previous prevention guidelines encountered. People did not believe in the effectiveness of the vaccine, and again, theories regarding the development of the vaccine started making their way through the internet. For example, some people believe that the vaccine is a chip implanted in our bodies so that the government can track us. In times of uncertainty, those who practice religion tend to turn to religion for comfort and guidance. In some cases, certain religious groups were advising their congregations to put all their trust in God, and that he would protect them from the virus, without the need of a vaccine. The clash of religion and science made it more difficult for the population to come out victorious from a very challenging time. More than 2 years later, and we are still seeing the effects of the pandemic in society. There is an emotional divide that lingers in our communities, not just a physical distance. Communities want to have their normal lives back but fail to realize that these are their normal lives now.
• 2022-04-26

  #REL101 COVID-19's Misery

  Wow, it’s crazy to think that COVID-19 has affected our entire world for a whole 2 years now. I remember when the pandemic had first started, and I was so lost and so confused as I had no idea what our world would come to. I remember being at work, I was working at a coffee shop at the time and my boss asking me if we should shut down or not. That day I came home from work with blistering hands from washing my hand so much because of the paranoia I was experiencing. The paranoia was not because of me or my feelings but it was because of the people that surrounded me and the way they had reacted to this illness that had spread so quickly across the globe. Life during the pandemic has been tough I lost my grandpa to COVID-19 in August of 2020, and it was one of the hardest and saddest time of my life. It was a huge shock and none of my family was expecting this at all, but it impacted us so heavily. Looking into power and how that has affected our world, I think immensely. With people in power not following rules and mask regulations because of the power trip they may have. It wasn’t fair to the rest of the world who didn’t have as much power to have to wear a mask when they were choosing not to. When it comes to religion, gatherings were impacted heavily, churches shut down and, on some occasions, churches decided to go online with their services. I don’t think it was fair for churches to have to shut down, but coffee shops could stay open, church and having that sense of belonging and purpose was stripped and taken away from so many people and so quickly. This was a crazy time and a time of so many unknowns and it sucks because we are still not done with this yet, there is still so much growth and rebuilding that needs to happen before we can fully be 100% okay again. Overall, COVID-19 has taught me a lot about our nation and how quickly things can get out of hand.
• 
  2022-01-10

  Journal from an NAU student

  My journal is a week by week deptiction of my everyday life going to college during an pandemic
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  2022-04-25

  COVID-19, Religion, and Public Life Reflection #REL101

  this is a look through my point of view living in the year 2020
• 2020-04-25

  Reagans Experience

  The pandemic was a crazy time but I believed it brought many people together. For example my whole family was home during quarantine, no one was away at school or work. This allowed us a whole summer to sit back and relax with one another. Particular things we did a lot was spend time outside by walking the neighborhood and spending time by the pool. We also enjoyed ordering to go food from local restaurants to help support them through the difficult time.
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  2022-03-02

  American Samoa COVID Cases Situational Report #6

  This is the sixth report released by the American Samoa Department of Public Health in regards to the rise of covid cases in American Samoa. As of March 2, 2022, positive cases have risen to 135 from 94 on March 1, 2022.
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  2022-03-01

  American Samoa COVID Cases Situational Report #5

  This is the fifth report released by the American Samoa Department of Public Health in regards to the rise of covid cases in American Samoa. As of March 1, 2022, positive cases have risen to 94 from 85 on February 28, 2022.
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  2022-02-28

  American Samoa COVID Cases Situational Report #4

  This is the fourth report released to the public by the Department of Public Health notifying the public of American Samoa of the number of cases that the island has as of February 27, 2022. From the past three reports, it seems as if from the past three days till now, the number of cases jumped from 22 to 85. While a summary is provided of the situation, upcoming events and health advisories are also included in the report for the public to continue to practice and where to get tested, vaccinated, or the booster shot.
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  2022-04-19

  GB Oral History, 2022/04/19

  The interviewee discusses vaccine hesitancy and life during the pandemic without having received the vaccine.
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  2022-02-02

  Engaged Couple Decide To Require All Wedding Guests To Be Vaccinated — Now Family Is Refusing To Comply

  This is a news story from Your Tango by Dan O'Reilly. This is about a couple that required all family members attending their wedding to be vaccinated. The issue with this is that the family does not want to comply to those wishes. This story was originally found in r/wedding on Reddit. According to the bride, her fiancé's family was on board with imposing vaccines, but the bride's own family is 50% vaccinated, with the unvaccinated thinking this is a dumb idea. This has been part of a controversial issue on if vaccines should be imposed. Most of the Redditors had sympathies for the engaged couple and believe it is what was needed for a safe event.
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  2022-02-18

  Covid Has Made Me Hate People

  This is a news story from Scary Mommy by Samm Burnham Davidson. This is a story written from the point-of-view of someone who has experienced some of the negative social effects of COVID. She says that before the pandemic, social media posts that annoyed her would only be mildly so, but with COVID and lockdowns, she started to feel senses of inadequacy compared to other parents. She thought that she needed to overhaul her entire wardrobe, her son should get ice skates, and that her four-year-old needs to learn to ride a two-wheeler bike. She has three young kids, and a 2020 baby. She describes feeling very isolated and the exposure to social media made her feel like she had to measure up to some imaginary standard of parenting, like trying to forgo all plastic toys for Christmas to help the environment. This is a good story for the perspective of mothers with many kids to take care of, resulting in even more isolation than what would happen for adults with no kids, as kids caused her to stay home more even before COVID.
• 2022-04-05

  Masks are still required in Mexico

  As someone who lives in a border town and travels to Mexico quite often, due to the fact that the U.S dollar in Mexico is twenty pesos, from an economic standpoint, it allows me to enjoy my time in Mexico quite well with my family. The only catch is that masks are required everywhere; it does not matter if you are fully vaccinated or not. As long as you keep using masks, you are good in Mexico, from tourism to recreational activities to travel across the country. It's something to consider when traveling to Mexico because I live 30 minutes away from the border to San Luis, Mexico, and sometimes I forget that I need to wear a mask in Mexico since they are no longer required in the U.S in 2022.
• 2020-04-08

  The Covid Birthday

  Back in April 2020, just after the whole Covid-19 outbreak began, it was probably one of the worst days of my life. For starters, I'm the son of one of the greatest mothers on this talent, I love my mother so much and would put anything aside for her every need. My mother's birthday is April 8th, so it's actually coming up this Friday, which is why I share this story with you. During the covid outbreak and til this moment, I have never had a positive covid test, not saying I may or might've not had it is beyond me. Unfortunately during the start of the outbreak in the Houston area, my mother was one of those unlucky people who caught covid early on and what made it worse was, it was about 2 days before her birthday. She was miserable from several illnesses attacking her body all at once, and there was nothing we could do for her except pray and wait. My mother laid in bed on her bday the entire day, she was running a fever, shivering from chills, and throwing up nearly every hour. She lost a lot of weight from this incident too and I was appalled by it all. On her birthday, I sat right outside her bedroom door the entire day and just talked with her while each of us wore a mask to try and prevent the spread within our own house. I would do anything for my mom, and I could tell that me staying with her all day to keep her company was something she most definitely enjoyed!
• 
  2020-04-08

  Neighborhood Sidewalk Art

  A few weeks into quarantine our neighborhood decided to decorate all the sidewalks and driveways with sidewalk chalk. This was a great way for the kids of the neighborhood to express themselves and feel a sense of togetherness, even though they were all apart. With the use of the neighborhood Facebook group, we were able to coordinate times for the kids to go around and check out all the cool sidewalk art and leave messages for their friends to read. This really made my son feel like part of something, as a kindergartener he was just getting used to being in school, and then after Spring Break he was not able to return to class and we had to get creative. This neighborhood art project was a bright spot in a very difficult and uncertain time.
• 
  2022-03-10

  Why have women been so disproportionately affected by Covid-19? Experts explain

  This is a news story from CNN by Alice McCool. This story talks about the inequalities women have faced during COVID-19. In a CNN poll, women in the G7 countries (US, UK, France, Germany, Canada, Japan, and Italy) felt less supported by their leaders than men did. Some of these inequalities include women being more likely to lose their jobs or take on more uncompensated care work. Other things, such as abortion services, were considered non-essential in some countries during COVID. Minority women and poor women were also more likely to work low-paying jobs and bear much of the economic strain. Additionally, trans healthcare was also viewed as non-essential in many places. In places like Uganda, many women lost their safety net provided from schools, resulting in rising teen pregnancies and early marriages. This article continues showing more examples of the hoops women had to jump through compared to men and demonstrates the social issues that got worse as a result from COVID lockdowns.
• 
  2020-12-14

  Holiday Care Packages

  Three years ago, COVID-19 barred many people from traveling back home, and my roommates and I were one of those people. We all came from American Samoa, and while we planned to return home for the summer, thanksgiving, and Christmas, we could not do that. I remember working a part-time job during school to save up just enough to pay for my roundtrip fare, but unfortunately, COVID changed that. Although we could not have the chance to return home for the holidays, our families made it possible to bring the taste of island snacks to St. George with the constant sending of care packages. The photo I uploaded showed one of the many care packages my family sent me from home, which meant a lot to me. My roommates and I were very homesick, but our families came through with the snacks from home. I remember eagerly checking and refreshing the USPS app to track my package. It became my favorite thing to do during the COVID shutdown.
• 
  2020-12-10

  Lumpia During COVID-19 Shutdown

  This picture is when my roommates and I cooked lumpia in St. George, Utah, and classes were all moved online during the shutdown. We ended up with a lot of time on our hands during the shutdown, and we decided to cook and bake our favorite recipes, and lumpia was one of them. While COVID-19 changed our educational experience, it also changed our eating habits because we used to depend on ordering food a lot that we hardly used our shared kitchen in our dorm room together. This was one of my favorite memories with my roommates because, through food, we were able to spend more time preparing recipes, cooking them, and eating them together, unlike before. While COVID shut down everything, it gave us more time to bond together as roommates through food.
• 
  2022-04-01

  Living Through the Pandemic

  One thing that really stands out to me when I look back on the past two years since the pandemic began is how much fear there was at the onset. I remember it being about mid-March of 2020 and schools had moved to online learning, all nonessential businesses were closed, and it was almost impossible to find even basic groceries. The overwhelming majority of people were wearing some sort of face covering at this point and just the act of going outside felt dangerous. I should point out that since I work in the aerospace and defense manufacturing sector I was classified as an essential worker without the possibility of working remotely. Given that all of my friends had jobs that had moved to remote work and could isolate in their homes I felt that it was too risky to be around them given that I was out every day. I think that it is interesting that this was the state of affairs when there were maybe 1000 confirmed cases in the state of Arizona at this point. When contrasted with the reality that there have now been a total of over 2 million confirmed cases with approximately 25,000 currently active cases and for the most part everyone is going on with life as normal, I am left wondering if the fear at the beginning was irrational or if the current sense of complacency is the result of a society worn down to the point of indifference?
• 
  2020-12-25

  New Traditions

  The pandemic marked a turning point for my family. A few weeks before the March 2020 lockdown, my grandmother was hospitalized then placed in her final nursing home. Although my family knew the Alzheimers and cancer were progressing, we never expected a pandemic to make letting go even more difficult. Shortly after her arrival in the nursing home, the building closed down for all outside visitors. For the entire summer of 2020, my family and I had to watch grandma through a screened window. By the time we were finally able to go inside the nursing home to touch her again, it was only because her time was coming to an end. By then, my grandmother only recognized my grandfather, the rest of us were strangers. My grandmother was in many ways the glue of our family. To lose her at a time when we could not see each other in person at holidays was extra difficult, but we adapted and even started new traditions. As a Polish family, we always have pierogi and fish on Christmas Eve and we usually purchased our pierogi from local churches that handmade the delicious dumplings every year. However with the pandemic, most churches did not sell pierogi in 2020 to protect their older community members who made the pierogi. Therefore, we decided to attempt for our first time to make our own pierogi from scratch. Admittedly, the pierogi we made in 2020 were not the best (and we made over 300 of them!), but we did not give up. In December 2021, our families could once again gather in person – our first Christmas together without grandma. We made our own pierogi, and this time my cousins were able to join and help. Not only did the pierogi turn out much better in 2021, but a new tradition became cemented. Although the pandemic provided many hardships, I can't help but be thankful for the two years of stillness and uncertainty it provided. The pandemic allowed me to return to my hometown, reconnect with my family, and start a new chapter in my family's history. I think my grandma would be really proud of our new tradition.
• 
  2020-05-10

  Where's Covid?

  A comic strip about Covid-19
• 
  2020-04-15

  That mean virus

  A comic strip about Covid-19
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  2022-03-25

  Virginia's Law Barring Mask Mandates Does Not Apply to 12 Children with Disabilities

  A news article from NPR talks about the parents of 12 children that challenged the newly signed law by Governor Glenn Youngkin to halt the enforcement of that law because it violated the children's rights under the federal American with Disabilities Act. This law would only give parents the right to choose for their own children. The group of parents have kids with health conditions that range from asthma to cystic fibrosis, which put them at heightened risk for COVID-19. What about other kids that have health conditions that make them a heightened risk for COVID whose parents didn't say their federal rights were violated?
• 
  2022-03-28T08:40

  Covid the Great Destabilizer

  My personal experience
• 
  2020-05-06

  Graduating Without the Pomp: Students, parents push back against virtual and drive-through graduation ceremonies

  My oldest daughter is now a senior in high school, and she is still pretty upset that she didn’t get to have a junior prom. She understands that in the context of everything happening in the world, it’s not the most important or most tragic thing that could happen, but it still stings. For many students, it’s the milestones like prom and graduation that make the whole four years worthwhile. If the milestones that high school students look forward to can’t be held, it can affect them deeply. As schools closed and Covid-19 became a fixture in our everyday lives, school events like sports, proms, and graduations went away. Some schools held virtual graduations featuring videos and speeches over Zoom. Others attempted to maintain an atmosphere of celebration by holding drive-up graduations with decorated cars and parking lots. However, many students and parents were upset by this change. While this is understandable, most school districts prioritized the health and safety of students, families, and staff over having an in-person ceremony. This article helps to capture some of the frustrations seniors expressed in 2020 when their hopes of walking the stage and receiving their diploma seemed to vanish overnight.
• 
  2022-01-07

  Americans adopted millions of dogs during the pandemic. Now what do we do with them?

  As one of many people who adopted a pet during the pandemic, this article resonated with me in many ways. It discusses how people transitioning from remote work at home and returning to the office are trying to ensure that the change is smooth for their newly acquired pets as well. Many of the pets – especially dogs – are not accustomed to being left along for lengths of time and are experiencing separation anxiety. As a result, some pet owners are trying to ensure that their animals have care while they at work. Unfortunately, this is easier said than done due to overbooked facilities and some animals with behavioral issues due poor socialization as a result of the pandemic. This article does a nice job capturing some of the struggles pet owners are experiencing now as they attempt to return to normalcy and some of the services available to keep them happy and occupied as they adjust.
• 
  2020-01-08

  Baked Breadfruit

  Baked breadfruit is a typical Samoan traditional food. Fully ripe breadfruit is baked or boiled for Samoans to enjoy as a common staple starch. Samoans eat breadfruit for everyday meals and in large feasts or celebrations. The video shows my family setting the baked breadfruits on the table to cool down before packing them to be sent over with my cousin leaving the island. Before the pandemic, whenever one of our close friends or family members left the island, my family always prepared baked breadfruits for them to bring over to us here in the states. Now, we could only enjoy the sight of it through video chats with my parents back home. To prepare for this delicious delicacy, we prepare everything the day before the cooking. If you are to visit Samoa, Sunday is the day when every family is baking breadfruit. Sundays are considered feast days or holidays in Samoa. We enjoy baked breadfruits every Sunday after church and other delicious home-cooked Samoan dishes. While we can also enjoy baked breadfruits here in the states using an oven, we can barely find any excellent, fully ripe breadfruits in-store in Washington. And besides, I know it will never bring the same taste as I grew up enjoying back home.
• 
  2020-05-09

  Successful Homemade Cake Donuts

  In May of 2020, it was the middle of the pandemic and I wanted to try and make homemade donuts. Everyone else in lockdown was making homemade bread, but I wanted to do something a little more sweet. With that, I searched on Amazon for molds that someone could use to make the circular donuts. I knew without them, the donuts would not come out well. Once the molds were delivered and using a box of cake mix, I tried to make donuts. Now, you would think the second picture of Devil's Food favored donuts was the first batch, but no it wasn't. My first batch came from Funfetti cake mix (my favorite boxed cake mix), but it was a disaster. The donuts got stuck in the mold and would not come out until I used a butter knife. It left a mess because only part of the donut came out sometimes. I was disheartened because since I had time on my hands, I thought I could make donuts because the recipe I found was easy to follow. I gave up for awhile but decided later on to try again. In January of 2021, the date for the second photo of the Devil's Food donuts, I succeeded. I had sprayed the molds thoroughly and took my Mom's suggestion to spread flour around in the molds. I was proud that my second batch of donuts came out successfully!
• 
  2021-10-20

  Birthday Presents from my Best Friend

  This picture shows the presents I received from my best friend Alex back in October of 2021. Normally, I would have two parties for my birthday; one with family and one with friends. Alex would normally be part of the friend party or possibly a separate party of our own. However, due to COVID, that was not meant to be. Alex wanted to keep healthy in order to keep seeing her nephew, so it was for the best to not hold the party this year. Instead, we decided to meet up on my birthday for about a half-hour to hand out my presents. She gifted me with four figures of Princess Aurora from Disney's Sleeping Beauty. Aurora is my favorite Princess and I was so happy to add these figures to my collection! I am glad that we were able to talk for at least a short time before she had to go home. I hope that in 2022, we can actually hold an in-person birthday party for my birthday and her's as well.
• 
  2020-12-22

  First Christmas not with Family

  This is a picture of the first Christmas tree that my brother and I bought to set up in our apartment. It is a small tree because I figured we did not need a big one since we had a small number of ornaments to hang up. This tree also represents Christmas 2020, the year of COVID-19 and the first year we did not spend Christmas Eve with our parents. My Mom has an auto-immune disease and she could not go out much in 2020. However, at some point, she either went out or COVID was brought home. She ended up in the hospital a day or two before Christmas and tested positive for COVID. Therefore, it was for the best for my brother and I to not go home on Christmas Eve. I was disappointed we couldn't go see them. However, my brother and I decided to order Shari's, a diner restaurant local to Washington and Oregon, for dinner. We didn't see them that day, but we were able to go over the next day to open presents and not much else. Not the best Christmas, but I suppose it could have been worse.
• 2021-04-21

  Grieving a non-covid death

  My grandfather on my dad’s side passed in April 2021. It’s coming close to a year mark at my time of writing this. I think that being in a time surrounded by so much death and loss that we have forgotten about those who have died during this time unrelated to Covid. He had suffered kidney failure in late 2013/early 2014, that part of my life is blurry in memory so I don’t recall exactly, but he had been on dialysis ever since. It’s been hard to talk about his passing, everyone assumes that death in the last two years always has to do with Covid. Death is never easy to talk about, but it is inevitable for every living creature. My grandfather was old and had been sick for a long time, he lived a long and happy life. I don’t mean that in some cheesy way, he truly did. I carry a tremendous amount of guilt surrounding his death. Due to Covid restrictions, I didn’t get to see him for a year leading up to the week that I spent with him while he was in the hospital, then hospice. I still think about him all the time and the last days that I got to spend with him. I don't think I'll ever get to have that closure I want due to this. It’s almost as if we had expected death due to illness, accident, age, anything else, expected to stop. Yet, death of all causes never stops.
• 
  2021-01-28

  Freezer Failure

  January 28, 2021, around 11 PM one of my friends called me, we normally don’t talk on the phone so I assumed something was wrong. I could tell that she was driving and her voice was shaky. She told me that a freezer had failed at her mom’s work and that around 1,300 vaccines would be expired by 5 or 6 AM. She was told to try to get anyone she knew to get to the hospital in order to reduce the chance of wasting such a hard to get thing. This was prior to my state lifting restrictions on who was eligible for the vaccine yet. Not everyone could get it, just certain people due to age, pre-existing conditions, and career. The clinic did a good job at still trying to make sure that people who were eligible got to the front of the line, but they knew that they needed to make sure every vaccine was used. My girlfriend and I would not have made it there in time since we were over 3 hours away, but her family all lived within a 30-minute drive. We started calling her parents and brothers to wake them up and get moving. Her mother, oldest brother, and soon to be sister-in-law were all teachers and were going to have to start teaching in person again. None of them would have been eligible until a month or more after going back in person, and they were all decently nervous about being in person unvaccinated. Her family got lucky and was able to get vaccinated that night. I cannot thank my friend enough for calling me to keep the people who have become my family safe.
• 2022-03-21

  Logistics in the COVID Era

  Logistics and Transportation have seen dramatic changes since the beginning of the pandemic, and as such, my life has drastically changed as well. When the pandemic started, I worked for a trucking company that had grown into a major corporation. With all of the uncertainty in the world, I decided to bet on myself and leave that job to start my own company. This is how my life has changed since then, and what a typical day in my world looks like now, which is much different than it looked at the beginning of 2020. I wake up at 6 am and grab my laptop, I then log in to my load boards and post the loads I have to work on for the day. 90% of my business is done over email, so I am able to get my work started before I even start to get ready for the day. I then have time to talk with my wife as we get ready, answering emails as we go. When 8 am rolls around, I wake up my two sons, ages 8 and 1. We have family time in the morning, eating breakfast and watching the news before my wife heads off to her Law School. I then take my boys to their respective schools and drop them off for the day. At this point, if I have any errands to run I usually try to knock those out. I then head home and start bidding on new loads for the days to come. And since most of my work is done over email, I am able to knock any household chores out that need to be done for the day. When lunch rolls around I like to meet my wife for a quick bite some days, and other days I eat a simple lunch at home. I am usually able to wrap up most of my business by 3:30 pm and head to pick up my 1-year-old son from his school. When we get back home, we meet my 8-year-old son as he is getting off the school bus around 4:15. We have some father/sons time, and my wife usually arrives back home around 5:30 pm. Once we have dinner, I then get to work on whatever schoolwork or reading I need to do, and then a little more family time before bed. Since the pandemic forced/allowed me to take on this new opportunity, I am able to see my family much more than I did when I was spending 50+ hours per week in an office, with another 5 hours spent commuting. The pandemic has been awful for a lot of reasons, but as a silver lining, I hope that we have learned how to be more efficient with our time and to realize that the bulk of our waking hours do not necessarily need to be spent in an office when we can accomplish the same amount or more remotely, while greatly increasing our mental health.
• 
  2022-03-20

  A Day in the Life of the Pandemic

  My daily routine has definitely been affected during the COVID-19 pandemic in multiple ways. During the height of the pandemic when most classes at ASU were virtual, I took advantage of the fact that I didn’t have to leave my house and got used to sleeping in late most days I could do so. I also noticed that as a result of being home all the time, I tended to order less food out, and regularly started making my meals on my grill again. Unfortunately, another thing I began to notice is that since began isolating at home, I have been very tempted to procrastinate on the work I have to do for classes. As a result, I sometimes had a hard time getting started on my classwork in a timely manner, so I would end up stressed trying to submit it closer to the deadline than I would have preferred. Additionally, since I have been stuck inside more than I would like, I have been using my bench and dumbbells much more to keep in shape. COVID-19 has also just made me instinctively feel very naked without a mask on, and it has just become a habit to wear one everywhere at this point. On another related note, I also have made it a habit to avoid large groups or crowds of people in general because of COVID-19, so I unfortunately not seen any live music since the start of the pandemic. I have however gotten into the habit of playing more music and video games, which has been a fun way to keep myself occupied when I am not busy with work or school. Although my daily routine definitely has changed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, I have gotten used to it in the many months that have passed since it began.
• 2022-03-20

  Day in the Life, Post COVID

  Now that it seems the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic is over, it is interesting to look back and see how the quarantine, rules, and regulations have changed our day-to-day lives. For me, I would say that it has changed many aspects of my day-to-day, here is a list of my routine and how it is different from before COVID. 1. I make coffee at home every morning. I hand grind whole beans and methodically use a French press. This came from not being able to get coffee at a coffee place on the way to work during covid lockdowns and closures. This one really is better; I save money and get to have better coffee. 2. I listen to one of the many podcasts I am subscribed to now on my commute to work. Prior to covid, I never really listened to podcasts but started to during the lockdown as there was literally nothing else to do. Again, I see this as a positive. Now I am learning things when I would usually just be listening to the same songs over and over. 3. As I walk into work I check to make sure I have a mask, even though it has been over a month since we have had to wear one indoors. It still feels weird not wearing a mask sometimes and I have little panic moments occasionally when I realize I don’t have a mask on me, then remember I don’t need one. I think that a lot of people experience this same thing. COVID changed a lot for people and many things will be the new normal. 4. My workday really did not change because of covid. Due to the nature of my work in the military, we did not have the opportunity to telework as we need access to certain systems that cannot be accessed from the regular internet. So I think there is probably resentment in there, seeing stories of people being able to work from home and spend more time with their families. Though other parts of the workforce, such as the service industry also did not have the opportunity to telework. I think it will be interesting to see if teleworking stays, I hope it does as it seems to have a lot of benefits that I would like to experience. 5. Another thing I do every couple of weeks is going for a drive. I never did this prior to COVID, but I would do it at least once a week to get out of the house in a way that wasn’t just going to and from work. Even though now I can go places and do stuff, I still find myself just wanting to go on a drive and clear my head. 6. I go home and make dinner. I never really ate out before covid, but my cooking skills greatly increased during the covid lockdown as I used cooking like a hobby, branching out and trying to make a bunch of different things. This was also a positive as now I can make a wider array of meals. The pandemic has forever changed our lives and though we may not think it, if we go through our daily routine, we can see things that echo that time. Hopefully, we can find that the changes are positive.
• 
  2022-03-20

  Cooking During the Pandemic

  This is one recipe I learned to make during the pandemic. It is a chicken pot pie with a biscuit topping (that I luckily did't have to make myself). I've made many things over the course of this pandemic. Restaurants became too much of a hassle for a while in 2020, and many weren't even open. I used to go out to eat more often before the pandemic, but with me starting school again in the fall of 2020, in addition to masks being very annoying for me to want to wear, I would either order takeout, or make food myself. Between school and the pandemic, cooking has become one of my favorite hobbies, as I need to eat anyway, and I have been able to try types of food I didn't know I'd like. Prior to the pandemic, I would not eat pickled things as often, but now I seek it out with recipes to try. I also learned some new skills, like discovering I can make the non freezer variety of jam, and how to use cast iron the right way. I maybe would have learned these skills later on anyway because I enjoy cooking, but being at home more has made me want to try more recipes. Contrary to the stereotype, I did not learn how to make sourdough from scratch during the pandemic, but my dad did, and now he's on a kick with making sourdough bread weekly when he is home. Cooking has been one constant I have had, and I did it before the pandemic, but currently, I am doing it more often to save money and learn more skills. I intend to teach my kids in the future on how to cook things. It's more than a hobby for me though, as the better I can cook, the less likely I am to want to spend money on takeout. With rising prices of food in 2022, knowing how to cook has been a blessing.
• 
  2020-09-08

  Remote Learning

  This was my son on his first days of remote learning in Kindergarten. He was a great trooper and worked hard to have the sense of being in school. Some days were more difficult than others, but overall we made it through and we continue to prosper through this pandemic.
• 
  2022-03-20

  Work, Food, Viki, and Home

  If there were anything that COVID changed in my everyday schedule, it would be helping me get closer to family. Ever since the pandemic, we have hardly gone outside the house unless it was for work or shopping for groceries. A typical day in my life would be waking up to check my emails and messages. After moving from Utah to Washington after graduating, I managed to find a job at a small business called Sozo Gifts while pursuing my master's program. I wouldn't say I am not a breakfast person, so I go straight to work after getting ready. After work, I go straight home to help my sister cook dinner. When I was living by myself, I ordered food a lot through Uber Eats and Door Dash. Being with my family during the pandemic helped me change my eating habits. We cook traditional Samoan food such as baked taro, pisupo, palusami, fai'ai pilikaki, or traditional chicken soup. After dinner, we all tend to gather around the living room and watch the latest episodes of our favorite Korean Drama. My sisters were never fans of KDrama before the pandemic, but I managed to introduce them to my favorite app, Viki Rakuten. Now, we binged watched a lot of KDramas through the Viki app, and it became our favorite thing to do as a family after dinner. I was supposed to go back home to American Samoa after graduating with my bachelor's. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic and strict lockdown and regulations back home, I wasn't able to return. But almost every evening, we would video chat with my parents and close friends back home. Now and then, my friend would send me pictures of the island. I never planned to stay in the states this long, but the pandemic has caused some setbacks and changes in my life. However, I learned to adapt to new changes, and it became a routine for me while also being grateful for letting me spend time with my family here in Washington.
• 
  2022-03-20

  Jason Inskeep, A Day in the Life of the COVID-19 Pandemic

  A Day in the Life of the COVID-19 Pandemic, 2022 edition: After two years of living in this pandemic, Dr. Kole de Peralta from Arizona State University, has asked me to ponder on how my day-to-day life has changed (or not changed) because of the pandemic. There are a handful of routine activities in a normal day that I will examine: dropping my daughter at school, conversations with my wife about her work, yard work, grocery shopping, my own workday, and extended family interactions. Several of these subjects I have reflected on before, but others I have not put much thought into. Dropping my daughter off at school: Ignoring the early pandemic stage, i.e., online school for my daughter, for the last year my daughter has been attending middle school in person. Before the pandemic this was a simple task of getting into the car, driving, and dropping her off. However, the process has evolved into making sure that she has a mask or two on her, as until recently masks were mandatory. Multiple times we have had to run back home or to the store due to forgetting a mask. This had added another layer to our morning routine. However, I must note, she is a stellar example of selfless health consciousness. Even when she does not have to wear a mask, she is typically the one that will, even reminding me. Interestingly, masks are no longer mandatory in her school, yet she still wears them and complains about the kids who do not. While a daily routine was altered for our family, she also appears to group kids into masks wearers and non-mask wearers. Conversations with my wife about her work: My wife is a 3rd grade teacher. Pre-pandemic she checked in occasionally with how her day was going, how the kids were behaving, or just to check on our dogs. Until last week, masks were still required at her school. As she works at a school for the deaf, this caused many communication and behavior issues. Most of our conversations have become about how difficult it is to sign to the children in her class without the necessary component of facial emotion for inflection or the equivalent of intonation. Or she will also discuss how the kids act about the masks. Ironically, when they removed the mask requirement last week, she then texted me that she felt vulnerable, even though she knew it was better for her and the kids’ communication. While this obviously affected my wife more than me, the pandemic has changed how families talk about work and school. Rather than, “how was your day at school,” questions changed to “did the kids wear masks and did anyone get isolated?” Yard work: In late 2019 I developed a horrible sinus infection that caused eye issues and facial pain. I discovered later this was likely from trimming poisonous Oleander bushes without a mask on. I also routinely mowed the yard with no mask. I often had some form of face or noise pain before that, which looking back sounds idiotic. I likely would have worn a mask if I had one sitting around, but it always became an issue of realizing I needed one and lazily just wanting the work completed. However, as an “essential worker,” my company supplied my family with an endless supply of masks. Today, now that masks are readily available, I find myself wearing them during yard work and my sinus issues have all but been eradicated. Grocery Shopping: My family used to shop as a crew, now my wife and I take turns because of the pandemic and continue two years later. This has changed a weekly routine, but I am ok with it. Here is a link to a previous archive item that included this discussion, https://covid-19archive.org/s/archive/item/46478. My workday: A typical workday for me as a shift technician worker, pre-pandemic, would begin and end with a pass down meeting with our night shift. The meetings took place in one room with approximately ten people, in a central location. We would then cram as many people as would fit into golf carts and separate to four different factories for our workday. Additionally, we would sit at desks, perform routine maintenance, and assist each other throughout the day, all within cross proximity. After the pandemic, started people began getting sick and getting each other sick. I work in the semi-conductor industry and there was a parallel surge in demand for chips. Beyond just our health, it was apparent that if people were not separated, it was possible that our mega-site could negatively affect the global chip supply chain and my employer’s bottom line. Thus, jobs like mine were made “essential” and safety rules were vastly improved. Other “non-essential” people began to work from home to make the site safer for essential work. Even today, we meet in four different control rooms rather that all in one room, with ¼ the people, wear masks unless eating, cannot ride more than one person in front and one person in the back of golf carts, and must perform complex maintenance tasks six feet apart and if this is not possible wear supplied air masks. While management may remove some of the safety regulations soon, things have become more complex at my job and manufacturing industries because of COVID-19. I also have to walk up to one to two miles a day due to golf cart rules, which is probably not a bad thing. Extended family interactions: The pandemic is slowly wanning. Rather than stopping by my parent’s house or simply all agreeing to have dinner as a family for a birthday on a certain day, as it was before the pandemic, things have changed. My family spends a fair amount of time to discuss how everyone is feeling and if we should cancel before we meet if someone is sick. Thus, all our plans are much more complicated, and we find ourselves meeting up as a family less out of caution. COVID-19 has altered the type and frequency of my extended family’s interactions. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed my days. However, it seems to me that I, and those around me, always adjust to situations that at first seem so stressful. Humans are highly adaptable, even to extremely spontaneous and stressful situations. Even more than we give credit to ourselves for. This exercise shows some things I had not even thought about, because I did not have a choice and just adjusted. Which is surprising because I am known as the biggest worrier!
• 
  2022-03-20

  A Day In The Life

  Every day things that run through my head that have changed since the start of the COVID-19 Pandemic
• 
  2022-03-16

  Navigating through COVID-19: A Personal Vlog of Ashley Hampton

  Spend a day with me as you see me (Ashley Hampton) navigate through a normal day in present COVID-19 in Anderson, South Carolina. I vlog about my workplace, shopping centers, and businesses in Anderson to give perspective of how COVID-19 has changed the way these institutions function on a day-to-day basis. Despite statewide coverage, not much is documented about South Carolina and COVID-19 in this archive, let alone, residential experiences. The objective of this video is added to the South Carolina COVID archive as well as highlight how personal experiences with COVID-19 may vary depending on which region you live in and community.
• 2022-03-13

  The Virus That Slowed Us Down

  I was worried before the virus as to what would happen to the world if we just kept moving forward like we were. It seemed that the world was in the motion of forward, keep going going going going. Do not stop, do not stop, keep moving forward. In a way the virus showed us more than we could have ever asked for. Once we were all stripped of the things we all enjoyed and loved, things changed. We were introduced to new things that we did not feel or experience again because we left them behind in our continuously moving forward lifestyle. The people that needed to do some internal viewing was able to stand back, and work on themselves. The people that did not know where they were going in life had a chance to breathe and catch up with the state of the world. Do not get me wrong, the virus was the worst thing to happen to our society...but it also showed us that we are all not different. Sadly some aspects of it were politicized and given a merit for your views, but in the end, the people that took it for what they could .. learned. We become better fathers, better mothers...better friends, better siblings,, a better us. We seen the things we were missing that were in-front of us all along and that was each other. The virus forced empathy upon us and everyone around us. The world will forever be changed by the one thing we could never fight against and that was ourselves.
• 
  2022-03-07

  Sam Beeson Oral History, 2022/03/07

  I spoke to Sam at the Arizona Historical Society's 2nd annual Covid Remembrance Event. Sam was with his son, Alex. Alex did not wish to be interviewed but he gave permission to have his health information included in the interview. He was present during the interview. Sam describes his family life during the initial lockdown, how he kept working at the hospital but his wife and son stayed home. Sam called himself the "hunter gatherer" during that time as he was the one getting groceries and running errands. He describes how he got the first dose of his vaccine but also got infected with COVID at the same time. His symptoms were mild, but his son and wife had different experience. Sam describes losing his wife to Covid. He also describes how he has dealt with his grief and anger by joining a support group and Marked By Covid group. He shares his story as a way to honor his wife.