Moving from a strict lockdown at the Philippines to Australia where life seems normal again

I think (and hope) this is the crisis of our lifetime. When grandparents speak about wartime, a crisis of that scale seemed like something we would never experience. That modern society and safeguards were somehow too developed to let something of that scale happen again. I’m looking forward to the day where we talk about COVID as a distant memory. Where I again feel that society is strong enough to deflect the next crisis. Read more

Giving birth during the lockdown

I´m happy the worst is over, but I´m very unsure about the future. Taking care of a four year old at home during the last months of my pregnancy while we were in lockdown was a big challenge. I´ll never forget seeing my husband with a face mask and protective suit waiting for me to give birth. Read more

When you visit your family and then got stuck in Spain for 3 months

In Gran Canaria it went from complete panic into a “nothing ever happened here“ attitude. It seems to me the government purposely let the situation escalate and get really bad so they could declare the state of alert and with it gain the power to change certain things in our constitution to gain more control. They tried to use the chaos to hide what they were doing behind the scenes. Read more

Living in the epicenter of the pandemic

United States is the epicenter of the pandemic with over 180,000 deaths and my home town of Miami is one of the worst hotspots in the country. We need more and faster tests, a system of contact tracing to measure outbreaks, and a PSA campaign on the need to wear masks. Read more

Bye bye koalas and kangaroos: About the challenge to get a ticket to leave Australia

Due to Covid19, I had to abort my semester abroad in Australia after a two-month stay and fly back to Germany. This decision was very difficult for me. Soon there was only one airline left to leave Australia with, but the seats were quickly booked up and very expensive. The German government sent Corona aid flights, but this was of no help to me as single travelers were not allowed to travel with the aid aircraft and there was no support at all. Read more