The pandemic continues…

As the pandemic enters it’s 53rd month (well, it feels like it!), nothing happened for a very long time, and then everything happened.

So, I’ll start the story where I left off – going crazy from all the nothing, wondering if I’ll ever make it to China, or even leave the house for longer than a trip to the grocery store, and thinking watching the squirrels is a great form of entertainment – and work my way up to the present.

I continued teaching online. I met tons of new students, most were good, a few were great and we had some very interesting conversations (One told me a story about a man in rural China who built a submarine! And it worked! Really well! So, he sold it to the government..?), and a few were really bad and either hated being forced to take the class and took it out on me, their poor teacher or just had no idea what I was saying.

Unfortunately, with the time difference between China and the US, I could only teach a few hours in the morning and then I’d have the whole rest of the day to do… nothing. I considered becoming nocturnal, but there was the occasional time that I needed to do something or go somewhere during the day. I also considered getting another job, but, well, pandemic and can take a while to get students when teaching online.

Since more work was out, and I still needed something to do, I tried improving my Mandarin. And for a while, it was a great way to pass the time and do something productive, and not continue to name the squirrels and make up little stories about their lives. However, after studying really hard for like a month, my brain decided to rebel and refuse to learn a single more new words, characters, grammar, or sentence structures I painstakingly tried to shove in there.

So, while I had improved my vocabulary a little, I had to give up and take a break from language learning. What was the point of learning a language that I was starting to realize I don’t like (all the words sound the same and so many characters are almost indistinguishable!) and I would probably never need to use as, at this rate, I’m never leaving my small town again?

All hope was looking lost. It was back to watching old TV shows and movies, dreaming of the outside world, and going slowly insane with my new squirrel friends. And I’d need another new plan for my life. Who wants a 4th career before 40?

But, finally, places locally started to open up, just a little. We were being allowed outside in places with other people, if we wore masks and stayed away from each other. Once outside, it was like everyone decided that we were beating the plague and staying at home for so long was boring. Everyone wanted to be outside and didn’t care about following the rules – so many people were not wearing masks properly and didn’t care if they stayed away from others.

There were only so many old TV shows I could watch without going completely and irrevocably insane. I needed to brave the outside world for my sanity. I tried follow the rules, at least a well as I could, and all the while I hoped I didn’t get sick.

In all that free time I had, I went to the local botanic garden to look at the pretty flowers, weird trees and water features. And, for a little excitement, I almost got run over by a lawn mower. It was the highlight of my month!

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And, for the next month’s wild and crazy time, I went to the zoo and saw some dinosaurs. Oh, and all the other normal animals in zoos, or at least the ones that were allowed to go outside. The zoo decided that people weren’t allowed in any of the buildings and not all animals were allowed outside. I got to see a lot of the African animals, but no penguins or monkeys/apes.

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After all that pandemic excitement, I didn’t know how I’d be able to top it. I mean what could be better or more exciting than plants and animals?

Luckily, soon after, I had an answer. China had decided to open its borders, at least a little bit…