Our re­port to­day co­mes from the Ta­la­gan­te re­gi­on of Chi­le. This ent­ry high­lights the ne­ga­ti­ve ef­fects of the pan­de­mic in the coun­try and de­s­cri­bes the struc­tu­ral in­e­qua­li­ties that fuel the cri­sis. Alt­hough the coun­try has ex­pe­ri­enced a strong eco­no­mic ups­wing sin­ce the end of the dic­ta­tor­ship, in­e­qua­li­ty and thus po­ver­ty are still ve­ry pre­va­lent. This is al­so shown by the fact that sin­ce the pan­de­mic be­gan, the­re has be­en an in­cre­a­sed need for cha­ri­ta­ble food sup­plies, as ma­ny peo­ple can­not af­ford enough for them­sel­ve­s.

To­day­'s blog ent­ry co­mes from Spain, the ca­pi­tal Ma­dri­d. An­drea­'s sto­ry ma­kes it clear how dif­ferent­ly peo­ple deal with the qua­ran­ti­ne si­tua­ti­on and so­ci­al di­stan­cing, and how this can change over time. Espe­ci­al­ly in so­ci­al con­texts, the pan­de­mic con­fronts us with com­ple­te­ly new ex­pe­ri­ences. For ex­am­ple, fri­end­ships de­ve­lop which might not ha­ve exis­ted in nor­mal ti­mes.

Va­len­tin Sag­vosd­kin ist wis­sen­schaft­li­cher Mit­a­r­bei­ter am In­sti­tut für Öko­no­mie der Cu­sa­nus Hoch­schu­le für Ge­sell­schafts­ge­stal­tung und Haup­t­or­ga­ni­sa­tor der neu­en Ring­vor­le­sung. Grund ge­nug ihm ihm ein paar Fra­gen zu stel­len.

Wäh­rend das Kurz­a­r­bei­ter*in­nen­geld die Rü­ck­la­gen der Un­ter­neh­men und die Pri­vat­ver­mö­gen der Ei­gen­tü­mer*in­nen schütz­t, rei­chen die Zah­lun­gen für Ge­ring­ver­die­ner*in­nen nicht zur Si­che­rung des Le­bens­un­ter­halts. Für pre­kär Be­schäf­tig­te und So­lo­-­Selb­stän­di­ge bie­tet die Maß­nah­me kei­ne Ab­si­che­rung. An­statt ei­nes Blan­ko­schecks für Groß­ver­mö­gen soll­ten die­se für die Be­wäl­ti­gung der Kri­se ge­nutz­t, und exis­tenz­si­chern­de Ein­kom­men ga­ran­tiert wer­den.

To­day with a re­port from the "e­ter­nal ci­ty" of Ro­me. In the be­gin­ning, when the di­sea­se star­ted to sprea­d, the ci­ty was se­ver­ely af­fec­ted by the pan­de­mic, re­sul­ting in a strict lock­down and strict cur­fews. Ma­r­lis Ma­li­gni­no de­s­cri­bes this si­tua­ti­on as one that took a lot of get­ting used to and tells how she was chee­red up by litt­le fun­ny sto­ries and images from her fri­ends du­ring this dif­fi­cult and lo­ne­ly time.

To­day­'s sto­ry is from Qi­ryat Ti­v­'­on, a lo­cal as­so­cia­ti­on from Ga­li­lee in nor­thern Is­ra­e­l. Gi­li Wald­mann sha­res her ex­pe­ri­ences du­ring the lock­dow­n. For Gi­li, the in­ter­rup­ti­on of her dai­ly life led her to think about her life in ways she would not ha­ve be­en ab­le to do in the nor­mal stress of eve­r­y­day life. It was a time for per­so­nal re­flec­ti­on and in­for­med de­ci­si­on ma­king.

To­day Ru­dolf is re­por­ting from Par­ty Is­lan­d, mo­re pre­ci­se­ly the is­land of Ko Pha Ngan. This is­lan­d, lo­ca­ted in the Gulf of Thai­lan­d, has had ve­ry few in­fec­ti­ons, but in­ha­bi­tants are still suf­fe­ring from the con­se­quences of the pan­de­mic: Thai­land is hea­vi­ly de­pen­dent on tou­rism and the pan­de­mic has cau­sed it to col­lap­se. Ru­dolf al­so talks about the dif­fe­rences bet­ween coun­tries in de­aling with the pan­de­mic.

Our re­port to­day is from Oğu­ze­li, a ci­ty in sou­th­e­ast Ana­to­lia, Tur­key. Dun­ja sha­res a sto­ry about her last se­mes­ter, which she had ex­pec­ted to be ve­ry dif­fe­rent. Due to the pan­de­mic it was not pos­si­ble to take part in the tra­di­ti­o­nal gra­dua­ti­on ce­rem­ony, neit­her could she ce­le­bra­te her suc­cess with fri­ends.

In to­day­'s post, Mar­ga­re­te from New York re­ports on de­ve­lop­ments and re­la­ted ex­pe­ri­ences du­ring the Co­ro­na Cri­sis. She has not be­en di­rect­ly af­fec­ted by the pan­de­mic and yet she and the en­ti­re ur­ban po­pu­la­ti­on are suf­fe­ring from the con­se­quences of the state of emer­gen­cy. It has led to a con­ti­nuous sen­se of ner­vous strain and an­xie­ty, cau­se­d, for ex­am­ple, by hea­ring con­stant si­ren wai­ling from emer­gen­cy ve­hic­les, which pla­ces ma­xi­mum psy­cho­lo­gi­cal strain on eve­r­yo­ne. In ad­di­ti­o­n, the­re is a strong fee­ling of iso­la­ti­on due to the so­ci­al di­stan­cing mea­su­res, i.e. from ha­ving to work at home and take care of child­ren at the sa­me time.

To­day with a sto­ry from Mau­ri­ti­us that shows how clo­se joy and suf­fe­ring can be. Li­li­an de­s­cri­bes the world trip she took with her child­ren and her hus­band when the Co­ro­na pan­de­mic struck. When the out­break oc­cur­re­d, the fa­mi­ly de­ci­ded to vi­sit the man­'s ste­pfa­ther in Mau­ri­ti­us, whe­re they spent three months in lock­dow­n. They had not seen his ste­pfa­ther for mo­re than 10 years and we­re now ab­le to spend some ve­ry in­ten­se time with him.