Six Weeks Down and Counting...

#StayAtHomeIrregularDiaries
Day 39--Day 5 of week 6

This week is almost over and this is the first time I am writing my stay-at-home journal in the last eight days. The workdays seem to be zooming past and we the work-from-home warriors are all suffering from various degrees of "zoom fatigue"--a newly coined term to describe the effect on your psyche because of the constant focus on your facial expressions during the video calls. (https://www.nationalgeographic.com/…/coronavirus-zoom-fati…/). Still, today was a rewarding day because i got some unique first hand perspectives on the impact of the COVID crisis on the educational industry from two very different people--the first one is a graduating high school senior from an under-privileged East Bay school, Scarlett Chang (who became the youngest member of my LinkedIn network), and the second one is Dr. Robert Briber, the Dean of the Engineering School of the University of Maryland. Scarlett is a student participating in the Development School for Youth (DSY) program through a non-profit that I volunteer for (All Stars Project). I conducted a mock interview for Scarlett, so that she is better prepared for a real interview when she is ready to enter the workforce. While Scarlett is happy that her community college will still offer online classes in Fall, Dean Briber of University of Maryland was understandably cautious. He shared how challenging it is going to become to offer certain types of classes this Fall that require a lot of hands-on participation, for example physics/chemistry/materials science labs for the undergrads and the graduate students. Being at a law firm, serving tech clients, and volunteering for pro bono law clinics, I have had some exposure to the challenges faced by big and small businesses. I now feel humbled to realize what a challenge the educational leaders of the country are facing trying to make sure that the emerging workforce, who we will need to count on to revive the economic engine, gets the right training. Still, I remember Scarlett's optimism and spontaneity as the high point of my day, and my entire work week for that matter. That is the power of youth! It rubs off on you.

#StayAtHomeIrregularDiaries
Day 40--Day 6 of week 6
Feeling lazy to write today, but took some good photos and videos during today's 6-mile hike at the Stevens Creek Reservoir, capturing Biscuit swimming the longest distance ever in the reservoir, me wading in the clean water of the creek, Gogol leapfrogging across the creek, the rare planes creating contrails in the bluest of blue skies, and wildflowers regaling the masked hikers. Nature heals! April 22 was the 50th anniversary of the Earth Day. I believe this must be the most uniquely celebrated Earth Day since its inception!

#StayAtHomeIrregularDiaries
Day 41--Day 7 of week 6

Weekend afternoons (4 pm-5 pm) have become quite enjoyable listening to authors being interviewed about their latest books as part of San Francisco based book store Book Passage's "Conversations with Authors" series. (https://bookpassage.extendedsession.com/). Last weekend it was Khaled Hosseni talking about his book "Sea Prayer." Yesterday it was Iranian-American author Jason Rezaian being interviewed by his wife journalist Yeganeh Rezaian about Jason's book "Prisoner: My 544 Days in an Iranian Prison," published in January 2019, which details his experience in captivity in Iran.Today's interview was particularly enjoyable, where the Irish author Colum McCann was interviewed by another fantastic author Dave Eggers about Colum's book "Aperiogon," which apparently means a polygon with infinite number of sides! I loved how he explained that an Irish author writing about the Israel-Palestine conflict can either be seen as cultural appropriation, or as a cultural celebration, depending on your perspective.

Slow Down

As somewhat expected, my blogging has slowed down this week, and for good reasons. Last Friday night (April 10 night  in America; which was April 11, Saturday morning in India) changed a lot of things. My father-in-law met with a severe road accident in India, and has been in the ICU since then. We could not go to India because of COVID-related travel restrictions. He is stable now and his life is no longer in danger. But it is a long road to recovery.

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 28--Day 1 of week 5

When you go to the grocery store to buy food and the first thing you pick up is a bunch of sunflowers, then you know how much you need color in your life right now!

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 31--Day 4 of week 5
#BreakKeBaad (translated in English to "After the Break")

I remember March 16 vividly. I remember the announcement in the middle of the day that the "shelter-in-place" order will take effect from midnight. I remember the madness all around to stockpile supplies. And the stillness that I felt, somehow convinced that things will be OK. Happy to say that one month later, today on April 16, things are OK. It has been an eventful month, and especially an eventful week from last Friday. So I decided to take a mini-break from writing my daily accounts. But sometimes the thoughts control you, and they wont let you rest until you give them a place in yours words. So here I am, acknowledging my thoughts--triggered by two concrete events today.
The first one is not quite an "event", but more of a silent moment. While taking my mid-day walk today, I noticed my 89-year old neighbor working intently in her yard, completely oblivious to the rest of the world. She had no clue that I was standing barely 6 feet away outside her green hedge, admiring how calm she is amidst all the doom and gloom. I didn't disturb her peace and simply walked back home--filled with reassurance that she is still healthy and fit enough to enjoy gardening.
The second one is indeed an "event", and quite a unique one. One of my colleagues is due to give birth in a few weeks. Her baby shower was scheduled for April 16 long before everything shut down. We decided not to back off and give her a "virtual" baby shower over WebEx! It was genuine fun. We even ended up participating in the typical baby shower games, including "Guess the price of baby items," "Mom or Dad" quiz, and "Guess the baby photo" contest.
The day simply proved that the force of life is much more than that of a crisis. And I am happy to break my streak of silence.

A Whole Month Now!

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 21--Day 1 of week 4

For a little more than a year, I have been volunteering with the All Stars Project, a national nonprofit founded in 1981, that uses a performance based approach to help tens of thousands of inner-city youth and their families create success in their lives.Today was their National Development Day, originally scheduled to take place at the Lincoln Center in New York. Obviously that could not happen. So almost 200 attendees, including the All Stars executives, volunteers, well wishers and of course the students at the heart of the initiative, convened on Zoom to celebrate continued development while social distancing. Some of the students performed raps and sang for the audience. One student shared the story of her personal loss--she lost her uncle in New York last week. She still smiled and radiated hope. It was uplifting for us in so many ways! And as a bonus, I got to participate in virtual synchronized hand gesturing with all the other attendees and learned how to "applause" via Zoom emojis (called Reactions). All in all, a great start of the work week. #DevelopWhileDistancing

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 22--Day 2 of week 4

Breaking news today is that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey pledged to donate one billion dollars to fight the coronavirus! That is huge! This news will probably again fuel the friendly tension between the biosciences sector and the high technology sector about which sector is more crucial in combating the corona monster (I am borrowing the President's vocabulary here. He repeatedly calls the virus a "monster.") Life Sciences were front and center at the President's daily briefing yesterday. He specifically mentioned Gilead, Genentech, Amgen, Regeneron, Abbott, Johnson and Johnson etc. I was chatting with my friend, a biotech patent attorney, yesterday. And she said that she and her husband, an artificial intelligence/machine learning expert at Google, frequently engage in healthy debate about which technology would get to the solution first. I guess the answer lies in the synergy between all possible technologies springing from human ingenuity fueled by the universal desire to get the better of this crisis. After all "you cannot let a good crisis go waste." (Learned this quotation from Khan Academy founder Sal Khan during his interview with Bill Gates.)

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 23--Day 3 of week 4

Today is all about music! The day started with listening to a song clip sent by my cousin in India, where he is singing a duet in unison with his friend from their respective homes. Then during my lunch break, my friend sent a rare gem of a re-imagined old Bollywood song audio clip, where two playback legends' (Kishore Kumar and Mohammad Rafi) voices were seamlessly mixed to create a refreshing version of the song. And finally, while writing this, I am listening to a video clip that my sister sent, where a few Indian classical musicians pay tribute to sitar maestro Ravi Shankar on his birth centenary (he was born on April 7, 1920). For the first time since the shelter-in-place order went into effect, I didn't feel the need to check how many people have died today. Music does heal.

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 24--Day 4 of week 4
#NeighborhoodEdition

The walks in the neighborhood, with the dog, are becoming more and more interesting in these shelter-in-place days. Three days in a row now I have encountered a masked runner. The first day I thought the runner was judging me, because I was not wearing a mask and he was. The second day both of us wore masks, and I felt there is nothing to judge. Today, the masked guy waved at me! If this is not neighborly, I don't know what is! I have no idea who the person is, how he looks like (because the face is mostly covered), or which house he belongs to, but there is no doubt that he lives in the neighborhood. And he can always recognize me (masked or not), because I walk with the same unmasked dog! 🙂
I am also seeing some old furniture being retired by some households in the neighborhood, as they are placed by the curb to be taken away. Now that people are having to spend so much time indoors, they need to have the right kind of furniture. That is especially true for the work desks and chairs, because you need an ergonomic and efficient set up to be productive. The other day I saw an abandoned desk. There were built in CD racks in the desk. That simply tells you that the desk is dated. They don't make those desks with the CD racks any more. The world has moved on to streaming over the Internet. And thank god for the internet that was built during the cold war with a 'hunkering down' situation in mind, as described in the article (https://tinyurl.com/qww8vuv) that I posted earlier on Facebook, titled, "Your Internet is working. Thank these Cold War-era pioneers who designed it to handle almost anything."

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 25--Day 5 of week 4

Challenge accepted! Vijay Vusirikala tagged me for the dog photo challenge. While the masks are still in the mail, we are improvising with the eye covers that you get to be able to sleep on the plane. This was Bikash's idea. Finally all his business travels and the goodies that he got for enduring those long flights are coming to good use. May be the airlines should think about pivoting their business model to mask production now that nobody flies but everybody wears a mask? 

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 26--Day 6 of week 4

I debated a lot today about whether to keep writing my daily journals, because things in India changed a lot from last night. But then I realize, when there is a lot to handle and a lot to process, then writing is my way of organizing my mind. So I want to finish archiving at least this week in its entirety. And then relax the commitment to write daily.
One of my biggest realizations today is how much my brain wants to solve a puzzle to achieve a sense of tranquility when there is external turmoil. It has become very popular to share quizzes and puzzles among like-minded friends over various social networks in these stay-at-home days. But now I need those more than ever. I am extremely fortunate to have some awesome female geeks in my network who seem to have an endless supply of challenging but fun math problems and logic games to send my way. We solve the problems. We discuss our methodologies. We take care of our families. We take care of business. And we soak in the "kindred spirit" feeling. I am a proud female nerd. 

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 27--Day 7 of week 4

Today is Easter Sunday. At one point Trump wanted to open up the country this weekend. That didnt happen, and for good reasons. But thankfully Dr. Fauci shared some good news today that "rolling re-entry" of US Economy is possible in May. Fingers crossed. Meanwhile, I count my blessings that in California, we are not under a complete lockdown, but under a shelter-in-place order instead. Outdoor exercise is permitted as long as social distance is maintained. Nothing nourishes you mentally and physically simultaneously like the weekend morning hikes, breathing in fresh air. Stevens Creek Reservoir is as beautiful as it gets at this time of the year, with bursting greenery. A sight for the sore eyes and hearts alike.

Masked At Last: Week 3

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 14--Day 1 of week 3

Today felt so normal that I almost forgot that we are still living the "sheltered" life. The rain is gone. You can again enjoy the gorgeous California sun and balmy weather. Bumped into my neighbor during one of the walks. We chatted matter-of-factly--maintaining social distance, while the dogs played with each other in the middle of the empty road. Where is the angst?! Had a killer day professionally too. A doctor client of mine said the ventilator crisis is all but over other than at a few hot spots. And big companies and the scientific community are signing a pledge to make their protected intellectual property freely available for humanitarian use until the World Health Organization declares the coronavirus crisis to be over. (https://www.law360.com/…/businesses-urged-to-make-covid-19-…). What a day!

But I guess that's just today. Everything may change tomorrow. And looks like the world at large still needs peace and relaxation, as evidenced by meditation guru Deepak Chopra's live stream crashing midway because of overcrowding. Apparently a million people joined! Good for them. Keep doing whatever works for you as long as you test negative for the virus.

#StayPositive #StayCOVIDnegative

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 15--Day 2 of week 3

Today is March 31, i.e. officially the last day of the Women's History Month. And what a month it has been! Women kept making history all over the world. In India, a medical diagnostics firm's research and development chief, Minal Dakhave Bhosale, spearheaded the rapid development of a coronavirus testing kit, which was delivered merely a week after she gave birth to a baby girl! (https://tinyurl.com/t7eswtj). In US, Dr. Deborah Birx (along with Dr. Anthony Fauci) has emerged as the voice of reason in her role as the head of the White House's Coronavirus Task Force.
But at the same time, women all over the world are also getting hit hard--maybe even harder then men--by this pandemic. Data shows that majority of the health care personnel working in the frontline are women. (https://tinyurl.com/sunpe9t).
Another area where women are suffering is closure of small businesses, which provide the livelihood for a lot of women. I'll give a concrete example. Our law firm had the tradition of "free lunch" every Wednesday to foster community eating at work. Individuals would select their lunches from a portal called the "Eat Club" and the company would pay the bills. Today we received an email, reminding us that though the office is inaccessible, we can still support the Eat Club chefs, many of whom are women, by ordering home delivery of food. A similar message came from the Cupertino city officials, urging the residents to order takeouts from their favorite local restaurants.
This unique time has taught me that even though ordering food might seem to be a lazy solution in these stay-at-home days, you might actually be doing a social service by channeling your hard-earned money to the female entrepreneurs in the food industry. We got this, girls!! #FemaleSolidarityInTheTimeOfCOVID

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 16--Day 3 of week 3
#AprilFoolsJoke #InspiredByATrueStory #TruthMayBeStrangerThanFiction

Good morning, folks! The day started with this BREAKING NEWS.

CORONAVIRUS: LOCAL TENNIS COACHES, PLAYERS SUE BAY AREA OFFICIALS OVER 'NON-ESSENTIAL DESIGNATION

"A group of tennis coaches, local tennis players and fitness organizations, have filed a joint lawsuit against an equally long list of Bay Area public officials over the designation of tennis courts and gyms as non-essential businesses under the region’s shelter-in-place orders to slow the spread of COVID-19.

Filed Tuesday with the U.S. District Court for Northern California, the lawsuit is centered on the claim that the shuttering of tennis courts by Bay Area counties is an unjust violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. It was filed the same day that a six-county Bay Area coalition extended the regional stay-at-home order to May 3, in which tennis courts were again not listed as essential businesses."

#TennisIsEssential

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 17--Day 4 of week 3

Yesterday I decided to keep it light, and started the month of April with a non-cruel (at least in my opinion) tennis-themed April Fool's joke by tweaking a true story with an author's (or may be player's?) imagination. But today we the tennis people are back to being serious and channeled the pent up collective energy of not being able to play into something constructive. A few of us brainstormed on how to keep the tennis coaches' morale high when they are losing their livelihood and dealing with the uncertain future on a daily basis, because nobody knows when the sports center will reopen. Within a few hours, a GoFundMe page was created and everyone chipped in with equal enthusiasm. It was exhilarating! We need more days like this where we tap into the deep bonds of friendship and community feeling to fight the boredom and frustration that is bound to creep in from time to time.
#GoFindYourHappiness #GoFundMe

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 18--Day 5 of week 3

Yayyy!! We have made it through another work week! And while we are staying in, the animals are frolicking! So endearing to see this video of a baby deer’s first encounter with the ocean! A friend forwarded it to me---source unknown. But that does not matter. The coronavirus has taught the whole world the universal language of pure joy and sobering sorrow at the same time. Have a great weekend everyone and stay safe in there!

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 19--Day 6 of week 3

Could not have been more proud of Santa Clara Law for pulling off an almost flawless Entrepreneurs’ Legal Advising Clinic via Zoom this Saturday morning. I talked to 5 clients, many of whom had questions related to the impact of the current coronavirus crisis on their small businesses. One client even had a question involving---believe it or not---his patent on a device to pick up balls easily from the ground! His son's pingpong center is closed due to the county mandate. And he wants to monetize his patent. Life imitating profession or the other way round? I cant tell anymore. But my sincere kudos to the indomitable Pamela Vavra and Jerry Rosenblum for roping me in to this pro bono clinic. And so proud of the student volunteers of Santa Clara Law for handling the logistics and legal research issues with so much poise!
Finally, I will be forever grateful to Pam for showing me how to change the background in a Zoom meeting. Many of the lawyers chose a beach theme as their background. Telltale signs, right? #SCULaw #LawyersWhoLead#LifeIsNotABeachRightNow #JustKeepHelping

#StayAtHomeDiaries
Day 20--Day 7 of week 3

This morning my brother reminded me that I need to take my car for a spin once in a while to make sure that the battery is still functional. I have literally driven my car once since the "shelter-in-place" order became effective on March 17. So I took the car out and drove around the rain-drenched empty streets randomly. Drove past a gas station just out of curiosity (I have an electric car, so don't need to go to gas station even under normal circumstances). Never seen gas prices this low! Drove past our weekend tennis courts in the De Anza College campus. The entrance to the campus was taped off. Then I drove to the local pharmacy. Had to pick up my diabetes medication anyway. It was like a ghost town. Only two other customers were in the sprawling store. Shelves full of merchandise including the illusive toilet papers, but no takers! The masked pharmacist put my medication in a basket--fitted with hand sanitizer--and pushed it towards me. I took out my iphone to make a "touchless" apple payment. My iphone usually recognizes my face to authorize the payment. But today it could not, because, you guessed it--I was wearing a mask!! For the first time in my life!! Didn't use a mask even in the time of wildfires last year. But that was different. This time the government wants you to wear a mask not necessarily for your own safety, but for others' safety, because according to the most recent studies, even if you yourself are asymptomatic, you may be carrying the coronavirus and can spread it to others. So I obliged. Another day with the virus, another compromise.
#MaskedInTheTimeOfCOVID

P.S. Finished the audiobook "Love in the Time of Cholera" this morning. So probably the hashtag will retire too.