Monday, May 18th, 2020
A bit of a grey day today as befits a Monday with news of summer plans coming undone. Then again, what did I expect?
EM heard from SMC that they will not be opening any of their community pools, so that is the end of her summer job.
I received an email from Shoshin Dojo in Hamburg that the Berlin Summer Festival, a five day Aikido seminar with instructors from 12 different countries, has officially been cancelled. I am assuming Shobukan will do the same with their summer intensive scheduled for the first week of July and our dojo had already cancelled the annual Gashuku planned for the first week August last month. So, all my seminar plans, and I was going to three of the above four, have disintegrated. I am devasted, just as I have discovered this art and am making the smallest of progress it is stopped dead in its tracks. This is sooo frustrating!
Currently it is almost impossible to enter Germany for travelers, however there are plans to lift travel restrictions within the EU as of June 15th, 2020 and travelers from EU, UK (???) and Schengen states will no longer be a requirement to quarantine for two weeks following arrival in Germany. Travel warnings to destinations outside of Europe will be maintained in place and travellers from outside of Europe will continue to be repatriation only. It is highly unlikely that this is going to change any time soon, and if it does, one will likely need to spend 14 days in quarantine upon arrival unless they find some way to test people before they board planes. So, based on all is, seeing mum over the summer becomes less and less likely. Though we have not yet completely given up for EM to be able to go having to spend an entire summer in the USA, becomes ever more likely both for myself and EM.
That combined with the prospects of all pools remaining shut for the entire summer makes for very dismal prospects. I might just decide to brave it in August and go to Puerto Rico - seeing we still have those tickets we could not us ein April - or maybe Hawai? At least, while air travel may be dangerous, it is not impossible. Here is a glimpse at the future of air travel, which is not to pleasant
Given Montgomery County has extended #stayhome until June 30th, 2020, we are not going anywhere. For the foreseeable future it is more of the same: Home, garden, walks, food. And as a weekly highlight go for a sail! Maybe in July we will do day drives to beaches somewhere. Time for both of us to become free water swimmers I guess. Maybe I will then do that swim across the Bosphorus from Asia to Europe; I could use this summer to train for the 13km swim and do it next summer. We were planning on Turkey for next July anyway – a graduation Blue Cruise from Fetihye to Kekova if not Antaliya, so if I time it right we sail, then swim and then come back. Assuming we may have a vaccine by then.
News on a vaccine developed by Moderna is cautiously positive. Trials on humans have shown it is not harmful and anitbodies were developed. Clinical trial sare however not going ot start before KJuly and can well take 6-12 months. Lastly, producing RNA vaccines at scale, even if proven to work, is challenging, so unlikely that everyone will be immunized within a year.
Infections today stand at 4.78 million, which is a slightly lower day on day increase then yesterday. Nonetheless the US has 1.54 milion confirmed cases and deaths have surpassed 90k today. Numbers in Maryland also continue to rise. We count 39k today, which is a 4.7%, so Corona news is fully aligned with the grey skies today.