10 ways to endure COVID-19's 2nd wave

Gilbert's Burger and Fries in Itaewon needs customers at dinnertime., May 20. / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

By Jon Dunbar

Well, we're at social distancing measures level 2.5, whatever that means. So basically, wear a mask when you leave home, wash your hands a lot and be prepared to sign your name on entering a lot of establishments. And be prepared to spend more time at home, and make every little resource including money last longer.

As the pandemic's end remains always beyond reach, it's important to develop a bottomless resource of entertainment content, busywork and pastimes that can help you stay grounded. Lazing around binge-watching TV shows was our first wave of COVID-19 back in early spring, but this time everyone should be feeling pretty restless.

Here are several suggestions for how to fill the hours spent at home or elsewhere while maintaining good social distancing practices.

Get artistic

Might as well see if the crisis inspires creativity in you. Just grab a pen ― or anything better if you have it ― and start drawing. Draw what you see out your window, or on your computer screen or in your imagination. Draw animals, cityscapes, the overflowing garbage can in your kitchen, a comic ― whatever works. When's the last time you just drew something for fun? Grade school?

Decorate or make homemade PPE

There's no shortage of face masks these days, but finding attractive personal protective equipment (PPE) is a little harder. So why not look up a tutorial to homemade face masks, and try cutting up an old shirt or something? Or you can get more creative, adding illustrations to masks or tie-dyeing garments. Just be careful if you're using paint. There are also recipes for homemade hand sanitizer.

Homebrew Korean alcohol

Have you ever tried making makgeolli? There are a few laborious steps involved, but it's almost as easy as letting bread go moldy. There's no shortage of resources and recipes online, so all you need is a bit of basic shopping, a way to cook rice properly and the container for fermenting. It's better to take a class but worth experimenting on your own.

A Canadian tourist examines home-fermented makgeolli in March 2019. / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

Go through your belongings

Chances are you have a lot of clutter accumulating at home. Got too many books? Read them and decide if there's anything worth passing on to other readers. Too many shirts? Donate a few to charity. What's in your fridge? If it isn't spoiled, make something with it. Find something to do with your plunder, or get rid of it. This applies to digital files too. If your file storage and backup habits aren't so great, now's the time to sort through it all and do things right. Maybe you'll find something you've been looking for, or relive some forgotten memories with what you dig up.

Start an online photo portfolio

Along with all the clutter, you're bound to find various things of interest. Old photos, memes, newspaper clippings, various other collectable items. Why not go through them and see what's worth sharing with others? Chances are you have a lot of great stuff sitting around, so you might as well use it for something. You could get an interesting project out of it for Instagram or Snapchat, or start a new blog project somewhere like Medium or Tumblr. On a related note, visit fb.com/koreatimesarchive to see one possible result of doing exactly this.

Organize your social media accounts

It should be pretty apparent by now that Facebook is accelerating societal destruction. You can get banned for saying "men suck" or singing in a ska band, but violent extremist gangs continue to organize unchecked. We've uploaded too much of our everyday life and social networks to social media, and it's time to break the addiction. You can download all your data from Facebook, a very slow process that may take up several gigabytes. It's also worth going through your friends list, paring it down a bit, seeing who you haven't connected with in a while and making note of who you would regret losing all contact with if Facebook were to disappear tomorrow.

Read old ebooks

The Royal Asiatic Society (RAS) Korea has a massive online library of ebooks dating back to the 1890s. Read writings from the early days of the foreign community in Korean Repository (1892, 95-98), Korea Review (1901-05) and Transactions (1900-), as well as various other collections. With over a century of publications, Korean culture and history are explored and first-hand knowledge and experience is presented. Visit raskb.com/books-and-publications to see the full selection.

Write a letter to The Korea Times

We know this paper isn't perfect ― probably more acutely than any readers. But while everyone is content to argue online about the paper's in-house and syndicated content ― driving up traffic to those same questionable articles ― few people provide actual feedback directly to the editorial staff. Maybe if more people wrote in, the contributions would be a higher quality. Try writing to opinion@koreatimes.co.kr and see what happens.

Support Itaewon restaurants

The pandemic is hitting restaurants hard, especially restaurants in Itaewon following the May outbreak. But they're all still open; at least the ones that haven't gone out of business. Many are available for delivery service or take-out, or you can go there at the right time and be the only customer dining in the restaurant. Even Bonny's Pizza rarely has a lineup out front anymore. It's an unexpected opportunity for foodies to broaden their horizons while restaurants are despairingly empty and desperate for customers.

Go for walks

There's no harm in walking around, as long as you socially distance and wear a mask. Unless you live in central Seoul, Gangnam or Hongdae, chances are the pedestrian traffic isn't unbearable, so you can safely wander outside. Where to go? There's always a surprise around the next corner, so aim yourself at where you haven't explored and head in that direction. Or if you live on a slope, go uphill and see where that takes you.