journal features

COVID-19 in the building

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-eight years and a million words

Tokyo, 2020.07.29

On Sunday my colleagues and I at work were alerted by email that there had been two cases of COVID-19 in our office building. Apparently the diagnoses had been earlier in the month.

That's the thing about pandemics, they're literally 'widespread, or general' in nature. The Japanese government has been auspicious in its self-congratulation and its supposition that superior Japanese culture or natural immunity were to thank for the country's "success" with the virus. I guess not!

rand()m quote

If a person has ugly thoughts, it begins to show on the face. And when that person has ugly thoughts every day, every week, every year, the face gets uglier and uglier until you can hardly bear to look at it. A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts it will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.

—Roald Dahl