What have I been doing during Covid? A lot!!! So, this may be a long one and Ill try to update more frequently in the future....
I have been working from home since March 22nd. Not much happened from March through July, at least, not much that would interest anyone outside However, work was extremely busy. We are based in Dubai, but many of our projects require us to travel around the region. As such, when the borders and airports were shut down, I had geologists scattered across Mozambique, Maldives, and Saudi Arabia for work, while one was stuck just before he was planned to return from leave in Pakistan. Maldives project went on and despite only being able to get half our team into the country before lockdown, we were able to do a great project ahead of time! Not to mention, they were stuck on a boat the whole time, so it was really the safest place for them to be.
In the meantime, our offices were essentially shut down as well. I was able to quickly move and work from home, helped along by the fact that my office got flooded
due to rain for the second time this year - it was a sign, so I was one of the first. Later that week, everyone was required to do so. Most of my team were ok - they were either preparing to go to the field or were already there, and all geologists have their own laptops, so we could still do work. Our support staff, however, were limited in their home internet connections and laptops. Two of my assistants based in Dubai had personal laptops. The guys stuck in Mozambique and Pakistan had their laptops, but not physical work. So.... we started to work on an internal project I had been wanting to do for a while - as long as they had excel and pdf, and were at least able to receive files, they were good to go. So we were actually able to keep everyone very busy!
A few hiccups on the more local projects, especially a large one, with restrictions and even a couple of Covid positive case (fortunately, most were false positives, the rest were asymptomatic for our team), and my team were able to stay very busy during the peak Covid time.
Not everyone at was so fortunate, but for the most part, two large projects carried us through, thankfully. In fact, at times we seemed even more efficient, especially with getting our internal side projects off the ground.
Now we are slowly starting to return to the office, and while our management desires everyone to back, they have not pressured us to do so, and are very open also to alternating days. So, things are functioning almost as normal, except sometimes we do forget that we are still in the midst of a pandemic, which means quarantines, border restrictions, changing requirements, and even some positives who actually do get sick. It is definitely a different world at the moment, but we have been able to adjust to it. The good thing is, everyone has been generally adaptable. There is literally nothing that we can do at many times, and fortunately the Clients have been mostly understanding, at least when to Covid. They have the same problems themselves, and we all are in the same boat. Its the new normal.
I was working hard, cooking and eating healthy, going out for walks when I could or doing some exercise from home, talking to friends and family over video, making some home improvements, sewing homemade masks, trying to grow plants. In June, after the initial lockdown started to be gradually lifted, I think I was a but still tried to do short walks, but I was leaning more on Deliveroo and less on cooking. July and August, when we were finishing our large projects and my guys started to return, I was crazy busy - constant doing something and eating was not always first on my mind. Then September hit. In 6 weeks, I pretty much gained about 10 lbs. Really. So depressing. I think at that point I was just over working so hard, being isolated, doing anything really. Netflix and Deliveroo were my new friends.
