First, I want to say I'm so sorry that you might have been exposed. It's so scary and not enough people take it seriously enough. My grandpa just passed from COVID in November and he caught it through the carelessness of my uncle, who was his caretaker. (https://yiavue.medium.com/the-casualties-of-covid-19-baae7e86ea5a) At this point, most of the families I know have lost someone to COVID. It's a dangerous mix to be Hmong right now because we are so community focused. We depend on our extended families for all events in our lives and so being isolated is very challenging. It's been a challenge to keep people apart, and then there are senses of entitlement that many have adopted and don't take it seriously. For your sake, I hope it turns out negative and I hope your partner takes it more seriously and is more cautious.

As to this piece, American nationalism is a social disease ingrained into the population out of the Cold War era, but it doesn't serve us now, especially when we look at the numbers compared to the global community. We're only #1 in incarcerations and at a high disproportionate rate for black and brown people. Not only can we take a few leafs out of the Asian playbook, we can also take a few chapters from the European playbook as well. Large parts of the world have happier and healthier populations than we do; and perhaps as more Americans travel and see how others countries do it, perhaps we'll bring back home much sorely needed changes. It's funny how Americans snicker about North Korea, yet, how much different are we from them?