Student Union
COVID-19 Diaries: Virus Puts Stresses Large and Small on Family Life
Hundreds of azalea bushes have blossomed, and a sea of colors has swelled up overnight in my neighborhood. Amidst this glorious awakening of nature, one could never suspect the mute sadness, anxiety and uncertainty we feel stuck in our home.
We are all safe though not all that sound — mentally, I mean. Arguments break out over whose turn it is to go to the grocery store, donning construction-style face masks and rubber gloves, disinfect incoming groceries, or take out the trash.
Our situation cannot be compared to that of people who are exposed to the virus, who work long, grueling hours at hospitals losing patients daily, or who are dying alone in hospital corridors.
But the nagging questions — “When will our lives get back to normal? Will they ever be the same?” — keep jolting us back to the grim reality every time our minds wander off to something happier. They are like a shrill alarm that needs to be put on snooze every five minutes.
WATCH: Penelope Poulou's video report
I am particularly anxious for my daughters’ future. They are both college students.
The older one studies at our community college nearby, and lives at home. And though there has not been a stark change in her day-to-day life, her studies have switched to an online platform and her final results have converted to a generic Pass/Fail system at a time when showing stellar grades would secure her transfer to her dream college next semester, a very selective four-year school in Virginia.
The younger one studies in Chicago — or I should say studied in Chicago — until she had to hurry home as the number of coronavirus cases mounted in the Midwestern state of Illinois. She too has switched to online instruction, a very challenging situation for her Performing Arts major.
She misses her friends, her surroundings and her very belongings, which student dorm employees threaten to stash haphazardly somewhere if she does not go and collect them. Never mind the funny little videos that Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot keeps posting online, asking people to “stay at home, save lives.”
Aside from my daily concerns at home, I worry about my family abroad. As a Greek-American, I have always straddled two continents — my husband and kids on this one, my mother and sister on the other.
I am grateful and proud that Greece has kept the COVID-19 curve relatively flat compared to the rest of Europe and the U.S. But Orthodox Easter, the greatest celebration for Greeks, is fast approaching, and there are fears that some renegades might defy government orders and congregate in churches for worship, or visit with one other to celebrate, and end up inflating that curve.
My 86-year-old mother shelters at home alone. A spirited human being, she is self-sufficient and resilient, but still among those who are most vulnerable to the virus and should not go out. So, every day, my sister drops food outside the door of her apartment building.
But social distancing is rough. My mom does not have an internet connection, she refuses to learn this “new” technology and has no online cameras, Zoom, Skype, Facetime or anything that can bring her closer to her loved ones through video during this time.
So, I guess, she does what’s second best. She goes out on her third-floor balcony, waves to my sister from a distance, and calls her on the phone. I could call it “tele” chatting without the internet.
Anxieties and uncertainties aside, I am thankful that we are all okay and sheltered. But the happiest being among us is our four-legged family member, Casey, who is over the moon about having, somehow inexplicably, all her family together, at her disposal, at all times.
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Reports of visa checks, deportations worry Chinese STEM students in US
Geopolitical tensions and growing competition in tech between the United States and China appear to be spilling over into academia despite commitments from the world’s two biggest economies to boost people-to-people exchanges.
The United States remains the top choice for Chinese students seeking to study abroad with nearly 300,000 studying in American colleges and universities during the 2022-2023 school year. But reports of some cases that students and professors are facing extra scrutiny while passing through immigration and the deportation of others are raising concerns.
For Chen Xiaojin, a doctoral student studying semiconductor materials at a university in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, it has been six years since she returned to her hometown of Beijing.
At first, it was the COVID-19 pandemic that kept her from going home. But over the past two years, she has been deterred by accounts of Chinese students majoring in science and engineering being required to reapply for their visas upon returning to China.
She also says she is worried by reports over the past six months of Chinese students being deported, even at nearby Dulles Airport.
"My current research is relatively sensitive, and my boss [adviser] is getting funds from the U.S. Department of Defense, making it even more sensitive,” she told VOA. "I am afraid that I won't be able to return after I go back [to China]."
Chen says that if she did return to China, she would have to apply for a new visa.
In a report late last month, Bloomberg said it had found at least 20 Chinese students and scholars with valid visas who were deported at U.S. Customs since November and barred from reentry. The U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency does not release relevant data.
Immigration attorney Dan Berger represented one Chinese student who was deported late last year. He tells VOA Mandarin that the student studied biological sciences at Yale University and was about to complete her doctorate.
She visited her family in China and got a new visa but was deported by customs at Dulles Airport and barred from reentering the country for five years. Berger said he did not see anything suspicious in the transcript of the conversation between the student and the customs officer.
"We have seen what seems like a pattern over the last six months of Chinese PhD students being turned around…. more than I've seen in quite a while," he said.
Matthew Brazil, a fellow at the Jamestown Foundation, said neither country seems willing to explain the situation. However, he believes that in most cases, the United States must have valid reasons for blocking visa holders from entering the country.
In some cases, the student’s background may not match what is written on the visa application. In other cases, customs agents may also find something that the State Department missed, and once they see it, they are responsible for taking action.
"I wish the Chinese side would be specific about their students who were refused entry,” he said. “The fact that both sides are mum on details and that the Chinese side is engaged with the usual angry rhetoric means that each has security concerns. And that says to me that there was good reason for the U.S. to stop these particular applicants."
Brazil also sees a connection between the entry denials and export control regulations issued by the United States in October 2022 that restrict China's ability to obtain advanced computing chips, develop and maintain supercomputers, and manufacture advanced semiconductors.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection is one of the law enforcement agencies authorized to investigate violations of export control regulations, he said.
"Beijing's intelligence agencies are known to focus attention on PRC [People's Republic of China] students and scientists headed abroad who study or work on dual-use technologies controlled under the Export Administration Act — compelling Chinese students and scientists to report on what they've learned when they return to China on holiday,” he said. “This has been true for decades."
Bill Drexel, a fellow for the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, said the U.S. government did find some cases where students tried to steal strategic technology for China.
"I think it would both not be surprising that they found some really questionable or incriminating evidence for some students,” he said. “It would also not be surprising if, in their hunt for really solid evidence, they also may have made some mistakes on other students.”
Drexel adds that “it’s just kind of an unfortunate fact of the time that we live in and the tactics that the CCP uses when it comes to these measures."
In a post on X in early May, U.S. ambassador to China Nicholas Burns tried to dispel concerns about visas and entry to the United States for students and scholars. In the post, he said "99.9% of Chinese students holding visas encounter no issues upon entering the United States.”
In an interview with The Wall Street Journal Monday, Burns said it is China that is making it impossible to promote people-to-people ties. Burns told the Journal that students attending events sponsored by the United States in China have been interrogated and intimidated.
He also said that since U.S. President Joe Biden and China’s leader Xi Jinping held their summit in San Francisco last year, China’s Ministry of State Security and other agencies had interfered with Chinese citizens’ participation at some 61 events.
At a regular briefing on Wednesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning dismissed those accusations, saying that they did not “reflect reality" and that went against key understandings reached by both countries’ presidents in San Francisco.
“The United States, under the pretext of 'national security,' unjustifiably harasses, interrogates, and deports Chinese students in the U.S., causing them significant harm and creating a severe chilling effect,” Mao said. “The image of the United States in the minds of the Chinese people fundamentally depends on the actions of the United States itself.”
Drexel said he believes Burns’ comments about visas and students' willingness to study in the U.S. still ring true.
“On balance, it's still the case that American universities are overwhelmingly warm towards Chinese students and want them in large numbers," he said.
However, Berger, the immigration lawyer, is concerned about the chilling effect recent cases involving Chinese students could have.
"In general, we are being more careful about advising Chinese graduate students in STEM fields about traveling and letting them know that there is some small risk,” he said.
Even though the risk is small, it does seem to be real at the moment, he said.
Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.
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