Q Dear Class: 1. Thank you for voting and stay as safe as possible with masks and social distancing. 2. I will be giving you topic suggestions for your final paper as we go along. Topics must be pre-approved. I would like you to think about world healing at this time. For example, let's say you have money and power and you want to set up a sewage system and a water treatment system in Haiti (not the whole country but one city perhaps). How would you do it? 3. We will now start Mandel's novel, Station Eleven. Please read pp. 1-27 and respond to the following: a) There are 2 kinds of snow in this beginning chapter. What are they? How do they make you feel? Research the plastic snow used in theaters and films. What happens to it? Does it impact water for drinking? If not plastic snow, then plastic and clean water needs research. Report on what you find. b) Have you ever found yourself thrilled to be alive after someone has died? Describe it? How did Jeevan feel about Arthur's death? c) The theater company comes together to process Arthur's death and they drink alcohol. Put substance abuse and pandemics in your browser and report on what you find. d) Jeevan learns about the pandemic from his friend Hua. How does the pandemic manifest in the novel? Put COVID in New York City in April. What was happening there? Any parallels between reality and the novel? e) What does Hua tell Jeevan to do? f) The flu is called the Georgia Flu and blamed on the lack of transparency of the Russian and Georgian people who had the virus. Go to your browser. Where did COVID come from? How did it get into the US? Who do we blame? g) Jeevan goes shopping. What does he buy? What did you buy or not buy because it was gone when COVID hit? h) The grocery clerk doesn't believe Jeevan when he tells her to get out of the city. She says it's like SARS, "no big deal." Use you browser and find at least 2 examples of politicians (not just Trump) that COVID is "no big deal." What did they say? How are they doing? i) Consider that some pundits are suggesting that Trump's COVID is a national security issue. Why? See what you can find out about this and report on what you find using your browser. j) Citations please. PAM