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My first dose and other thoughts

How are you, dear friends of Read.cash? Today, I've received the first dose of my COVID vaccine. For weeks, I'd been trying to get an appointment to be vaccinated, and I finally got it. But before I tell you about my experience with vaccination, excuse me if I vent a bit first. The last few days have been difficult for me, and my mood has been a bit low. My mother-in-law passed away yesterday. It's sad news for me, but she had been very ill the last few weeks due to a degenerative disease. But what has had me most heartbroken, and at the same time pissed off, are the difficulties we have had due to the situation we have in the country. So forgive my two minutes of complaints and vent. I've already told in my article **What would my score be**, how here the government does social control by making it difficult some things in other places are taken for granted. One of those things is mobility within the country. https://read.cash/@CoquiCoin/what-would-my-score-be-a51aeba2 My in-laws live in Maracaibo, the second largest city in the country. And these days it would have been easier to go to Istanbul than to go from Caracas to Maracaibo. Some background - Flexible or Radical For a year, due to the COVID situation. The government has established a lockdown scheme, which until now, I have only seen here. We are supposed to "lockdown" for a week, and the following one we don't, and so on. They call them a flexible week and a radical week. Here for months, everything has been very relaxed and the only thing that hasn't really been reactivated are the classes that are still online. And the only thing a radical week is for is to complicate people's lives. In the radical week, you cannot do paperwork in public institutions, bank branches don't work and transportation is restricted. There are no buses on interurban routes, nor internal flights. Everything else works, bars and restaurants are open at least in Caracas, people keep little distance and make their normal life, either if the week is flexible or radical. Since Monday, we've been trying to get my husband to travel to Maracaibo and there has been no way to achieve it, without flights or buses. Going in our car isn't an option because as I've mentioned in the past in Venezuela there is a shortage of fuel, especially outside of Caracas. And Maracaibo is the city in the country most affected by the shortage. Also on the road, it's difficult to fill fuel. You have to do lines for hours. And the distance between Caracas and Maracaibo is approximately 700 kilometers and a 9-hour road trip if there are no setbacks.

So my husband couldn't be with his mother in the last moments or accompany his father. On Tuesday, I got through a friend to contact people who do private transfers but the next transfer they had was today. The cost of the trip is more than double the cost of a plane ticket, so my son and I couldn't go with my husband and accompany him at this time. But at least, he managed to leave this morning in a private transport that had two cans of gasoline in the trunk. I always try to be positive and try to get around the problems that exist in Venezuela in the best way. But when it's your turn to really face reality, you just want to get out of here. After these two minutes of venting my feelings, if you are still reading, thank you for doing so. And now I'll tell you about my day and the vaccine. My morning and the jab This morning, I woke up so early that I could see the sunrise. I had to take my husband to the place where he would take the transport to Maracaibo. While we waited, we stopped at an arepera. An arepera is a place that sells arepas, which sometimes use to be open 24 hours. I owe you the photo of the arepa with queso de mano we ate. I was so sleepy that I think I forgot to take it. To know what an arepa is, you can check this article. But I did take a picture of this painting on the wall outside the place. It looks like a Queen Pineapple. https://read.cash/@CoquiCoin/the-queen-is-ours-859b4d1e

After this, I went home to prepare to attend my vaccination appointment. For me, there was no doubt as to whether to vaccinate or not. COVID has hit my family and friends hard. One of my dearest uncles passed away in December and two of my college mates died a few months ago. Especially the latter was a hard blow to me and a way of realizing how vulnerable and fragile we are in the face of the virus. We don't know how our bodies will react to it. So I got my decision months ago, and finally, my turn came. So this morning I had to go to a vaccination center in the areas of a fire station near my house. I had to be in line for about two hours but finally got my jab. Here, the vaccine they are putting is Chinese's Sinopharm. I've been told to come back in 21 days for the second dose. And that in the coming months they will put a reinforcement, although they aren't yet certain of the dates. I've been told also, for the next three days I shouldn't drink alcohol or do physical exertion.

So far, what I've felt immediately after the jab is a burning where I got it, and my arm has been hurting a lot all day. I've had a lot of heaviness in the head, but that may also be because today I had to get up early and I couldn't rest during the day. And what about you, are you already vaccinated? If you haven't. Are you going to get vaccinated soon? To all my dear readers, thank you so much! These are all my wonderful sponsors! I encourage you to visit their amazing articles if you haven't done so. Lead Image credit - Image by **Angelo Esslinger** from **Pixabay**  https://pixabay.com/users/whitesession-4645995/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=2722937 https://pixabay.com/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=2722937 **Images credits in the caption. All writings are my own unless anything different is stated. Copyright CoquiCoin 2021.** Until next time! ;) August 26, 2021

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