I am Cinthya and I have been doing a side job as a personal shopper during my rest days. My regular job is as a cashier at one restaurant in New Rochelle NY.

With this pandemic, the world turned as I’m doing the personal shopper job as my full-time job for now. When we heard the first case of the virus was from our place, we were shocked, scared. We didn’t know what to do. We waited for the government’s advice. Until all of a sudden, the National Guard was sent to our city to create a containment zone to avoid the spread of the virus to other counties. But it was almost impossible given that the first case person had been exposed to too many places and people. We felt like we’re going to die. We were told to stay home which we did. At that point in time, I was jobless. I mean I could still do the personal shopper job but I did not want to take risks. Until I had to go out to buy food for my family. Then I realized, I’m already taking a risk by going out to buy essential needs for my family and sooner or later I won’t have money to do so, so I decided to do the shopping for my customers too.

I get food for my family and at the same time, I earn money, it’s the same risk I take. I even earn a lot more than what I was earning for my side job. Until a few days ago, I was in line at Costco, and mind you I went there as early as 6 am cos I know the line gets crazy and the number of people is twice or even three times more than I have seen there before, and it got so insane as I heard someone was complaining that they’ve been standing in line for almost an hour and the employee was delaying the gate opening. I said to myself, I was there at 6 am, I was there before the person complaining, and yet I patiently wait until they open because I know how overwhelming it is seeing that many people.

It got worse and the employees had to call cops. I don’t have an idea how it happened in just a snap. I feel bad for the employees. Now we were even more delayed to enter the warehouse because of the incident caused by an impatient person. It was freaky to be in a crowd when you know the virus can be anywhere. Now I came to realize that I have earned enough for the next month or so and I decided to lay low with personal shopping until it’s not too risky anymore. I also do not want to be in the same position again where people can’t control their anger when something worse is happening. It really was total chaos.