Trav­el­ing Stu­dents Share Their Sto­ries

MISHAWAKA - Two stu­dents share their ex­pe­ri­ences com­ing back to Bethel Uni­ver­sity as travel bans -- na­tion­wide and state or­ders -- come into play due to the coro­n­avirus (COVID-19).  

Han­nah Mi­hut, Eng­lish and phi­los­o­phy dou­ble-ma­jor, and Maryann Brandt, Wor­ship Arts Ma­jor, both took part in school-or­ga­nized trips to for­eign coun­tries.  

Mi­hut left on a soc­cer-re­lated mis­sions’ trip to Guatemala with a group called "En­gadi Min­istries" along with other fe­male Bethel soc­cer play­ers. Brandt was a part of the South Africa Study Abroad trip study­ing mul­ti­cul­tural min­istry in con­junc­tion with race and rec­on­cil­i­a­tion, South African his­tory, dis­ci­ple­ship and lead­er­ship. 

Mi­hut, and her team­mates, all came back safely and on the ap­pointed day they had orig­i­nally booked their flights; how­ever, Brandt, and other stu­dents, were com­mu­ni­cated with to come back to Bethel as the sit­u­a­tion grew, caus­ing them to sched­ule flights be­fore their ex­pe­ri­ence was over.  

Brandt said that she was in Cape Town, South Africa, when COVID-19 made its first ap­pear­ances and was wit­ness to the coun­try’s de­ci­sions to quar­an­tine be­fore leav­ing.  

“Their coun­try lead­ers were en­cour­ag­ing every­one to san­i­tize and stay at home. I be­lieve they closed the board­ers of South Africa on the 15th of March, and a few days af­ter we left, they an­nounced they are do­ing a coun­try-wide 21-day lock­down.”  

Both stu­dents had op­po­site in­sights into what was hap­pen­ing. As Brandt was in­formed about the spread of COVID-19 in South Africa, Mi­hut ex­pressed the pan­demic was not as se­ri­ous yet for the United States, and Guatemala was not tak­ing pre­cau­tions at that time.   

“There was­n’t much se­ri­ous talk about it in the states yet, and as far as we could tell no one in Guatemala was wor­ried about it,” Mi­hut said. 

Af­ter com­ing back to Bethel and start­ing a train­ing rou­tine again, Bethel com­mu­ni­cated with the soc­cer team about send­ing them to an on-cam­pus house to be quar­an­tined.  

Mi­hut said, “In­for­ma­tion and in­struc­tions were not com­mu­ni­cated well, and only girls who said they weren’t feel­ing well were put in the house.”  

Sim­i­larly, the study abroad stu­dents came back to Bethel and were quar­an­tined upon ar­rival to the uni­ver­sity.  

“When we re­turned to Bethel, they pro­vided my team and I spaces to quar­an­tine and have taken care of us dur­ing our 14-day quar­an­tine be­fore we head home,” said Brandt, who spoke to The Bea­con prior to cam­pus clos­ing.  

Both stu­dents were grate­ful for their ex­pe­ri­ences in other coun­tries, al­though their trips were unique fol­low­ing the out­break.  

Brandt ex­pressed her grat­i­tude to be able to go to South Africa, even though she had to leave ear­lier than planned.  

“As I think back through the ex­pe­ri­ence, what sticks out the most to me, is God’s ex­treme faith­ful­ness and guid­ance as we nav­i­gated get­ting back and even as we left South Africa,” Brandt said. “He an­swered many prayers and con­tin­ues to bring peace about the whole sit­u­a­tion. I am ex­ceed­ingly grate­ful for the time that I was able to have in South Africa and will con­tinue to cher­ish the lessons I have learned and the friend­ships that I have gained.”   

Both soc­cer and study abroad stu­dents went home af­ter test­ing and when cam­pus closed.