The fall semester is rapidly coming to a close, bringing with it a sick season and cold weather.  

Finals and study week are coming up, and with so many things on people’s minds, COVID seems to be forgotten. This fall semester was the beginning of senior year for students that were directly impacted by the disease.  

“My freshman year was exactly right after COVID… class restrictions only had about 60-70% of their normal capacity,” Wayne State College student Rohan Oelofse said. “We had a curfew until 2021 in Potchefstroom, Northwest Province, South Africa. It was difficult due to the curfew to really get any sort of college experience.”  

Oelofse wasn’t the only student with restriction complaints.  

Travis Fischer said he graduated high school 6-feet away from the rest of his classmates.  

“Suddenly I kind of realized I wouldn’t even meet all the people I would be graduating with in college due to COVID,” he said. “You weren’t allowed to have more than four people in a room without a mask. I was quarantined twice, both of which I spent two weeks in almost total isolation. The only time I saw someone was when I saw the person at the front door who gave us food.” 

Both of these students attempted to break out of their shell and get the ‘original college experience’ by joining fraternities. These groups offered protected environments where students could still mingle without getting punished as harshly as some other students.  

“I was a little more protected I think, being in a fraternity,” Fischer said. “It made it hard constantly being over there, but I got social interaction at least. I knew people who were locked in their dorms and couldn’t wait to see someone, anyone.” 

With the lockdown being enforced worldwide and the strict nature of governments, it isn’t too far out to say South Africa had its own issues with ‘necessities.’ 

“In South Africa, it was significantly stricter on the spread of Covid,” Oelofse said. “All liquor stores and any tobacco or nicotine products were banned. People were selling cigarettes out of their houses for massive profits. I have heard of a lot of people who were distributing these things during the restrictions. Like [how the U.S.] had a toilet paper problem, we had an alcohol problem. People got arrested for being outside their houses after curfew.”  

Fischer decided to transfer to Wayne towards the end of his freshman year. 

“My relationships were stressed, and I had a really hard time trying to engage with any sort of event because I just couldn’t see anyone,” he said. “I was looking to transfer here when the dean said they would never hold another mask mandate, and that was really the pushing point where I knew I could meet people and try to get that college experience.”