There were far more people out and about in Karlsruhe, Germany on Tuesday when Markham native Christie Glaser went to do her grocery shopping in her adopted home country.

A day earlier, German Chancellor Angela Merkel allowed shops smaller than 800 square metres to reopen, with rules in place for each store’s capacity. More than a month had passed since the country’s coronavirus lockdown took effect on March 17 — the same day Premier Doug Ford declared a state of emergency in Ontario because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Glaser moved to Germany nearly six years ago to be with her now-husband Burkhard and the couple welcomed a son, Noah, 18 months ago. She has never personally felt anxious about contracting the coronavirus — statistically, age and health suggests her family is not particularly vulnerable. But she wasn’t comfortable visiting any of the newly reopened shops right away.

“There’s still something holding you back because of how focused it’s been on not going anywhere and not being too close to people,” Glaser said later that day. “It is weird, for sure.”

Countries around the world are beginning to loosen restrictions around coronavirus measures and Canadian expatriates in Germany, Austria, South Korea and even Italy — where regulations are expected to be more widely eased starting the first week of May — are learning the return to normal will be slow, with new fears to manage in the wake of the global pandemic’s peak.

Germany recorded the fifth largest number of confirmed cases in the world — 150,773 — and the eighth highest number of deaths, 5,319 as of Thursday, according to Johns Hopkins University’s data on the pandemic. But German Health Minister Jens Spahn said last Friday the outbreak had become “manageable” in the country, with more patients recovering than being infected every day last week.

Glaser credits Merkel’s empathetic yet matter-of-fact and never fear-based addresses to the country, as well as Germans’ penchant for logic and conforming, as key to getting the country to a place where it can start opening its doors again.

“People are extreme rule followers here,” Glaser said. “That stereotype is absolutely correct. There can be no cars in sight and they will not cross the street until that little man is green. It’s hilarious but in a crisis like this it’s actually very helpful because people are really following the rules.”

Nick Cornish, a Canadian-born teacher who lives in Vienna, Austria, and his wife Amanda Holder, also a teacher, found their adopted country responding to restrictions with similar immediacy when the country locked down on March 16.

Thousands of smalls shops, less than 400 square metres in size, have reopened in Austria since last week, with shoppers required to wear masks. Bigger stores are expected to follow suit on May 1, with restaurants tentatively scheduled to open on May 15, according to Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz. In a recent interview with CNN, Kurz said the number of cases in Austria is only increasing by about 100 new infections a day.

The step-by-step process the government is taking offers Austrians who are getting antsy in isolation a light at the end of the tunnel, said Cornish.

“Just the general idea that there’s a plan in place gives me confidence and makes me feel less enclosed because I know that soon we’ll return to the ‘new normal,’ which is the term they keep on using,” Cornish said.

Both Glaser and Cornish expect their new normals will include a focus on germs; handwashing, sanitizing and masks will continue to be priorities. Cornish has been told he will likely need to wear a mask when he returns to teaching. He expects the same protocol to be adopted by other professionals, such as servers in restaurants.

Kurz also made it clear more stringent restrictions could be restored if the need arises.

“(Kurz) says if stuff starts going badly you can step back and he even used the word ‘or pull the emergency brake,’” Cornish said.

Schools in Austria are also set to open through an unspecified step-by-step process starting May 15. It’s a good sign for teachers like Cornish and Holder, but worrisome for others, like Louisa Russell, a native of Vancouver living in Salzburg. Her 7-year-old daughter, Klara, is in Grade 1. The family lives in a multi-generational home, with Russell’s husband Markus Kirchgasser and his parents, Peter and Vevi, both 68. Russell suffers from asthma, while her father-in-law does not have a spleen.

“I do not know how to protect them if my daughter is going to school,” Russell said in an email to the Star.

In Seoul, South Korea, where Bradley Hider, who spent much of his life in Toronto and Hamilton, has lived for almost six years, people are keeping an eye out for a possible second wave of the virus.

The country, which has reportedly lowered its spread of coronavirus infections to single digits per day, recommended in March that indoor sports, religious and entertainment facilities suspend operations. Many facilities are now able to reopen as long as they comply with disinfection guidelines, according to news reports.

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Hider mostly stayed inside as fear about the virus peaked in South Korea in February and March, but he is now “cautiously optimistic” about the way forward, if not yet ready to go to a Korean Baseball Organization game, which will resume without audiences next month, or a crowded shopping mall.

“I know we’re not out of the woods yet and the government is constantly reminding us not to be complacent,” he said.

The benefits of remaining vigilant are why Victoria Sportelli, a native of Toronto who has lived in Apulia in the south of Italy for the last 33 years, doesn’t expect her life to change much over the next few months. Sportelli has spent the last seven weeks barely leaving the house, except to go into her garden. Saturday gatherings at the pizzeria with eight to 12 friends and a birthday party she was planning for her husband, Antonio, in July, are off the table, even with Italy, the European country hit hardest by the virus, expected to enter what Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte called “phase two” of it’s lockdown by the first week in May. The plan for the country going forward is to “coexist” with the virus by opening some stores and factories, among other areas of the workforce.

“We need to get into phase two,” Sportelli said. “We need it economically, financially, psychologically. It has to come, it has to be. What the repercussions will be, we don’t know.”

Meanwhile, Sportelli will hope for a better tomorrow, and longs for the day when “her safety net” — the ability to hop on a plane and visit her sister and her family in Toronto — is once again an option.

“The freedom that we have all lost right now is so hard to deal with.”

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