The Diamond Princess arrived in Busan at 7:30AM, and it was raining, so I took this photo from inside my cabin. The rain later stopped. We docked next to the Regent 7 Seas Explorer,  the ship we were on a year ago from Dubai to Singapore .  I said: We boarded the Regent Seven Seas Explorer, and if there is a Heaven, this certainly is one possible scenario.  Check-in was flawless, and in consideration of all the visa and vaccination protocols, quick. Started with a champagne greeting With a welcome champagne, this was our skyline view of Dubai.  Note the Burj Khalifa, the tallest in the world.   But work has begun again for Saudi Arabia's Jeddah Tower, to be called  Kingdom Tower , and at 3281 feet, will be 564 feet taller. So, anyway, this is the same Regent 7 Seas Explorer next to us. First, a Japanese breakfast, to which I added an egg-over-easy and ham. Not long thereafter, lunch.  Again, wonderful, but filling. Dessert. I looked down to the dock area, and it looked like compoun

Using   Worldometer   data, the USA had 66,046 new cases during the past week.  This was 55% the World total of 119,320 cases.  This past week, however, saw a 48% drop in the U.S. from the previous full week. That 55% rate is far too high, as many countries, such as Japan and South Korea, don't report anymore, and I know from  other sources  that South Korea at more than 10,000 or so cases/week. South Korea began to have covid outbreaks after most of its citizens were vaccinated.  Thus, their overall mortality rate is  only 0.1%.  Today it is still at 0.1%, twice that of the seasonal flu at  0.05%.  The USA overall is now at 1%.  However, in recent weeks, the mortality rate has dropped to 0.2%, or four times the flu mortality rate. The USA during the 2021-2022 flu season had 9 million cases, or divided by 365 meant 25,000 flu cases/day.  Of course most people got sick during the colder months.  So let's double that to 50,000 cases/day.  We are beginning to enter the 2023-2024 f

From  Worldometer , total world covid cases and deaths.  Nine waves?  Or ten? Three countries continue to dominate new covid cases/week, with South Korea still #1, by far:                                   This past week   Previous week World                     300,529              490,578 #1  South Korea     216,046              359,479 #2  USA                   56,391                85,783 #3  Brazil                   9,713                10,741 Of course, many countries don't do any reporting anymore. During the past week, South Korea had 72% of all covid cases, USA 19% and Brazil 3%, or these countries had 94% of all the world cases.  South Korea had 4211 new cases/million people, USA 168  and Brazil 45. The grand summary regarding percentage of citizens who were infected with covid, and mortality rate in the right column, which is deaths divided by total cases. S. Korea   66%   0.11% Australia  45%   0.19% Italy         43%   0.74% Taiwan     43%   0.19% USA         32%    1.