The Covid-19 pandemic has been tough and lonely for many but it has been particularly challenging for binational couples who have been separated by travel restrictions.

Whilst most people were stocking up on toilet paper and hand sanitiser right before the shelter-in-place order was issued last spring in New York City, Andrea Hazen was buying paintbrushes, oil paints and canvases.

She sat alone in her light-filled Manhattan apartment, painting and listening to jazz, throughout the hardest months of the pandemic. When the city began to open up, she started playing tennis at the concrete courts across from her apartment block.