Fowler Faculty Embrace Hobbies During Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic forced many of us to give up our hobbies and our favorite pastimes. However, some of us were able to explore new talents and passions that were pandemic-safe, helping us through the “new normal.” 

These scenarios were also true for several of the faculty members at San Diego State University’s Fowler College of Business. While some are in the process of getting back to the things they loved to do before the pandemic, others discovered new talents that emerged this past year. Remarkably, some of these new interests benefitted the faculty and at times, helped their friends and neighbors during the lockdown. 

Here’s what a few of the Fowler faculty members do to pass their time outside from the classroom: 

Erlinde Cornelis

Marketing professor and sustainable living advocate, Erlinde Cornelis, has embarked on a tour of the U.S. in a 1995 Lazy Daze recreational vehicle (RV) that she and her husband, Yannick, retrofitted to make it more environmentally friendly. The two of them installed eco-friendly options like vegan leather seats, cork flooring, a reverse osmosis water filter, LED lights, and solar panels on the roof. 

The couple, along with their tabby cat, Chamise, went on a road trip earlier this year which took them throughout the United States. Some of the highlights was their visit to the Love Plan, which is a small-scale, ecological, intentional living homestead in Mt Dora, Florida; sampling vegan ice cream at Certified B Corp NadaMoo! in Austin, Texas; and hiking at several national parks in the U.S. 

Now that their road trip is concluded, the couple and their cat will continue to live on a small footprint. “This summer we will build a beautiful outdoor deck, outdoor kitchen, and a solar-heated outdoor shower with composting toilet where we live, so we can live more sustainably,” said Cornelis. “So, this outdoor infrastructure will become an extension of our tiny indoor living space.” 

Click here to see a video of the couple discussing their eco-friendly RV renovations.

Wendy Patrick

Management lecturer, Wendy Patrick, began learning to play the violin at the age of three.  She grew up playing in multiple orchestras, including the Orange County Youth Symphony, which performed in California and throughout Europe.
 
Patrick is still a dedicated violinist.  She currently plays, in several groups including the La Jolla Symphony Orchestra and Chorus (she sits in the first violin section), and a rock band called Blue Groove, where she plays the electric violin. Between the two styles she prefers classical (loves playing anything by Beethoven or Vivaldi), but also has a passion for worship music, and has performed with different worship bands around the world “from San Diego to South Korea.”

Nils Randrup

Originally from Copenhagen, Denmark, Nils Randrup started biking to kindergarten and has never given up on his favorite mode of transportation. Now a management information systems lecturer, Randrup is still an avid cyclist — mainly mountain biking, he says — but the start of the pandemic has given him an interesting new hobby. “I been fixing bikes for friends and people in our neighborhood during the COVID-19 lockdown because all the local bike stores were slammed with work and most people have to wait four-plus weeks to get their bicycles fixed,” said Randrup. “I have now repaired approximately 120 bikes for local residents during the lockdown to keep our community on wheels.”

Randrup began fixing bicycles at an early age. “When I was 10-years-old my father, got tired of fixing my bike for me and then taught me how to do the standard stuff,” he said. “He told me that in the future, I could fix my bike myself. In my late 20s, I started doing competitive cycling and I taught myself to do the more complex repairs.” 

Another hobby Randrup has maintained since childhood is his interest in art. “My grandfather was a painter,” he said. “Since I was around art as a kid, I pursued my interest in art as a teenager.” As a young adult, he began purchasing and restoring second-hand furniture, but later began restoring artwork, specifically sculptures. “I don’t do this professionally, but I do the restorations for myself, family and friends,” he said. 

Robert Showghi

Robert Showghi’s New Year’s Resolution for 2017 was to learn to bake bread. It’s a resolution that Showghi, a lecturer in the management information systems department, has kept and put to good use. 

Showghi learned to bake bread by conducting internet research and using his mother’s recipes. After many practice runs, he eventually came up with his own recipes, which he put to good use when the COVID lockdown was put into place in March 2020. “Since I live in a Lake San Marcos community of mostly retirees, many of my neighbors were reluctant to go out and buy groceries,” said Showghi. “To help my neighbors minimize their trips to the grocery stores, I began baking and distributing loaves of bread each week. At the height of the pandemic, I was baking and distributing 25 to 30 loaves each week. That practice continued until late July or early August of last year.” 

Now that the pandemic is winding down, Showghi says he only bakes a few loaves every other week for his family, but he’s hoping to embark on a new hobby. “My new focus in 2021 is baking French pastries,” he said. “Hopefully, I will not have any compelling reasons for mass producing them.”

Congcong Zheng

Management professor Congcong Zheng began hiking at Torrey Pines State Reserve during the winter of 2007. She still hikes there on a year-round basis and occasionally runs into Fowler colleagues while on the trails.

“I went there the first time on a date — that date is now my husband,” said Congcong. “During the hike, you can follow the trails to go down to the beach and dip your toes in the water before coming back up to the top of the hill. It’s a beautiful hike in all the seasons of the year, a great place to gather thoughts on your own or engage in long conversations with a friend.”

Jim Vogt

Jim Vogt, an accounting lecturer at the Charles W. Lamden School of Accountancy, thought he’d given up playing softball 25 years ago. “I started playing in my early 20s and played pretty consistently until my late 30s when life and injuries got in the way,” said Vogt. “I didn’t play again for almost twenty years, but decided to give it another shot when I found a league for players aged 55+ about five years ago.”

In 2019, Vogt was recruited to play as an outfielder with the Southern California Top Gun Lightning, a tournament level team, which plays in Southern California, Las Vegas, Phoenix and other cities in the Southwest. 

In addition to playing softball, Vogt also likes running on the beach and enjoying other outdoor activities with his wife, Debi, and his grandchildren.