Sitting in the backseat of an Uber, static radio waves in the air, Rodrigo Veiga da Cunha (C ‘24) heard the news of the first COVID–19 cases in Brazil. Unlike our other Penn10 interviewees, Rodrigo knew a pre–COVID–19 Penn when he started college in the fall of 2019. As any student who faced the first waves of COVID–19 in college can tell you how the story goes. A week of spring break turned into a month—and suddenly childhood bedrooms were classrooms. By spring, COVID–19 was tearing across the globe.
In the south of Brazil, Rodrigo’s home, the pandemic struck especially hard for his family. As healthcare professionals, they were forced to step back from work almost immediately on account of their age and high–risk status. It was then that Rodrigo informed his pre–major advisor that he would not be returning to school that fall semester. Over just weeks, he went from the bustling energy of Penn’s campus to his childhood home in Brazil, and ultimately stepped away from school to support his family and preserve the years he had left in his Penn experience from the unpredictability of COVID–19.
“It was kind of weird because for most of 2020, the only income in my house was coming from me,” Rodrigo recalls. Although his gap year between freshman and sophomore year was laden with adult responsibilities, that summer he luckily already had an internship lined up through Penn’s Undergraduate Research and Mentorship program. He spent his summer, cloistered in his childhood home, researching the Brazilian economy, hyperinflation, and International Monetary Fund interventions. As the world stagnated around him, Rodrigo did what he could to propel himself intellectually forward, wading through the muddy waters of personal and academic uncertainty against the backdrop of global uncertainty. That summer solidified his desire to study economics and political science—but he certainly didn’t have that academic conviction from the start of his academic endeavors.
Like most other freshmen, traumatized by high school math classes, Rodrigo was dead set on never taking math at Penn. He recalls telling his pre–major advisor before freshman year, “I don’t really care what happens—just help me never take a math class.” (As someone who has gone through the trials of tribulations of the Penn Math department, he was right to be afraid). Despite his teenage maxims, five years later, Rodrigo is preparing to graduate with a double—major in economics and political science with a minor in math. He learned to love the quantitative disciplines, even if they didn’t always love him back.
While few people would say that the pandemic served them well, for Rodrigo, the radical change in pace, place, and passion did stem from his wildly unique Penn experience. He returned to campus from his leave of absence in the fall of 2021, ready to immerse himself in his studies once more and reconnect with old friends.
But just as Rodrigo was hitting his academic and social stride once again, one spring day, he fractured his foot playing pick–up soccer. His friends rushed him to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center and learned that night that he had a Lisfranc fracture. “I stayed [at the hospital] for six or seven hours … at midnight, a doctor came back to me and said, ‘Yeah man, you have to have [a] surgery.’” Rodrigo was gobsmacked. “I’m like, ‘What do you mean? Like at most, I broke my foot … there’s no way I need surgery for this.’ I was definitely in denial.” Saddled with the shocking news, he couldn’t even return to his house on Sansom Street—he wouldn’t be able to walk up the three flights of stairs to get to his room. Rodrigo spent the next few days at a friend’s place while figuring out how to get home for surgery in Brazil in order to recover with his family’s support.
Before he knew it, Rodrigo was submitting a request for another semester’s leave. The path that COVID–19 tore through like a tornado was once again had to be repaved. A major surgery later, with six screws in his feet and the scars to show for it, Rodrigo emerged from the injury relatively healthy, and lives to tell the tale to those who can bear a bit of gore. Just as he begins to show me old photos of his post–operation foot, fitted with multiple screws and a metal plate, the clouds open up and release a smattering of spring rain on us—even the gods were displeased at the sight of his mangled foot. Not all stories are meant to be coupled with visual aids.
At this point, I’m certain you’re sympathizing with Rodrigo’s story to the nth degree—he traversed perhaps the most treacherous paths throughout his Penn career. But despite his setbacks of dramatic proportions, Rodrigo doesn’t dwell on what could have been or lament his tragic chronology of events. From a pandemic–induced pause to fractures that forced further academic absence, Rodrigo believes that the student and individual he is now is a direct product of the unbelievable challenges he faced.
Rodrigo walks with scars to this day, but in the process of recovery, he reconnected with his now–girlfriend whilst home in Brazil and upon his return, became a shepherd and mentor for Brazilian newcomers. With the power of retrospective reflection, Rodrigo is honest about the pressure from Penn’s pre–professional culture. Those expectations often press students to have their majors, career path, and salaries planned by the time they hit Locust Walk. Rodrigo steered clear of this stereotype early on. “I was always open saying, ‘I have no idea’ [what I will do].”
“My trajectory helped me be a little bit more comfortable with [uncertainty] in the sense that I have plans, but I don’t feel like I have to stick to like one specific path. And in the past few years, I kind of learned that for me at least, the best way to plan things ahead is to leave a few doors open,” Rodrigo confesses. Throughout the trials and tribulations of the past five years, he has learned to expect the unexpected.
When reflecting on his long–term post–graduate plans, Rodrigo hopes to one day be able to return to Brazil, utilizing his degree to give back to his own community. “I’ve called several places home, but [Brazil] is where I feel like my people are. I see myself as someone using everything that I’ve learned [at Penn] and helping out back there. I feel like I would let myself down a little bit if I kind of forgot about my country, and just made my entire life here [in the United States].”
While each of our Penn10 interviewees carries the legacy of COVID–19 through their college careers, none have had quite the whirlwind of chaos and uncertainty that has pervaded Rodrigo’s college career. Despite the lamentable challenges he faced from pandemics to surgery–demanding injuries, Rodrigo remains a beacon of optimism. He remarks, “It’s cool to look back and see how much of the things that I didn’t know were going to work out or not actually ended up working out, and not because I saw things clearly … it’s the way life is; stuff works itself out.”
For those incessantly checking LinkedIn and Handshake, just know that the post–graduate landscape seems immeasurably less intimidating when there are students like Rodrigo who have excelled through the most challenging of tribulations. Find comfort in knowing that no matter what, “you’re going to survive the next day, the next assignment, [and] the next job hunt.”
