6/9/22, 10:18 AM Connected by extension - How paying connects old regimes and new isolations - Allegra Lab neat pile, touching their right arm above the elbow with their left hand, holding the money on the small side, sometimes creasing it in ④ the middle ( in chaîne opératoire 2). I would take the return ( in chaîne opératoire 2) while the cash ⑤ given would remain with the cashier. Taking touch as an index of proximity, the customer and the cashier touch the same thing more often when paying by card than when paying by cash, three times against twice. Additionally, items which change hands in cash payments do not return to the giver. These two factors could qualify the director-general’s description of paying by credit card as closer contact. “ As hands touch faces, bodies and other (https://allegralaboratory.net/wpcontent/uploads/2020/11/chaineoperatoire2.png) Chaîne opératoire 2: Paying with cash in a supermarket in Yangon. Cash (green square) given to the cashier who hands back a receipt and/or the return (red diamond). matter, techniques make people. ” It is important to note that my articulation is one among many. At the time, I was texting with two local friends and interlocutors. When I wrote that I felt both anxious and that “my lifestyle and diet will protect me”, one said they were also “feeling both. And a bit feverish”, affirming shared anxiety and confidence. As I spoke with the second interlocutor a few months later, he told me he understood the director-general to have meant that a) the number of contacts in credit card payment was higher because transactions were faster and b) the number of interactions in small local stores which operated by cash would be lower. He further thought the director-general said this to calm people down, not because it was true. My interlocutor thus focused on the supposed effects of the director-general’s words rather those of the actions described. We further diverged on our respective interpretations of what the director-general called https://allegralaboratory.net/corona-connected-by-extension-how-paying-connects-old-regimes-and-new-isolations/ 8/12