A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come

Q: What is A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come?

It is a Twitter photo chain where users post smiling pre-pandemic snapshots of themselves from January 2020 as a bittersweet joke about not knowing the COVID-19 pandemic was weeks away.

Q: Where did A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come come from?

Brazilian Twitter user @gabrielgranadoo started the chain on August 11th, 2020, with a Portuguese tweet using the word 'CORRENTE' meaning 'CHAIN'. The first English-language version was posted on August 29th, 2020, by Twitter user @miguelAbueno.

Q: What does A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come mean?

The chain plays on the gap between how carefree people looked in January 2020 and what actually happened over the following months of pandemic lockdowns and disruption.

Q: How do you use A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come?

You post a photo of yourself from January 2020 with a caption based on the original wording, or you swap in a fictional character shown in a happy moment before their story takes a turn for the worse, as comedian Mike Camerlengo did with Rickety Cricket.

Q: Is A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come still popular?

The chain peaked in late August and September 2020 during its initial viral run on Twitter, with the celebrity boost from figures like Mark Hoppus. It is mostly referenced historically now as a snapshot of early-pandemic internet humor.

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Published August 2, 2026

A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come is a viral Twitter photo chain from August 2020, where users posted smiling pre-pandemic snapshots paired with a caption about not knowing what was coming. It started in Portuguese and quickly jumped to English-speaking Twitter, becoming a shorthand for pandemic grief and dark humor.

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Overview

A Photo Of You In January 2020 Without Imagining What Would Come is a photo chain challenge in which people posted smiling snapshots of themselves taken in January 2020, weeks before the coronavirus pandemic upended daily life1. The bittersweet joke pairs an innocent, happy image with the shared knowledge of what was about to hit.

The format spread first in Portuguese as 'Uma foto de você feliz em janeiro de 2020 sem imaginar o que estava por vir' and then in English translation, with participants sharing vacation photos, birthdays, gigs, and other pre-lockdown moments4. Celebrities and comedians also joined in, sometimes with fictional characters shown in their happier days before their storylines went south5.

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Origin & Background

Platform

Twitter (Portuguese) / Twitter (viral English spread)

Creator

@gabrielgranadoo

Date

2020

On August 11th, 2020, Brazilian Twitter user @gabrielgranadoo tweeted 'CORRENTE Uma foto de você feliz em janeiro de 2020 sem imaginar o que estava por vir' (translated from Portuguese: 'CHAIN A photo of you happy in January 2020 without imagining what was to come')1. Within a month the post picked up more than 240 likes and 115 retweets, kicking off a viral chain across Portuguese-speaking Twitter4.

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How It Spread

Over the next 24 hours, users flooded Twitter with pre-pandemic photos of themselves at parties, on trips, and with friends1. On August 29th, 2020, Twitter user @miguelAbueno posted what Know Your Meme identifies as the first English-language version, opening the chain up to a much wider global audience2.

Celebrities jumped in within days. On August 31st, Blink-182 co-founder Mark Hoppus shared his own version, which drew more than 1,600 likes and 450 retweets in under 24 hours3. That same day, comedian Mike Camerlengo swapped in a fictional stand-in, posting an image of Rickety Cricket from 'It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia' during the character’s priesthood days, before his long slide into degeneration across the series5.

The chain became a shorthand across social media for pandemic grief and dark humor about lost normalcy, with variations pulling in film characters, athletes, and public figures whose 2020 fortunes soured4.

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How to Use This Meme

People typically pick a photo from January or early February 2020 showing themselves smiling, on vacation, at a concert, or with friends. Captions often stick close to the original Portuguese wording or its English form, sometimes shortened to just 'a photo of you in January 2020...'. A common convention is the fictional twist, in which a beloved character is shown in a hopeful moment before their story arc turns dark, like the Rickety Cricket version5.