Wuhan Diary Page 3
But of course the bad news is circling everywhere. A few days ago when I first saw the news of a 40,000-person public banquet gathering at Baibuting, I immediately sent out a text to my friends group criticizing it. I was quite harsh with my words. I even said that hosting a large-scale community gathering like that during a time like this “should effectively be considered a form of criminal action.” That is what I said back on the 20th but I never imagined that on the 21st the provincial government would then go ahead and host a massive song-and-dance concert. Where has people’s common sense gone to? Even the virus must be thinking, Wow, you people have really underestimated me! I don’t want to say too much more about this issue. The bad news today is coming from where else but Baibuting, which now has several confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus. Although I haven’t authenticated this new information yet, based on my own intuition I don’t see any reason for my source to be lying. Just think about it; if you put 40,000 people together in a closed space, how can you expect people not to get infected? Some specialists have pointed out that the death toll from this type of new virus is not too high; everyone wants to believe that, myself included. However, some of the other news coming through is quite alarming. For those officials attending all those government meetings between the 10th and the 20th, please take care, because the virus doesn’t discriminate between ordinary people and high-ranking leaders.
While I’m writing, I’d like to say a little bit about Mayor Zhou Xianwang’s hat. For the past two days everyone online has been roasting him alive over his hat.2 During ordinary times I may have also gotten a good laugh out of this, but right now Mayor Zhou has been running all over the city, trying to lead an army of Wuhan city officials in the fight against this outbreak; you can see the exhaustion and anxiety written all over his face. I suspect that he may have even realized what will probably befall him once this thing has settled down. In times like this, people usually face a mixture of guilt, self-blame, uneasiness, and a sense that they should have done more, even though now it is all too late—I’m sure that Mayor Zhou is experiencing all these complex feelings. But he is, after all, still the man running our municipal government; he needs to pull himself together and focus on the pressing tasks ahead that we are going to have to face. He is, after all, just an ordinary person. I have heard people say that Mayor Zhou is a disciplined and pragmatic man; people usually have a very good impression of him. He started out in western Hubei and worked his way up the bureaucratic ladder, one step at a time. He has probably never encountered anything on this scale in his entire life. All this makes me think that we should perhaps look at this “hat incident” from a more sympathetic perspective. Perhaps it is something as simple as his wanting to wear a hat because it was so cold outside, but when he saw that the premier wasn’t wearing a hat he got nervous. After all, he is younger than Premier Li Keqiang and maybe he thought that if he wore a hat but the premier wasn’t wearing one, it might be interpreted as impolite? Perhaps that is why he suddenly took off his hat and handed it to his assistant. Perhaps it is better if we just look at it from this perspective?
Anyway, that’s all I have to record for today.
January 29, 2020
Taking care of oneself is one way to contribute to the effort.
I decided to just let everything go and slept all the way up until noon today. (It is actually not uncommon for me to sleep in like that, but in normal times I would blame myself for being so lazy. These days, however, everyone in Wuhan is saying: “On those sunny days when we till the crops, It’s hard to get a good night’s rest! We sleep all morning; we sleep all afternoon.”3 When people are all sleeping in like that, it is hard not to just let things go!)
I was still lying in bed flicking through messages on my phone when I saw a text one of my doctor friends sent me: “Take care of yourself and, no matter what, don’t go out! Don’t go out! Don’t go out!” I felt a bit jittery as soon as I saw the way he repeatedly emphasized the phrase “Don’t go out!” I figured this must mean that the outbreak is hitting its peak. I quickly called my daughter, who was about to go out to the local neighborhood supermarket to pick up a few boxed lunches. I told her not to go. Even if the only thing you have left to eat at home is plain white rice, don’t go out. Back on the first day of the Lunar New Year, when I first heard that the downtown district was shutting down the traffic, I immediately went over and brought her enough supplies to get her through at least 10 days. I suspect she was just too lazy to cook and that is why she wanted to go out. A good thing my daughter has a good fear of death ingrained in her! The second she heard what I had to say, she agreed to stay at home. She called me back a bit later to ask how to cook cabbage (can you believe that she actually put a head of cabbage in the freezer?). I don’t think my daughter has ever cooked a proper meal in her apartment. Usually she finds a way to get herself invited to other people’s houses for dinner, or just orders takeout. Perhaps this was a good way to get her to finally start using her kitchen. But I’m not sure if my daughter’s finally forcing herself to learn how to cook should be considered the silver lining in this situation. Compared to her, I’ve got it much easier. One of my neighbors just brought over a plate of steaming hot buns for me. We were both wearing face masks when she dropped the buns off; although it’s risky, I decided to just brave up and dig in.
The sun is glorious today. The most comfortable weather during the Wuhan winter is when the sun beams down like this, so soft and warm. If not for the coronavirus, I’m sure that the streets around my apartment would be jammed with traffic right now. That’s because East River Garden Lane, one of the Wuhan locals’ favorite destinations, is right around the corner. But these days East River Garden Lane is completely deserted. Two days ago my old classmate Old Dao went out there for a jog. He said that he was the only person out there. If you want to figure out where the safest place in the city is, I suspect that East River Garden Lane might be it.
For those of us here in Wuhan who are quarantined at home, most of us are fairly at ease—that is, as long as no one in our family is sick. But those patients and their families are really having a rough time. Right now it is extremely difficult to get a bed at any hospital, and many people are still suffering. The construction site for Huoshenshan Hospital4 is really kicking into high gear, but, as the old saying goes, distant water can’t put out a nearby fire. Those patients without a place to go are the greatest victims of this tragedy. So many families have been torn apart by this. But a lot of media outlets have been reporting on these stories. Freelance journalists have been even more active in covering this topic, many of them quietly documenting what has been happening from the very beginning. All we can do is record what is happening. This morning I read an essay about a family whose mother just died from the coronavirus on the first day of the Lunar New Year and both the father and the elder brother were infected. Reading that essay really tore me up, and this was basically a middle-class family. But what are all those lower-income people supposed to do? What will their lives be like? A few days ago, I actually saw some video clips of exhausted medical workers and patients collapsing, and I can tell you that I don’t think I have ever seen that kind of helpless sadness in my entire life. Professor Liu Chuan’e from Hubei University said that he feels like crying every day. Don’t we all?! I’ve been telling my friends that what we are seeing today allows one to clearly appreciate the true gravity of this human calamity. After pondering things, I really feel that there is no way to forgive those irresponsible workers; they should all pay a price for their incompetence. But for now all we can do is put all our efforts into this fight to get us through these hard times.
I should say a bit about what has been happening with me. Besides the fact that I’m in a very different state of mind than normal, my everyday life is actually not that different from before. During previous years, I spent the Lunar New Year in basically the same way as I’m spending it now. The only thing different is that I normally visit my grea
t-uncle Yang Shuzi to pay my respects and join him for a New Year’s lunch, but this year the luncheon was canceled. My great-uncle is getting on in years and isn’t in the best of health, so we need to take special care not to expose him to the virus. So in the end, I basically didn’t go anywhere during the holiday this year. I actually have acute bronchitis and it usually acts up during the winter months. There was one period of time when I ended up being hospitalized for my bronchitis three years in a row during the Lunar New Year. So these past few days I have been repeatedly reminding myself to do everything possible to ensure that I don’t get sick. I did have a little headache a few days ago, and yesterday I had a slight cough; but today I’m feeling much better. A long time ago, Jiang Zidan5 (she is something of a specialist in traditional Chinese medicine) told me that, based on my illness, I have a condition referred to as “cold encapsulating fire.” From that point on, every winter I would prepare a traditional medicinal potion of milk vetch root, honeysuckle essence, chrysanthemum, Chinese wolfberry, red dates, and American ginseng, boiled in a pot of mulberry leaf tea. I gave my little potion the nickname “hodgepodge brew” and made sure to drink several large glasses each day. Once the coronavirus outbreak started to get serious, I added a morning vitamin C supplement, a glass of fizzy vitamin C drink, and a few glasses of hot water to my daily regimen. For my evening shower I made sure to let my back soak under the hot water, which was on the verge of scalding. I also went through an entire package of Lotus Flu Capsules. One of my classmates even taught me the “mantra of the closed door” to chant silently to myself: “Close up all of your body’s openings! If you stave off the cold wind, the hundred evils will not befall you! Store up the proper qi inside yourself, so the evil will be unable to assail!” He told me in a manner of all seriousness that this was a chant that had been secretly passed down for generations and was not at all “superstitious.” We had a good laugh about that one! I wonder if anyone really does chant it. In any case, I have already picked up whatever tricks I can from all sorts of people on how to protect myself from this virus, and I am employing them all, except, that is, for chanting the “mantra of the closed door”! But I think all those other tactics seem to be working. I’m in a pretty good state for the time being. Taking care of oneself is one way to contribute to the effort.
By the way, two days ago one of my posts on Weibo was taken down. It actually had a longer lifespan online than I originally thought it would. I didn’t expect it to be forwarded by so many people. I’ve grown accustomed to writing in that small 140-character window afforded one on the Weibo platform, so when I publish things online they tend to be quite informal (I always had a preference for a more informal style!). I just post whatever pops into my mind. I don’t spend much time editing my posts before uploading them, so there are often grammar and spelling mistakes (which is embarrassing, considering that I’m a graduate of the Wuhan University Chinese Department!). I hope readers will excuse me for my carelessness. I actually had absolutely no intention of criticizing anyone during this outbreak. (Isn’t there an old Chinese saying about “Best to wait until spring to settle your scores”?) After all, right now our main adversary is the virus itself. I am dedicated to standing side by side with the government and all the people of Wuhan, fully committed to battle this outbreak together. I am also 100 percent committed to accommodating any and all requests made of me by the government. However, as I write about this I also feel that reflection is required. And so, I reflect.
January 30, 2020
There is no way for them to shirk responsibility on this issue.
The sky is clear and it feels like one of those perfect winter days. This is the kind of weather that really allows you to appreciate the winter season. But the virus has completely destroyed all of that. It may as well be the most gorgeous day in a thousand years, yet there is no one outdoors to admire it.
The cruelty of reality continues to dangle before me. After I got up, I saw a news story about a peasant traveling in the middle of the night who was prohibited from going to his destination. People had built a dirt wall to block the road and no matter how he pleaded, the people guarding the road would not let him pass. Where else could that peasant go in the middle of a cold winter night? It was really difficult to watch. The regulations that they have put in place to prevent the spread of the disease are pretty good, but you can’t enforce them with an iron will that overlooks the basic principles of what is humane. Why is it that all these different levels of government officials are able to take an official document and turn it into something so dogmatic and inflexible? Why couldn’t someone just put on a face mask and take that poor man to an empty room where he could spend a night in isolation? What would be so wrong with that? I also saw a report of a child with special needs whose father was ordered into isolation; the child was forced to live on his own for five days and ended up dying of starvation. This outbreak has exposed so many different things: It has exposed the rudimentary level of so many Chinese officials, and it has exposed the diseases running rampant through the very fabric of our society. These are diseases that are much more evil and tenacious than the novel coronavirus. Moreover, there is no cure in sight. That is because there are no doctors willing to treat this disease. Just thinking about this leaves me with an indescribable sadness. A few minutes ago a friend told me that a young man from our work unit got sick about two days ago and has been having difficulty breathing. He thinks he has the coronavirus but hasn’t been properly diagnosed and there are no hospital beds for him. He is really a good, honest, hardworking young man and I’m quite close to his whole family. I really hope it is just a common cold, and praying that he hasn’t been struck down by this evil virus.
I’ve been getting a lot of messages from people who saw my interview with China News Agency and really appreciated the things I was saying. Of course, a lot of the original content was censored, which is understandable. However, there are a few things that I think should be worth preserving. When I was discussing the topic of “self-treatment,” I also said: “The most important group we should be paying attention to are those who are infected and the families of those people who have died from the coronavirus. They are the ones who are worst off and suffering the deepest pain. Many of them will never truly recover from what they have experienced here. They are the ones most in need of the government’s support. . . .” When I think back and reflect on that peasant who was turned away in the middle of the night, when I think about that boy who starved to death at home, those countless everyday people calling out in vain for help, those people from Wuhan (including children) who have been discriminated against and driven out onto the streets like a pack of stray dogs, I have a hard time imagining how much time will have to pass before they can heal their pain. And that is not even to mention how much we have lost on a national scale.
For the past two days, the internet has been abuzz with news about how that group of specialists behaved when they visited Wuhan. That’s right, these are the same well-respected “specialists” who lowered their guard and nonchalantly told us that it was “Not Contagious Between People” and “It’s Controllable and Preventable”; they have truly committed heinous crimes with their irresponsible words. If they had even an ounce of decency left, I wonder what sense of guilt they might feel when they see all those people suffering. Of course, the political leaders of Hubei have the basic responsibility to ensure the safety and security of the people who live here. Now that we have arrived at a time when the people are no longer safe or secure, how could they not share some of the responsibility? The coronavirus getting to this point is the result of multiple forces coming together. There is no way for them to shirk responsibility on this issue. But right now what we really want is for them to stand up and lead the people of Hubei out of this dark place, with a sense of repentance and responsibility. That is how they can win back the people’s understanding and forgiveness. If Wuhan can make it through this, the rest of the country can, too.
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All my relatives live here in Wuhan. I am quite thankful that up until now everyone has remained healthy. Actually, most of my family members are getting old. My eldest brother and his wife are already in their mid-70s, and my other brother is also about to hit 70. Staying infection-free is the best thing we can do to help our country. I’m happy that my niece and her son were finally able to make it safely back to Singapore, where they are now being quarantined in a resort area. For that, I need to express my deepest thanks to the Hongshan Department of Transportation. When my niece received the notification yesterday, it read: “The flight to Singapore will depart at 3:00 a.m.; please arrive early to the airport.” But my brother doesn’t drive, and with public transportation shut down, they had absolutely no way to get to the airport. That’s where I came in. I asked Officer Xiao to help get my niece to the airport. My entire family is grateful for his help. When you are in a bind, you can always go to the police for help! That’s something you can always count on. But the fact that my niece and her son were able to get out safely is the only thing I have to be happy about today.