This week, I removed all antigen test photos from my phone. For over two months, we had to do self-tests and share them in the building’s WeChat group, and cleansing my phone of them felt almost therapeutical. It’s not just our phones that are healing, so are we. Now we have our freedom back for […]
Long distance calls while looking out of the window
I haven’t traveled to the Netherlands now for almost 3 years, hindered by 1) insane flight ticket prices 2) two or three weeks of quarantine 3) insecurity of whether I can make it back to China if I get covid abroad. Compared to if I’d be living in the Netherlands, of course this influences my […]
There’s this famous anecdote of a professor who fills a glass with rocks, pebbles, then with sand, and then adds water, and there’s some life lesson in that. Well, I think Shanghai is such a jar as well. Everything is decomposed on the ladder of wealth. On the top people are buying mansions and supercars […]
An old guy says: “The top one, give me a big one. No no no, the one to the left”, to which an old lady yells: “C’mon it’s all the same.” The next person wants half a roasted duck: “A small one please”, but when the staff shows a tiny duck she’s: “No no no […]
During the Shanghai lockdown, we took up watching The Wire for the first time. We even joked we were released too soon (after 61 days) because we only finished the final season a few days after our release. We semi-binged it with Chinese Hanzi subtitles, under the guise of making it more educational. It’s interesting […]
Today we had sushi, walked, and cycled. The best part is seeing everyone outside & friends sharing photos on WeChat and knowing that they feel the same relief. It’s only shot with my phone, but I wanted to document the streets, even if only for myself: Being back very quickly feels normal — familiar at […]
And just like that, we’re out after 61 days. The baoans have been letting people slip out — hours before midnight — saying “Don’t go too far”. People are on the street, energized, happy, looking at everything for the first time. Stores are open or stocking up for tomorrow’s opening. It feels monumental, the way […]
Should you learn Mandarin despite China’s zero covid policy?
There’s a huge overlap between politics, culture, and language. And even though I’d like to focus on the latter, China’s future will also affect many potential Mandarin learners — especially those not in China now, but looking to study or work in China in the future. Regardless of whether you agree with zero covid or […]
Day 50 and I got a rare “临时出门单”, so I walked around the Yangpu district for a few hours, which is the hardest-hit area in Shanghai now. Main roads have some traffic, but curbs are empty — except for around the area of two hospitals I passed. I saw many seniors who had to […]
Day 46 of the Shanghai lockdown is about to end and yet we wait for our release. We’ve had our freedom severely limited, further still — to the point where we cannot buy food ourselves and have to rely on rations, whatever the powers higher up are deciding to send our way. One of the […]
