2020.2.25 The 34th Day of the Wuhan City Closure 中文日记最下
A friend outside Wuhan “commended me”, saying that out of all her friends, I was the only one whose family had escaped scot-free. Among the families of three other friends, one entire family had gotten infected and been sent to the big. new prefabricated hospital; in a second, both parents had been admitted to the hospital; and in the third, the father was seriously ill with new corona virus pneumonia.
I didn’t know what to say. I ordinarily should have been pleased that both our survival skills and our luck had been recognized. But I couldn’t even smile; it all seemed to be a kind of black humor.
Community network workers on community WeChat networks asked community members to make group purchases of face masks. On the Tengxun Health small order facility, every Wuhan person can make an advance subscription for face masks every 30 days and place an order, pay and arrange for home delivery from a nearby pharmacy all online. Fifty ordinary face masks costs 90 RMB or 1.8 RMB per mask. That is the definitely the lowest price I have seen since the closure of Wuhan but it is still twice the price I paid for face masks I bought in mid-January. I am pleased that I bought 200 face masks then.
The clearest lesson I’ve gotten from my personal experience since the start of the epidemic is that the more people have placed their trust in the words of the Communist Party and the government, the more they have suffered. For people. Like me who have assumed that things are one hundred times worse than what we have been told by now we are starting to breathe sighs of relief.
The official microblog Wuhan Announcements issued this microblog entry at about
midnight last night:
“#GoodEveningWuhan Only those who learn to relax will people once again become satisfied. There are always ups and downs in life. Things can’t always go our way. But we can learn to laugh at our worries and to put them aside. Let’s go Wuhan!”
Accompanying the message was a four word phrase i “Wuhan Will Certainly Win” written in big characters. Seeing that was certainly amusing reading. The Wuhan Epidemic Prevention and Control HQ couldn’t have gotten to the point when they start talking like the Falungong? With the mourning period for many of the newly dead not even over yet, how could they conceivably be saying to those who now have lost family members and shattered homes that they shouldn’t “expect everything to always go their way”? Certainly, it is true that we have to “move on” but that such a very impatient “chicken soup” like consolation message should come from the official mouth of the authorities that is really bad breach of “table manners”.
Perhaps it is just that I have seen so many fake stories being put out that I have finally reached the point that I can’t even manage to get angry anymore.
The Alipay online payments platform and other apps like it on WeChat have a special coronavirus information page where one can read current statistical information. The numbers are very easy to look up but as to whether they are reliable or not, that is another story. According to officially published information, the death rate has remained high for the past several days. This makes it clear that once this pneumonia becomes serious, it certainly is very hard to cure. Whether a patient lives or dies depends entirely upon whether their body can stand up to the punishment. People with mild cases recover fairly easily. However in cases where the virus is especially “sly”, even when the patient is finally cured and can be discharged from the hospital, they still need to be quarantined for fourteen days.
Some classmates who work at semi-public, semi-private “enterprise work units” , even some who Communist Party members, were sent down to work in grassroots communities. I have heard lately that communities are being run much better now and that infected people have all been admitted to the hospital. Their main task has been to ensure that grassroots community work is being handled in an orderly fashion and to help out with tasks such as buying food and medicine. This certainly is a sign for a change for the better. That expression “being sent down” however is one that I don’t like at all. Could it be that Communist Party members are better than the community? I don’t know who first applied that phrase to our present situation but it is I’m used with a baffling sense of superiority.
Recently many of the news reports of how Japan and South Korea have been handling the epidemic on the Chinese internet include commentaries that “they have been copying a lot from the Chinese experience” that is really hard to take. Especially when that phrase comes from the mouths of Wuhan people themselves. WHO officials have been saying “Wuhan is a hero city”, news that every Wuhan WeChat group seems at great pains to forward along. But do we really have anything to be proud of? I don’t know whether all this comes out of not having a brain, not having a conscience, having a low IQ or being especially lacking in humane feelings.
If I were to say who is doing the most beautiful “homework”, I’d have to say that it was North Korea. What they would do is just shoot all the suspected coronavirus cases. But who would want to copy that “homework”?
I don’t want to “dress up” a discussion of something that is serious. Serious matters should be taken seriously. I think it very likely that if someone’s way of speaking and their way of thinking were all “dressed up” then their expression and their logic would be concealed. I would doubt that they have the capacity for serious reflection. It would be as if the builders of the mountains of the Fire spirit and the Lightning spirit were banished from their hometowns, homeless and making a living as they can, where then would be people like those young fire-breathing for hire Chinese cyber-nationalists whose Chinese-language nickname was inspired by those take loads small distances for hire? They’d probably be ridiculing neighboring countries, happy they themselves were just “cultivating their own gardens”.
February 23, 2020 diary entry of Wuhan writer Fang Fang was especially worthy of our attention. She wrote:
I suggest that at the highest state central leadership level mobilize the three main communications operating companies (China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom) that they mandatorily create a system for transmitting messages and getting feedback during national emergencies that can send a message to every mobile phone subscriber in China. Every person would be responsible for filling in their personal health card everyday adopting the two-dimensional barcode system for health status reporting that Shenzhen, Hangzhou and some other localities are already using. In addition to the three telecommunications operating companies mentioned above, two other privately-operated internet companies (WeChat Payments and the Alipay) would also be brought into this system. This system would cover the great majority of China’s population of 1.4 billion people. Those people who do not have mobile phones and Alipay accounts in general do not live in regions where the epidemic outbreak is most serious. Most elderly people, with the help of family members will also be able to receive these notifications.
Moreover, the drones made by the Shenzhen-based Dajiang high tech company and many other excellent drone manufacturers (during a national emergency these can be requisitioned) can be used to make drone surveys of epidemic regions. Airborne broadcasts, notifications, and surveillance networks will make it possible to reduce human entry into epidemic-hit areas to a minimum and to maximize work efficiency. This will make it possible to quickly solve the problem of latent infected people who have not yet been identified. This should be our top priority.
Using telephones, WeChat messaging and Alipay to search for people will have another important significance. It will make possible precise and simultaneous tracking of everyone’s movements over a considerable period (from November 1st to the present). No-one will be able to escape it!”
Fang Fang writes that that was her classmate’s suggestion and that she is merely passing it along. Fang Fang’s Diary often has things that are being “passed along” including quite a bit of information about Traditional Chinese Medicine, apparently “just passed along” with a note that this information does not represent my personal views. This makes it all appear so very so very neutral and objective.
Some people on microblogs have been saying, “These writings by Fang Fang are just like a pig in a pig slaughterhouse calling for high voltage electrocuting pig-slaughtering equipment be imported from Germany so that pigs can be slaughtered more efficiently!” No more needs be said.
Today I saw online a video of Michael Jordan words at Kobe Bryant’s memorial service.
Michael Jordan was wonderful. He brought laughter and he brought tears. I really like that American style. Tears flowed freely on the speakers’ platform while down below people sometimes everybody joined in a big laugh. It was genuine and it was wonderful.
I hope that my memorial service will be like that with both tears and laughter with family and friends gathered in a circle telling funny stories about me. If someone will be able to say that I was an interesting character, that will be the greatest honor and commendation I have ever received in this life.
Living a life like this of people featured on Chinese Central Television (CCTV) obituary items who had “noble character who kept well apart from vulgar preoccupations” — how could a life be more boring than that!
2月25日 武汉封城第34天
被我的一位外地朋友“表扬”了，她说她在武汉的朋友中，只有我是全家无虞，她的另外三个朋友，一个是全家进了方舱医院，一个是爸爸妈妈住院，一个是父亲重症。
我也不知道能说什么，按理说应该高兴吧，毕竟生存能力和运气都得到了认可。
可是怎么笑不出来呢。仿佛一场大型的黑色幽默。
社区网格员在微信群里教居民购买口罩，“腾讯健康”小程序里每个武汉人每30天可以预约一次，线上预约，到附近的药店付款取货，50个普通医用口罩90元，折合一个1.8元，从封城前到现在这确实是我见过最便宜的口罩了，不过跟我自己在一月中旬买的口罩比贵了一倍，感激自己当时果断买了200个。
经过这次疫情最直观的感受就是，越相信党相信国家相信喉舌的，现在越艰难；像我这种把糟糕程度放大100倍来应对的，反倒现在还能喘口气缓一缓。
“武汉发布”的官方微博昨晚近零点的时候发了一条微博，内容如下：
“#晚安武汉#只有学会放下，才能拥有新的幸福。人生在世，难免有得有失，不可能事事尽如人意，但我们可以学着去笑对和化解。武汉加油！”配图是“武汉必胜”四个大字。
这个内容把我看乐了。这个城市还在疫情中心呢，还没到论功行赏的时候呢，很多新死之人的头七二七还没过呢……跟那些家破人亡的人说“不能事事尽如人意”？？是的，move on没有错，但是官方喉舌这样急不可耐的灌鸡汤，这吃相就很难看了。
大概是荒唐的故事看了太多太多，我竟然连生气的想法都没有了。
支付宝、微信这样的APP上都有新冠肺炎专题，可以看到实时数据，查起来很容易，但是数字可不可信就另说了。按照官方公布的数据，最近几天的死亡率依然居高不下，可见这个肺炎演化为重症后确实是很难治疗的，是死是活全看自己的身体扛不扛得过去。轻症好像比较容易好，有些症状轻的还能自愈，只是这个病毒格外“狡诈“，就算是治愈出院，也要继续隔离14天。
同学在事业单位，还是共产党员，这几天被安排下沉到社区里，听她说最近社区的秩序好了很多，感染的都已经进医院了，他们主要是维持小区内的秩序，帮忙买菜买药之类。应该也是一种好转的表现吧，只是“下沉”这个词我一直挺不待见的，党员难道就比社区高端吗？这个词也不知是谁造的，充满了一种莫名其妙的优越感。
最近好多韩国、日本的新闻，中文网络上那些“抄作业都不会抄”的评论我特别不能接受，尤其这种话是从武汉人自己的嘴里说出的时候，WHO的官员说“武汉是座英雄的城市”，恨不得武汉每个群都在转发……很值得骄傲吗？不知道是没脑子还是没心肝，没智商还是没人性。
要我说作业最“漂亮”的是朝鲜，直接把疑似一枪崩了，但是谁要抄这个作业？
不要把严肃议题“萌”化，严肃的事情应该严肃对待。我很怀疑，如果一个人的语言体系和思维体系全部被“萌新”的表达和逻辑覆盖，他们还有没有严肃思考的能力，比如当火神山、雷神山的建设者们被自己的家乡拒之门外、讨薪无门的时候，那些给叉车取名字的小粉红们人在哪里呢？
大概是在嘲笑邻国，幸而种花吧。
方方昨天的日记我觉得值得记一笔，她写道：
“我的建议：通过国家层面，动用国家三大通讯运营商（中国电信，中国移动，中国联通），强行联络全国每一位手机用户，发布通知，建立有效的国家紧急状态的反馈机制。每人必须回应每天的健康打卡，学习杭州深圳等地的健康二维码系统。除上述三家，还需要加上另外两家民间支付网络（微信支付，支付宝）。五管齐下，全国14亿人口，估计可以覆盖绝大多数。没有手机和支付宝的人群，一般情况下也不在疫情集中爆发的地区。老人基本有家人协助，能够被通知。
再加上深圳的大疆无人机和众多优秀的无人机公司参与（国家紧急状态下征集征用），实行疫区无人机巡查。广播，通知，监控的空中网络，最大限度减少地面人员的列入，最大可能提高工作效率，尽快解决所有没有查证的潜在感染者。这是当务之急。
通过电话微信支付宝找人，还有一个重要意义，同时精准锁定所有人相当一段时间内的行动轨迹（11月1日至今），谁也跑不了！”
方方说这是她同学的建议，她只是转发，方方的日记里经常有这种转发，包括之前很多关于中医的内容，似乎注明一个不带立场的“转发”就会显得中立客观。
对这段内容微博有人评论：“作家方方，你这样是屠宰场的猪们提议从德国进口高压电击自动杀猪仪器，以提高杀猪效率”，一语言尽。
今早看到科比追思会上乔丹发言的视频，有笑有泪，真可爱。我很喜欢老美的风格，台上人泪流满面，台下可能笑成一片，真实，可爱。
我也希望我的追思会会是这样，有眼泪有欢笑，亲人好友们围在一起说一些关于我的好笑的事情，如果有人能说我是一个有趣的人，那就是对我这一生最大的褒奖了。人生如果活成CCTV讣告里那种“高尚的人，脱离了低级趣味的人”，那该多无趣啊。
Comments