2020.2.10 The 10th day of Wuhan Quarantine 中文原文在后
I got up early today to watch the Oscar Academy Awards. Congratulations to Director Feng Junhao for winning 4 awards. Although Director Feng Junhao is not my favorite Korean director, and I think it is a bit overrated for Parasite to achieve such a good result, as a fan I am still very happy for him.
I only watched Parasite and Joker among this year's Oscar hit movies, because these two will definitely not be released in mainland China, and even if they can be released, they can't escape the sniper's sniper. I simply looked for the Internet resources to download and watched it. Found Blu-ray discs of them. Others like Jojo Rabbit, Marriage Story, and Little Women have already been scheduled for release in February, and it is said that they will also be releasing 1917 as scheduled ... As a fan who is totally not interested in the Chinese New Year's New Year movies, I have been looking forward to it since early January and now my frustration is really beyond description. Even before the city was closed, I still had a naive wish, hoping that it would not affect the film release in February. It is certainly impossible now.
Fortunately, I saw the official news from several distribution companies. After the epidemic, these movies will still be released in theaters, which is somewhat comforting. Can a movie be considered a movie without watching it on the big screen?
I got another frustrating news this morning. The five stops of the "French Musical Drama Concert" originally scheduled to tour in mainland China in April were cancelled. Although I had a hunch that the April performance would also be affected, I still had hope. I held the ticket for the Nanjing Station that I had already bought, and I cried, and now I have to refund it.
From "Aida" on January 19th to now, all the theater performances in Wuhan have been cancelled. The most regrettable is the mainland tour of the Broadway musical "The Lion King". Originally, only Wuhan and Beijing were scheduled to perform. Wuhan Station would perform from February 19th to early April. Obviously, it can't be performed now. I have been looking forward to it since last year. On the first day of ticketing, I grabbed the animal corridor spot of the premiere venue. Fortunately, They are only postponing the schedule, not completely canceling, so there is still hope.
My current psychological expectations have been adjusted to June. I have already bought tickets for the original Xi'an drama "Yevgeny Onegin". I have been looking forward to this year since last year, and I hope it won’t be canceled.
I suddenly feel that I am very emotional and ignorant. After all, this sudden epidemic has claimed so many lives. Many people around me are experiencing despair and struggle. The lives of countless people have changed, but I am still worried about several movies and performances. It seems a bit selfish.
In yesterday’s diary I wrote that recently some institutions of higher education had been requisitioned to quarantine coronavirus pneumonia patients. After thinking this over for an evening, I realize that I was being a bit too “cute”. Yesterday I wrote that “Putting away and storing student property properly is a problem” because I feared that students would lose some of their belongings.
What I hadn’t considered was that some schools couldn’t care less about student property. Several friends teach at some of the schools now being requisitioned. After asking them about it, I found that there are enormous differences in the way different schools are handling this. Some schools seal the students belongings in the rooms. Other schools load up several bedrooms with all the student belongings. Still other schools have announced that they will change out all the furniture in student rooms before classes resume.
My friends feel aggrieved as well. “This is a political task” they were told. The school notified all their teachers then in Wuhan to go to the school. The teachers were allowed them very little time to get thing ready considering the large number of dormitory rooms that needed to be packed up. Schools that handled things crudely can very easily made a big mess of things. One friend told me that some teachers, when cleaning out the girls’ dormitory rooms, just threw the girls’ collections of photos of movie stars and celebrities into the trash. My friend said “Others cleaned out a girl’s bedroom using five bags. It took me ten!” Oh, children, if you have a teacher who understands students so well, you certainly should study hard for them!
You see, whether the results are good or bad depend on the ideas of individuals of what good and evil are. The whole system is failing. It always works like that.
Just consider the way the dormitory rooms were packed up. I can’t but help thinking of that Wuhan University of Science and Technology professor and graduate student advisor Wang Pan abused and hounded a student to death. I also thought of those teachers at Mainland China’s institutions of higher learning who had been exposed these past two years by the Me Too movement. The conduct of those “model teachers” was completely unacceptable. The way schools protected them and pretended to know nothing displayed a contemptuous and bullying attitude towards their students disillusioned many. The bureaucratic, cruel, vulgarity and lack of empathy seen in these institutions from top to bottom, from the inside to the outside demonstrates that modern culture has vanished from modern institutions of higher learning. That is what the nature of the “university” of today with the supposed mission of teaching and building character. All that was on display in the way that the packing up of the requisitioned dormitory rooms was handled. That is just the tip of the iceberg. The same inner logic is the same everywhere.
Finally, let me mention something very interesting that happened. Yesterday evening a student asked angrily on the neighborhood WeChat group: “Don’t students have any human rights?!” Startled, I was at a loss for words. I didn’t know what to say – that is not to say that students don’t have human rights but those two words “human rights” are a sensitive phrase around here. We can just count our blessings that our neighborhood WeChat group wasn’t immediately shut down!
Before student dormitories were expropriated, the most anxious local group of people were “corporate slaves” - worrying about time to go back to work, about work itself, about salaries and about if the company would dissolve before the outbreak is over. Now, students have joined this anxious group of people.
If the outbreak is not controlled soon, more and more people will get affected.
I read some news this afternoon, saying that ZTO Express, YTO Express, STO Express, Yunda Express, Best Express and Deppon Logistics are getting back in business today. In addition to China Post, SF Express, JD Logistics and Suning Logistics which remained in business throughout, theoretically, the shipping services should recover completely from the interruption due to the Chinese New Year holidays and the coronavirus outbreak.
But it is unknown if this “recovery” will include Hubei Province. On Taobao (the biggest online shopping platform in China), It is to my surprise to discover that Hubei is receiving the same treatment as Xinjiang. Currently in Wuhan, although SF Express can deliver goods, it only ships personal packages of medical equipment under 3 kg to Hubei Province. Furthermore, ground shipping is halted and only air shipping is allowed with more restrictions on the packages. Last week, a friend outside of Hubei wanted to send a thermometer to me. After consulting with SF Express, he discovered that mercury thermometer could not be air-shipped because there was liquid and electronic thermometer could not as well because it was electronic. As a result, the thermometer could not be shipped at all. Though China Post EMS service has not been interrupted, mailmen have not been able to deliver mails due to the lockdown and have to stay outside of Hubei; thus people needed to pick up mails in the post office themselves.
The shipping service was not the only factor limiting online shopping for us in the epicenter of the outbreak. We hoped that we could buy some face masks and rubbing alcohol after Chinese New Year holidays, but ended up in disappointments frequently. The other day, a friend happily informed me about an online shop selling disinfecting effervescent tablets, and they could be shipped to Wuhan. I asked the shop and got a negative response, “all medical equipment shipped to Hubei will be compulsorily collected”. Another friend told me about how she overcame difficulties and bought 200 face masks online. However, her order was cancelled after the shipment was dispatched. The seller told her that “all of the goods were collected to deliver to places most in need in this outbreak”. My friend complained, “I am in Wuhan, is there any place worse than Wuhan?”
2月10日 武汉封城第19天
今天早起看奥斯卡颁奖。恭喜奉俊昊导演拿下4项大奖，虽然奉俊昊导演不是我最喜欢的韩国导演，而且Parasite拿到这样好的成绩我觉得多少有些过誉，但作为他的影迷，我还是很为他开心。
今年的奥斯卡大热影片我只看了Parasite和Joker，因为这两部肯定不会在大陆上映，就算能公映也逃不开剪刀手的狙击，索性很早就找网络资源下载看了，而且还找代购买了这两部电影的蓝光碟。其它几部Jojo Rabbit、Marriage Story、Little Women原本已经确定了2月上映的档期，1917据说也会定档公映……作为一个对国产春节贺岁档完全不感兴趣的影迷，从一月初就一直在期待着二月的到来，我现在的沮丧心情真是无法形容，甚至一直到封城前我都还怀着天真的愿望，希望不会影响2月的电影上映。现在当然是不可能的了。
好在看到几家发行公司的官方消息，疫情结束后这几部电影还是会在院线公映，多少也算有些慰藉。电影不在大荧幕看还能算电影吗。
早起还收到另一个让我沮丧的消息，原定4月在大陆巡演的《法语音乐剧集锦音乐会》五站全部取消了，虽然我已有预感4月的演出也会受到影响，但一直还心存侥幸。我捏着早就买好的南京站的演出票欲哭无泪，现在只好退票了。
从1月19日的《阿依达》到现在，武汉的剧场演出已经全部取消了，最遗憾的是百老汇音乐剧《狮子王》的大陆巡演，原本就只安排了武汉和北京两地演出，武汉站会从2月19日演到4月上旬，如今自然是演不了了，我从去年起就一直在期待，开票第一天就抢了首演场的动物走廊位置……唉。好在也只是推迟档期，不是完全取消，总还是有希望的。
我现在的心理预期已经调整到6月了，早就买好了西安场原版话剧《叶甫盖尼·奥涅金》的演出票，这部戏我从去年期待到今年，惟愿不要再次落空。
写到这里，我突然觉得自己很矫情。毕竟这场突如其来的疫情夺走了那么多人的生命，我周围还有很多很多人正在经历着绝望和挣扎，无数人的人生就此改变，而我却还在担心着几场电影、几场演出，似乎有些自私了。
昨天的日记中写到最近在征收高校作为隔离安置点，经过一晚上的发酵，我发现我还是有些“小清新”了。昨天我说“学生财物的处置保管是个问题”是担心学生财物会有遗失，却没想到，有的学校根本就没考虑过学生的财物。
有几个朋友是这次征收的几个学校的老师，在询问过他们以后，我发现不同学校的处置方式差别也蛮大的，有的学校是把学生物品就地封存，有的是几个寝室集中在一起，也有学校明确承诺开学前会给学生全部更换新的家具。朋友们也委屈，“这是政治任务”，学校通知了所有在武汉的老师必须到校，清理工作预留时间非常短，需要整理的宿舍又太多。如果碰到简单粗暴些的学校，确实容易搞成一团乱。有朋友跟我讲，在清理女生寝室时有老师把明星周边当垃圾扔了，她给捡了回来，“别人清一个床位装5包，我要装10包”。唉，小朋友们，遇到这样理解学生的好老师一定要更加努力的念书啊！
你看，结果的好坏总是要寄托在个人善恶一念上，整个系统却是失灵的，总是如此。
看着寝室征收的消息，我莫名就想到武汉理工大学那位逼死学生的研究生导师王攀，想到近两年一系列在Me Too运动中被曝光的大陆高校教师，这些“为人师表”者的所作所为并不是最让人无法接受的，学校的包庇、装死、对学生轻视和打压的态度才最让人寒心。从上到下、由内至外的官僚、粗暴、缺乏人文素养及同理心，现代文明绝迹于现代的高等学府，这就是现在教书育人的“大学”，这次征收寝室的表现，不过是冰山一角的体现罢了，内在逻辑都是相通的。
最后有件挺有意思的事情，昨晚在本地群里有学生愤怒问道：“难道学生没有人权吗？！”，我竟一时语塞，不知如何回答——不是学生没有人权啊，“人权”两个字在这个地方就是敏感词，没有就地封群已经是恩典了！
在征收学生寝室发生前，本地群里最焦虑的基本都是“社畜”——担心开工时间、担心工作、担心工资、担心会不会疫情还没结束公司就地散伙。现在又多了学生群体。
疫情如果不能尽快控制，被裹挟其中的人只会越来越多。
下午看到新闻，今天起，中通快递、圆通快递、申通快递、韵达快递、百世快递和德邦快递将陆续恢复，加上之前一直没有停工的中国邮政、顺丰快递、京东物流、苏宁物流，因为农历新年和疫情原因停工的快递理论上就能完全恢复了。
但是这个“恢复”中是否能包含湖北就不得而知了，最近上淘宝能惊喜的发现，湖北享受到了跟新疆同等的待遇。现在在武汉，顺丰快递虽然可以派件，但是外地寄往湖北的私人包裹仅能发送3公斤以下的医疗物资，并且由于停了陆运、只能空运，对寄送物品的要求格外严格。上周有外地的朋友想在当地买体温计寄给我，咨询顺丰快递后才知道水银温度计因为有液体不能上飞机、电子体温计因为是电子产品也不能上飞机……结果就是寄不了。中国邮政EMS虽然一直没有中断，但是很多区域的派送员因为封城滞留外地无法到岗派送，需要自己去快递点取件。
限制疫情中心的我们网上购物的原因也不是只有快递，原本我们还希望年后能买到口罩、医用酒精等物资，最近也仍然是失望居多。前两天朋友发我一家卖消毒泡腾片的网店，很开心的说可以发武汉，我一问，又说不行“现在寄往湖北的医疗物资会被强行征收”，有一个朋友也告诉我，她好不容易在网上买到200个口罩，发货以后订单却取消了，店家告知“全部被征用了，需要给疫情严重的地方”，朋友吐槽“我就在武汉，还有哪里比武汉更严重”。