As of February 16, there are about 70,000 people afflicted with COVID-19, but 58,000 of those people come from the Hubei province. There are 58.5 million people who live in Hubei, so that puts it at 0.1% of the province that has the virus. This leaves roughly 12,000 additional people affected. Out of the 1.3 billion Chinese who don't live in Hubei, that means 0.0009% of people have it (and about 80% of them had direct contact with someone from Hubei). All in all, our chances of getting this are ridiculously slim, and, even if we got it, our age and health would indicate a recovery. We are not overly concerned about contracting the virus, but it is still dictating our life at every turn.
China has gone to extraordinary lengths to prevent this from spreading and it looks like that work is paying off as only a minute percentage of people outside of a Hubei connection have contracted the disease and the number of newly afflicted is getting lower and lower. To stop the spread, the country has shut down most businesses (except grocers) and has instituted laws about wearing masks, and also against congregating in public spaces. This has meant that our school has been closed for nearly a month and we've had to turn to e-learning. The girls have been pretty good about doing the online work assigned by their teachers, which has been a heavy load. We've also been doing some reading and flash cards for Nina. We try to take time to play outside every day and the girls love playing together & building their little towns. While they are still being creative and working on new skills like skateboarding, it is clear that they both miss & need interaction with other children, and they both really want to go back to school. As a family, we've just tried to embrace this unexpected slow-down and we are trying to enjoy our extra family time (but this can be trying at times). Overall, it has been strange to see empty areas that are usually packed, and to have our temperature taken everywhere we go.
Ultimately, we've gotten out to see some unusual sites like a "Ground-scraper Hotel" (building skyscrapers was getting too easy) and abandoned theme parks because no one can go in. We have not had any trouble buying food or any other products we typically use. We have enjoyed running into a few friends on our walks and our spirits were boosted incredibly today when we went to one of our favorite restaurants. The owner and a few other workers were outside cleaning their windows and the restaurant was closed, but they were happy to see us and invited us in. They opened the kitchen just for us and gave the girls free juice like they always do. They were happy to see we made the trip and we were overjoyed that they would open for us, and they just said, "You are our friends, this is what friends do."
Valentine's Love
When Ben and I went down to gather the groceries that had been delivered to our lobby, the girls secretly made us valentine cards and then presented them to us when we were finished.
Quite the start to the Year of the Rat
This school year, we've been impacted by a typhoon, an earthquake, the Australian bushfires, and now we'll make it through this too. We sincerely thank everyone who has sent us notes of concern and support, and we hope that normalcy will return soon.
No comments:
Post a Comment