A 30-hour Journey Home of a Wuhan Family
Original article by Xiaoyu Tong (佟晓宇), Baolu Yang (杨宝璐) and Jianhua Song (宋建华). Translated by Jason Xu. Edited by Meiqing Xiong.
[Translated Article] This article was originally published in bqshenyidu (北青深一度) on February 5th in Chinese. The original article can be found here.
A Wuhan license plate has never been as striking as it is today.
On January 23, due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, Wuhan cut off transport networks. The city’s public transportation is temporarily suspended. Wuhan residents are not allowed to leave Wuhan without special reasons, and the airport and train stations are temporarily shut down. However, many people left Wuhan before this policy. They crossed the bridge, returned to their hometown, or went to the tourist destinations they had long yearned for. Unexpectedly, they encountered a test of quarantine and acceptance.
The Nings and their friends got out of Wuhan around this time: before Academician Zhong Nanshan confirmed the person-to-person transmission of the new coronavirus, they drove out for a holiday trip with ease; after the outbreak, they had to return to Wuhan. Over the 30-hour drive, Ning had to tell her children again and again that others were just afraid of the virus, not of them.
The Most Special Chinese New Year’s Eve
Ning: At about 5 pm on January 28, we exited the highway at the Gongjialing Highway Exit after a 30-hour drive and finally returned to Wuhan, our home.
This is probably the most special 30 hours in our lives.
On January 17th, our family of three and my sister’s family of three, along with my sister’s best friend and her kid — five adults and three children all together — set off from Wuhan to Changbai Mountains. We three ladies drove an off-road vehicle, and the three of us drove in turns. The two fathers took three kids and drove a business car. Everyone wanted to go skiing in the Changbai Mountains. This plan was made last year on November 11th, when we booked a resort hotel in Changbai Mountains online.
Before departure, I saw some news on the Internet saying that a new type of pneumonia was discovered in Wuhan. There were quite a few patients in the hospital, but the news said that it was preventable, controllable, and only had limited person-to-person transmission. People in the community didn’t appear nervous; they looked rather usual. We never expected it would be so serious, and we did not receive any notification about the outbreak, so it did not occur to us to wear a mask when we left. When we were staying in a hotel in Shandong, watching the “Tianjin Eye’’ in Tianjin, or visiting the Mukden Palace in Shenyang, there were no problems. We directly took our ID card to buy tickets for the Shenyang Mukden Palace. Everything was normal at that time. There were many people in these places.
It was not until the 21st that there was news about how serious the epidemic became. We were in Shenyang at that time, and we quickly bought masks when we heard the news. At that time, masks were already very difficult to buy. I ran to four drug stores only to find two packs of disposable masks.
We certainly watched Academician Zhong Nanshan’s speech and realized that the epidemic situation was serious. We were worried that others might have thoughts about us since we came from Wuhan. We called the resort hotel in Changbai Mountains when we were in Shenyang and asked them whether we, as some people from Wuhan, could check in as usual? If not, we planned to stop in Shenyang and return to Wuhan. The hotel responded that we were fine. On the 21st, we successfully checked into the resort hotel in Changbai Mountains.
At the hotel, we reported our situation to the staff. The hotel’s services and emergency measures were good, and they arranged people to take our temperature on time. The large suite we lived in had a large living room with beds on both sides. Basically, eight of us lived in the same room, and the lunch was directly delivered to the room. With two thermometers we bought at a local pharmacy, we took our temperature every day when we had nothing else to do.
We had booked three ski instructors and paid a deposit. But afraid of causing unnecessary trouble, we took the initiative to communicate with the coaches in advance, saying that we were from Wuhan. If the coaches minded we would not go. At that time, there were two coaches who were afraid and did not want to take us. We said that if they minded it was ok for us to not ski. At the end, we only had one coach willing to give us instructions. Later, We went to the infirmary to take a temperature measurement, and our temperatures were normal. Back then, I already felt that the situation was concerning, given the attitudes of people around us.
On the 22nd, we went skiing with that coach’s help. When I went back to the hotel to watch the news, my mobile phone kept receiving various information related to the epidemic, and some friends sent me messages to warn me. At this point, we clearly realized how serious the epidemic was. Our coach was also affected: he was quarantined soon after returning from our session.
We communicated with the hotel right away and asked them to bring food to our room so we can self-isolate ourselves. We also rescheduled the ski tickets for next year.
At this time, all kinds of news about the epidemic swept through, and the news of Wuhan being sealed off came at that time — we never thought that a situation as dire as this could happen. I remember hearing about the morning of the 23rd, the day before Chinese New Year’s Eve, as we were ready to be isolated in the room that day. After I got up, I was faced with the news of shutting down Wuhan that just made everyone anxious. We felt that the epidemic situation was getting worse and worse. At that time, we mostly worried about the elderly back at home: according to the news, the elderly had the highest mortality rate. So we kept calling the family, telling them to wear masks and to try not going out.
Because no real confirmed or critical cases were seen around them, the elderly in the family did not fully believe in the epidemic. We needed to make a video call every two or three hours to check in with the elderly home and tell them what to do. We were also afraid that the elderly didn’t have food, since on the 23rd, it was said that many supermarkets were snapped up. We simply told the elderly not to go. Fortunately, as the New Year was approaching, we stored tons of food in the house enough for at least two or three days.
This is probably the most special New Year’s Eve we have had away from home. We ate the ginseng stewed chicken soup provided by the hotel. We also had a hotpot with the food we brought from Wuhan. So much for our New Year’s Eve reunion dinner.
Return, or Stay
We had to face one question: return or stay?
On the 26th, the tourist site began to close down based on new policies. We negotiated with the hotel. After all, a journey more than 2,300 kilometers was too challenging. The hotel also communicated with the local government, but the policy kept changing. At the beginning, the hotel said that we could stay until the 29th, but it was not certain where we should go after the 29th. We contacted the government of the town next to us. We wanted to find a place for quarantine alone, but the government responded that there are only places designated for mass quarantine.
On the 25th, government officials told us that there appeared to be suspected cases in the site for mass quarantine. Now we were even more afraid to go. We even called the police. The police said that this was neither an order incident nor a dispute, so they could not handle it.
Family and friends advised us to stay still and not to rush back. During our lengthy discussion everyone was hesitating: if we rushed back, we were heading right back to the center of the outbreak, not to mention the danger of driving more than 20 hours; if not, we didn’t know what would happen if we ended up with having no place to stay, especially when we were with our kids.
We collected all kinds of information about the epidemic and made many phone calls to friends from all walks of life. We also considered going to Shenyang for a few days. To decide what to do, we constantly discussed various situations that might occur and devising possible solutions. After midnight, we finally reached a consensus: return.
We originally planned to spend the Spring Festival away from home, since it is the only holiday we have in a year. According to the plan, we would return on the 28th, the sixth day after Chinese New Year, when we had to start work. But no plan can keep up with the changes.
On the 27th, we came out from the hotel at 11am and directly went to the highway.
We didn’t dare to go to the supermarket for supplies. We were worried that we would be stopped when we entered the supermarket. So we steamed the braised beef and braised duck wings cooked by my parents and brought a box of mineral water, 3 boxes of milk, and a pile of bread gifted by the hotel. We hurried off like this.
On the night before the departure, we found that the tires of the off-road vehicle were badly scratched, so we tried everywhere to contact some car repair service. The ski instructor also helped us contact a professional. The repair shop didn’t open during the Chinese New Year, so we looked for someone local to help change the tires. As soon as others heard that it was a Hubei car they were dealing with, nobody wanted to help. On the morning of the 27th, we felt that we couldn’t wait any longer. The two fathers in our group could only reverse the front and rear wheels of the off-road vehicle by themselves.
We needed two jacks to switch the front and rear tires. We were missing one, so we had to borrow. Later, we borrowed one from a taxi driver. Concerned that the driver might mind that we were from Wuhan, we spent 300 yuan buying the jack.
It was not until we almost reached Wuhan that the two dads told us a potential incident: The car was not supported properly when they were changing the tires, so suddenly fell off in the middle of the process, almost hurting them.
Becoming “Subjects of Focus”
Along the way, we learned what it means to be subjects of focus.
We had all experienced SARS in 2003, so everyone was mostly calm despite some troubles we ran into. We had joined many WeChat groups and learned that a license plate from Wuhan is conspicuous. When our car was parked on the hotel parking lot, we could see the car upstairs. Everyone sat in a row by the window and kept an eye out for what was happening to it or to us. Fortunately, nothing happened during this period.
When we passed the first service station on the highway, there was an auto repair shop open, so we refueled the cars. During the refueling process, the employees of the auto repair shop saw the license plate and called the police.
The police came over soon. We registered our IDs and took temperature measures. It was in the evening, and we wanted to take our children to the restaurant for dinner. However, the police advised us to order takeouts. However, in the freezing north, the food would be too cold to eat as soon as we took it outside. We were also worried that our children would get a cold in such a winter.
At 11 pm that day, we found a ramen restaurant in a relatively small service station. After doing a regular inspection, we went in and had hot beef noodles. Although there were only three slices of beef, we couldn’t help but weep in tears. It almost felt like we did something wrong and acted sneakily to prevent others from knowing that we were from Wuhan. The children were very sensible. They didn’t talk, simply focusing on the noodles.
On the way, we joined a few other WeChat groups of Wuhan citizens who couldn’t go back home. We all felt a bit miserable. We were also helping people seek solutions. Every time someone in the group said “I’m home, I’m in Wuhan”, the rest of the group would be thrilled. Good news about getting home served well as an encouragement.
At about 12 o’clock in the evening, everyone was very sleepy. On the way from Shandong to Tianjin, the smog was particularly severe, the road was very dark. It was extremely difficult to drive. We were all scared. We drove until the middle of the night and wanted to take a break, so we went to a service area. When the security guard came over, we cooperated with the registration and took a temperature measurement. We asked to sleep in the car and take a break, but at four o’clock, the staff came to wake us up, notifying that the service area supervisor would soon come to check. Seeing us might cause trouble, so we were told to leave.
So we woke up the kids and left promptly after a bathroom break.
In the service stations on the highway, when the staff saw the Wuhan license plate, they spoke rather aggressively. We could sense some temper in their tone. This happened two or three times during our drive. On the other hand, we also understood that they still had to do these tasks during Chinese New Year holiday, so they must have been very irritated. So I adjusted my mentality and talked with them calmly and with patience. We worked together with the staff for any requirement that had. In fact, after communication, everyone’s attitude softened more or less.
In fact, before the departure for Wuhan, I didn’t feel anything special. I just felt that the way back might be hard. The children were very docile and cooperative on the way, but we could feel their fear. Along the way, we had to park our car far away from the service stations. We had to run quickly to the bathroom, because we were afraid that someone would not let us in if he or she saw us. While eating, we would also tell the children to eat quickly and not to talk. I was worried not only that the children would be infected or unknowingly infect others when they contacted other people, but also that others would drive us away if they knew we were from Wuhan.
The children had asked, “why couldn’t we let others know that we were from Wuhan, and why did they treat them like this?” I told them that our city was sick and everyone, despite being a little scared, would still help us. This is our home. No matter what she becomes, we still love her, so we have to go home.
When the children asked questions like this, I felt sorry for the innocent Wuhan people. We should not be treated like this just because we had a Wuhan license plate. It is not that the Wuhan license plate car was infected with the virus. How can someone say for sure that other cars running on the road were safe? People should not be labeled and distinguished in this way. We should not be excluded and discriminated against just because we are Wuhan people. It should not be like this. We are fighting against viruses, not Wuhan people.
But we will not talk to children about the topic of discrimination. For children, I hope they see the positive sides, so I had to tell them something hopeful. Bad feelings would hit the children hard. The children also asked, “we were not sick, why couldn’t we ski?” Fortunately, there were two teachers in our group who explained to our children why this happened. We isolated ourselves from others for being responsible for not just our own safety, but also the safety of others and the entire society.
Our enemy is the virus
At 9:40 am on the 28th, we arrived at the first service station that day. The children shouted that they were hungry, so we went into the service station to look for food. The children wanted to go to the bathroom. When we were halfway there, we were stopped by a staff member from the service area. He said to us in a very loud voice, “What are you doing? Don’t go, stop!”
The children were startled.
In fact, we were mentally prepared along the way. In each service station, if we were allowed to go to the bathroom, we would go; if we were allowed to eat, we would eat. However, if we are not allowed to enter, we would hurry to leave. It was the same at gas stations. But being shouted at like this, even we adults were frightened. We were very concerned for the kids.
So we communicated with him. I thought that even if we had emotions at that moment, we shouldn’t show them. If we didn’t control those negative emotions well enough, there might be a conflict. I felt that at this time, emotions like anger or grievances could not help. The priority for us was to solve the problem and go home smoothly. After we talked with him, he also calmed down. He asked us to register our IDs and let us in for breakfast.
When refueling, the staff did not even let us open the window or let us off because he saw our license plate. After the staff filled up the oil, I put the mobile phone on the window to show the QR code, and he came to scan for the payment. There was no interpersonal communication throughout the process.
I work in the pharmaceutical industry, so I have worked with many doctors. During the entire journey, we were also very careful. Many people might not know much about the disease or the protection process, so it was normal that there was some panic. However, the scary thing is that other than keeping a distance from us, they did not take any protection measures themselves.
We also made other preparations: we contacted our friends in Liaoning in advance to prepare a place to stay, but eventually we decided to drive back to Wuhan. The whole journey was fortunately free of obstacles. After we got on the highway at Changbai Mountains, we did not exit the highway until we reached Wuhan, since once we were off the highway, there would be risk of getting intercepted.
After we got off the highway at Wuhan, a police car required all vehicles to be registered there and everyone to take a temperature measurement. They told us not to panic and advised us to ask the community for help if we encountered any difficulties in life.
As soon as we entered the city, we the three mothers burst into tears and just could not stop. There was tension and fear along the way. Everyone was psychologically prepared for all kinds of situations, including the worst. Sometimes we felt quite down, but none of us dared to release this emotion in front of others. Everyone was positive along the way, encouraging each other and telling jokes.
After getting out of the car, the children were jumping super high with joy. Before we disbanded, we took a few photos of the three children, and then we took everyone home and said goodbye one by one. We hugged each other as if we had just experienced life and death together.
In the past few days, Chinese people have learned to tease that the people of Wuhan are now famous, and everyone in the country knows about Wuhan license plate. Every time I hear about these, I feel grieved. The common enemy of everyone is the virus, not each other.
(To protect personal privacy, Chang Ning is a pseudonym in the text)
