William Yang Profile picture
Freelance correspondent covering the Greater China region for @voanews. Words in @DWNews, @Guardian and @thetimes. tips and assignments to wy30611@gmail.com

Nov 29, 2022, 8 tweets

As Tianhe district in #Guangzhou faces sharply rising number of cases in recent days and as a sudden lockdown looms, large number of students have reportedly been sent home by schools and on Weibo, there are many posts about the train station packed with stranded passengers.

One netizen wrote about how he hasn’t slept for an entire night, has been waiting for the PCR result for 16 hours without a success, can’t get on his train to leave so he has to cancel his ticket and he is still waiting for his pcr test result at the bus stop.

“I’m cold, stranded, tired and hungry yet I have to prevent things from being stolen. I’m feeling terrible,” he wrote.

“I got an emergency notification at 1 am, sat in the corridor crying and trembling at 2, saw students flee with their luggage at 3 am, sat on my own luggage and cried alone, waiting to go home at 4 am, and I finally got on the train at 5 am to leave this place that “eats people.”

I woke up at 3 am. Since hearing about the news last night, I haven’t been able to sleep well. The school only informed us about ending early on Tuesday and we need to leave school before December 4. I am confused. I didn’t get train tickets beforehand, the prices for ...

... arranging a car to drive me home will be priced on the spot, school doesn’t let us keep staying and even if they let me stay and eat, what can I do? I’m so tired.

It’s like mass-fleeing since midnight and when I woke up, it’s empty around me. I couldn’t believe what I saw in pictures of the situation at the train stations now from friends. It’s already 2022 and I can’t run.

The emotions, anxiety and frustration expressed in these posts help to offer a good sense of the helplessness that many people in #China feel right now. It also helps to explain why people are willing to take risks and protest against the zero covid policy publicly.

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