Stocking Up on Some Grain, Just in Case

The pandemic is worsening day by day. I had originally stocked up on more than a month's worth of food, but after seeing the situation in Shanghai this time I was still somewhat taken aback; I had not expected a first-tier city to be so vulnerable under the impact of the pandemic. Today I spent the whole morning stocking up on more food, preparing three or four months' worth.

Beijing is still orderly at present. After three years of pandemic fighting, many residents are tired; many people walk the streets without masks, and throughout residential compounds people wander about without masks. Among big cities, perhaps only Beijing has never conducted universal nucleic acid testing from the beginning until now; I do not know how many rounds the other first-tier cities have already completed.

Wuhan, Xi'an, Shenzhen, and Shanghai have successively locked down, and the same disaster has played out again and again. Living in Beijing, I too feel uneasy. As first-tier cities, no one can guarantee that Beijing will always remain safe. After all, these first-tier cities have extremely high population mobility.

Since the Wuhan outbreak, I have been lucky in Beijing; neither my own compound nor the compound where my former studio was rented has ever had an outbreak, so until now I have never been confined at home. But now, with the increased transmissibility of variant viruses, the situation may be different.

My relatives in my hometown are in Hubei; my older brother is in Shenzhen; my aunt is in Shanghai. They have all been locked down one after another, and I deeply empathize with their hardships after lockdown. I still often stay in touch with my aunt in Shanghai and with old classmates, and I am well aware of their difficult situation, though there is little I can do to help.

Fighting the pandemic is a hard battle and not easy to fight; how it will develop next is hard to judge. As an ordinary citizen, all I can do is protect my own family, so that if there is a local outbreak and the compound is locked down, we will still have food and not need relief, and will not add to the country's troubles. Having the cautionary examples of Wuhan, Xi'an, and Shanghai before me, I dare not be complacent about food, and I still shudder when I think of what they went through.

In the first half of this year, the economy and people's livelihood will inevitably be greatly affected, and most families will have a hard time. Our family's aspirations have already fallen very low; as long as we do not starve, it is enough. I also deeply hope that every family can ensure basic food and clothing, though this wish is itself a luxury.