Tomorrow morning I depart for Beijing, commencing what will be a full day's journey with an mtr ride to the China border, a bus ride to the Shenzhen airport, a flight to Beijing, and then a taxi ride to our hostel, enticingly called the "Candy Inn." This is undoubtedly a trip I have been dreaming of since I knew I would be coming to Hong Kong this year. It is also fitting that I am making the trip towards the conclusion of my time in Asia, since I am now so much informed of the politics, history and economics that move minds here.
Alas, I'm also departing at a time when it seems to be safest to remain secured within Hong Kong's health protection zone. Owing to its horrific experience with SARS in 2003, Hong Kong has taken one of the most proactive approaches to preventing the infiltration of swine flu. Travellers temperatures are screened as they pass through both ground and air borders, and those with a temperature above a certain point are being quarantined ( a grandmother and her five year old grandchild were recently subject to these measures so there is action in conjunction with strong rhetoric) I'm interested to see if health agents at the China-Hong Kong border in Shenzhen will have a more alert look to them then usual!
Tonight, while discussing the current world health scare of the swine flu with Wing Wing, I got a look back at what it meant to be a thirteen year old during the SARS epidemic. Wing Wing told me that 400 people in Hong Kong died during 2003. These deaths were both young schoolchildren, and the elderly grandparents playing mah jong on Hong Kong streetsides. For Wing Wing, it at first meant no gym class, as the physical contact between children was thought to be too dangerous. It also meant that both teachers and students wore facemasks to class. Ultimately, it resulted in schools being closed for a month, families attempting to isolate themselves within their flats, and school children like Wing Wing being assigned the morose homework of writing essays tallying the number of deaths attributed to SARS each day. Understandably with such a recent past, Hong Kongers are buying face masks and antibacterial wash by the score.
Hopefully, there will be no problems with the swine flu in Beijing. The Chinese government's reputation when it comes to being forthright when dealing with the health of their population- think total denial of HIV/ AIDS epidemic in Yunnan province- is not the most comforting at times such as these.
