This is now on Wulumuqi (=Urumqi) lu in
#Shanghai
. People holding up white sheets of paper. ‘We don’t need to write anything on it. It is a symbol of the revolution of the people’, someone says. (Don’t manage to send videos.)
Witnessed this last Saturday. Girl was violently arrested bc she didn’t want to show her ID card unless the police gave her a reason. (Think she lowered her mask while eating.) What this shows? Girl (from Guangdong) stands up for rights. Police doesn’t know what to so with that.
I’m heading home now. Just want to add how incredible this is. Never seen anything like this in the decade that I report on China. The anger seems too much to crack down on. Wonder what happens next.
Ik zat dus gister in een talkshow met
@MarionKoopmans
en zie nu alle tweets langskomen. De drek die zij over zich heen krijgt is waanzinnig! Als je verstand van zaken hebt, ga dan in debat. Zo niet, houd lekker voor je wat je allemaal wel niet van haar denkt. Mijn hemel.
At the south end of the street are still more than hundred people. They are yelling. ‘We are all Chinese!’ The police is quietly waiting until they leave.
Wonder what the vigil site on the Wulumuqi/Anfu lu corner looks like now. Seems the police has surrounded it. Meanwhile, this new site is being set up further down the road.
Meet the gang of 6 that is following me and
@SLeplatre
in
#Guiyang
.
‘We are looking out for your safety’.
‘Are you police?’
‘No.’
‘So who are you?’
‘I can’t say.’
Protests in Wuhan too. Doesn’t look like your average protest maybe. But parts of the city are supposed to be under lockdown. So these people just removed barricades and are walking out. Which would explain why this are older people, and not just students.
I was supposed to have dinner in a restaurant in Wulumuqi lu tonight. My friends went without me and just sent me this video, taken from behind the window. People getting arrested and taken away.
Partir c’est mourir un peu.
These were 9 years and 25 days of my life. Still some reports to finish in the next few weeks, but this is China 🇨🇳 for now. I’ll miss it.
It shows how tense
#Shanghai
now is. But in light of what happened in
#Tangshan
, it also shows how these days more girls are not letting men (police or other) mess with them. How those men are unable to react decently. And how quickly things escalate in this ‘super safe’ country.
My essay in
@nytimes
was featured on the frontpage.
It’s been a few days since I found out, but decided to share it anyways. This goes beyond any bucket list, really.
Because, coincidental or not, one day earlier, I witnessed this escalation. Police was called bc of an issue with a girl not let into the neighborhood while moving house. She flipped a middle finger. Police arrests her. Boyfriend wants to take her dog. Then this.
Half by accident I ended up in
#Wuhan
Zhongshan park where retirees are still trying to protest against pension reforms. The number of both police and plainclothes thugs is overwhelming. Which is exactly the point of course. But damn, those elderly are brave.
This is the story of Shanghai today. Police checking phones on the metro. Apparently, they type ‘wu’ to see if there is any suspicious Wulumuqi lu related info on the phone. The frustration is still there, people are still talking about protesting.
Nu weet ik natuurlijk lang niet zoveel over ‘China’ als menig man, maar toch even voor de zekerheid: ik ben de komende weken nog in Nederland en schuif graag aan bij talkshows.
What happened in Urumqi, combined with the promis of easing of
#zerocovid
measures, followed by new lockdowns… it sparked something. This is students protesting in
#Nanjing
It’s now just super annoying to live, work or pass through Wulumuqi lu in
#Shanghai
.
Police (plainclothes and uniformed) on every corner. Was told not to take pictures. When I kept asking why, the officer and I agreed that I wouldn’t take photos of the police. But it’s tense.
Deze week is het tien (10!!) jaar geleden dat ik met zwangerschapsverlof ging en
@NOS
me liet weten dat er geen vast contract kwam. (Ja, dat had sympathieker gekund.) Een mijlpaal om bij stil te staan. 🎉🥂 1/6
This is what that looks like doing interviews. Mind the lingering guys. I’m behind the man in the blue hoodie, trying to speak to the ladies in the shop. The man at one point interfered, telling her to ‘go home’.
There’s a lot of anxiety now, with the sudden new rule that if there is 1 (one!) new case in a building, all residents are deported to an isolation camp. Seems not an official rule, but local authorities reacting to pressure from Beijing. Meanwhile, the Global Times… 🤷🏼♀️ ->
Bedankt voor alle lieve reacties! Voor wie zich zorgen maakt over het welzijn van mijn kinderen: die hebben een fantastische vader, en fijne grootouders die de zorg even overnamen. Ze komen niets tekort. Daarentegen, als ik mijn werk niet doe, is er veel minder brood op de plank.
Julu lu in Shanghai, around lunchtime. The city has a weird pre-Chinese Newyear feel, right now. As if people left for their hometowns already. In reality, they stay indoors. Many because they’re sick, others to be careful.
De kop is eraf. Ik begin als correspondent voor
@trouw
,
@fd
en
@bbvpro
in
#Frankrijk
. Ooit was het correspondentschap in Parijs een belofte die ik mijn 18-jarige ik deed. Nu is het een nieuwsrijke standplaats die zich óók leent voor invalshoeken groter dan de navel van één land.
Last week I was in Harbin, the provincial capital of Heilongjiang. A very special city due to the Russian and European style architecture. I haven’t seen a single Russian, but as a folkloric theme, Russia was everywhere.
Vandaag ging ik een interview helemaal zelf in het Chinees doen.
De geïnterviewde trakteerde mij op een door zijn vrouw gemaakte lunch, inclusief zelfgebrouwen 美酒 waar ‘maar een beetje alcohol’ inzat. Twee limonadeglazen later ging het interview uitstekend.
Einde bericht.
Dat is het dan.
Het afscheidsverhaal voor
@trouw
waar ik weken op heb zitten kauwen. Want afscheid nemen, iets loslaten waar je bijna een decennia van je leven in hebt gestopt - is niet makkelijk.
Just these past few days travelling to asia i have been tested more frequently than all of last year back home. PCRs, serology, temperature scans. Absolutely no slack. Very different from how we handle things in europe.
Does Beijing really not see the irony in this?
Question of usefulness of restrictions aside, the CCP loves to emphasize the principle of reciprocity. Mind you that people traveling TO China still need a 48 hrs PCR-test, verified by the Chinese embassy.
Actual relaxation of the
#ZeroCovid
policy is marginal - for now. Still need to scan location code, show green health code. Schools are still testing. Largest effect of the policy shift is that the fear of getting locked up for weeks on end is fading away slowly.
There is police at literally every corner on my 10 minute bike ride home from the office. Wasn’t like that in the previous days. (Sorry for the terrible photo.)
This… is something we in China can’t really digest at the moment. It’s a 180 degree turn in covid policy and no-one really understands what is happening. Give us a moment please.
COVID is not something to fear. Even if you are infected you can boost your immune system to mitigate the effects. Li says. "The severe type of COVID is not caused by COVID itself. The virus storms the immune system. Chinese medicine can stop symptoms from becoming too severe."
Wat te doen als er brand uitbreekt? Dat zien we dan wel weer, lijkt de gedachte. Dit filmpje gaat rond op WeChat. De brand zou in Pudong zijn. Brandweerauto’s kunnen niet bij het gebouw komen omdat alles is afgesloten.
He Nederlandse mensen, even dit:
Xi spreek je uit als SH-IE. Zoals het Engelse ‘she’ (‘zij’). Nee, niet precies, en er zijn tonen en bladiebla. Maar het is duizendmaal beter dan Ksie. Sjie mag ook. Maar Sh-ie is beter.
Dus: SH-IE. SHIE. SHIE. SHIE. SHIE Dzjin-ping.
#SHIE
Beste redacties, ik ben nog altijd in Nederland. Mocht u behoefte hebben aan een bijdrage van iemand die daadwerkelijk in China was tot een paar weken geleden, dan ben ik nú in uw tijdzone.
#freelancen
(En voor de volledigheid: ik hoop snel weer terug te gaan.)
Wulumuqi lu around midnight. The street is lined with police cars and vans. People are pushed to streetcorners of larger streets around. (Changle on one side, Changshu en Fuxing on the other.) The protesters want to stay there, they say. Or at least come back.
Bedenk opeens dat het deze maand 10 jaar geleden is, dat ik voor ‘t eerst in China kwam! Ik keek altijd naar EU, VS, Afrika - maar
#China
bleek een walhalla voor
#journalisten
op zoek naar verhalen. Makkelijker werd het in dat decennium niet, wel interessanter.
#jubileumplaatje
Beijing authorities finally releases more credible numbers for Covid deaths. Dec 8th- Jan 12th, almost 60,000 people died due to Covid. Almost all had underlying diseases and their average age was 80. Note: people who died at home are not incl in these (hospital) stats.
Voor de volledigheid: Voices of April. Het filmpje dat een paar dagen geleden overal op WeChat werd gedeeld én gecensureerd. Het toont hoe Shanghai eerst zegt NIET in lockdown te gaan. En een dag later TOCH dicht ging. En dan stemmen van woedende, hongerige, wanhopige inwoners.
Zo ziet quarantaine er in China er uit. Over cipiers in witte pakken, pijnlijke testen en chloortabletten -> Quarantaine werkt. Ze zouden het in Nederland eens moeten proberen. via
@trouw
Wang is back with his family, his friends told me. Wang is the young man who chanted ‘Xi Jinping step down!’, during the protests in Shanghai, last November. I wrote about him
@TheEconomist
. He was taken away from his workplace. No-one knew where to. (1/2)
In case people don’t know what I’m talking about: at least 10 (incl a 5 and 14 yr old) died in a residential fire in Urumqi. The city, as much of Xinjiang region has been in lockdown for over 100 days. That lockdown greatly obstructed the rescue efforts.
Xinjiang Urumqi residential building fire, the last words of the victims on the 16th floor before they were burned to death.
Under the Zero-Covid policy, the residents of the whole building were locked in their homes and could not go out.
#TheGreatTranslationMovement
Uw krant wordt voor een enorm deel door freelancers gemaakt. Zonder hen is er geen
@trouw
of
@volkskrant
. Die freelancers (zoals ik) vragen
@DPGMediaNL
nu om een eerlijke koopkrachtcompensatie. Bevlogenheid is mooi, maar het betaalt de huur niet.
A Chinese person told me this morning: the new coronavirus is like pasta. The Chinese invented it, and the Italians spread it around the world.
#COVID19
#China
Na vijf coronatesten en twee weken koortsvrij afgezonderd van de buitenwereld, word ik niet langer meer beschouwd als gevaar voor de Chinese volksgezondheid.
#backinthebubble
#quarantaine
#China
Tip voor
@MinPres
: passeer RIVM en WHO voor een keertje en ga direct praten met medische deskundigen in Azië die ziekenhuizen hier van binnen zagen. Ik wil sowieso graag een knipselmap maken, motto: als je zó weinig zeker weet, neem je beter het zekere voor het onzekere.
Police came into a quiet compound to bother
@micpeuker
who was doing a live talk for
@RadioTeleSuisse
. There was no reason given by the police, and what happened sounds very much like an attempt to intimidate journalists.
#Shanghai
1/8 Update: Après un duplexe pour le moins mouvementé dans le
@1930
de la
#RTS
, sous le regard pressant d'agents de police venus nous embarquer au poste (mon cameraman et moi-même), nous sommes libres tous les deux.
Over mondkapjes. Ja, we gebruiken ze meerdere dagen, en ze gaan op en af. Volgens deskundigen helpt iedere barrière, de hygiënekwestie lossen we op met veel handen wassen. Maar je kunt er natuurlijk ook nog een jaartje over doordebatteren. (Cc
@sheilasitalsing
@NadiaBouras
)
China is not just another chess piece on the geopolitical board. Knowing what its priorities are, is essential. In this book Everything Under Control, I explore in a bunch of reports (and juicy behind the scene-scenes!) how the CCP manages to keep in power. (1/2)
Wisdom from my daughter’s diary, February 2020,
#Shanghai
. This was when the city was empty, but there was no virus and I told her to not be scared.
#realitycheck
#throwback
Hier in China stonden tientallen ondernemers klaar om
#mondkapjes
te regelen voor de Nederlandse zorgsector. Maar die kregen geen voet aan de grond bij de Nederlandse inkopers. Die context is veel erger.
#Sywert
Sywert van Lienden herhaalde het keer op keer: belangeloos stelde hij miljoenen Chinese mondkapjes veilig voor de Nederlandse zorg. Geheim bleef dat hij via een eigen bedrijf tóch verdiende aan de pandemie
Testevents? Nieuwe pistes? Vlam? Bubbels? Buitenlandse journalisten in China krijgen geen informatie over, en nauwelijks toegang tot de
#OlympischeWinterspelen
in Beijing.
De Foreign Correspondents’ Club roept de organisaties op tot transparantie en duidelijkheid.
1/ Statement on Olympic Coverage
The FCCC is concerned about the lack of transparency and clarity from the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG) as well as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) with regards to Olympic-related reporting in China.
How to fill that suitcase if there is no more need for crackers, a coffee maker, bowl, mug, dried noodles, cans with carrots&peas, tuna, cheese, nuts, olives and chocolate? And when will I drink 3 liters of water per day, read a book and do my admin, if not in quarantine?
While many arrested protesters are free again, the man I portrayed in this
@TheEconomist
piece, is still missing. His friends are worried. No-one knows where he is held, or how he is doing. No news from him since the day he was arrested by the police.
‘Don’t be afraid of the coronavirus. Face it scientifically’.
Seems that it would be very scientifically correct to keep those masks on for a while. I actually have the impression that more people are wearing masks on the street now. But that could be a false perception…
These last two weeks have been crazy. (And it seems like the craziness isn’t over yet!) After that night in Wulumuqi lu in
#Shanghai
, I received so many messages, that I simply couldn’t reply to all. However, I did appreciate and read every single one of them. Thank you!