My school (public) asked for my entire winter break travel history around the date school was originally supposed to start. I took photos of all my boarding passes and typed out the entire itinerary with Chinese alongside airport codes for the places I transferred. The 主任 asked me for that info.
Yesterday I get a less than polite message from the 組長 telling me the 教育部 needs all the foreign teacher travel history starting in January through now immediately. I told him to ask the person sitting next to him (the 主任) because I already provided that info and will not dig it up again. Total communication failure on their part.
Today the school announced that all teachers who have left the country since early March need to send in their info.
Taiwan has gotten shitty towards non-citizens. Foreigners need to publicly record their travel history from the past 3 months but locals only need the past few weeks? We more disease prone? You trust us less? You know the incubation period is, at absolute max, 27 days, right?
Meanwhile, I’m being bombarded with messages from everyone asking if the Fulbrighters being forced home will impact me. Sure, it impacts me. I won’t be confused with a bunch of 22 year olds on a derp-around-Asia gap year for the next 6 months. The fact that anyone is asking goes to show how little anyone here cares about the difference between someone who worked their ass off to become a licensed teacher and someone who has no right to be in the classroom in the first place.
A medical respirator is an N95 or better. A medical mask is your typical surgical mask. The 2017 study proved both effective.
When you say there’s no way to get any, that’s the fault of the governments. If Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan and even China can manage to put a mask on everyone’s face, so can all Western countries. Had they heeded the warnings, prevented Chinese people from exporting all their masks back in January and February, prevented price hikes of the masks by some rationing measure, and get to work on producing masks in country, everyone would have at least 1 to 2 masks to use per week, which would be sufficient in times of social distancing.
Now every European nations bans the exports and movements of masks, and many are working on manufacturing them, such as France and Germany. However, when you have already drilled the notion that “masks are useless” into peoples heads, they aren’t going to be using masks even when you finally have them available.
Oh, and I have not “told” anyone not to wear a mask, (like I could).
I wear a mask routinely, and have done for years, because of the levels of air pollution here.
A positive in the current crisis is I don’t have to constantly respond to “Do you have a cold” enquiries from blissfully unaware Taiwanese “fresh air fiends” when the local AQI is over 150 (RED UNHEALTHY) and all the doors and windows are open.
A negative (every cloud has a sooty lining) is that they now maybe have a reason to have the doors and windows open.
I’ll say this again. The CCP has the support of their citizens on this. When I went there, one of the first things I was told by Chinese people there was to watch out for the Uighers. I never heard of them before, but during my time there, I often heard really negative things about them. Like how they’re dangerous, all carry big knifes, hate chinese culture. Things like that. The CCP is the vanguard of the people of China, they couldn’t keep power if people did support them in the masses.
I’m surprised Taiwan or even Korea and Singapore was doing so well. I mean given the high population density diseases should spread like wildfire. I mean in the US it’s so much easier to practice social distancing because everyone drives their own cars, live in their own houses with a ton of rooms, and things are just so spread out. The fact they’re getting beaten up by the virus shows something is fundamentally wrong.
Every Chinese people I have seen so far love the CCP so much. They agree 110% with what they do and couldn’t understand all the western propaganda. And this is in the US where they’re free to say anything.
Lao wai in China are very easily brainwashed. Last summer, a dude my local friend was fucking/dating (Colombian living in Guangzhou) was giving a free pass to the CCP over the treatment of protestors in Hong Kong, totally talking out of his ass of course. Had to set his ass straight.
