2020: Coronavirus Has Changed My World!
By Joseph Harrison
@JTAH_1990
Real talk, Miss Rona has taken my last piece of sanity! Here in June 2020, I have been home in England since early February due to the world pandemic altering my plans and then some! Straight up, I am done with 2020! As lockdowns ease and we find our temporary 'new normal', I want to look at how the world around me has coped. UK has been soft! 英国, 你疯了吗? 我的天!
As the UK locked down it was astonishing to see how the public went into meltdown, how would we survive without McDonalds and KFC? I experienced seven weeks during early 2020 in lockdown in Beijing, China to find that the already strong mobile payment and food delivery industry was ready to brave a pandemic situation! No benefits system would fill the pockets of local Chinese people who had lost their jobs due to the Coronavirus lockdowns, across the country those unemployed citizens took up food delivery jobs without hesitation! During my Beijing transitional period I wasn't hungry, paying through WeChatPay I was fine to order my daily meals to my hotel room on my mobile phone app without needing to use any cash! With the exception of Hubei McDonalds locations, food delivery workers picked up thousands of orders without any closures needed at all! China took the wheel! Come on through 外卖!
Restaurants closed their doors to dine in customers, bolstered by an established e-commerce industry, those whose didn't want to cook throughout the Chinese lockdown were able to get their delivery meal fix. In the UK, we neither have mobile payment systems like AliPay or WeChatPay, turning to contactless payment has forced people to become entirely cashless in a society that still sees people not cave into the modern ways of paying for things. Will ApplePay become the next big thing? Back to those delivery companies in the United Kingdom, would it have taken to get furloughed staff into food delivery posts to assist restaurants and fast food outlets who were open for delivery? Instead of allowing people to stay at home in that respect, those furloughed individuals could have helped in the community to distribute medication and food shopping to shielded people like those delivery workers did in China? The lockdown effort in China was strong, but businesses continued!
As I made my best efforts to forge on with my professional transition from Beijing to my new city, my lockdown friend, Cyndi had chosen to fly back to the United States of America to fix her head. Little did I know I would be following in her footsteps, back in our home country's we weren't ready for one nation to throw their toys out of their adult sized prams! The UK remained calm for the first few weeks of the lockdown, key workers made their way to work without hassle but on the other side of the pond a certain few citizens were feeling some kind of way, triggered maybe? Yes! As those 'stars and stripes' became visible on the news bulletins, me and Cyndi corresponding in shear disbelief as people demanded their country would be reopened because individuals wanted their prom or a haircut but their health wasn't any concern of theirs! Yes, Miss Rona would snatch lives, she knew who to attack! UK, stay at home!
As I poured another 'quarantini' during the height of the UK lockdown, it was utterly earth-shattering to see countless UK citizens flout the rules of the Coronavirus 'stay at home' order. The message had been given to us by Boris Johnson one way or another, with one hour of exercise people started to take those civil liberties a little too far! Coronavirus was ought to get those who lounged around in parks, we had been given the opportunity to have a walk not have a stupid picnic, choices! Wales told us to 'sling our hook' otherwise in 'Nessa style' we'd have our faces broken! Go to the beach or stay at home? Most of the UK public knew how to abide by the rules but some really made a mockery of those 'social distancing' rules! If that was supposed to be a sign of democracy, I was witnessing a mockery! Black lives do matter, what carnage would break out at the end of May into early June turned the western world upside down! The world already has issues, Miss Rona don't stir the pot!
With people locked down within their four walls, mother nature got to work and she went in hard! Venice cleaned up its canals, apparently dolphins returned for a little swim? Air travel was not on the agenda, the ozone layer went to work to patch itself back up! In Llandudno, Wales, the streets had been invaded by goats as they commandeered those streets back! The lions in South Africa knew it was safe as they slumbered in the middle of the roads. Bison ran wild once again in Poland, the world rejoiced in some mad way whilst Miss Rona massacred populations on a worldwide level! Getting back into the world remains my main priority, locked down at home in England had me reevaluating what I truly wanted out of life, it wasn't just the animals who were taking their territory back! People needed to stay home, allowing nature to take back what was rightfully theirs! Mother Nature has taken her world back!
Will I get back to my life in China? Will things be like they were before? It's been like a mouthful of sour candy, 2020 is driving me super psycho during this lockdown period. Feeling completely grounded it was like a miracle when Wuhan's initial 76 day period of lockdown was lifted! It won't be instant but I'm plotting my comeback to the Mainland of China! Miss Rona, ain't nobody going to stop me from making those 'Before Corona' moves! 2019s successes had me blinded, 2020 gave me a false start with a thud that found myself touching down at Manchester Airport during February of that year! This is why I don't have time for these fools who disregard 'social distancing' in all outside settings because I actually have an international existence that I have a duty to pick up! Like the bisons and goats running free, I'm ready to take back what is mine and fly high once again! Miss Rona, I give you full permission to strike down those trifling ass individuals who aren't listening to those rules! Go!
The worlds aviation industry had been shot from the sky, masses of passenger aircrafts were being repurposed for cargo flights from their respected country's to China for PPE missions. Cabin crew donned their masks, boarding repatriation flights to bring back citizens who had been displaced whilst on their holidays as Miss Rona struck her deadly virus! National airlines took to the skies to bring back large quantities of 'Personal Protective Equipment' from China to the four corners of the globe, with the pandemic as the priority things have had to change a lot! People moaning that they had missed out on their holidays, 2021 would give them their chances to rescheduled Rona ruined plans! Airlines remain at the brink of collapse, surely people's jobs are more important than a one weeks package holiday to Greece for a summer week in 2020? I'm making my Coronavirus travel plan, this departure lounge of dreams!
Coronavirus has changed my world, its locked me down and ripped me away from a lifestyle that I quite frankly took for granted! Yes, the lockdown in the United Kingdom has been soft, people continue to not listen to quarantine and 'social distancing' rules. I didn't want to come home, I didn't want a world pandemic to break out, all I can do is make those tracks back to China to rebuild my working life once again! The world has changed, masks will need to be worn at the disgust of some but if that gets those embassies and visa centres reopened I will sashay away in the middle of the night. Creating my plan, I have been afforded perspective during this world pandemic moment. From an e-commerce point, the UK needs to fix up and diversify for its life! I'm done with this Corona chat, I want to get back to my Asian life! 2020 continues to be one almighty lesson, allowing me to appreciate the blessed life in China. Miss Rona, get your coat because its curtains for you, B!
Trifling Ass Miss Rona!
Joseph Harrison