Dan Wang’s 2022 year in review

One of the highlights of any year, here is the letter, part about Yunnan, part about Chinese locksdowns, but this time only a smidgen about music, and much more.  Here is an excerpt:

The situation worsened if one tested positive. A trip to a centralized quarantine facility (often a bed in a convention center) would await. That was sometimes the least concern. The city’s policy was to separate children from their parents if either tested positive; fear of separation drove parents mad with worry, until an outcry prompted the city to drop the policy.  Dog-owners who couldn’t find another household willing to host their pet had to decide whether to leave it alone at home for the duration of their illness; or let it loose outside and hope for the best. (A viral video of a health worker beating a corgi to death with a shovel did not help to make the decision easier.) A positive test would summon cleaning staff into one’s home, who could soak everything—clothes, books, furniture—in disinfectant…

Psychologically, the most difficult thing was that no one knew how long the lockdown would last: a few days or a few weeks more. Every so often a video would circulate that purported to show someone who jumped from a balcony. Friends spoke about three types of shock. First, the raw novelty of extended physical confinement. Second, the wonder of feeling food insecure in this age and in this city. Third, a disenchantment with government pronouncements. Many people kicked themselves for trusting officials who said that Shanghai would impose no lockdown. They saw how positive cases in their own neighborhoods would be absent from the city’s data releases. And they shared a recording of a health official who said that these controls were unscientific.

And:

But life in Yunnan was much better than being in the big cities last year. “Far from being seen as a regrettable backsliding and privation,” Scott writes: “becoming a barbarian may have produced a marked improvement in safety, nutrition, and social order.”

I advocate for departing from the court center too. So it’s time to say: it’s a barbarian’s life for me.

Dan Wang — very highly rated but still underrated!