Fireworks have always been a symbol of celebration. Found around the world now. Some countries regulate them and others do not. They are fun, but can be dangerous or even deadly.

In China around the Lunar New Year’s people buy them privately and fire them off in the city to celebrate. It is their way to celebrate. I’m normally very open about a culture’s festivals and celebrations. But I have grown to really dislike this holiday.

Here’s what happens every year. A few days before the New Year random people will start lighting noisy fireworks without any flash. They just go “Bang!” Loud enough to set off every car alarm in a block. These are started around noon. When any sane parent is trying to get their infant or toddler to have a nap.

This leads to a cranky child. Who scream at the loud noise. By New Year’s eve they start setting off the night time fire-show. In the street right next to the buildings.

The day before (This year Feb 11th) and the day after (Feb 13th) you might get a couple fire works in the middle of the night. And The New year’s night it is all night.

So to iterate, over the week, we have a toddler who didn’t nap and is cranky all week who passes out at night, then the light show (right outside our window) keeps us awake all night. Keep this up for about half a week.

This year, my youngest got to see the light show on New year’s and liked it (it is beautiful) but since, when people put on the noise makers at night then stop for an hour we have a cranky, tired child screaming that her fireworks have disappeared.

Repeat every hour.

This has happened with all of our kids when they were young….

Some years the fireworks go for 2weeks. This year, it just started.

You can’t sleep because of the noise, you can’t watch TV because of the noise, you can’t read because of the tired child. So the only option is to go to the mall, during a 3rd wave of a global pandemic…

Just some thoughts…

Officially Quarantine is over, but that does not mean it is safe, and I don’t want to sound paranoid, so please hear me out.

Yes, Information is available in English here, but it is not READILY available to us. So my best source of information is by using Google translate on Chinese information sent out. Let me break down what has been happening and crossing our minds here in Beijing.

Schools

The Spring Semester for school began end of February and schools were told not to open. As Educators we were told by the department of education this would be temporary, and that we should NOT be teaching new material, but only sending out review material by WeChat. (China’s favourite app that you literally cannot live without). Mid-April we were told to start teaching our classes online and that the semester would continue this way until further notice.

For myself and my son, this turned out alright. Our department was free to use a program called Zoom (Ever heard of it?) to handle class. Almost all of our teachers were in China, and all but 1 were in Asia so timing out the classes was not a problem. My son was able to have all of his English based classes in the mornings, and since the afternoon was going to be Chinese-based (All above his level of Chinese) I took that time to help him with homework and Canadian Curriculum leveled work.

My daughter was not so lucky. The department she was in had to have class over a different program (Ding-Talk, I think it was dictated by the board of education for them). This program was really difficult for us because it was like Zoom, but included a heavy Chat-box at the bottom. I believe it was chosen because it could handle large group meetings easily. Except, to be able to view the video conferencing, aspect you needed to log in with your LEGAL CHINESE NAME AND CITIZEN ID NUMBER. So my daughter did not get class from the school at all that semester. I informed her teacher that this was a problem, and was not provided with any solution, so I told them not to worry about it and that I would homeschool her completely myself. So I did, using the Canadian Curriculum books we have at home, and free web resources like Khan Academy, and Education.com (Which I have a lifetime membership to). We also paid for a few other programs for her hand her brother.

In June it was announced that Grades 4+ would be returning to school, and that every-student would have to take the Covid Test. I informed the school that neither of my kids would be returning to school. My son’s teacher’s asked for a written notice for his file, which I provided, but then they were really good about sending self-study notes for him every day. My daughter’s class didn’t ask for anything and provided nothing. Which is fine, I did sign her out of school for the whole semester.

School was back in session for 1 ½ weeks, mid-June. Then schools across Beijing closed again. Tests happened digitally for myself and my son.

Summer

We have been on summer vacation, stuck in the house since July 10th. Beijing has just got down to 7 cases of Covid. No cases in my region of the city. (According to WeChat Medical. This number was 80 in our area for most of July). Now, my children don’t particularly like wearing masks, but do when we go out. My apartment compound has a lot of children, and they are often out running around without masks or anything, same with the senior citizens. Life goes on, I guess.

The thing is, I understand not wanting to panic and live your life in fear of a disease, but if the virus was really gone, we would not have to go through the security measures we do everywhere.

Security Measures

Until last week, if I wanted to enter my apartment compound, (All apartment compounds are walled in with private security officers) I needed both my resident card (A Picture ID Given by the compound management office) and a temperature check. Now I need my ID card.

To go anywhere else you need to open up what is called “Health Kit”. Health Kit is a mini-program that runs through WeChat (Surprise surprise) that requires you to Take a picture of your passport (Full Passport Number and everything) and give it your Passport Number directly, so that each day it can scan the city wide Medical records and report to your phone whether you are Covid Free or not. You then have to show this report to building security at every public building from malls to supermarkets to restaurants even the open air wet market nearby.
Luckily this Health Kit is available in English, but I am still not a fan of showing off my passport number and picture to every Tom-Dick and Harry we pass in the street.

Malls

2 weeks ago my family decided to check the malls again. We do this every month or so, sometimes it is just myself and the older kids, last week was the whole family. The mall was packed. Lots of people wandering around the mall, enjoying themselves, ¼ of the customers wearing masks on their face. I went into the men’s bathroom, and an older gent went in just before me. He had his mask wrapped around his wrist. When in the bathroom he promptly went to the urinals, and used them, mask still on his wrist, probably being sprayed with his own urine. Ick. I noticed he did not wash his hands when he left, and when I came out I noticed him at a clothing shop feeling the clothes to see how they felt, just before returning to a restaurant to eat with his family.

We decided then, and there, that we were returning home. We all decided that we didn’t want to risk our toddler daughter with any of this crap. If anyone in my family gets sick, any hospitalization comes out of pocket, and it is not worth it. Hospitals are closed except for Covid and Emergencies, so my daughter has not been vaccinated since she turned 2 (She’ll be 3 in November) and even if she doesn’t get Covid, the myriad of other things she could get from idiots who can’t wash their hands before fondling clothes or other things just doesn’t seem good to us.

If we had been able to fly out of Beijing to anywhere for the summer we would have, but all foreigners are denied re-entry to China until October at the earliest.so I would have found myself either unemployed or on a lower pay because I would not be able to perform my duties as a homeroom teacher. So we are stuck in the house watching a lot of TV and using a lot of screen time. Board Games help, but unfortunately we have to wait until the Toddler is asleep or napping to play them as she likes to grab and gnaw on things still.

Same goes for any personal projects. My wife and I can’t read paper books, draw, play non-digital games or anything like that unless our daughter is asleep or playing on her phone. ( Yes she gets preschool apps every day.) But even if she is using her phone, she drags you in to play. This is fun, but stops other projects.

So sorry if you asked me for a picture or a game design. It is taking longer than usual…