Wuhan is more than the Coronavirus (Breaking out of the Outbreak)

 

It is a special kind of grief

To watch your home suffering from

Afar

I haven’t thought of Wuhan as home in a long time, don’t feel like I can claim it as mine

I was born there, yes

But I have lived there for less than 10% of my life

And yet, now, particularly,

I feel the way the blood of family, and history tie me irrevocably to that

City of 11 million people

So I want to name that it

hurts hearing about the coronavirus in China

Seeing videos of the streets so bare when I know what they are supposed to look like

That is where I'm from

The city where I'm from

Its name stamped as "birthplace" on my Canadian passport

A piece of my Chinese identity I have not been forced to lose

I need to share about how I feel a double, maybe triple burden

Not only do I need to be concerned for myself and my family, many of whom are so much closer in proximity to the outbreak than here in Canada

And also, stigma

The fear mongering, and victim-blaming, and xenophobic racism

That is this time pointedly directed at me

The: callous they deserve it, and they are disgusting, and why were they allowed to come?

That make hashtags like “#Chinesearepeopletoo” necessary

How somehow, now,

it makes sense for 11 million people and who knows how many more diaspora to be painted with one critical brush

I know you are afraid

For yourselves and your family

I am asking you to

have compassion for

mine

And of course some people behaved irresponsibly

But most are just regular folk, doing the best with what they know, trying to get home

To see their family

For many

they can only do that this time of year – lunar new year

Reunite with big festivities for the biggest celebration of our people

But this holiday

There are quiet spaces where joy should be

Empty homes that should have been full to the brim

celebration taken by virus  

And there’s also the way

That for many, this virus is all you know of the place I am from

How painful

How mundane

Because how could there be a way for us to know something about every place

But maybe that’s

not how it needs to be

Maybe when we see tragedy we should also remember that this is not all there is

That Wuhan is more than the coronavirus

We are a meeting place of north and south

Often talked about as having some of the best food in China

Dumplings and noodles from the north and sweet white rice from the south all congregate here

How we built a bigger, better subway system than Toronto’s in 4 years

How the very first bullet train in the country was from Wuhan Zhan

So can we please stop always painting China in such a negative light

6 days to build a hospital is “authoritarian” right?

Not innovative, or courageous, or wow that’s leadership,

Like we’d say if this was in Canada

Like Canada could ever pull that off

Can we not say, hey, how

extraordinary that millions of people are taking it as seriously as it should be

Good naturedly doing their part and putting their lives on pause

to stop the spread

Because again it’s people, living their lives, just trying to get by

And not everything you’re not used to is crude

You’re used to plenty that Chinese people would never do

And yes the government has done terrible things, but that information is often presented from the eyes of a racist lens  

And besides it’s not fair to only talk about the bad

Villainize until you no longer empathize with the people because of the government

Villainize until you no longer empathize because of propaganda

Erasing history so it seems like a bigger crime to try to go see family

Than conquest deliberately infecting Indigenous peoples with smallpox

We are people

We shouldn’t have to be perfect to be treated with humanity

I don’t have to prove my

lovability, my humanity, my just-like-you ness to

Get your approval to let me exist

We don’t need to be perfect

don’t have to earn basic human decency

it’s what everyone deserves

The outbreak hit us this time

But we are breaking out of the boxes your racism puts us in

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I never post my poetry to my blog, but this has been on my heart for many days now. It hurts hearing about the suffering in China and around the world, and that's exacerbated by all the racist things people are saying. So I wanted this out there, now, to stand in contrast and stand against the racism that people are spewing. Times like this it’s more important than ever to remember history, but perhaps most of all: we are people, we deserve compassion.