TM Arrives

TM arrives in China tonight. I arranged his flight to China less than a week ago. I got him a fine fare with enough time to change airports in Shanghai. But I did not take swine flu into account. The Chinese authorities have taken swine flu into very serious account. A couple of weeks after we arrived, Hilda got a telephone call during class. She took the call in the hallway. Someone in authority was on the phone and was talking (in Mandarin) about needing to go to a hospital. I was already packing my bag in case I needed to go rescue Calliope from some as yet unknown calamity. Li LaoShi, our very sweet and helpful teacher, took over on the telephone.

They were concerned about Hilda's sister's daughter. Hilda's sister's son, Anton, was visiting with us. And of course, Hilda's sister-in-law's daughter is Calliope. But none of Hilda's sister's daughters were here in China. We guessed they were not talking about Anton, because he was back at the apartment, safe and sound with Hilda's mother, Magdalena. By the end of the conversation, we had established that they wanted Calliope to stay in the apartment and to take her temperature in seven days and call in to a special phone number, if she had a fever. Well that explained everything. Not. This was a game of telephone on the telephone.

Further discussion ensued. Using a creative rather than a literal approach to language translation and one more phone call, we understood that they were concerned about swine flu. Within fifteen minutes two community health workers showed up at the apartment, quickly took Anton's and Magdalena's temperature, and were on their way.

This still left quite a bit of unexplained intrigue in the air. First off, how had they found Hilda's Chinese cell phone number? She hadn't given it to either her mother or her nephew. I had given it to Xiamen University, but how would a health worker have known to call there? Second, how did they get to the apartment so fast, without asking directions, or even an apartment number? Now, just to get to our classroom at the University takes half an hour by taxi and we've been there lots of times. So these health workers must have been very close by. I don't even think they rang the bell to get buzzed in. Together, these factors give me the willies in that we are being monitored much more closely than I might have thought.

And from a public health perspective, these actions didn't make much sense. Magdalena and Anton had already been here for two days. When they disembarked in Xiamen, they went through a temperature check. Were health workers swarming the city checking on each passenger from every plane that had landed in the last two days? And if either Magdalena or Anton had been sick, they would already have affected many, many people over the course of two days. On the other hand, when Hilda, Calliope, and I arrived, the flight attendant announced that they were about to do a temperature check, but then never did one! Such efficiency and inefficiency all rolled up together.

So what did all this have to do with TM's arrival? I hadn't realized that officials had stepped up their temperature checks for international arrivals. The girlfriend of one of our classmates arrived in Shanghai two days ago. She, along with all the other passengers, sat on the plane for an hour and a half waiting for health officials to finish. If TM had to wait that long, he would never make his connecting flight to Xiamen. Since this was the last flight of the day, he'd have to make arrangements for lodging, transportation, and a new flight - all this without knowing any Chinese.

Normally I don't spend many cycles worrying about things I can't do anything about. But today, I just gave in and started worrying. And then I started worrying out loud. Worrying out loud actually helped. In the end, I made a connection with the friend of a friend (thank you Fenny). He works at the Shanghai airport where TM might get stuck and he also speaks English! I gave TM his phone number and relaxed.

Night time came. Calliope and I made our way to the airport. We waited in front of a large screen TV amidst a crowd absorbed in a soccer game. Someone approached me from the crowd. I had met him at the English Corner at Xiamen University. I asked him and his buddy why they were at the airport. As it turned out, they had come to watch the soccer game in an air-conditioned space; they didn't actually have any business at the airport. It wasn't long before TM was heading calmly down the corridor towards us, his head bobbing above the flood of shorter Chinese people. He had made his flight :-)

But Northwest airlines had lost his luggage. Another problem for another day.

TM looking at me looking out the apartment window.