Mozambique: Marracuene Municipality to introduce student pass, slashing transport fare from 19 to ...
Interview: Mozambican student returns from Beijing, China – Noticias
1:12 CAT | 04 Feb 2020
File photo: Noticias
When Joaquina (*) landed at Mavalane International Airport, the fear she had felt for more than a week after the outbreak of the coronavirus in China finally left here.
The virus had by then taken the lives of more than 300 people and infected another 14,000, ‘Noticias’ reports today.
In quarantine, her sense of panic only increased. Two things frightened her: contagion and the possibility that one day she would run out of food.
“Therefore, I wanted to return to Mozambique as soon as possible. Until then, there was no record of cases of anyone being infected [here].”
At the university she attended in Beijing, she was forbidden to leave without convincing justification. Security guards at the gate simply stopped people leaving. She spent days on the campus, with no contact with the outside world.
“All the gates to the university campus were closed. Anyone who wanted to leave had to write to the University office, explaining the reasons for their departure,” the Mozambican student told AIM, one day after arriving in Mozambique.
Beijing’s streets and shops were empty – a combination of the coronavirus and the fact that many citizens leave to join their families for Chinese New Year at this time.
The coronavirus epidemic started in December in the city of Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, in central China. The World Health Organization (WHO) has now declared an international public health emergency.
When the epidemic started, Joaquina did not take it seriously. She thought it was superficial and would pass quickly.
“We thought it was going to go away and it wasn’t that serious,” she says.
But time would only prove that the virus was something much more serious than she had imagined.
Social media, televisions and corner conversations revolved around the outbreak. With more and more messages on the subject, her fear only increased. Then that the university prohibited students from leaving the campus.
“Then, I started to take this more seriously,” she said.
Once a day, between 7:00 and 9:00 a.m., university employees went through the dormitories testing students for fever.
“They did it then because our temperatures were lowest at that time of day, they said. They practically woke us up,” Joaquina said.
Hunger was one of her potential enemies. Joaquina still had food, but it could run out at any time.
“There are things that we needed, including food, but we couldn’t order online, as is common in China,” she said, adding that “we were afraid to touch anything, most of all people. We didn’t want to be in crowds of people.”
Fear of buying food online was high, because they didn’t know where the food had been or the condition of the people who would deliver it. Danger was everywhere.
Over time, the desire to return home to forestall infection increased. So she wrote to the University asking to return home to Mozambique.
“The university accepted,” she told AIM.
She packed her bags and called a taxi, asking a friend for help with her bags. But a security guard at the forbade her friend accompanying her, despite the fact that “he did not intend to travel. He was just there to support me.” He wasn’t allowed to leave.
She met some Mozambicans at the airport in Beijing, where her anxiety abated somewhat. They talked about everything while waiting for the plane, including the disease.
“We were trying to relax a bit. We even laughed and made jokes. When we got on the plane we were all relaxed, despite being separated from each other.”
Joaquina plans to return to Beijing, where she studies. “I hope things get better. The university will postpone the start of classes until March this year. They advised us not to buy tickets back to Beijing in February, but to wait for March.”
The health sector has prepared an isolation centre at Mavalane General Hospital in Maputo to hospitalise patients thought to be infected with the coronavirus.
(*) Fictitious name, at source request.
By Hilário Taímo, from AIM
Source: Noticias
Show comments
Also read
Leave a Reply
Be the First to Comment!
You must be logged in to post a comment.
You must be logged in to post a comment.