C-Virus Phenomenon
I learned about this “C-virus” when waiting for an Uber along the road in South Kensington, a random man by himself passed me by shouting “China Virus!”, In deep fear, I did not respond or turn my face to even look at him thoroughly. He passed by like a shadowy ghost, and I hid behind my mask. Oh no, but I did see him from the corner of my eye, he seemed to be white, young and athletic with a black t-shirt. I saw him moved away in a pair of loose jeans and the popular white sneakers, thanking God in my heart that he didn’t attack me. From then I began to understand that when some people see this “C-virus” name, it stands not only for Coronavirus, but Chinavirus and Chinesevirus, even communistvirus, too. It all depends on what they stigmatise it.
Initially, the virus has caused nothing but fear to Asian people across the entire U.K. Many cases have been seen and unofficially reported on social media, from Facebook accusations to BBC, whereas only Asians know how scary their situations are. I fear of wearing a mask despite the fact that I desperately want to protect myself…… but Asians are disgusted for no reason just by wearing masks. “Is it a democratic society? Why can’t I have the freedom of expression to wear whatever I want?” Sarcastically, many Asians ask.
Whether the mask is a necessity is questionable, but Chinatown’s huge amount of visitors being swept away overnight from the beginning of the coronavirus is also questionable. On Chinese twitter style of Weibo, the famous account Hello_Bamboo (你好_竹子) told a story: ‘“What does Chinese eat? I heard it’s because people in China have eaten something that’s not right?’ my husband(white British)’s nephew asked. I replied him, “normal as your food, vegetable, meat, rice. He nodded and ran away to play with his sister ”.
Being threatened or attacked on the street is not the only way in which Chinese/Asian people in Britain are suffering the effects of the virus. Chinese restaurants have experienced a catastrophic loss of business ahead of the real crisis. London’s chinatown is my playground and mild cure to my homesickness. Even though there can never be as authentic as “the China” of mine, Chinatown has been many home to all kinds of asians. Like many other people, I have favourite food and drink there, and would go crazy without them once in a while. I went to Chinatown to buy my favourite fried chicken three times, on February 8th, February 20th and March 10th.
On February 8th, a regular Friday night, I went to Chinatown to have a look. First stop was Tianfu Supermarket, the one I go to the most often because of this decency in hygiene and cosy environment. There were still many young Chinese people hanging around. The market is family-run and I had spoken to two of them.
“Have the coronavirus affected the business?” I asked the male staff who was arranging the shelf next to me ,without wearing masks.
“Very badly, we are losing a lot.”
“How bad it is?”
“Just bad. But I tell you, I am afraid, of course I am afraid. The other restaurant has a chef just went back from China, rumour has it he has coronavirus, woah, I wouldn’t want to go to the restaurant”.
The lady on the register heard his words, “of course it’s bad”, she added.
It was a Friday night, Chinatown’s streets had lost its majority of tourists and consumers have gone to disappear, they were empty. Most of them seemed open even without many customers, chefs and staff were idly smoking and observing passengers, someone asked me to come in have a meal here and there. The famous anti-communist Fa Lun Gong propaganda station had also disappeared into the night as if all of their preaching and handing-out-brouchures had never happen. They hid from the “Communist Virus” which they called in their anti-communist brochures.
I then went into the Monga Fried Chicken shop where they serve Taiwanese Chicken. The call number (number of customers) during the day is usually 500, meaning they serve 500 times of food a day, during the weekend the number can reach to 700, but at the night I was there, my call number was #31.
“Have the coronavirus affected the business?” I asked one of the memebers of staff who was by the side just finished the call.
“Not going well, you see your number is 31, usually it should be 531”
“Do you think it is the racism towards Asian food that makes it hard?”
“Yes, but guess what, we get more online orders these days, all from Hungrypanda, I am sure Chinese customers have not abandoned us.”
Hungrypanda is a Chinese version of Deliveroo with all popular, authentic Chinese restaurants in London and it mainly targets the Chinese community in the U.K. Its service currently expands to countries of Chinese immigrants such as the U.S., France, Austrilia. Compare to Deliveroo, Hungrypanda sets up its premiere fee much higher but its selection ranges from asian restaurant and bubble tea shops to asian supermarkets. During current difficult times, many Chinese restaurants use promotions like “order at least 20 pounds and get 1 free mask” or directly sell masks through Hungrypanda, too. The masks are usually 5 for £20, no inflation but it soothes some asian people’s sense of insecurity when masks are sold out and not recommended.
Chinatown whereas is not all about food. I also visited the hair salon Xingyun that day where I usually visit for a good discount and one of the hairdressers from Hong Kong totally ignored my question on “racism” just like Tianfu market’s staff, instead, he told me a story: rumour has it, one of the supermarket owners has coronavirus and he is afraid.
Rumours are all over among Chinese workers throughout Chinatown, as if anyone who was back from China carries the virus. However, the fact is, by February, 8 people who were confirmed were almost outside of London, but Chinatown was scared. Additionally, not only international students have the contrasted viewing on masks. When Chinatown workers in Monga, for example, started to wear masks, Monocle cafe workers were still facing a huge influx of customers every day without any protection, not gloves either.
Fox News host Jesse Watters in his show on March 2rd states that Chinese people owe the world an apology, because that “they have these markets where they were eating raw bats and snakes”,and that Chinese people have no food thus they have to eat them. The consequence of xenophobia leads to the largest Chinese restaurant Jing Fong in New York City shut down. Jing Fong serves dim sum and has about 800 tables, closed on March 12th. Similarly, London’s Chinese restaurant BaoziInn closed its Little Newport Street branch in facing a dropdown of 40% in business, instead, it will undergo an innovation that was planned much later in the year, for the ones that are still open, all staffs wear masks despite their races.
On Feb 20th, a regular Tuesday afternoon, U.K. reported its COVID-19 number was 13 with 5 people stepping out of Diamond Princess cruise, the tension between human being and coronavirus seemed alleviated,I went in the Monga shop to have my favourite fried chicken, the line had reformed again. I see the screen showing my pick-up number: 81.
I asked one of the staffs only shortly due to too many fried chicken orders: “how many non-Asian people visit here?”.
“Same as many bubble tea places, like Coco, some”. He quickly replied without a second to look at me.
“How many non-Asian people visit here?” I brought up the same question to the Tianfu market guy who seemed to remember me.
“Some.” he quickly answered while organising zing all instant ramen boxes on the floor.
“What do you think the main reason for losing customers these days?”
“Simple. People don’t come anymore. Chinese or white, don’t come.”
However, for most of the restaurants before Coronavirus outbreak in Europe, most of other styles of restaurants: Italian, Fish & Chips, Midditerrinan have not closed due to coronavirus pre-outbreak. On March 3, Circolo Poplare, the popular Italian restaurant still had a long queue of customers who wanted to try but could not get a table within 30 minutes.
C-virus phenomenon is rarely reported by major media during the entire period of global outbreak. It started with violence to Chinese people on the street. It all began with 2 Chinese girls being called “china virus” on the street of Berlin and sent into the hospital due to injury after the fight on January 31st. Not long after all Asian people become targets.
On February 9th, Pawat Silawattakun, a Thai city worker in London got attacked on Fulham road by two teenagers and was left with broken noses. They called him coronavirus from afar and approached then robbed him and attacked him. The case was known the very first coronavirus-related hate crime to Asian community in London, but many more go unreported. Couple days after on March 3, on Oxford street, a Singaporean student studying in UCL was attacked and beaten, left him with swollen eye bruises, because, according to himself, he wore a mask; A BBC (British Born Chinese) girl and her non-Asian friend were assaulted in a restaurant in Kent, left her friend with bruised ribs and trauma……Most of the times, people just ignore the mild bully and comfort themselves that it is occasional and at least non-violent.
On March 10th, as I stepped into Chinatown, it was like the end of the world had come to Chinatown. Monga had seemingly closed and throughout the entire time, I was the only customer there, Tianfu market looked as if no one had ever been there and Xingyun hair salon was a deserted beauty school. It all looked like a deserted 80’s Chinese city in in our new strange world. Chinatown at its core looks like 80’s China yes, but with massive international visitors to make it always excited its 80’s outdated vibe is usually neglected. This time, it is as if Chinatown has fallen back to the desolation of the 80s.This time, I did not talk to any of them and when I walked in every shop, they smiled and nodded at me inside the masks from as far away as they can.
“How’s business lately?” I asked the same staff at Tianfu market, he looked at me and shook his head, squeezing out a reluctant smile.
When China has learnt harshly from the virus crisis, European countries seem to be relaxed as it is physically far and a third-world-only tragedy: Heathrow and Gatwick do not do any simple health examinations upon custom borders, and the UK has reluctant reaction to everything that has been happening in Italy, Spain and France. Donald Trump has been calling “Chinese virus” for political reasons and his actions are impacting globally, and then racism will always be there.
Even though the major media rarely reports hate crime towards Asian community during coronavirus fear, Chinese Weibo has seen many more hate crimes all over the world towards Chinese people. On March 18th, a post with video went viral on Weibo of some high schoolers following and yelling to 4 Chinese students with masks with “China virus”; “go back to China”, nearby Vincent in Southampton, and this is not posted in English media.
Chinese food is usually stereotyped for its heavy grease, dodge cooking environment and the rumour of bats cuisine. London’s first Chinese restaurant opened in 1907 and after Second World War, Hong Kong people brought Cantonese restaurantS to the U.K., numbers of new Chinese immigrants chose to open cheap restaurants to make a living regardless of their limited cooking skills, which explains low-qualified food that are based around local tastes for sake of direct money. The amid long-lasting suspicious habits of dog eating and “Chinese eat everything” has further reinforced the food racism, too. THe subconsciousness might have affected how people react to C-virus related racism. Under the massive business downfall during Covid-19, Chinese restaurants are at the first to suffer, days before there was a real pandemic. British Chinese people working in the restaurant industry are facing more cruel financial crisis due to the prejudices, and many of them are living outside the mainstream British society: Language barriers and immigration issues. For them, it is harder to appeal their needs and find solidarity with people outside Asian community. Immigrants and minority groups are the vulnerable, especially those who work for minimum wage.
C-virus does not only exist in the U.K. In the U.S., restaurants are also hit by drastic bankruptcy, and hate crime has sickened Asian people. In New York City where coronavirus infected the most, many Asian people fear to wear masks or simply show up on the street.
Yinxing Zhang, a Chinese worker from China shared her experience to me recently on the airplane we took back home. She was once almost spat on by a non-Asian man on Upper West Side, while she was walking to Columbia University, it was the beginning of March, and she then decided to forget and move on, but the traumatic experience has lingered since. Yinxing avoided the road and started doing White people make-ups. She joked: “I painted my eyes and highlight my eyebrow and my nose so people wouldn’t know I have an Asian face behind the mask”, “Thanks to my excellent make-up skills”. On WeChat, many racist incidents happen every day being shared with friends and family. Chinese actress Hu Jing who married to a Malaysian and settled down in Malaysia posted on Weibo that : “this is the 3rd day of Malaysia’s lockdown, and the 30th day of self isolation. Hope everyone can stay indoors to help fight this pandemic. Now I feel how difficult and great China has gone through. China is seeing its dawn…… cherish, cherish, cherish, take care everyone. ” Malaysia Sin Chew Daily’s official facebook account reposted it, and received many hate comments: “China is great, especially Wuhan virus!”; “Now the world all feels Communist’s greatness”; “go back to China, Wuhan virus”……
Thousands of Chinese students in the U.K. have decided to flee back home during this crisis. On one hand, they have lost the trust to the U.K.’s method of handling the crisis and on the other hand, many people have expressed their concerns about being unsupported here due to racism. “I feel unsafe”, a Cambridge student Kry complained to me, “Cambridge warned us to continue coming to classes otherwise we should take full responsibilities for our own action’, but only one week later they asked us to move out of school dorms immediately and leave”, “I am hugely disappointed by my school”, Kry had to get her March 29th ticket refund and bought a much more expensive yet recent one, she packed all her stuff in one night and left with stress. Her WeChat was full of Cambridge students who were dissatisfied and stressful.
“I also wanna protect myself via masks but many racist incidents stop me, and it puts me in danger. I am not supported here, I cannot guarantee my own safety the way that I think works” Kry also expressed the concern that many Chinese people have. “I am disappointed about this country, I mean, I have a decent life in China, and studying abroad in countries like U.K., U.S., would not be an option for me anymore”, Kry had experienced huge distrust, “at least my school in the U.S. has done a much better job in protecting students, not chasing students away, I am so disappointed by Cambridge”.
The C-virus phenomenon has caused thousands of Chinese students flying back to China and the flight tickets have gone up to unreasonable prices, with many flights being cancelled, Chinese students both pay higher prices and have to choose third country connecting flights. “If U.K. wasn’t that ridiculous, I would not flee back home with an unreasonable price and leave my academic life behind”.
A video went viral on Weibo on March 23rd. The video is a made by a Chinese girl who came a long way from London to Shanghai via Singapore, in the video, she cried when she spoke her experience and landed safely, “I felt so safe in my country when I landed at 1 am and saw the staff who were there napping but instantly waking up to the noise I made. I cried, they were all in heavy protection suits, a janitor was disinfecting the area every hour, and everyone was working so hard”, she added, “you know it is the comparison I think, because when I left from Heathrow, they did nothing in protecting our safety and themselves’, and people at Heathrow did not protect themselves at all but wash hands…… How can Chinese staff be so warm and efficient? I can’t, I am proud of being Chinese and my people, they are great ”. Even though many netizens think she was being too patriotic, more think her video as a solid representation of what most Chinese students think.
After being called China virus in London, I gave up wearing masks to protect myself to live in constant fear of getting coronavirus, I feel sick all day with a sore throat, sleep badly, I have constant fear of getting it because I cannot wear a mask and people speak directly to my face. One day in the elevator a lady told me almost to my face that my mask doesn’t work, she showed off her gloves, “only this really works”. Till that point, I already could not tell if she was being nice or being mocking, but I then filled with the fear of her saliva all over me, I am so constantly distressed in London.
Many of Chinese migrant workers find it hard to promise their financial situations and even human rights due to isolation. In July 2018, the raid happened: the immigrant office workers going into Chinatown in Vans without warrants to check on workers. It caused anger, protests and fear amid Chintown’s workers. Chinatown is always suspicious for its immigrant workers issue, and this is the point where these workers are facing the risk of catching the virus and ending up in financial crisis, because the U.K. would not be able to protect workers with questionable immigration status from getting abused during their time-offs. “China virus” eventually targets Chinese people the most, from every aspect.
Whether it is “China virus” by the guy passed by me, or “Chinese virus” by Donald trump or “Communist virus” by Falun Gong, these C-virus names have caused the disbelief among Chinese students studying in London. “I cannot believe so many people, even major medias make racist jokes on coronavirus and target the entire Chinese population when people in Wuhan are suffering, it is inhumane. Chinese people have gone through a lot. they die, every single Chinese was put into isolation for 2 months, they has the most strict pandemic control on customs, they haven’t cancelled all the flights and every passport holder in the world is eligible to enter China, not like Canada, U.S., Australia etc., Australia closed border to Chinese students, now these countries closed their own borders to prevent foreigners flooding in. China sacrifice its economics and everything else to stop it. Most importantly, innocent Wuhan people are dying, It had been a living hell, and people are making fun of C-virus and hate crimes are everywhere outside China.I have seen no global solidarity, no support but mockeries and hatred. It is a huge disbelief to me. It is 2020, and I feel like savage racism has never changed, it just exists in different styles”, said Kry.