Lockdown Day 12: A Day Full of Deliveries!
23,000 cases.
Today was a day with delivery after delivery!
It started out very normally. I had some toast with cheddar cheese, cold coffee.
And a small slice of the tortilla.
I was expecting a delivery from my office today, and I asked the entryway leader through my WeChat group what the protocol was for picking up a delivery, since the delivery people can’t come into the community. She said to call the juweihui 居委会, or neighborhood committee first. I tried calling them all morning, but the line was always busy.
Finally, the driver called me to say that he was coming (he had gone to the entrance that was locked completely during this lockdown period. I sent a message to the entryway leader that the delivery had arrived, but I wasn’t able to get through to the juweihui all morning. So she said I could go myself to pick up the delivery, and to hurry back. When I went, I saw quite a few people outside, and the big gate open! No wonder the other day, I had heard the sound of a delivery person right next to my apartment calling out for a neighbor. My apartment is very much set in the middle of the community. I went outside to my balcony to observe. A person dressed in the blue disposable hospital gown asked the delivery person how he got in. He said the gate was wide open and no one was there!
Anyway, I was very happy to get this shipment from my office! There was a 5 kg bag of rice, some very fine bok choy, I think the kind that is called 鸡毛菜, or chicken feather vegetable. There was also a big bag of Chinese chives 韭菜, a big celery, a huge head of cabbage, six potatoes, and the part that excited me the most: 5 kg of oranges. Fruit!
This is my second 5 kg bag of rice, but interestingly the one from the neighborhood government (on the left) looked more like medium grain white rice, whereas the one from the office (on the right) looked like short grain white rice.
Speaking of groceries, I noticed that the store Baichuan 百川 which was collaborating with Xuhui district to facilitate grocery delivery to residents was showing the price of two whole chickens (with heads on!) was 110 RMB (about US$17). I also got two chickens last weekend, so they were actually quite valuable!
After this delivery excitement, I had lunch. I toasted some of my whole wheat bread…
… and topped the slices with tuna salad, made from Kirkland Signature tuna, red onion, celery, and Kewpie mayonnaise.
I also had some coleslaw, made of roasted cabbage, red onion, and carrot, topping some of the slices with coleslaw too.
In the afternoon, we had a PCR test. This one was unique in that each household got their own vial, rather than putting around 10 swabs in a single vial. I don’t know why there was this change. I like this picture of the hazmat-suited person (nicknamed 大白 in Chinese, or Baymax in English), organizing vials in the doorway of a house.
In the evening, my friend wrote to me asking if I wanted some apples. She sent a picture of a huge bag of apples! I told her I was just about to write to her asking if she wanted some oranges! So I went to her door and replaced a bag of apples hanging on her doorknob with a bag of oranges from my office shipment. I said I only wanted 1-2, and she gave me 4. And these look pretty good! Very large, blemish-free, and none of that wax coating.
At the same time, I was seeing some messages in the group buying group, which was saying that some of the groceries bought through that store that is collaborating with the district and neighborhood committees had arrived. I had bought a package of fruit on the second day this service was offered. I knew I was getting the 5 kg of oranges from my office, so I held off from ordering the first day. But on the second day I figured that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to have more fruit. And I liked that this was a much more “normal” shopping process where you pay on a mini-app to the supplier directly, as compared to the group buying process which is more like grass-roots organizing via WeChat groups, with tons of lists floating around, Excel files, and lots of deals that fall through. Since this was organized through the district and neighborhood committees (i.e. government), it would be more reliable.
I figured that my order wasn’t in this first batch of orders, because I ordered on the second day. But then I saw some messages saying that if you ordered earlier, your order still hadn’t arrived. A guy on a motorbike came to the door of my building, and called out for one of my neighbors to get a delivery. I asked him if he had my order. He said he didn’t, but pointed towards the gate. So I went to the gate, and a neighborhood committee person had a paper printout of a spreadsheet, with the names of everyone who had orders. It looked like she was writing the building and apartment numbers on each of the bags, and then sending them off with the guys on motorbikes. What a laborious process! The heading for each column, corresponding for what package of goods was purchased (vegetable pack, fruit pack, meat and fish pack, oil and seasonings pack, etc.) wasn’t even printed on each sheet of paper, so she had to count the columns and go back to page one to count the columns in the headings.
So surprisingly, she found my order! I found out later that inexplicably, if you ordered before 8pm on the first day of orders, your order was NOT there. But if you ordered after 8pm or on the second day like me, your order did arrive.
I was happy to receive my order, but don’t know why the people who ordered on the first day got nothing!
Anyway, this pack included a pineapple, cherry tomatoes (yes, they include that in fruit rather than vegetable pack!), 6 pears, 4 oranges, and 2 apples. While I’m not usually very enthusiastic about apples or pears, I figured it was still worth it to get more fruit of any kind before I ran out.
Some of the fruit was a bit bruised, like the apples, pears, and a couple cherry tomatoes. But I figure that’s because they were all in these plastic bags, jostled around during shipment, and left on the ground.
It was so exciting to get so many deliveries in one day!
And then there was one last delivery. A bulk box of 25 rapid antigen tests. I can see why - this way the entryway leader and volunteer don’t have to go door-to-door every time they needed to give us a rapid test. But 25?! It seems they’re really stocking us up, as if we’re going to be in lockdown for another month!
