Day 28 of Shanghai Lockdown
How am I doing? It varies from hour to hour. At 11am, I got permission to leave my compound to walk the 3 blocks to my boyfriend’s...
About The Blog
Scribblings from Shanghai. You can find more of my writing on Medium.
Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash
- Apr 23
Day 23 of Shanghai Lockdown— The Relay
I spent my Friday night in lockdown reposting the same video over and over again. For a video that dominated my WeChat Moments feed for...
- Apr 14
Day 15 of Shanghai Lockdown
The rain in the last couple of days helped. Its not as inviting as the sunny bright blue skies that’s taunting me right now. The water...
- Apr 11
Day 12 of Shanghai Lockdown
Infographic by SmartShanghai So my freedom was short-lived. Turns out many communities have taken it upon themselves to "control" the...
- Apr 2
COVID Cat Lady Day 785, Day 3 of Shanghai Puxi Lockdown
The hardest parts about isolation? Not being able to explain to my friend's dog Mocha (covid foster, my friend is in hotel quarantine)...
- Mar 22
#COVIDCatLady, Day 774 (?)
For the first time since the pandemic started, someone I personally know tested positive for COVID in Shanghai. That gives you an idea of...
- Mar 17
#COVIDCatLady, Day 769
Our whole compound tested negative and lockdown was *gently* lifted as scheduled at 6 p.m. today. I say gently because we were still...
- Mar 17
#COVIDCatLady, Day 768
OK, here we go again. There are a few hundred cases in Shanghai and the city is on lockdown lite. Or as I like to call it, rolling...
- Jun 5, 2021
#COVIDCatLady, Day 515—Mobility and Identity
515. This is how many days it’s been since I’ve been home. What used to be a 5-hour door-to-door commute from Shanghai to Taipei is now a...
- Jan 25, 2021
#COVIDCatLady, One Year On
A year ago, on January 23rd, I landed in Taipei, home for Chinese New Year, to find that the city of Wuhan in China had been "locked...
- Feb 21, 2020
#COVIDCatLady, Day 15
I met a pet mini pig today. Her name was either Tofu or Belly, both work. Jing’an district, where I live, has been particularly strict...
- Feb 21, 2020
Day 14 of Self Quarantine
Spent most of the morning traumatizing one of my cats, trying to feed her her medication. Cats really cannot be forced into doing...
- Feb 20, 2020
Day 13 of Self Quarantine
Every time I walk out of my apartment complex, there are more posters. Notices and registration forms and pamphlets. This time I walked...
- Feb 19, 2020
Day 12 of Self Quarantine
I’m trying to remember what life was like after the earthquake that hit Taiwan in 1999. It was a massive quake and killed over 2,000...
- Feb 18, 2020
Day 11 of Self Quarantine
Yesterday an old friend half way across the world sent me a headline: Woman refused to evacuate without her cat. He asked, “is this...
- Feb 17, 2020
Day 10 of Self Quarantine
Self quarantine day 10: 4:00, wallow in self-pity; 4:30, stare into the abyss; 5:00, solve world hunger, tell no one; 5:30, jazzercize;...
- Feb 16, 2020
Day 9 of Self Quarantine
It snowed last night in Shanghai. No, you can’t tell in the photos because it’s mostly just leaves (very nice ones) with a teeny tiny...
- Feb 15, 2020
Day 8 of Self Quarantine
Cats really do make staying at home a lot less boring. Case in point, this morning I dropped my coin box. It took me until age 33.89 to...
- Feb 14, 2020
Valentine's Day/Day 7 of Self Quarantine
I don’t usually celebrate Valentine’s Day, but since this year (by default) I am my own date (not my cats. I’m not that level of crazy...
- Feb 12, 2020
Day 6 of Self Quarantine
Saw a squirrel 🐿 My first in Shanghai. I kid you not. If I wasn’t on my scooter with 10 second left at the stop light I would have taken...
- Feb 12, 2020
Day 5 of Self Quarantine
Uneventful day, aside from my neighbor’s laundry debacle (see earlier post). The day started out gray, though the trees outside my window...
- Feb 11, 2020
Day 4 of Self Quarantine
Just dropped my phone into a bowl of popcorn. Starting to think this little diary is a very helpful routine to keep me from becoming...
- Feb 10, 2020
Day 3 of Self Quarantine
First day “back to work” for most of Shanghai, so I spent it working from home and counting my blessings. I know might I seem calm about...
- Feb 9, 2020
Day 2 of Self "Quarantine"
I went out. Hence the quotation marks around the word “quarantine.” Folks have asked me how the quarantine is enforced. I’m allowed to go...
- Feb 6, 2020
Day 1 of Self Quarantine
My company required that everyone returning to Shanghai must stay home for 14 days before returning to work. I've decided to keep a daily...
- Nov 1, 2017
Digital Life Behind the Great Firewall
Photo by Jonas Leupe on Unsplash Friends visiting me in Shanghai have often asked me: How do you live without [insert one of many apps...
- Oct 10, 2017
On Rejection
A Facebook friend of mine recently posted cheerfully about his work being rejected. There’s a parallel to be drawn here between modeling...
- Dec 2, 2016
Lingerie and Dragon
When I saw the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show posts starting to pop up in my WeChat moments feed, I knew exactly what to expect from the...
- Jan 28, 2016
Working Across Timezones
Conference calls are awkward. I work in Shanghai as part of a dispersed corporate publications team. All of my colleagues are situated in...
- Dec 25, 2015
What AQI 300 feels like
You don’t come to Shanghai to coast. Most take on modu (魔都), or Monster City in Chinese, because it is an adventure. The challenges...
- Sep 18, 2015
The Realities of Modeling
They told me not to set the fur on fire. #DontTellMeHowToLiveMyLife Confession — I did modeling in my early 20’s. It started when a...