Member-only story
The Coronavirus causes hemorrhaging (of savings…)
I’m an expat. Living in Shenzhen, China. Well, my family was living there until the end of January, anyway. We are homeless at the moment and this is my coronavirus story from the front-lines, sort of.
The saga begins the second half of January 2020, while I’m still in North America on the tail end of my holiday trip back home, and dealing with some business matters in Mexico. People are talking about a possible new epidemic going on, and I start nervously joking around with my friends and business colleagues, that hey, maybe I don’t want to return to China after all. Except that my wife and kid are already back in Shenzhen waiting for me to return so we can enjoy the second half of their Chinese New Year school vacation. The virus outbreak is still not quite serious enough to make serious changes to our plans.
A week later in Los Angeles everyone is now talking about pandemics, and I’m glued to the news. I’ve taken a long layover on the way back from Mexico for a DJ gig on the night of Friday, January 24th. My return flight to China to meet up with my wife and kid is booked for Monday, January 27th. Things are looking bad enough that I really don’t want to get on that flight.
