The 11 million-strong residents of Wuhan, source of the global coronavirus pandemic, want everyone to know it is now China’s party central and the Western world “should get used to it.”
The official Chinese Communist Party news outlet Global Times made the announcement Tuesday, exactly one year to the day after the World Health Organization acknowledged the city was the scene of a “pneumonia” outbreak with this anodyne statement:
The Global Times’ story detailed the parties now featuring in the town under the headline: ‘More gatherings, celebrations will be held in Wuhan; West should get used to it.’ The story began:
More big gatherings like the New Year celebrations, sports events and live concerts will be staged in Wuhan, which was the hardest-hit city in China by COVID-19, during 2021, and the world had better get used to it, Wuhan residents said, calling on some Westerners to save their fellow countrymen following Chinese experiences rather than attacking Wuhan’s gatherings with prejudice and hostility.
When large crowds of Wuhan residents took to streets and launched balloons to celebrate the arrival of 2021 on New Year’s Eve, in sharp contrast with what Western media called a ghost town like Times Square with roads closed but no live audience, some Westerners with jealous eyes were sarcastic about Wuhan.
The boasts of Wuhan come after Breitbart News reported last month of the dramatic recovery of a city that underwent a draconian 76-day lockdown as its hospitals struggled to deal with a tidal wave of coronavirus cases that required the rapid construction of field hospitals to handle the overflow.
Nightlife in Wuhan is now back in full swing almost seven months after the city lifted its stringent lockdown and the city’s partygoers are embracing the catharsis.
In scenes unimaginable in many cities around the world reeling under a resurgence of the pandemic, young Wuhan residents during a recent night out crowd-surfed, ate street food and packed the city’s nightclubs.
The Global Times report affirmed Wuhan life “had returned to normal months ago, and more gatherings like the New Year celebration would be held in the city. ”
For many Wuhan residents who emerged from the shadow of the epidemic last April, when the 76-day-lockdown was lifted, it’s quite normal to have such celebrations, Yang Zhanqiu, deputy director of the pathogen biology department at Wuhan University, told the Global Times.
As to the future, China is sneeringly telling the world to get used to the fact Wuhan is party central and any criticism of that is simply racial prejudice mixed with jealousy.
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