Post-00s international students talk about infecting Opmi kerong

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After being infected with the new crown pneumonia virus variant Aomi Kerong, Yang Chen's sense of smell and taste was like being wrapped in a layer of plastic wrap, swallowing a few mouthfuls of "old dry mother", and did not have any feeling, "taste the same as chewing wax".

He asked his girlfriend's mother, a nurse at a hospital in Porto, Portugal. Instead of offering medication and medical advice, she bought him a whole roast chicken and asked him to eat more rice, saying "it's good for you to eat this."

The 21-year-old Chinese student born in Xi'an began his solo journey to face Omikejon in a foreign country.

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After a year of online classes at a language school in his hometown of Xi'an, Yang Chen flew directly from Beijing to Spain in April 2021 to continue the course.

Before leaving, he received two shots of the vaccine, did a nucleic acid test, and got a "negative certificate." At that time, there were about 4,000 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Spain every day. After Yang Chen landed, he did not meet the staff wearing white protective clothing, nor did anyone check his certificate and vaccination records. The only episode was that he brought two packs of Chinese pills, which the police thought were drugs.

The latest outbreak in Europe was after Christmas, and the media used the term "epidemic tsunami" to describe the spread of the Olmikron strain on the European continent. Yang Chen remembers that "the number of confirmed cases of new crown pneumonia in Europe exceeded 100 million" once became a hot topic in the news, which accounted for almost one-seventh of the total population of Europe.

On Christmas Eve, Yang Chen's eyes were itchy, there was no red blood, and there were no tears. The next day, his throat began to hurt, "much like the feeling of eating too many peppers, and the spit in his throat hurts." ”

At that time, Spain began to suffer a sixth wave of the epidemic. Countries with a total population of 47 million have confirmed more than 5.7 million cases of COVID-19. On December 29, 2021, there were more than 100,000 new confirmed cases, and 31 players in La Liga, familiar to Chinese fans, were found positive on December 28. By 15 January, the cumulative number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country exceeded 8 million.

After New Year's Day, Yang Chen received a notice from the local government that masks must be worn outdoors. "The spread of Omikejon is so terrible, with hundreds of thousands (new cases) every day."

At that time, Yang Chen was a guest at his girlfriend's house. His girlfriend, a native of Porto, Portugal, studied at a university in Macau and was curious about Chinese culture and cuisine, often asking Yang Chen to take her to Chinese restaurants for fried noodles.

The girlfriend's hometown of Portugal is also attacked by The O'Mikhalon. As of January 3, local time, among the new cases of new coronavirus infection in Portugal, the proportion of infection cases of the Omiljung strain has reached 89.6%. By 17 January, the cumulative number of new cases had exceeded 1.88 million, the death toll was close to 20,000, and portugal, Spain and the United States were listed by Germany as high-risk areas for the epidemic.

At first, Yang Chen felt that he was "on fire". When he encountered this situation when he was a child, his grandmother often gave him a handful of "yellow beans", and after pulling his stomach, the symptoms were mild.

He did not find the "yellow beanie" in Portugal, nor could he describe to his Portuguese friends what it was to be "on fire". At dinner, he began to have a fever and a sore throat that he could not eat.

After getting the advice of his girlfriend's mother, who is a nurse, Yang Chen endured the pain of eating a bowl of rice and a few bites of roast chicken.

On the evening of December 26, 2021, Yang Chen's symptoms were the strongest. When he slept, he coughed and sneezed, his throat ached when he coughed, twitched half of his chest cavity, with a heavy hum, "thief's deep cough, cough all night", and coughed up blood twice, like a seriously ill old man.

A high fever followed. That night, he felt the bone-chilling cold at his hotel in Porto, "never felt that cold, indescribable", wrapped tightly around a quilt, turned the heater to the maximum, and sweated wildly, carrying it all night.

After dawn, he found a self-test kit for the new crown pneumonia virus from his girlfriend's home, 5 euros (about 35 yuan), similar to the domestic "nasal swab" nucleic acid test, he "took a stick to poke the nostrils", and then put it into the test tube, dropped the liquid in the test tube onto the test paper, and after about half an hour, the test paper showed two bars - "positive". He was sure he was infected with the new crown virus.

Yang Chen said that he did not know why there was a sudden "relieved" mentality at that time - after two or three years of epidemics, he personally encountered it.

In the past, whenever European students who were chatting together saw Yang Chen's East Asian face coming, someone would always turn their heads to the other side or take out a mask and put it on.

"I look stronger and less good-looking." Yang Chen is 1.75 meters tall, the muscles on his body are clear, and he began to practice boxing in junior high school, and the main direction is "unlimited fighting". "If you change to someone who looks weaker, or a girl, someone will jump out and order you to wear a mask, or even say something insulting, even if you don't need to wear a mask outdoors."

He has some international student friends who are also infected with the virus, recording symptoms in the circle of friends, "should come or come": "The first day to eat what to vomit, spit bile, a day and a half of sustained low-grade fever, muscle soreness, standing unsteadily; the next day diarrhea, endless cough, vocal cords temporarily unable to speak normally; the third day to the hospital test, the original 10 minutes out of the results of the reagent directly out of the second two bars, now it looks ... It was carried by immunity. ”

For Yang Chen, the most terrifying symptom of the virus is the "nose water". Colorless and odorless water flows out of the nose and, unlike snot, is "not sticky at all."

"I panicked." Yang Chen said that a young man suddenly felt that "his health is not good" - "I think something in my head has melted and flowed out of my nose." ”

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Yang Chen returned from Portugal to Almeria, a city in southern Spain, where he lived. There is no domestic health code, itinerary code, and he did not meet anyone at the airport to check the temperature and vaccine passport - after vaccination, the government department sent a text message link, clicked in to register to generate a two-dimensional code that is, the vaccine passport. Yang Chen put on a mask, took the plane as usual, and returned to the rental place to self-isolate.

"Oh my God, my mom went to work with a high fever." The day after Yang Chen left, her girlfriend sent a message saying that both she and her mother had begun to have a fever. Her mother also went to the hospital to work that day, but was later admitted to the hospital for breathing difficulties, and was tested to be infected with Omicron. Yang Chen did not know whether the virus was transmitted to his girlfriend's family or to his girlfriend's family.

He had not received an epidemiological investigation call from a public health agency. Whether in Portugal or Spain, he doesn't know which government department or agency to report the coronavirus to.

According to Spanish media reports, on December 29, 2021 local time, the Spanish Public Health Commission agreed to reduce the isolation period of new crown pneumonia virus infection cases from 10 days to 7 days, and close contacts who have completed vaccination do not need to be isolated.

In fact, isolation is all about self-awareness. Yang Chen sometimes wears a mask to go out shopping and eating. "I didn't want to go out and harm other people." Yang Chen said, "But I am alone in a foreign country, and if I don't go out, I can't buy anything, which is a dilemma." ”

After the fever subsided, Yang Chen's body temperature returned to normal, but he still coughed, sneezed, and his throat hurt. When he drank water, he felt strange in his mouth. "Although the water does not have an obvious taste, one can feel that it is water." That day it was like drinking only "warm liquid".

When Yang Chen was cooking, he put a lot of salt and spices in the eggs and meat, ran to the Chinese supermarket and bought a bottle of Lao Gan Ma for 3.25 euros (about 22 yuan), and there was still no taste in his mouth. "Too desperate". Yang Chen fantasized about shabu-shabu, which was the motherland food he missed most abroad.

He searched the Internet for ways to restore his sense of taste and smell, and poured freshly squeezed orange juice into his stomach in large cups, but it was no different from drinking water.

On 5 January, he tested himself for nucleic acid several times and turned negative. Three days later, when he drank a mouthful of freshly squeezed orange juice, he felt a few drops of orange juice seem to penetrate the "plastic wrap", and he suddenly had a taste in his mouth - his sense of taste and smell suddenly returned.

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Yang Chen felt completely recovered. On January 6, he drove more than 1,200 kilometers on a motorcycle from Spain to Portugal. Fearing an inspection because he was going to cross the border, he went to the testing agency and got a negative nucleic acid test certificate before leaving – only to arrive at the Spanish-Portuguese border and find that the checkpoint was empty.

He saw the news that the Spanish leader had made a proposal to the EU on January 12 urging its EU counterparts to debate the "possibility of treating the coronavirus like the flu", a move that would lift the lockdown and the daily count of infections.

"If this is placed in China, it may not be imaginable." Yang Chen said. In the video he filmed of local young people gathering, people wearing masks were barely visible.

A French friend of Yang Chen's "vowed not to be vaccinated" quit his job as a chef and drove 10 hours from Paris to totoulouse, hiding in the mountains and forests more than 100 kilometers away, and making a living by trading bitcoin.

In September last year, Yang Chen rode a motorcycle to visit him in the mountains. There was electricity there, the mobile phone network was intermittent, and "I had to pinch the words when I sent messages to people."

"It's really an exaggeration, we both eat, exercise, sleep all day, and we can't see anyone else." Yang Chen stayed for a week, wearing only a pair of underwear to ride a motorcycle on the mountain road. And the French friend is still living alone in the mountains.

"I don't really understand these people's minds." Yang Chen said, "If he thinks that the vaccine may hurt the body, but they usually drink and smoke, they are not the kind of people who particularly care about the body." ”

Yang Chen hopes that the epidemic in Europe will end as soon as possible, so that his friends can return to the city to work and live. He also hopes that the epidemic in his hometown of Xi'an will ease as soon as possible, all his relatives are there, and he plans to return with his Portuguese girlfriend in the summer.

Recently, Yang Chen heard that there was another "IHU" in France, a new type of new coronavirus mutation strain, and his confidence was lost for the most part.

(At the request of the interviewee, Yang Chen is a pseudonym)

China Youth Daily and China Youth Network reporter Geng Xueqing

Source: China Youth Daily client