- Gordon Dumoulin
Village life in huge Chinese metropolises
The voluntary or instructed quarantine or 'home stay' life by 100's of millions of people is creating huge changes in daily routines and logistics of daily supplies.
Mobile fresh shops and e-commerce pick-up centers popping up at residence compound entrances in Beijing. As people are either not allowed or prefer not to go out to supermarket for groceries due to the coronavirus, the e-commerce for groceries such as fruits, vegetables and other fresh foods is flourishing. This week I also saw a mobile fresh shop for fruits and vegetables popped up at our entrance.
In general the e-commerce delivery services are tremendously increasing and as the courier delivery people can usually not enter the residence compounds anymore, small collection centers are popping up as well at the entrances of residence centers where residents can collect their package.
The residence entrances are one of the few places where more people gather nowadays in Beijing and China. It feels like moving back to a kind of village life residence by residence complex independently.
We finally meet our neighbors at the depots and talk, and praise the guards and security for their hard work. It creates different kinds of bonding.