BEIJING: Wei Lili, a woman who delivers milk to households with her husband in Beijing, hadn’t been back to her hometown in Shanxi Province for three years, owing to travel restrictions imposed to control the spread of COVID-19. This year, as China has optimized its pandemic control measures and lifted travel restrictions, she booked two train tickets to her hometown well in advance for a reunion with her children and other family members to celebrate the Chinese New Year, or Spring Festival, which fell on January 22.
Wei has two daughters: One is around 20 and the other is 5. When her younger daughter was only 6 months old, Wei came to Beijing with her husband to work and left her children in the care of her parents-in-law.
Before the pandemic, she had returned home every year for the Spring Festival. On Spring Festival Eve, she used to make dumplings while watching the annual Spring Festival Gala broadcast by China Central Television with her family.
“I have been longing to go home for a long time and am counting the days till our departure. My family members are also very happy knowing we are going home this year,” Wei told China Business Herald News Weekly in the days before she left Beijing.
“I want to share the housework with my parents-in-law and take my children to visit local scenic spots during the festival,” she said. Wei added she also wants to take a family portrait this year and bring it back to Beijing after the holiday.
Zhang Guibo, who works for an air compressor company in Taizhou, Zhejiang Province, also hadn’t returned to his hometown for the Spring Festival for three years for similar reasons. After the relaxation of these restrictions, travelers now no longer need negative nucleic acid test results to catch planes, trains and buses, and no longer need to go through test and quarantine on arrival at their destinations.
Owing to the easing of restrictions, Zhang decided to go back for a visit. He arrived at Taizhou West Railway Station before 6 a.m. on January 7, took a six-hour train to Jinan, capital of Shandong Province, and then a three-and-a-half-hour bus to his home in Linyi County of Dezhou in Shandong.
He took back with him Taizhou specialties including brown sugar and dried salted fish for his parents and told Dazhong Daily that he wants to make some dishes using the fish for his family during the festival. “I am really homesick after all the years of working away from home and I want to spend more time with my family during this year’s festival,” Zhang said.
–The Daily Mail-Beijing review news exchange item
