Quarantine in Shanghai – Day 3

I have landed in Shanghai for three days already, and with a little help from my friends, life in quarantine was getting slightly better.

• 

• 

• 

Remember I said there were only a couple of paper cups in the room, and the only thing I got was my flask. Finally the package from my friend in Shanghai arrived – with mugs and covers, bed sheets and pillow covers, and herbal tea to keep my yin and yang balanced.

These bed sheets were not so popular before the pandemic, and since they have sold millions of due to the reopening of domestic travels in China.

Cleanliness during quarantine is advised, according to the handout from the health bureau. As there was no housekeeping service, one had to make sure everything remained sanitised and wiped down. I brought a travel pack of Dettol – if the hospitals trust them for area cleaning, I would too. Remember it is not Covid-19 that you would be worried about, you do not want to get other common ailments as it would reset the count for the quarantine, and you have to do it all over again.

It came in different sizes (this one was a Queen) and it fitted between the duvet and the mattress with a cover for the pillows. So it provided some form of protection against mites and dusts from the hotel amenities. Not sure how well they worked, but it would definitely be useful for the fact that there’s not housekeeping, and the duvet and bedsheets were only changed when they cleaned the room for the next guest.

Another thing that I tried to do diligently while in quarantine was to stay active. I tried to get the 10,000 steps done daily, and after a while, it could get really boring. Time to pick up yoga.

There’s really nothing much on the hotel TV channels – remember this is not an international hotel brand, and the usual international channels are not available. And because we are behind the “Great Firewall”, I had no access to Netflix or other streaming services. Advice: download as much series as you can for the 14 days. or else you will be working like crazy to kill time.