This year some writers from Room 11 participated in the IWA essay writing competition for years 5- 8.
The theme was 'You, me and the Media' and was based on the effects of mass media.
The students worked really hard to understand what the meaning of this was and what it meant to them personally.
All of our submissions were fantastic pieces of writing and I am proud to say that Kiera Ennion from Room 11 received a 'Commended' for her piece about her experiences of the difference in mass media during covid times in China and New Zealand.
Have a look at the website to read the winning submissions when they are posted, and here is Kiera's writing.
Living in China when Covid started and how mass
media was used to inform us
I had just moved back to China in January 2020, when Covid hit.
China identified it’s first cases of Covid on 31 December 2019 in
Wuhan city, but they didn’t name it 2019-nCov until 7 January 2020.
Most people didn’t hear about it until mid-end of January. Once
my family and I heard about it, we weren’t too worried at first,
because we thought it wasn’t that contagious. That is, until late
January when we started getting messages every day from
the government. They used mass media to share propaganda
messages on TV, phones, social media, and even on signs
and banners everywhere you went. The government sent messages like:
"Those who gather together are shameless; those who
play mahjong are daredevils."
"Have a bite of a wild animal dish today, see you in hell
tomorrow."
"Returning to your hometown with the virus means
you're unfilial; passing the virus to parents means
you're utterly devoid of conscience."
These messages might sound strange, but I think they
worked because there was hardly anyone outside, which
felt very eerie. Especially because there were 8 million people
living in the city that we were in, which is way more than the
population of New Zealand!
We had 1000 neighbours living around our courtyard in
apartment buildings that were about 18 stories high. Usually
the courtyard was full of children playing, skipping with ropes,
biking and scootering. There were also lots of older people
who would exercise in the courtyard. It wouldn’t be how
we exercise in New Zealand, but more Chinese type exercise,
which is like slapping any part of your body while walking, or
doing dancing or martial arts. But after the outbreak of Covid,
the most you would see in the courtyard would be around 5 people.
It was a little sad that we couldn’t play with our friends.
Day by day, things changed. Food was harder to get and fresh
markets were closed. We had to wear masks for a long time which
I felt very frustrated wearing, because your face gets sweaty and
since I have asthma, it is hard to breathe in the mask. It was really
hard to find masks, because everyone tried to buy them and it also
did not help that there were more than 1.398 billion people living
in China.
All the gates out of our apartment complex were closed, except for one,
and we couldn’t get out of our complex unless we had our temperature
checked. My parents got too scared to let me go out the gate with them,
which I found out afterwards, was very responsible, because if I had a
fever, a van would take me straight away to isolate in a hospital,
with no parents! And since I haven’t learnt that many words in
Mandarin Chinese, they might have given me food that has dairy in
it, which I am allergic to! I think that I am very lucky to have responsible
parents.
There were some elements of life in China with Covid that I found pretty
weird and funny, like when there was Glad Wrap covering the numbers
in the elevator. I don’t know how that was going to stop Covid spreading,
but I think that whoever put the Glad Wrap on the elevator was very
scared and anxious after hearing the propaganda messages. Though
I would like to know who ever put the Glad Wrap on, what their
opinion was, and how they thought it could stop Covid from spreading.
In complete contrast, I experienced lock down in New Zealand as well.
I went out for walks, did some biking, played outside - but not on the
playground, and listened to the 1pm news when Jacinda Ardern said
things like “we can do this together” or “be strong and be kind”
which was completely different to what was said in China, and I felt
much safer in New Zealand than in China. But I did miss China alot.
I have experienced Covid 19 and how mass media is used by
governments in two very different countries. Both governments used
it to stop the spread, China’s government used it to make us too
scared to go out, and New Zealand’s government used it to make
us work as a team. Some Chinese have now stopped trusting
their government because the message has got confused.
In conclusion, mass media can be used in scary ways or more
gentle ways, but imagine if we didn’t have mass-media. Would many
more people have died, because they didn’t know about Covid and how to
stop it spreading?
References:
Population of China (2019) -
https://datacommons.org/place/country/CHN?utm_medium=explore&
Wow Kiera, simply no words but WOW for this amazing piece of essay writing!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteRiley
Amazing Writing piece Kiera. I was so interested when reading that.
ReplyDelete