Durban graduate in China has no plans to come home, despite Coronavirus crisis

WHILE South Africans are being repatriated out of China, a former Durban resident says she has no plans on returning home.

“What freaks me out the most is dying poor. That’s what really scares me,” said Lizeka Maduna, an English teacher based in the city of Tianshui, the second largest town in the province of Gansu.

“I am sitting in SA, I know I don’t have a job and chances of me finding that job are minimal so I had to come back to China. In China I have a pay cheque waiting for me, I am here to make money and live my dreams.

According to Reuters, Gansu had the least reported Coronavirus cases in China and was the province to lower its emergency response levels from I to III.

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Maduna was well aware that there had been only two reported deaths in Gansu when she made the decision on 29 February to return to China.

“During the flight it was really scary. The flight was empty and you could tell not many people were flying out. You just had to be really strong,” said Maduna.

“When I landed in Shenzhen everyone looked really frightened, everyone had a mask on. You could tell it was very serious business.”

After a rigorous process of screening and questioning, Maduna was sent to a quarantine site where she spent 14 days in total isolation.

What does a quarantine site look like in China; it’s a 3-star hotel room, three meals a day, room service on call and two daily thermometer tests which you text your results on WeChat to the authorities.

“I thought it would depress me, not being able to go out but I have actually enjoyed it. I’m usually on Twitter laughing at all the jokes South Africans make about the virus,” she said.

Back home, Maduna graduated from Durban University of Technology in 2016 with a degree in Journalism and worked a couple of years for an online news company based in Johannesburg.

Frustrated with the lack of opportunities and little money, in 2019 Maduna began the process of applying to become an English teacher in China.

She’s employed by a training institution that teaches young children English after school, meaning that Maduna works three days a week, Friday to Sunday.

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The extra time between the week allows her to focus on her Masters research, which she enrolled in this year.

“I had a bit of a culture shock,” said Maduna of her first time in China.

“I was like where am , who are these people, what are they eating and what kind of culture is this. The language, it just kills you, you can’t even ask for the simplest thing.”

Monday marked the end of Maduna’s quarantine and she is cleared to resume her teaching duties this Friday.

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