Huang Shaofang, a sophomore at Northern Jiaotong University, is among 400 students quarantined last week in a dorm building as part of the SARS battle. Here is his account of his first day in quarantine.
After we got the news about being quarantined last Thursday evening, my classmates and I understood that another type of campus life awaited us.
The next day, April 25, we were to be confined to the building: No shopping, no eating out, nothing. So far, life has been fine.
I got up at 7:30am. The first thing was to ventilate, clean and disinfect the room.
Breakfast was sent to the door. After breakfast, I was given the task of going round the dorm rooms to take the temperatures of the others and to make a "no fever found" report.
That took about an hour.
That was followed by a boring period. Internet access was denied and I had to look for something to do. I borrowed a history book from a friend, turned the music on, and began reading.
By 11:30am, I was busy again. We hung a banner across the dorm, reading "Unite to win the battle with SARS!".
We need slogans to keep our morale up during this trying time.
Lunch arrived at midday. The food was good, several tasty dishes and a fresh banana. Compared with the dull morning routing, life looked better in the afternoon.
Some thoughtful teachers brought us shuttlecock, jump-ropes and DVDs to help us kill time.
In fact, the quarantine does not seem much different from normal life, and is actually more comfortable to some extent.
But, some still haven't adapted to this life.
The biggest problem is not knowing what is going on outside. I hope our Internet access resumes so we can contact friends and know what is happening elsewhere