Refused Entry to My Gym Because I am an American
I finish my run, gasping for air but elated with the time — 17:30 for 5.4k of intervals, 40 seconds faster than last time. Not amazing, but…progress.
Walking home, I savor the burning in my lungs, that heavenly feeling of being both dead tired and high on life, feet aching and legs shaking but totally at peace with the world.
Swinging by my gym, I make my daily check — it’s been about ten weeks since I’ve stepped foot in there, but there are reports of other gyms opening, so I am checking as often as possible-I’m a personal trainer and well…I miss the gym.
I still have dreams about it.
Here in China coronavirus has, for the most part, been banished from the land.
I walk up to the security guard — my gym is inside of a community and requires the gate to be opened to access it.
I ask him, for what seems like the zillionth and twenty first time:
“健身房开了吗？“ （Is the gym open?)
I expect the answer that I’ve gotten for weeks (还没开, it’s not open yet) but this time, it’s different. He asks me a question:
“你是哪个国家？“ （What country are you from?)
I tell him I’m American, but have been in China for more than two months. He makes a phone call. I hear:
“这里有美国人，他可以进入健身房了吗？” (There’s an American here, can he enter the gym？）
There’s a response on the other end, the guard grunts, turns to me and says simply and abruptly:
“健身房不开” (The gym is closed) then turns away and ignores me.
And that’s it. Nothing else. No logic. No emotion. No thought. No apologies.
Just some good, old-fashioned, in-your-face xenophobia, served up cold and uncaring with a side of red tape.
Two months ago, Asian citizens of the world, Chinese nationals and the Chinese government itself denounced xenophobia in the West.
The irony is not lost on me.
It may, however, be lost on them.
