In a massive show of unity today Chinese businesses around the city, and reports suggest around the entire country, closed up shop today. Chinese leaders maintain the shutdown is not a protest but rather it is so they could mourn the death of Susan Yue, the 26-year-old mother and restaurant keeper who was killed on Sunday in Orange Walk. And while the Chinese community mourned the rest of the community suffered without its corner shops, fried chicken joints, and dry goods outlets. Keith Swift found out that the while closure was a curse for some, it was a blessing for other.
Keith Swift Reporting,
It is the lunch hour and on any other day Chinese restaurants like Li Chee would be teeming with Belizeans waiting to get that lunch time serving of fry chicken. Any other day but not today because Li Chee and other Chinese businesses are closed for mourning. And while they mourn, Belizeans are left with few alternatives to get their fast food and other groceries.
Man #1: Well the Chiney man close down right now and I am doing a lil work and I need something to bite.
KS: What are you going to do? It's 12 o'clock and you got $5 in your hands.
Man #1:Well I haffu try walk and find somewhere else to buy something to eat.
KS: You were looking forward to the chicken?
Man#1: Yes man.
School Girl #1: I come buy chicken and the shop close yea and so I just said I will get a little meal instead, doughnut, fast food.
KS: So doughnut will be your lunch?
School Girl #1: Yea I do it to study so its not nothing unusual.
KS: You wanted fry chicken?
School Girl #1: Not really. I don't really like fry chicken but I just wanted it today.
The mass city wide closure of chinese businesses had much the same effect across town where a local restaurant, Jenny's Fast Food, had one of its busiest lunch hours as students had to settle for great dogs instead of fry chicken.
School Girl #2: I just had to buy some great dog because no Chiney open to buy chicken.
KS: So what you normally eat for lunch?
School Girl #2: Chicken or I buy yah.
KS: And today, you wanted to eat?
School Girl #2: Chicken.
KS: And when you went to buy the chicken?
School Girl #2: Chiney shut down.
And the effect of the shutdown started way before mid-day when the city awoke to shutters pulled down on most Chinese run businesses including venerable establishments such Simon Quan, Gonzalo Quinto and William Quan.
With the exception of Augusto Quan on Albert Street, his was what greeted customers: shutters at the popular Brads Supermarket on Vernon Street. Further down Vernon Street more shutters. On Mahogany Street from Tow Tow Grocery to the shops you find on every corner were closed. Down Cemetery Road, there was the sigh of more shutters, which brought commerce, near its intersection with the Pound Yard Bridge, to a standstill. All around the city shops, big and small, were closed and customers were feeling the effect.
Man #2: This morning everybody was running around trying to find a store to buy cigarettes or thing and none of the places were opened so it affected the Belizean people a lot. It affected us real bad that they were closed down..
Woman #1: Every minute she has to run to shop to buy something which she needed which she didn't have in the house or refrigerator.
KS: You think your mom will make it through this day?
Woman #1: No. She usually buy pack bread so she'll have come all the way here to buy a pack bread.
Woman #2: If affects me because I have to walk very far right.
KS: How far?
Woman #2: Like way dah Sav-U or Extra House, way outta town.
Longer walks but there were few complaints.
Man #2: It is good that they do this because they are trying to make a point too by closing too. It is not only for mourning because basically they probably had enough of what's going on in Belize.
KS: You agree with the shutdown?
Man #2: Well I don't agree with that because the Belize people need them because a lot of people have to go grocery shopping and they need the store to be open; some of them should have stayed open. I think they need to have more Belizean businesses in Belize, they should have more Belizean owned businesses.
And that is perhaps the silver lining for some in today's shutdown - because while many Sino-Belizeans are spending their day leisurely strolling with the family their sales are going to those "Belizean" shops. The shops, which are often times dwarfed by the sheer volume and persistence of their Chinese competitors which are often quite literally next-door. Today it seems is their day.
All stores, restaurants and business are expected to be re-opened tomorrow.
