If you could predict when such a draconian lockdown would happen, you would certainly made a plan to escape early.  While now it's way beyond too late for that, there were enough warning signs.

In fact, as early as the end of 2021 it became clear the Omicron was spreading rapidly around the world and there was no way that any country could contain it, China included.  I'll never forget watching a video where someone interviewed random people on the streets of Shanghai and asking them about what they'd do if Omicron hit the mainland.  Some people said, "I haven't thought that far ahead" which was completely telling.  Others said, "If there is a lockdown then I would support the government 100%"

Well maybe it's time for all us to start looking and planning further ahead.  That video was made in November of 2021.  The Shanghai lockdown was a mere few *months* later!

I wrote in a subsequent journal entry that people here remain in a perpetual state of spinning around because they don't plan ahead or think far enough into the future.  It's not all their fault though, the authoritarian governments design life like this on purpose.  100% by design.

One scary takeaway from all of this is that there will certainly be future lockdowns.  If the government got away with it now and people chose to forget, then there's no reason why they wouldn't do it again.  It might be even worse next time.   This experience is really a good reflection to leave China well before and that happens.

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Even so, during the Shanghai 2022 lockdown, if you were paying attention, you still could have escaped in time.  My friend Jenny did exactly this.  She made the very best moves she could and escaped Shanghai at the absolute last minute and ran towards a neighboring province.  The purpose of this was to simply plan her next moves.  Her story intentionally leaves out some key details of how she executed the plan, and to be honest I'm greatly astonished she did this at all.  Her escape actually happened AFTER the lockdown started.  Whatever the method used, she did it with both brains and bravery.     

Frankly, her mindset is exactly what is needed these days.  Playing it safe and never taking risks is the death of the human experience.  The covid lockdown proves all that and more, along with a population which is afraid and complying with all this slavery.  Those like Jenny who take risks and escape a lockdown are doing both themselves and society a favor actually.

Here it is some based off some text screenshots she posted publicly:

I'm available all the time here in Hangzhou [a city some 150km away].  My laptop is in Shanghai.  I'm totally stuck here.  All my documents are on my laptop, I don't have any backup.  Also I'm wearing [old] clothes because I was really escaping.  Running from the lockdown.  Arrived here April 1st [the first day].  They took my ID card at the Hangzhou East [railway]station.  The officer who worked there wanted to quarantine me with a large group of people in [collective] lockdown in a bad environment. I found a chance to run off from there without ID.  I just hope everything gotta be alright soon.  I'm very anxious everyday here. Because my life was not supposed to be like this.  [Due to this] epidemic, I'm broke.  I can't be happy about that.  Can't do what I want do.  Thinking about a way to get a new ID and praying Shanghai can unlock soon and slowly rebuild my life together again.

I chipped in financially so she could order food, along with others who helped out.  Thankfully it was a lot easier in her situation to buy food than us in the impoverished city of Shanghai.  And really, how maddening is that.  Here we are living in the most developed city in China in 2022 and literally starving to death.

Somehow she cobbled together a plan to stay with friends, and this was after sleeping on park benches or anywhere else due to the impossibility of staying in hotels without ID and having a travel record from Shanghai.

In a way she reminded me of the delivery drivers setting camp on the street.  It was actually safer to be homeless than locked down in some compound where you have zero rights.