Pandemic immobilities as provocative pauses: Reflections from Macau’s non-resident worker community

Abstract

This research explores the lived experience of waiting and its social implications in the context of travel restrictions and resulting immobilities for Macau’s non-resident worker community during COVID-19. Waiting has become a defining experience for most people over the past two years as we wait for the pandemic to end and for ‘normal’ life to resume. Although often associated with passivity, non-action, boredom and even ‘stuckedness’ (Hage, 2009, p. 101), waiting can alternatively be a purposeful action aimed at identifying and realising opportunities of the future (Bendixsen & Erisken, 2018). An understudied area on the whole (Bendixsen & Erisken, 2018), in the context of travel, waiting has been explored only infrequently, despite being an intrinsic part thereof. Based on participants’ stories of living through the pandemic in Macau, this research seeks to further insights into the social implications of (enforced) periods of waiting and immobility and expand on conceptualisations of waiting as more than empty periods of inactivity (Bissel, 2007; Gasparini, 1995), while providing insights into a microcosm of Macau’s non-Chinese migrant workers during the pandemic. Critical reflections are sought on the pandemic creating provocative pauses wherein pre-pandemic norms of access to travel and the urge to be on the move are highlighted in their contingent nature.

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http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/4179341