Opinion | Let’s give thanks for what the long winter of the pandemic brought out in us
- In Chinese art, pine, bamboo and plum blossom symbolise fortitude, modesty and endurance – traits that help us through dark days. These traits have helped us through the pandemic as we emerge into a hopeful spring
Throughout China, people are celebrating the arrival of spring. I, too, am excited about what flowers I may see or smells I might savour this spring, my first as the UN resident coordinator. As the days go by, temperatures will rise, frozen lakes will melt, and farmers will get to work in their rice paddies. Cities, towns and villages will be showered with rain or shrouded in soft mists.
We’ll be seeing and smelling pear blossoms and peach blossoms, azaleas blooming, and cherry blossoms carpeting the land. In Beijing, I am told that we can look forward to apricot flowers, lilacs and peonies.
I feel a kinship with the three friends of winter. At the United Nations, we often speak of resilience, equity and sustainability. They are the marks of a peaceful and prosperous world that the UN is working towards for all of us today and countless generations to come.
In “resilience”, we see societies that have been made strong enough to withstand what shocks may come their way, be it violence or disaster or disease. By “sustainability”, we mean a world in balance, one in which we enjoy the fruits of the earth but do not gorge on them; we cultivate them for future generations. By “equity”, we mean to focus on the basic equality and dignity of all human beings, no matter their birth or their station.