A DAY WITH WECHAT

*This is a short fiction illustrating the many ways that Wechat is integrated into the daily lives of people in China. Many thanks to Vickie for this creative contribution.*

It is a cozy Saturday morning in Shenzhen, China. Amy woke up in bed and reached for her phone as usual. She unlocked it and opened Wechat. She read all the new messages, replied to some of them, and scrolled down people’s Moments (like facebook posts). That took about 20 minutes. Her plan for the day was  to see a movie with friends. She opened “features” in Wechat, took a look at the movie options, and decided she was going to watch Despicable Me 2. She picked a 2:30pm showing, clicked on the closest movie theatre, and bought the tickets for her and her friends.

Afterwards, Amy read a book she found on Wechat’s subscription. She was interrupted by a Wechat video call from her globe-trotting mother. Amy answered it and took a peek at the place her mom was living in India. It was a dim and small but seemed cozy. After the video call, Amy browsed the Moments for a while. Her friends had posted Wechat group messages on where and when to meet.

Amy decided to order something for lunch. She ordered through her favorite restaurant Mom’s Noodles’ service account in Wechat, and within 30 mins her food appeared outside her apartment. She finished the lunch and went out for a walk. Meanwhile, one of the Wechat  “features” kept track of her miles. She took a look at the rankings. Of all her friends who chose to show their distances, her walking distance was the 5th highest . She went back to the apartment, satisfied.

After taking a nap, Amy woke up to find that it was already 2:10pm. She quickly got dressed. Figuring that she would now have to take a taxi, she opened the Didi Dache feature ( a service akin to Uber) and called a taxi. Fortunately, she managed to get to the theatre in time.

Amy and her friends scanned the ticket stored in their Wechat movie ticket buying features, and enjoyed Despicable Me 2. After the movie, they all wanted to eat at a popular restaurant in the mall called Watami. Since the line is usually insufferably long, especially on a Saturday,  they went on Watami’s Wechat service account and clicked on “Line Up”. That way, all they had to do was show up at Watami at  6:30, instead of having to physically line up. For the time between then and 6:30, Amy found coupons on Wechat for the stores that she had been wanting to visit for a while, and shopped a for clothes for the next season.

Time passed quickly and it was 6:30. They sat down in Watami after showing the waitress their line up ticket in Wechat. They had also ordered food when they got the line up ticket, so the time between ordering and waiting was saved, sushi and ramen came right away. When the time came to split the bill, Amy paid for the meal through Wechat. All her friends need to do was to click on “Split the Bill”, and transfer the money to Amy’s Wechat account, just like Venmo.

Amy went home. It was a satisfying Saturday. Before she went to bed, a friend she met in Brazil messaged her through WeChat.  Although  Amy did not speak Portuguese, and Raissa did not speak English, they communicated well. The translation of the sentences showed up when the sentences were clicked on. With her phone still in her hand, Amy gradually fell asleep after the great conversation. Suddenly the screen lit up. It was “Yao yi Yao”, the feature in Wechat that functions like Tinder; an unknown user “sweetpotato” said, “Hey what are you up to?”