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China-based Twitterers too observed a 3 minute silence on the 3 minute silence that took place from 14:28 to 14:31 just now to mark the first of three days of national mourning, and this is what they said immediately afterwards.
inwalkedbud There was just a moment of 'silence' for the earthquake. Cars stopped and blasted their horns for three minutes, whilst people watched.
xiaomiao Is that the Chinese interpretation of "silence"? Still, whatever it was, it was good that everyone thought about the victims together.
apgalbraith Traffic actually stopped at jinling/xizang lu. Stood in the park to watch the CCTV broadcast. Very moving
lonniehodge Still many decibels below normal noise level here in S. GZ
feng37 Here in Panyu everyone started honking their car horns, a city wailing for the dead. Then the air sirens stopped and the horns stopped too.
pandapassport What Dalian sounded like just now: http://www.pandapassport.co...
lonniehodge Somehow the siren seemed fitting. It was like a photograph 27 floors below us on the street. Even the traffic stopped.
niubi Sadly my meeting kept going. I m only non-chinese in it, the other guys didn't stop. Didn't think my place 2 tell them 2 b silent.
singaporeano A marine police boat just parked itself in front of our office by the Suzhou River and blared its sirens.
imagethief Standing in TAM. Crowd chanting "long live China". Started fitfully then built.
marcvanderchijs Very impressive 3 minutes of mourning in SH. All sirens went off, cars blowing horns. Traffic stopped completely and all people stood still.
papajohn @ajschokora I asked my wife, and she said that during 默哀是心里默默地. Cultural differences, I guess...
AlexBowman Office poll going on. First moment of silence anyone can remember since Deng's funeral.
apgalbraith @ajschokora 全国人民默哀3分钟，届时汽车、火车、舰船鸣笛，防空警报鸣响
ajschokora was it explicitly supposed to 3 minutes of silence or just focused mourning? I am utterly confused.....
lonniehodge Construction site enxt to me was quite for the first time in months. Moving to see all workers with yellow hats off and heads down.
Maria_Trombly my ears are still ringing
Maria_Trombly there were some VERY loud horns blowing in the distance, too -- maybe air raid sirens or disaster sirens
michaeldarragh That was the loudest 3-minutes of silence I have ever heard - and I'm on the 27th floor
kaiserkuo Very moving three minutes of silence. Saw many people standing outside, respectful and stock-still.
AlexBowman Seemingly everyone in Dalian beeped their horns and rang bells.
dedlam Traffic Stopped on Tianshan Rd. Horns blaring for 3 minutes. It was beautiful.
Maria_Trombly many employees -- including my staff -- went outside during hte three minutes
ajschokora maybe I missed a memo, but my 3 minutes of silence in SH was filled with an air raid siren & honking horns....can anyone help me understand?
Maria_Trombly all traffic in downtown shanghai stopped -- and everybody blew their horns
Maria_Trombly that was the loudest three minutes of silence i'd ever heard
papajohn That was the loudest three minutes of silence I've ever seen. Everyone marked here by laying on their horns.
Video of those 3 minutes taken by Dedric Lam from his office window. Audio clip taken by Megan Shank here.
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For people who don't understand, I think the sirens are just similar to the ceremonial gun salutes for a state funeral in your countries. These sirens and horns are the mourning ways given by the whole nation to the victims. So, please keep your respect. Thank you.
When they said "loudest moment of silence", I figured they meant it in irony. Many people realize that I hope.
Wasn't so loud in my neighborhood, though I'm in the middle of a residential area, removed from heavy traffic.
I've seen comments elsewhere in a mocking tone over the sirens and horns, which I think is really disrespectful. It's ok to question it if you dont understand it, but some people should really think before they make an ignorant comment. Death rituals for chinese people are very complicated. It is said that the soul of the deceased leaves and returns home on the 7th day, Being that it has been 7 days since the earthquake, I feel that it is really fitting for the entire country to sound off the sirens and horns simultaneously to welcome the deceased back home. I'm sure a lot of people also have misunderstandings seeing firecrackers go off by the disaster areas. Just keep in mind that different cultures have different ways to mourn the dead.
it was certainly loud downtown where my office is and yes, it sounded like a city wailing, mourning. Touching.
Every single place that I read about the moment of commemoration said that air raid sirens and train, boat, fire engine, ambulance and car horns would sound while people stood silently. These twitter people are twits to a say the least. It was very moving to see that 95% of the people in my part of busy Shanghai stood respectfully silent. The idiots who are complaining about this should be ashamed.
Agreed. I cannot understand how people can get indignant because this "moment of silence" didn't work how THEY thought it should. It was a "moment of (human voice) silence (while we listen to the sound of horns)", not a "moment of (complete) silence".
My office observed the three minutes of public/collective mourning as well (I think that might be a better gloss on it than "silence"). I was extremely moved by the horns, actually. In our part of town (in Xicheng) it was VERY obvious when the clock hit 2:28. Cars stopped in their tracks and horns just went off like crazy. Suddenly. Even though I was expecting it, it was a shock to the system, like the quake must have been to those who experienced it. And it just went on and on in rising and falling waves of sound. Like the quake did. I think everybody in our office spent the whole thing dissolved in tears. Really hard to go back to work afterwards. But thank goodness we all have work/home/family to go back to. So many are not so lucky....
Are you really sure they're being indignant? I said the same thing today at work, but didn't mean any disrespect. A simple statement of friendly sarcasm, and my colleagues understood it as just that. No one called me indignant or whatnot. They understood what I meant.
Hard to read sarcasm, friendly or not, when it's online.
Call it a "Moment of honor and respect". There is something very mournful and haunting about wailing horns. Very moving.
When someone says it is a loud moment of silence, they are not necessarily expressing disrespect for the event. I know exactly what the commentors mean. It is just a way of wondering why it was called a "moment of silence" in the first place. It isn't an expression of mirth at an "event gone wrong".
Don't be so touchy.