It is summertime again in Houston. Each day goes by, and every hour brings me closer to summer vacation: a time of bliss, of no school, and of no annoying alarm clocks. It is the period when we get to relax and have fun.

This year, I would be visiting China. I would be experiencing what a small village would look like, documenting it on camera. I would be visiting my grandparents, viewing towns, and going to all the sights.

Emphasis on would.

Maybe you have heard of swine flu, the epidemic that is freaking everyone across the world out. If everyone believed what the media has said, swine flu will turn everyone into zombies and every single man and woman will drop dead one day.

China is quarantining all flights from the Americas for three hours at minimum, my parents tell me. If a case of swine flu is detected on the flight, a lot of aircraft passengers are quarantined for a week.

It’s not the only country.

On June 5, 2009, my flight takes off for Beijing, China, without me. Although my ticket has been refunded, it is still a great despair to not be able to visit China. I must stay home over the summer.

My mother planned a writer’s conference over a year. It was to be held in China. It has been postponed, possibly indefinitely. Almost a year of planning has gone into the project.

Swine flu, H1N1, whatever you call it: it doesn’t alleviate what countries and people think of the epidemic. In the United States, people have generally calmed down. Schools aren’t being canceled anymore.

But across the world, other people are reacting differently.