At the height of Shanghai's latest COVID-19 outbreak, a number of foreign nationals decided to return to their home countries. However, Niels Peter Thomas chose to fly back from Frankfurt in late April amid a citywide quarantine. The head of China operations of the Springer Nature Group, a German-British academic publishing company, also shot a series of videos to help cheer up and boost the morale of his colleagues stuck in Shanghai. He spoke to CGTN about why he decided to return.