WEBVTT

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"One, Two, One."

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"Be united, alert"

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"earnest and lively."

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"Unite to win yet greater victories!"

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Back in 1949...

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Everyone called

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Jia Family Village

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a pit.

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The place made

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people ill.

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Alkaline soil

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and foul sewage.

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There were just three treasured assets.

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Sow thistles,

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willow shoots,

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and phragmites reeds.

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Why were these assets?

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People could eat sow thistles.

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They're an edible foodstuff.

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That was one of them.

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The reeds were

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also edible...

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They fed the livestock.

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So these assets

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were essentials for life in the village.

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Nothing else

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would grow there.

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It was desolate land.

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We couldn't cultivate it.

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The soil was too salty!

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I won't go into the history of it.

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Let's jump ahead to when

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Ma Feng convened a meeting.

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A general discussion.

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That was the start

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of the big change.

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One evening we

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talked with Ma Feng.

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He asked us to gather

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twenty or so people.

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Maybe thirty,

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people with skills.

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Smart people

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with good memory.

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To have a group discussion.

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So we sent out a call.

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And more than forty people showed up.

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Ma Feng raised the issue of

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filtering water
before irrigation.

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We needed to treat the water first.

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The water was causing
the alkalinity of the soil.

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It's like the clothes we wear.

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When our clothes

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get soaked in sweat

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it's harder to clean and dry them.

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You end up with stains

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you can't get out.

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Ma Feng was

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implementing

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what Chairman Mao

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said about strength in unity.

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If one family

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tried to solve the

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problem of alkaline soil

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it couldn't be done.

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How to make it happen?

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We needed to mobilize

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everyone in the village.

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We took Ma

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Feng's advice.

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With three families,

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then five, then ten

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we formed

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what we called

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'mutual aid groups'

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We mapped out a plan for the village.

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When we'd figured it all out

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there were thirty to

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forty people in each group.

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And each group

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took about ten days

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to finish the preparations.

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We started by filtering

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the fresh water.

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Then drained away the salty water.

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And then let the sun do its work.

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It was just like drying
clothes outdoors,

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under the sun.

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Bit by bit, the

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seeds took root.

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They germinated.

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Nothing died, the

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seedlings flourished.

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They grew.

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The mutual aid groups

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speeded

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things up.

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We went on to form a production team.

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It was based on
individual production units.

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We were highly motivated.

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As a result of all this hard work.

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Jia Family Village became quite famous.

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Lots of people came to see our progress.

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Other villages were still short of grain.

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They couldn't feed themselves.

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Relied on food coupons.

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But we had

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plenty to eat.

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We even had surpluses!

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In fact we had enough surplus

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to sell grain to the government.

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We ended up contributing
one million kilos to the state.

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"Working the land, standing tall..."

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"Raising his work-tool even higher..."

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"He holds the hoe up in the air..."

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"As if he were holding"

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"a flag of toil."

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He holds the hoe up in the air

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as if he were holding a flag of toil.

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Yu Jian.

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I like what you are.

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And I like how you behave.

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- Straightforward, optimistic...
- It's true.

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He could hear you with his hearing aid.

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How old are you?

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I'm Ninety-one.

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Bring it over.

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I can hear now.

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In the past, the village
had three "too many" s.

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Too many unmarried men.

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Too many young children sold away.

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And too many beggars.

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Life was so hard here

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that no-one would marry our men.

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There was a saying...

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"Don't marry your daughter
into Jia Family Village."

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Those who came here to marry would suffer.

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So no-one did.

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That's why there were
so many unmarried men.

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Ma Feng...

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The first time we met was in 1953.

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In the spring of that year

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I was First Secretary of the
Communist Youth League.

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We were having a meeting that evening.

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Talking about...

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The county League had given us

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three promotional tasks.

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One was to promote the Marriage Law.

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It came into force in 1953.

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Second, to promote
the collective

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procurement and
distribution of grain.

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And finally, to promote collectivization.

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To encourage people to join co-operatives.

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Mutual aid.

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We were in the middle of the meeting...

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Assigning tasks

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when Old Jia arrived with Ma Feng.

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Old Jia came in and said...

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"This is our League's First Secretary."

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We knew that he was a writer.

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But we didn't know he was such a big name.

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We just knew that he was a writer.

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He loved joking,
making fun of this and that.

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Our members loved listening to him.

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He smoked a fat little cigar.

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About this thick, but quite short.

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He invited us all to try it.

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He even invited the girls who were there!

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We were all teenagers.

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But he offered his cigar regardless.

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Laughing, we said we couldn't smoke.

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You could have it all yourself!

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That made us laugh.

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Lots of us were there that night.

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He said that to promote the Marriage Law

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we should take the lead ourselves.

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Find ourselves partners!

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"What about you with him? Or you with her?"

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He was fooling around with us.

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"You look like a good match for him."

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"You two look good together."

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He became the League matchmaker.

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She and I...

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In fact he matched three

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couples in our League.

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We got together and married.

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So to speak...

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He planted a seed in people's minds.

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A seed of love.

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That was when people starting

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seeing each other,
forming couples.

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When love became a freedom of choice.

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Arranged marriages were outlawed.

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We were free to choose marriage partners.

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"In the mountains and rivers."

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"I would like to hold your hand."

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"To cross the bridge."

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"On the bridge are red
flowers, green leaves."

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"Families and rivers are nearby."

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"On this side of the
bridge, hair is black."

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"On that side, hairs have turned white."

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On this side of the bridge, hair is black.

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On that side, hairs have turned white.

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Shen Congwen.

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My father Ma Feng was born in 1922

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23 May in the lunar calendar.

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It was in Juyi Village, in Xiaoyi County.

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When my father was born

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my grandfather was over fifty.

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And my grandmother
was still in her twenties.

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When grandfather died

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the family went downhill.

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Nothing went well.

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My grandmother wanted

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to raise this son herself.

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So she refused to remarry,

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despite being so young.

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She sold the house and land.

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Took the money.

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And returned to Dawang Village, in Fenyang.

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So my father, from the
age of six or seven

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grew up in Dawang Village.

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When he finished school...

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Not long after that

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the Anti-Japanese War began.

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When he was in the army.

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His squad leader was...

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Sun Qian.

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The writer Sun Qian.

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His involvement in the

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arts began by accident.

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Father liked painting when he was young.

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Back then, the platoons

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held a blackboard

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newspaper competition.

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He remembered a magazine he'd once seen.

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The illustrations in it

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were woodcut prints.

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They showed soldiers with machine guns
in the undergrowth.

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Taking aim at the enemy.

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There were no paints available.

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Only ink.

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He made the best of it.

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He did a big ink drawing.

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No paintbrushes, only an inkbrush.

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So that's what he used.

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The competition was judged

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the day after he finished it.

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And his platoon ended up as the winners.

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So they decided

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he was a talent.

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He seemed to be talented.

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That got him transferred
to the publicity team

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which was actually a performance troupe.

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In 1940, the troupe

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crossed the Yellow
River and went to Yan'an.

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He was very impressed by Yan'an.

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He said there were so many books in Yan'an.

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A great cultural climate.

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Later on, someone told him...

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The Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts

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had a school for the military.

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My father applied,

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and was admitted.

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My father applied for the art major.

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He was a life-model for the art class.

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Why did he want to do that?

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Because he could read while posing.

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You know which book had

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the biggest influence on him?

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It was 'And Quiet Flows the Don'

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After he graduated from the Academy

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he became a journalist.

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At the start of 1945...

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It was either the end of
1944 or the start of 1945

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there was a conference on

00:22:49.227 --> 00:22:51.084
outstanding workers
at Mount Lأ¼liang.

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They were sharing stories of heroes.

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My father and his
colleague were sent there.

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As both journalists and volunteers.

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After that, they began writing their...

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'Heroes of Mount Lأ¼liang'

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He and Xirong, the two of them...

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They took turns writing it.

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"You do today's, I'll do tomorrow's".

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It was serialised in
'Jinxi Public Newspaper'

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They kept up daily

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instalments for a while.

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Then they thought they should take a break.

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They stopped for a couple of days.

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But the readers
complained about its absence.

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So they went back to writing it.

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That's how that book took shape.

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They'd begun it in the spring of 1945

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Japan had not yet surrendered.

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The war was still on-going.

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In the run-up to October 1949

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my father attended a
Youth Conference in Beijing.

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He went as a

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Youth Leader.

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And after that, he
stayed in Beijing to work.

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That was when he came

00:23:56.956 --> 00:24:01.501
to know the literary world.

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He was almost thirty by then.

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But he wasn't married,

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and didn't even
have a girlfriend.

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One time he went back to Xiaoyi

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to see his mother,

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and saw a couple of
newlyweds on the train.

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Observing this young couple

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he thought how interesting they were.

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It inspired him to write 'Marriage'

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His story was about how marriage

00:24:27.876 --> 00:24:31.126
changes the lives of young people.

00:24:31.501 --> 00:24:34.376
When it was published

00:24:34.459 --> 00:24:35.499
it caught someone's eye.

00:24:35.542 --> 00:24:37.501
He had the idea of filming it.

00:24:37.584 --> 00:24:40.959
When this man found out
my father wasn't married himself

00:24:41.251 --> 00:24:44.292
he thought he should intervene.

00:24:45.542 --> 00:24:47.167
This was a director called Guo Wei.

00:24:47.501 --> 00:24:50.626
He'd once been my mother's supervisor

00:24:50.709 --> 00:24:53.292
at a theater in Hebei.

00:24:53.376 --> 00:24:56.709
He was plotting to make this introduction.

00:24:56.792 --> 00:24:59.834
But he didn't have a photo of my mother.

00:25:00.084 --> 00:25:02.917
All he had was a group
photo of the theater company.

00:25:03.001 --> 00:25:04.206
When the time came,

00:25:04.230 --> 00:25:06.501
he showed my father
this group photo.

00:25:06.584 --> 00:25:08.459
He told him...

00:25:08.542 --> 00:25:10.685
"I want to introduce you to one of
the girls in this photo."

00:25:10.709 --> 00:25:12.459
"Guess which one it is."

00:25:12.542 --> 00:25:14.001
My father studied the photo.

00:25:14.084 --> 00:25:15.709
He thought, she looks nice...

00:25:15.792 --> 00:25:18.834
But some seem a bit too...

00:25:19.917 --> 00:25:21.584
Anyway, not suitable.

00:25:21.667 --> 00:25:23.001
Some were too pretty.

00:25:23.084 --> 00:25:25.334
Some were too old.

00:25:25.417 --> 00:25:27.667
Some, probably already married.

00:25:27.751 --> 00:25:29.227
In the end, he pointed
to one girl in the photo.

00:25:29.251 --> 00:25:30.792
"Is it this one?"

00:25:31.876 --> 00:25:34.292
And yes, he picked my mother!

00:25:34.876 --> 00:25:38.167
He tried writing about
city life in Beijing.

00:25:38.251 --> 00:25:39.731
But he wasn't happy with the results.

00:25:39.834 --> 00:25:42.584
But when he left Beijing for Shanxi,

00:25:42.667 --> 00:25:44.352
and started writing in
and about the countryside

00:25:44.376 --> 00:25:46.876
his fiction became quite popular.

00:25:46.959 --> 00:25:49.042
'Stockman Uncle Zhao' for example.

00:25:49.126 --> 00:25:50.751
And 'Han Meimei'

00:25:50.834 --> 00:25:53.584
It became very popular.

00:25:53.667 --> 00:25:57.376
Both those short stories were selected,

00:25:57.459 --> 00:26:00.334
for student textbooks

00:26:00.417 --> 00:26:02.751
Chinese studies.

00:26:03.001 --> 00:26:06.084
He'd thought he should
focus on rural topics.

00:26:06.167 --> 00:26:08.584
That's why he went back to the countryside.

00:26:08.667 --> 00:26:10.001
Back to Shanxi.

00:26:16.959 --> 00:26:20.001
The one who objected
strongly was my grandfather.

00:26:20.417 --> 00:26:22.167
He was originally from Hebei.

00:26:22.251 --> 00:26:25.126
He thought since they
had a place in Beijing...

00:26:25.209 --> 00:26:28.709
And were settled there...

00:26:29.292 --> 00:26:31.052
What was the point of
moving back to Shanxi?

00:26:31.126 --> 00:26:34.167
He had no idea what Shanxi was like.

00:26:34.459 --> 00:26:36.185
There was no comparison
between Beijing and Shanxi.

00:26:36.209 --> 00:26:39.042
It's the difference between a capital city
and a provincial town.

00:26:39.126 --> 00:26:40.667
There's a huge gap.

00:26:40.751 --> 00:26:44.376
It was not at all pleasant
when we first moved.

00:26:44.459 --> 00:26:46.667
Our lives were entirely different.

00:26:46.751 --> 00:26:48.102
And the local dialect was different.

00:26:48.126 --> 00:26:51.126
Being from Hebei, he could
understand the Beijing dialect.

00:26:51.209 --> 00:26:54.834
But he could barely grasp
a word of the Shanxi dialect.

00:26:55.459 --> 00:26:58.251
I came to Jia Family
Village when I was very little.

00:26:58.709 --> 00:27:00.459
With my parents.

00:27:00.959 --> 00:27:03.834
We arrived and lived in the village.

00:27:03.917 --> 00:27:06.834
Actually, his writing had a very
intimate connection with this place.

00:27:06.917 --> 00:27:08.542
He was writing non-stop.

00:27:08.626 --> 00:27:11.292
My father wrote about many people.

00:27:11.792 --> 00:27:13.352
When the villagers read it,
they knew who it was about.

00:27:13.376 --> 00:27:14.417
"That character is you!"

00:27:14.501 --> 00:27:16.251
"That's about you" and so on.

00:27:17.042 --> 00:27:18.060
'The Young People of Our Village'

00:27:18.084 --> 00:27:21.084
depicted China's first generation of
educated farmers.

00:27:21.167 --> 00:27:22.292
How should they appear?

00:27:22.376 --> 00:27:24.001
They should be literate...

00:27:24.084 --> 00:27:25.768
The characters were about
those educated farmers.

00:27:25.792 --> 00:27:28.834
The People's Republic had celebrated
its tenth anniversary.

00:27:30.167 --> 00:27:33.029
People were getting

00:27:33.053 --> 00:27:34.209
decent educations.

00:27:34.584 --> 00:27:37.876
How was their life
when they returned to their villages?

00:28:04.584 --> 00:28:06.209
What you can see here

00:28:06.292 --> 00:28:09.042
is a general view of Jia Family Village.

00:28:09.126 --> 00:28:12.376
It shows both the village as it is now,

00:28:12.459 --> 00:28:14.917
and the plans for its future.

00:28:21.667 --> 00:28:22.667
What are you doing here?

00:28:22.709 --> 00:28:24.209
Nothing, Sir.

00:28:24.292 --> 00:28:25.792
We're just chatting.

00:28:25.876 --> 00:28:26.876
Chatting?

00:28:27.376 --> 00:28:29.209
Show me what's in your bag.

00:29:10.417 --> 00:29:13.834
I've been thinking, at
the Literature Festival

00:29:15.751 --> 00:29:18.709
I'll be able to see
the writers in person.

00:29:20.334 --> 00:29:22.042
I can listen to what they say.

00:29:23.292 --> 00:29:27.001
It's a site for literary encounters.

00:29:28.334 --> 00:29:30.501
No particular obligation this time

00:29:30.584 --> 00:29:32.292
I'm there to have fun.

00:29:35.492 --> 00:29:38.284
Jia Zhang-ke told me I'd have fun any time.

00:29:50.992 --> 00:29:52.701
Jia Family Village.

00:30:53.409 --> 00:30:56.534
Good afternoon to all our Festival friends.

00:30:57.576 --> 00:30:58.992
Let's hear it for our next guest.

00:30:59.076 --> 00:31:00.867
He's a renowned writer...

00:31:00.951 --> 00:31:03.867
Let's welcome Mr Yu Hua to the stage.

00:31:08.659 --> 00:31:10.534
We've come to Fenyang.

00:31:10.617 --> 00:31:11.701
Coming here

00:31:11.784 --> 00:31:13.534
feels like

00:31:13.617 --> 00:31:15.576
being Brahms

00:31:15.659 --> 00:31:19.409
when he went to visit Schumann
in his country house.

00:31:20.492 --> 00:31:21.576
So being here...

00:31:21.659 --> 00:31:24.076
All of us, whether we're
authors or readers...

00:31:24.409 --> 00:31:26.201
We're all like Brahms.

00:31:27.826 --> 00:31:29.034
We're in Fenyang.

00:31:29.117 --> 00:31:30.326
We're in Jia Family Village.

00:31:30.409 --> 00:31:33.117
It's a group visit to our country home.

00:31:33.951 --> 00:31:35.576
We use our own

00:31:36.076 --> 00:31:37.159
individual voices

00:31:39.076 --> 00:31:40.451
to make

00:31:40.742 --> 00:31:42.367
the so-called lonely countryside

00:31:42.451 --> 00:31:44.242
lively again.

00:31:52.992 --> 00:31:55.284
God created the village.

00:31:57.076 --> 00:31:59.534
Man created the city.

00:32:06.159 --> 00:32:07.951
Take our house...

00:32:09.242 --> 00:32:11.367
Back then, it was my grandfather's house.

00:32:12.617 --> 00:32:14.409
Situated below the dam.

00:32:16.242 --> 00:32:17.784
Coming back here...

00:32:17.867 --> 00:32:19.826
A lot has changed.

00:32:20.201 --> 00:32:23.326
We've used the word "nostalgia"
many times today.

00:32:25.701 --> 00:32:27.141
Girls in the villages most likely...

00:32:27.867 --> 00:32:29.576
From the point of view of equality...

00:32:29.659 --> 00:32:32.772
It's very hard to

00:32:32.796 --> 00:32:33.826
win a real place.

00:32:36.909 --> 00:32:38.135
Since there's been so much rebuilding

00:32:38.159 --> 00:32:40.159
the layout has changed a lot

00:32:40.242 --> 00:32:42.242
I couldn't even orient myself.

00:32:42.742 --> 00:32:43.867
Knowing a place is

00:32:43.951 --> 00:32:46.951
like being in an airport.

00:32:47.034 --> 00:32:48.951
You can take off,

00:32:49.534 --> 00:32:51.992
and fly back some time later.

00:32:53.701 --> 00:32:57.617
Opera is like an open classroom
for the people.

00:32:58.117 --> 00:33:01.659
Actors are teachers in make-up.

00:33:02.159 --> 00:33:04.951
You became a rabbit.

00:33:07.409 --> 00:33:10.534
I became an eagle to catch you.

00:33:12.451 --> 00:33:14.826
We always miss things that are lost.

00:33:16.492 --> 00:33:18.576
Modernization needs

00:33:18.867 --> 00:33:20.867
to be interpreted differently.

00:33:22.534 --> 00:33:24.751
Fenyang Middle School

00:33:24.775 --> 00:33:26.992
has a history of 113 years.

00:33:27.867 --> 00:33:31.409
That's twelve years more than the history
of Chinese modern poetry

00:33:31.701 --> 00:33:33.617
I think villages

00:33:33.701 --> 00:33:35.076
are the reality.

00:33:37.451 --> 00:33:40.534
I notice how people wait for trains.

00:33:40.784 --> 00:33:43.201
Some of them squat down.

00:33:44.784 --> 00:33:47.742
In my hometown,
not least in my extended family

00:33:47.826 --> 00:33:49.868
almost every family
unit has someone

00:33:49.892 --> 00:33:51.451
working in Guangdong.

00:36:48.859 --> 00:36:50.609
We usually drink tea from Hanzhong.

00:36:51.276 --> 00:36:52.359
It's also.

00:36:52.609 --> 00:36:53.692
Anji white tea.

00:36:54.317 --> 00:36:57.359
Actually, I don't like Anji white tea

00:36:57.442 --> 00:36:59.192
I prefer Shangluo white tea.

00:36:59.276 --> 00:37:01.067
There's a Shangluo white tea?

00:37:01.151 --> 00:37:02.651
Shangluo white tea is good.

00:37:05.026 --> 00:37:06.026
One time

00:37:06.109 --> 00:37:09.301
I went out with some

00:37:09.325 --> 00:37:10.984
Xi'an University teachers.

00:37:11.067 --> 00:37:12.567
One of them told me...

00:37:12.651 --> 00:37:14.514
He managed to get you

00:37:14.538 --> 00:37:17.026
to drink white tea.

00:37:17.442 --> 00:37:18.942
Nonsense!

00:37:19.567 --> 00:37:21.359
I'm bringing out my poetry collection.

00:37:21.442 --> 00:37:23.234
The second?

00:37:23.317 --> 00:37:26.067
The second and third will both come out
later this year.

00:37:27.109 --> 00:37:29.151
It will include unpublished earlier poems?

00:37:29.234 --> 00:37:31.234
These are all new

00:37:31.317 --> 00:37:33.567
I wrote them after the
first collection came out.

00:37:34.234 --> 00:37:36.192
Writing poetry...

00:37:36.276 --> 00:37:38.817
I have nothing against it.

00:37:39.234 --> 00:37:40.401
But the first thing

00:37:40.817 --> 00:37:42.234
is to live a good life.

00:37:42.317 --> 00:37:44.109
First, be a good person.

00:37:44.192 --> 00:37:47.359
Fulfill your duties as a wife
and mother in the family.

00:37:48.151 --> 00:37:49.317
And then write poetry.

00:37:49.401 --> 00:37:50.567
And be a good daughter too!

00:37:51.609 --> 00:37:53.484
Actually, I don't care about that.

00:37:54.734 --> 00:37:56.859
The main thing is that

00:37:56.942 --> 00:37:59.901
writing poetry doesn't
mean living a poetic life.

00:38:00.567 --> 00:38:02.439
Dihua lies in the basin

00:38:02.463 --> 00:38:05.276
of the Qin Mountains.

00:38:05.651 --> 00:38:07.984
There's a river near the village.

00:38:08.067 --> 00:38:10.192
Nowadays it's called the River Dan.

00:38:10.276 --> 00:38:12.817
Back then, it wasn't called that.

00:38:12.901 --> 00:38:14.567
We used to call it the State River.

00:38:14.651 --> 00:38:16.692
"State" as in city-state, that character.

00:38:17.109 --> 00:38:18.442
When I was very young

00:38:18.526 --> 00:38:22.192
I could see boats on
the river from the village.

00:38:22.276 --> 00:38:24.651
Of course boats can't sail there now.

00:38:24.734 --> 00:38:26.859
The water's too shallow for boats.

00:38:31.192 --> 00:38:33.567
I remember when I was in primary school...

00:38:34.067 --> 00:38:36.609
In the third or fourth year...

00:38:36.692 --> 00:38:38.276
I went to my aunt's place.

00:38:40.317 --> 00:38:42.776
And she had a copy of
'Dream of the Red Chamber'

00:38:43.067 --> 00:38:44.639
A hardcover copy,

00:38:44.663 --> 00:38:46.442
I don't know where she got it.

00:38:46.526 --> 00:38:49.484
It was in four volumes.

00:38:50.067 --> 00:38:52.026
That was the first time I ever read it.

00:38:52.109 --> 00:38:54.067
That time, visiting my aunt.

00:38:54.151 --> 00:38:56.706
At first sight, all the

00:38:56.730 --> 00:38:58.942
poems at the start...

00:38:59.026 --> 00:39:00.734
And all the mythological stuff...

00:39:01.609 --> 00:39:03.609
That made no sense to me.

00:39:03.942 --> 00:39:06.109
When I reached the main text...

00:39:06.192 --> 00:39:08.442
And it was about daily life...

00:39:08.776 --> 00:39:11.526
I felt I understood it.

00:39:11.609 --> 00:39:12.776
It was an interesting read.

00:39:12.859 --> 00:39:14.627
Although it was about
life in a great mansion,

00:39:14.651 --> 00:39:15.859
and I lived in a village

00:39:15.942 --> 00:39:17.859
it nonetheless intrigued me

00:39:18.234 --> 00:39:20.067
I enjoyed reading it.

00:39:20.151 --> 00:39:23.692
Since I could stay for only one night

00:39:24.109 --> 00:39:25.484
when I left the next day

00:39:25.567 --> 00:39:28.192
I 'borrowed' two volumes.

00:39:28.276 --> 00:39:29.942
When I got home

00:39:30.026 --> 00:39:33.327
my cousin noticed that

00:39:33.351 --> 00:39:36.651
two volumes were missing.

00:39:36.734 --> 00:39:38.421
He knew I loved reading

00:39:38.445 --> 00:39:39.817
and must have taken them.

00:39:39.901 --> 00:39:43.442
So he came to demand them back.

00:39:43.692 --> 00:39:46.109
In my early years, in my family

00:39:46.192 --> 00:39:49.401
there were already
more than twenty people.

00:39:50.026 --> 00:39:52.817
When I was in primary school

00:39:52.901 --> 00:39:56.734
I remember there
were already twenty-three.

00:39:57.067 --> 00:39:58.442
If everyone was there

00:39:58.526 --> 00:40:01.297
we had to serve
twenty-three mouths

00:40:01.321 --> 00:40:02.526
with one wok.

00:40:03.192 --> 00:40:05.109
At that time

00:40:05.192 --> 00:40:07.109
my 'po' was still alive.

00:40:07.192 --> 00:40:09.901
'Po' was our word for grandmother.

00:40:10.317 --> 00:40:13.567
My father had three brothers.

00:40:13.651 --> 00:40:16.484
And they each had more than one child.

00:40:16.567 --> 00:40:18.526
Twenty-odd people, all squeezed together.

00:40:18.609 --> 00:40:20.526
The conditions were rather difficult

00:40:20.609 --> 00:40:22.734
with so many people.

00:40:23.651 --> 00:40:25.776
If you can imagine, this huge family

00:40:25.859 --> 00:40:27.435
was like the one in

00:40:27.459 --> 00:40:30.359
'Dream of the Red Chamber'

00:40:31.859 --> 00:40:34.276
Every daughter-in-law of
my father's generation

00:40:34.359 --> 00:40:35.526
all my aunts

00:40:35.609 --> 00:40:37.901
including my mother

00:40:37.984 --> 00:40:40.692
took turns to cook for everyone.

00:40:40.776 --> 00:40:43.484
Each had to do it for a whole week.

00:40:43.734 --> 00:40:46.097
Whoever was

00:40:46.121 --> 00:40:48.484
handling the ladle

00:40:48.817 --> 00:40:50.127
she'd be sure to serve her own kids

00:40:50.151 --> 00:40:53.651
the thickest congee.

00:40:54.151 --> 00:40:57.026
The rest of us made do with what was left.

00:40:58.484 --> 00:41:00.442
All from the one wok.

00:41:00.526 --> 00:41:02.192
Everyone served themselves.

00:41:02.442 --> 00:41:05.567
In the end, people tried to hide the ladle.

00:41:05.651 --> 00:41:06.901
Why was that?

00:41:06.984 --> 00:41:09.567
Because the ladle could reach the bottom.

00:41:09.651 --> 00:41:11.192
Where the best stuff was.

00:41:11.276 --> 00:41:13.776
The burnt rice at the bottom tasted better.

00:41:13.859 --> 00:41:15.942
Everyone tried to get to it first.

00:41:17.067 --> 00:41:19.609
Anyhow, times were pretty hard.

00:41:19.692 --> 00:41:21.401
But we didn't split up.

00:41:21.484 --> 00:41:22.826
Because my 'po' was still there,

00:41:22.850 --> 00:41:24.192
she held the family together.

00:41:24.276 --> 00:41:27.234
Until 1958.

00:41:28.067 --> 00:41:30.276
That was when mandatory
communal kitchens came in.

00:41:30.359 --> 00:41:32.820
People couldn't get along,

00:41:32.844 --> 00:41:34.609
and the family split up.

00:42:22.842 --> 00:42:25.009
The year I started junior high

00:42:25.092 --> 00:42:27.051
the Cultural Revolution began.

00:42:27.926 --> 00:42:31.009
Actually,
the schools were already closed by 1966.

00:42:31.092 --> 00:42:34.171
We'd just reached

00:42:34.195 --> 00:42:35.342
mathematical simple equations.

00:42:53.759 --> 00:42:56.051
My father was a teacher

00:42:56.134 --> 00:42:58.009
urban and rural separate

00:42:58.592 --> 00:43:00.134
urban and rural separate.

00:43:00.842 --> 00:43:03.092
My mother was a housewife.

00:43:03.384 --> 00:43:05.801
If a mother was classed
as a 'rural citizen'

00:43:07.009 --> 00:43:10.384
her children were
also classed as 'rural'

00:43:11.467 --> 00:43:13.176
There was 'household registration'

00:43:13.551 --> 00:43:15.676
And that was linked to food coupons.

00:43:16.759 --> 00:43:18.676
Without that piece of paper

00:43:18.759 --> 00:43:20.342
you couldn't even stay in a hotel.

00:43:20.884 --> 00:43:22.092
Without food coupons

00:43:22.176 --> 00:43:23.884
you had nothing to eat.

00:43:35.842 --> 00:43:37.176
"There's an old saying..."

00:43:37.259 --> 00:43:38.592
"The place you're born"

00:43:38.676 --> 00:43:41.509
"is the place that half-buries you."

00:43:41.926 --> 00:43:43.935
"That's why 'birthplace'

00:43:43.959 --> 00:43:45.967
is also called 'blood land'."

00:43:47.717 --> 00:43:49.681
That's why 'birthplace'

00:43:49.705 --> 00:43:52.217
is also called 'blood land'

00:43:52.676 --> 00:43:54.801
Jia Pingwa.

00:43:55.176 --> 00:43:58.426
The college my father went to

00:43:58.509 --> 00:43:59.971
was later renamed

00:43:59.995 --> 00:44:02.592
'Shaanxi Normal University'

00:44:03.384 --> 00:44:05.064
He studied there, and when he graduated

00:44:05.134 --> 00:44:07.384
he was assigned to a suburb of Xi'an.

00:44:07.467 --> 00:44:09.592
A teaching post in
Tianjiawan Primary School.

00:44:09.884 --> 00:44:11.568
The Chinese civil war was coming to an end.

00:44:11.592 --> 00:44:12.882
When it ended in 1949,

00:44:12.906 --> 00:44:14.592
the Communist Party took power.

00:44:14.676 --> 00:44:17.301
Xi'an had been ruled by Hu Zongnan.

00:44:17.384 --> 00:44:20.384
He was a KMT general,
and he was in charge here.

00:44:20.676 --> 00:44:22.467
He was known as 'King of the North-west'

00:44:22.551 --> 00:44:25.509
He had both political and military power.

00:44:25.592 --> 00:44:26.967
Not long before the KMT retreat

00:44:27.051 --> 00:44:29.259
he convened a big meeting in Xi'an.

00:44:29.592 --> 00:44:31.027
Later, during the Cultural Revolution

00:44:31.051 --> 00:44:32.676
this meeting was reclassified

00:44:32.759 --> 00:44:35.176
as training for the KMT secret service.

00:44:35.426 --> 00:44:37.509
And whoever had been at the meeting

00:44:37.592 --> 00:44:39.467
was for the 'secret service training'...

00:44:39.551 --> 00:44:43.217
Well, my father and five
or six other teachers

00:44:43.842 --> 00:44:47.467
came by foot from
Tianjiawan to attend it.

00:44:47.801 --> 00:44:49.342
About halfway there

00:44:49.426 --> 00:44:52.551
my father sneaked away with another guy.

00:44:52.634 --> 00:44:56.092
They went to Yisu Theater
to see Shaanxi opera.

00:44:56.176 --> 00:44:58.551
So they never went to the meeting at all.

00:44:58.634 --> 00:44:59.818
But his name was on the attendance list!

00:44:59.842 --> 00:45:02.509
They checked the record
during the Cultural Revolution.

00:45:02.592 --> 00:45:04.051
And there was his name!

00:45:04.134 --> 00:45:06.592
The record said he was there.

00:45:06.676 --> 00:45:08.509
The matter

00:45:08.592 --> 00:45:10.342
was reported to Xi'an.

00:45:10.426 --> 00:45:11.789
Since the meeting
was now classed as

00:45:11.813 --> 00:45:13.176
'secret service training'

00:45:13.259 --> 00:45:17.051
my father was accused of
being a KMT secret agent.

00:45:17.134 --> 00:45:19.801
He was fired from his job.

00:45:20.301 --> 00:45:24.009
Sent back to his
birthplace to do forced labor.

00:45:24.467 --> 00:45:27.467
We had to move back too.

00:45:28.051 --> 00:45:29.384
When he arrived

00:45:29.467 --> 00:45:31.415
under armed

00:45:31.439 --> 00:45:34.634
military escort

00:45:34.717 --> 00:45:36.634
I was working on the land.

00:45:37.217 --> 00:45:40.509
I was doing some farm job
on the mountain and I saw him.

00:45:40.759 --> 00:45:43.759
He was walking along the road.

00:45:44.051 --> 00:45:45.551
With two armed escorts behind him.

00:45:45.926 --> 00:45:47.967
The moment I saw him,
I rushed back home.

00:45:48.051 --> 00:45:50.467
He'd already been reassigned

00:45:50.926 --> 00:45:54.009
to the local production brigade.

00:45:54.092 --> 00:45:57.217
At home, Father was lying on the kang bed.

00:45:57.676 --> 00:45:59.134
When he saw me, he cried.

00:45:59.217 --> 00:46:02.092
That was the only time I saw him cry.

00:46:02.176 --> 00:46:04.176
Because, in his mind, my father

00:46:04.259 --> 00:46:06.842
always thought of me as a scholar.

00:46:06.926 --> 00:46:09.676
He thought I'd go to high school.

00:46:09.759 --> 00:46:11.176
And then to college.

00:46:11.676 --> 00:46:13.476
But now I'd been sent
back to the village too

00:46:13.551 --> 00:46:14.860
I probably wouldn't get to university

00:46:14.884 --> 00:46:16.485
since he was a 'counter-revolutionary'

00:46:16.509 --> 00:46:18.676
He thought my future was hopeless.

00:46:19.592 --> 00:46:21.092
My brother, three years younger

00:46:21.176 --> 00:46:22.676
was as tall as me.

00:46:22.759 --> 00:46:24.051
We two brothers

00:46:24.134 --> 00:46:26.967
started working in
the production brigade.

00:46:27.051 --> 00:46:28.884
One day's work earned three points.

00:46:29.551 --> 00:46:31.217
And one point, at that time

00:46:31.301 --> 00:46:33.217
was worth twenty cents.

00:46:34.759 --> 00:46:38.301
The normal rate for
an adult male was ten points per day.

00:46:38.384 --> 00:46:39.634
Worth twenty cents per point.

00:46:39.717 --> 00:46:42.634
For women, it was eight points per day.

00:46:43.967 --> 00:46:46.259
That made one Chinese
dollar and sixty cents

00:46:46.342 --> 00:46:47.527
I could only earn three points.

00:46:47.551 --> 00:46:49.592
That amounted to very little money.

00:46:49.676 --> 00:46:51.467
Sixty cents per day.

00:46:51.759 --> 00:46:52.884
Just sixty cents.

00:46:52.967 --> 00:46:54.051
Back then, the villages

00:46:54.134 --> 00:46:57.039
were preparing for

00:46:57.063 --> 00:46:58.509
war with the Soviet Union.

00:47:00.301 --> 00:47:02.134
All of the young people

00:47:02.217 --> 00:47:05.801
had to register in militias.

00:47:06.301 --> 00:47:09.342
Every day there was
training to prepare for war

00:47:09.426 --> 00:47:11.610
until my father was named as a
'counter-revolutionary'

00:47:11.634 --> 00:47:13.301
And sent back to his birthplace.

00:47:13.717 --> 00:47:15.884
That disqualified me
from being in the militia.

00:47:16.634 --> 00:47:18.009
They threw me out.

00:47:18.676 --> 00:47:20.717
When they recruited, I applied to rejoin.

00:47:20.801 --> 00:47:24.634
But I could never pass
the background checks

00:47:24.717 --> 00:47:26.634
I remember having the physical examination.

00:47:26.717 --> 00:47:27.757
Someone checked your ears.

00:47:27.801 --> 00:47:29.634
This part of you and that

00:47:29.884 --> 00:47:31.723
I passed those tests,

00:47:31.747 --> 00:47:33.092
but never made
it on to the list.

00:47:33.426 --> 00:47:35.884
Later, they started
hiring geological workers

00:47:35.967 --> 00:47:37.342
I tried that too.

00:47:38.259 --> 00:47:40.717
They accepted my application,

00:47:41.467 --> 00:47:44.176
but disqualified me
after two or three rounds of checks.

00:47:44.259 --> 00:47:47.592
Still later,
they needed road maintenance workers.

00:47:48.092 --> 00:47:51.092
We didn't have asphalt roads then.

00:47:51.176 --> 00:47:52.634
They were still sand roads.

00:47:53.134 --> 00:47:55.467
They always needed maintenance workers

00:47:55.717 --> 00:47:58.009
to shovel sand from
the roadside ditches,

00:47:58.092 --> 00:48:00.176
and flatten the roads.

00:48:00.551 --> 00:48:01.842
That was the job.

00:48:02.134 --> 00:48:04.801
Very often the work was in

00:48:05.801 --> 00:48:07.801
quite remote areas.

00:48:08.676 --> 00:48:11.009
I applied, and the checks took forever.

00:48:11.884 --> 00:48:14.134
In the end, I was rejected again.

00:48:14.967 --> 00:48:18.801
Then, in 1969,
there was mass mobilization

00:48:19.051 --> 00:48:20.896
in water conservation

00:48:20.920 --> 00:48:23.384
for agriculture.

00:48:23.467 --> 00:48:26.092
At the time, Chairman Mao said...

00:48:26.176 --> 00:48:29.134
"Water conservation is
the lifeblood of agriculture."

00:48:29.217 --> 00:48:30.330
Everywhere began

00:48:30.354 --> 00:48:33.717
building reservoirs.

00:48:34.092 --> 00:48:37.051
Our county planned three of them.

00:48:37.759 --> 00:48:39.842
And one was in my home village.

00:48:40.342 --> 00:48:42.551
One rainy day I put on a back-pack

00:48:42.634 --> 00:48:45.301
with a bag of corn grits in it.

00:48:45.551 --> 00:48:47.592
Even though it was a construction job

00:48:47.676 --> 00:48:49.967
you had bring your own grains
for communal cooking

00:48:50.051 --> 00:48:52.717
I rushed to be first in line for the job

00:48:52.801 --> 00:48:55.676
I paced in front of the
construction office

00:48:55.759 --> 00:48:57.884
hoping someone would notice me.

00:48:57.967 --> 00:49:01.009
As I hoped, the commander greeted me

00:49:01.092 --> 00:49:02.717
I said "I'm here to work".

00:49:02.801 --> 00:49:05.217
He knew I had good handwriting.

00:49:05.301 --> 00:49:06.527
Then he asked if I'd be willing

00:49:06.551 --> 00:49:09.801
to work for the office

00:49:09.884 --> 00:49:12.051
I was more than happy to.

00:49:12.342 --> 00:49:14.047
So he gave me a bucket

00:49:14.071 --> 00:49:16.634
of paint and a broad brush.

00:49:16.717 --> 00:49:19.259
And that afternoon he assigned me

00:49:19.342 --> 00:49:23.301
to paint slogans on the rocks

00:49:23.384 --> 00:49:26.259
I climbed up the rocks

00:49:26.634 --> 00:49:29.592
tied a rope around my waist,

00:49:29.676 --> 00:49:31.551
and hung down to paint the slogans.

00:49:31.634 --> 00:49:33.051
Everyone was pleased.

00:49:33.342 --> 00:49:34.551
That's how

00:49:34.634 --> 00:49:36.926
I came to work for
the construction office.

00:49:37.009 --> 00:49:39.130
That was a good

00:49:39.154 --> 00:49:41.009
preparation for college.

00:49:41.092 --> 00:49:42.178
Soon after that,

00:49:42.202 --> 00:49:43.967
universities started
enrolling students

00:49:44.051 --> 00:49:45.967
based on recommendations.

00:49:46.051 --> 00:49:47.872
The ones they took were called

00:49:47.896 --> 00:49:49.717
'worker-peasant-soldier
students'

00:49:50.134 --> 00:49:53.384
They were the children of workers,
peasants and soldiers.

00:49:53.467 --> 00:49:55.842
Hence the name.

00:49:55.926 --> 00:49:58.676
My father's case had
not yet been re-examined.

00:49:58.759 --> 00:50:00.009
But there were signs

00:50:00.092 --> 00:50:01.967
that he might be rehabilitated.

00:50:02.842 --> 00:50:06.092
Since I was classed
as a 'reformable child'

00:50:06.384 --> 00:50:07.551
I was allowed to apply

00:50:09.176 --> 00:50:11.384
I've been in Xi'an ever since.

00:50:31.717 --> 00:50:33.926
"Cast a cold eye

00:50:33.950 --> 00:50:36.842
on the world."

00:51:06.226 --> 00:51:08.226
I studied arts at Northwest University,

00:51:08.309 --> 00:51:11.934
and published twenty-two pieces
during my college years.

00:51:14.517 --> 00:51:15.562
In September 1975 I was assigned

00:51:15.586 --> 00:51:18.559
to Shaanxi People's
Publishing House.

00:51:18.642 --> 00:51:21.226
Strictly speaking, the
Cultural Revolution wasn't over.

00:51:21.476 --> 00:51:24.184
There was barely any market for literature.

00:51:25.351 --> 00:51:26.450
Given the times,

00:51:26.474 --> 00:51:28.017
I tried writing
revolutionary stories.

00:51:28.101 --> 00:51:30.351
Essays, novels.

00:51:31.309 --> 00:51:33.767
Even traditional songs.

00:51:34.309 --> 00:51:35.309
And poems

00:51:35.392 --> 00:51:37.142
I wrote everything.

00:51:51.726 --> 00:51:53.351
When we reached the 1980s

00:51:53.434 --> 00:51:56.934
Chinese writing in general
came to be thought of

00:51:57.309 --> 00:51:59.684
as literature of the new era.

00:51:59.934 --> 00:52:02.559
That marked the start
of real modern literature.

00:52:02.642 --> 00:52:03.642
Why?

00:52:03.726 --> 00:52:06.517
Well, there was foreign literature.

00:52:06.892 --> 00:52:08.642
Modern work.

00:52:08.892 --> 00:52:11.101
It began appearing in Chinese translations.

00:52:11.809 --> 00:52:14.724
The first I learned about

00:52:14.748 --> 00:52:16.017
the west was from the arts.

00:52:16.101 --> 00:52:19.434
From introductions to foreign artworks

00:52:19.892 --> 00:52:21.517
Van Gogh

00:52:21.601 --> 00:52:23.976
Paul Gauguin, Pablo Picasso.

00:52:25.017 --> 00:52:26.020
Cubism, Fauvism,

00:52:26.044 --> 00:52:27.809
Impressionism and Structuralism.

00:52:28.851 --> 00:52:31.892
There were books

00:52:32.851 --> 00:52:37.101
about all these movements.

00:52:37.559 --> 00:52:40.190
I thought I could become

00:52:40.214 --> 00:52:41.934
an artist by learning this.

00:52:44.809 --> 00:52:48.476
But when it came to my writing,
it was hard

00:52:48.559 --> 00:52:50.017
I didn't know what path to take.

00:52:50.101 --> 00:52:52.434
Because at that time, you either

00:52:52.517 --> 00:52:55.309
imitated western models, or...

00:52:55.392 --> 00:52:57.226
Whenever something new comes along

00:52:57.601 --> 00:53:00.767
people tend to absorb it by imitating it.

00:53:01.017 --> 00:53:03.380
What they're really trying to see

00:53:03.404 --> 00:53:04.976
is what's the boundary.

00:53:05.392 --> 00:53:07.880
Is there a breakthrough?

00:53:07.904 --> 00:53:09.892
Can it be improved?

00:53:10.642 --> 00:53:13.851
But I was facing a different blockage

00:53:14.142 --> 00:53:16.193
I didn't know what

00:53:16.217 --> 00:53:18.267
I wanted to write

00:53:18.351 --> 00:53:21.559
I was young, impulsive and curious

00:53:21.642 --> 00:53:23.242
I wanted to write down everything I saw.

00:53:23.684 --> 00:53:25.267
Looking back at that time

00:53:25.351 --> 00:53:27.101
I called myself a roving bandit.

00:53:27.184 --> 00:53:29.101
My work had no roots

00:53:29.184 --> 00:53:32.934
I just wrote whatever my gun was aimed at

00:53:33.017 --> 00:53:34.237
I was sure it wouldn't work,

00:53:34.261 --> 00:53:35.642
I feared the worst.

00:53:35.934 --> 00:53:38.101
Then, sometime between 1982 and 1984

00:53:38.392 --> 00:53:40.976
that was when it struck me.

00:53:41.434 --> 00:53:45.392
I should go back home.

00:53:45.476 --> 00:53:48.526
Back to my

00:53:48.550 --> 00:53:49.559
birthplace, Shangluo.

00:53:50.101 --> 00:53:51.688
So off I went, and

00:53:51.712 --> 00:53:54.392
found someone I knew.

00:53:54.476 --> 00:53:56.184
Someone who could take me around.

00:53:56.267 --> 00:53:57.742
There was no public transport,

00:53:57.766 --> 00:53:58.976
so it was hard to get around.

00:53:59.059 --> 00:54:00.517
We only had bicycles,

00:54:00.601 --> 00:54:02.809
and cycled back to base every night.

00:54:02.892 --> 00:54:04.782
Every morning, at random,

00:54:04.806 --> 00:54:06.934
we'd visit nearby villages.

00:54:07.017 --> 00:54:09.559
It was delightful.

00:54:09.934 --> 00:54:12.226
There was nothing to worry about
in the countryside.

00:54:12.476 --> 00:54:13.976
Nobody to supervise you.

00:54:14.059 --> 00:54:17.517
Just two or three of us, riding our bikes.

00:54:17.601 --> 00:54:18.797
It felt free!

00:54:18.821 --> 00:54:21.226
We ate wherever we went.

00:54:21.559 --> 00:54:22.768
When we were hungry,

00:54:22.792 --> 00:54:24.476
we simply stopped
to buy some food.

00:54:24.559 --> 00:54:27.017
Or paid local people
to cook for us in their homes.

00:54:27.101 --> 00:54:28.559
In the evenings

00:54:28.934 --> 00:54:31.517
we slept wherever we could.

00:54:31.892 --> 00:54:34.392
But that was when my body failed me

00:54:34.476 --> 00:54:36.309
I got sick

00:54:36.392 --> 00:54:38.612
I was in the worst pain

00:54:38.636 --> 00:54:41.601
I've ever experienced.

00:54:42.142 --> 00:54:43.892
Those times brought me great joy...

00:54:43.976 --> 00:54:45.726
But also the worst pain.

00:54:51.142 --> 00:54:52.402
I'd caught a cold and

00:54:52.426 --> 00:54:54.434
been to a clinic for a shot.

00:54:54.517 --> 00:54:56.796
The clinic had

00:54:56.820 --> 00:55:00.684
an alcohol stove.

00:55:00.767 --> 00:55:02.726
Lots of needles in the boiling water.

00:55:02.809 --> 00:55:05.392
They used boiling water
to sterilize back then.

00:55:05.476 --> 00:55:07.684
Everyone who came with a cold

00:55:07.767 --> 00:55:10.559
would get a shot with a new needle.

00:55:10.642 --> 00:55:12.559
They gave me the injection.

00:55:12.642 --> 00:55:14.767
And it made me very ill

00:55:14.851 --> 00:55:16.642
I was infected with.

00:55:17.101 --> 00:55:18.976
Hepatitis B

00:55:19.059 --> 00:55:20.563
I found only later that

00:55:20.587 --> 00:55:23.101
there'd been a local
hepatitis epidemic

00:55:23.976 --> 00:55:26.267
I've been treated for it ever since.

00:55:26.517 --> 00:55:28.809
It took fifteen years to recover.

00:55:29.226 --> 00:55:32.101
During that period, I wrote a lot.

00:55:33.476 --> 00:55:35.934
Stories, novellas, essays...

00:55:36.351 --> 00:55:39.976
The main essays were the
'Three Records of Shangzhou'

00:55:40.267 --> 00:55:42.976
There were so many short pieces.

00:55:43.059 --> 00:55:46.476
The novellas included
'Chicken Coop Valley'

00:55:46.559 --> 00:55:48.476
After that...

00:55:48.767 --> 00:55:51.226
In 1985, 1986...

00:55:51.309 --> 00:55:53.101
I wrote the novel.

00:55:53.726 --> 00:55:55.767
'Turbulence'

00:55:56.517 --> 00:55:57.934
Since that time

00:55:58.226 --> 00:56:00.767
I've slowly established myself here.

00:56:01.309 --> 00:56:03.809
From Shangluo...

00:56:04.392 --> 00:56:06.642
From the hometown I live in,
I'm looking at China.

00:56:06.726 --> 00:56:09.392
Looking at the whole world.

00:57:42.934 --> 00:57:45.153
I was born on 3 April 1960,

00:57:45.177 --> 00:57:48.184
in Hangzhou.

00:57:49.642 --> 00:57:52.976
My father worked in the provincial center
for disease control.

00:57:53.059 --> 00:57:55.684
And my mother worked in Zhejiang Hospital.

00:57:57.101 --> 00:57:59.142
When I was three years old

00:57:59.226 --> 00:58:02.267
my father was assigned...

00:58:03.142 --> 00:58:05.559
There was a severe outbreak of

00:58:05.583 --> 00:58:07.434
snail fever
(schistosomiasis) in Zhejiang.

00:58:07.517 --> 00:58:10.226
My father was transferred to Xiamen.

00:58:10.309 --> 00:58:11.559
And he ended up in Haiyan.

00:58:11.642 --> 00:58:14.267
They were establishing
a new hospital in Haiyan.

00:58:14.351 --> 00:58:15.601
So he stayed there.

00:58:15.934 --> 00:58:17.767
He wrote to my mother

00:58:18.476 --> 00:58:20.434
saying that things were good in Haiyan.

00:58:20.892 --> 00:58:24.351
So she took my brother and me to Haiyan.

00:58:24.601 --> 00:58:27.351
Later she told me

00:58:28.309 --> 00:58:30.429
there weren't even any bicycles
in Haiyan back then.

00:58:30.767 --> 00:58:32.755
We lived in

00:58:32.779 --> 00:58:34.767
the workplace.

00:58:34.851 --> 00:58:36.517
Right opposite the surgery

00:58:37.059 --> 00:58:38.309
was the morgue.

00:58:38.392 --> 00:58:39.184
The surgery faced it.

00:58:39.267 --> 00:58:40.976
It was just a small bungalow.

00:58:41.059 --> 00:58:44.226
My brother and I came and went freely.

00:58:44.476 --> 00:58:47.351
The operating theater
was inside the bungalow

00:58:47.434 --> 00:58:48.514
while my father
performed surgeries

00:58:48.538 --> 00:58:49.785
and we could even go in there.

00:58:49.809 --> 00:58:52.434
Many times, after midnight

00:58:52.976 --> 00:58:55.601
we'd hear crying.

00:58:56.101 --> 00:58:59.309
The cries of grief would wake us up.

00:58:59.684 --> 00:59:03.059
Haiyan had particularly hot summers.

00:59:03.142 --> 00:59:05.309
When I woke up from a nap.

00:59:06.934 --> 00:59:08.726
I saw that my sweat

00:59:08.809 --> 00:59:11.351
left the outline of my body on the mat.

00:59:13.226 --> 00:59:16.642
Homes didn't have
their own bathrooms then.

00:59:16.726 --> 00:59:19.226
We used the public toilet.

00:59:19.309 --> 00:59:21.184
That was next door to the morgue.

00:59:21.267 --> 00:59:22.892
There was a concrete slab in the morgue.

00:59:22.976 --> 00:59:23.976
About this wide.

00:59:24.934 --> 00:59:26.094
It was kept very, very clean.

00:59:26.142 --> 00:59:28.434
In my mind, I feel in the world...

00:59:28.517 --> 00:59:31.476
When I think about the
cleanest place there is

00:59:31.767 --> 00:59:35.130
it's not the lobby

00:59:35.154 --> 00:59:36.267
of a five-star hotel,

00:59:36.351 --> 00:59:38.642
but that morgue I passed by as a child.

00:59:39.142 --> 00:59:40.642
One time I took a nap there.

00:59:40.726 --> 00:59:42.167
At least, I tried to...

00:59:42.191 --> 00:59:43.434
It was nice and cool.

00:59:43.517 --> 00:59:45.226
When we were little

00:59:45.309 --> 00:59:46.869
people thought that was unbelievable.

00:59:46.934 --> 00:59:50.517
But my generation took it in its stride.

00:59:50.601 --> 00:59:52.934
We don't believe in ghosts.

00:59:53.017 --> 00:59:54.142
We're all atheists.

00:59:54.809 --> 00:59:55.956
As an adult,

00:59:55.980 --> 00:59:58.517
I came across a poem
by Heinrich Heine...

00:59:58.851 --> 01:00:00.684
"Our death is in the cool of the night."

01:00:00.767 --> 01:00:02.726
When I read that, I thought...

01:00:02.809 --> 01:00:04.559
That's me, in the morgue!

01:00:04.642 --> 01:00:07.142
That was exactly how I felt.

01:00:10.892 --> 01:00:12.559
In primary school.

01:00:12.976 --> 01:00:14.392
We had a classmate

01:00:14.476 --> 01:00:16.017
whose father

01:00:17.309 --> 01:00:18.476
he killed himself.

01:00:18.559 --> 01:00:20.392
He jumped down a well.

01:00:20.642 --> 01:00:23.434
Southern wells are about this wide.

01:00:23.934 --> 01:00:26.547
If you jump head-first,

01:00:26.571 --> 01:00:28.559
there's no turning back.

01:00:28.642 --> 01:00:30.017
The well is too narrow.

01:00:30.101 --> 01:00:31.136
In a northern well,

01:00:31.160 --> 01:00:32.642
you could still hope
to change your mind.

01:00:32.726 --> 01:00:34.351
You could try lifting your head.

01:00:34.434 --> 01:00:37.142
Roll forwards and paddle in the water.

01:00:37.226 --> 01:00:38.559
Not possible in a southern well.

01:00:38.642 --> 01:00:40.517
So, just like that, he killed himself.

01:00:40.601 --> 01:00:41.934
We didn't know.

01:00:42.017 --> 01:00:43.787
Our classmate showed

01:00:43.811 --> 01:00:46.392
up with his satchel.

01:00:46.642 --> 01:00:47.964
But he was crying,

01:00:47.988 --> 01:00:49.976
he stood in a corner and cried

01:00:52.517 --> 01:00:54.058
did we realize that

01:00:54.082 --> 01:00:56.226
his father killed
himself the night before.

01:00:56.767 --> 01:00:58.133
So we asked our classmate

01:00:58.157 --> 01:01:00.809
to play ping pong with us.

01:01:01.101 --> 01:01:03.809
We asked him twice and he finally came.

01:01:03.892 --> 01:01:06.726
He was still crying
while he waited for his turn.

01:01:06.809 --> 01:01:09.392
And when he played...

01:01:09.476 --> 01:01:11.267
And even when he won, he was still crying.

01:01:11.351 --> 01:01:13.184
When he won again, he smiled.

01:01:15.434 --> 01:01:16.976
In our high-school years

01:01:17.309 --> 01:01:19.809
we managed to read some novels.

01:01:19.892 --> 01:01:23.184
Mostly books

01:01:23.517 --> 01:01:27.267
which had survived
the Cultural Revolution.

01:01:27.351 --> 01:01:28.910
Books which hadn't been
burned or confiscated.

01:01:28.934 --> 01:01:31.351
They'd been hidden away.

01:01:31.434 --> 01:01:33.101
Passed through many hands.

01:01:33.184 --> 01:01:34.934
By the time they reached me

01:01:35.017 --> 01:01:37.767
they'd lost pages at the front and back.

01:01:37.851 --> 01:01:40.017
You'd have no idea how the story started,

01:01:40.101 --> 01:01:42.434
or how it ended.

01:01:44.101 --> 01:01:47.851
Didn't know the title, or the author.

01:01:48.976 --> 01:01:51.214
I soon realized that

01:01:51.238 --> 01:01:53.476
the title and
author didn't matter.

01:01:53.934 --> 01:01:56.726
And I could manage without
knowing how the story started.

01:01:56.809 --> 01:02:00.059
But it was very frustrating
to not have the ending.

01:02:00.142 --> 01:02:01.351
You got through it.

01:02:01.434 --> 01:02:03.336
But the next book
that came along

01:02:03.360 --> 01:02:04.517
was in the same condition.

01:02:04.601 --> 01:02:07.101
And by the time another book
came into your hands

01:02:07.184 --> 01:02:10.101
a month or two had passed.

01:02:11.851 --> 01:02:13.684
I was so frustrated

01:02:13.767 --> 01:02:15.767
that I was haunted by
those missing endings

01:02:15.851 --> 01:02:18.309
I figured out what to do.

01:02:18.392 --> 01:02:19.910
As the line in the 'Internationale' goes.

01:02:19.934 --> 01:02:22.017
"There are no supreme saviors".

01:02:22.101 --> 01:02:23.976
We need to save ourselves.

01:02:24.059 --> 01:02:27.351
Since I lay awake at night,
thinking about endings

01:02:27.434 --> 01:02:29.934
I came up with my own ending.

01:02:30.017 --> 01:02:31.351
And if it wasn't good enough

01:02:31.434 --> 01:02:33.517
I'd think of another one.

01:02:37.892 --> 01:02:40.517
At that time, boys and girls
didn't really speak to each other.

01:02:41.101 --> 01:02:43.767
It sometimes happened
that girls were bolder than boys.

01:02:44.309 --> 01:02:47.226
A girl classmate once handed me a note.

01:02:48.101 --> 01:02:51.309
In our school, she was given a job

01:02:51.392 --> 01:02:54.809
as a school librarian.

01:02:56.476 --> 01:03:00.101
The note she gave me was an accusation

01:03:00.476 --> 01:03:03.059
I'd recently returned a book.

01:03:03.142 --> 01:03:05.142
And apparently I'd damaged it.

01:03:05.226 --> 01:03:07.892
The pages were slightly torn.

01:03:07.976 --> 01:03:09.976
But she accepted it anyway.

01:03:11.476 --> 01:03:13.642
Her note made a very
strong impression on me.

01:03:13.726 --> 01:03:16.559
It was the first time
a girl ever handed me a note,

01:03:16.642 --> 01:03:17.976
and it was to criticize me.

01:03:18.059 --> 01:03:20.684
The note ended by
saying she'd let it go this time.

01:03:20.767 --> 01:03:23.642
But if it happened again,
she wouldn't let me return the book

01:03:23.726 --> 01:03:26.101
I'd have to pay for the damage,
something like that

01:03:26.184 --> 01:03:28.559
I got her real meaning right away.

01:03:28.642 --> 01:03:30.852
Back then,

01:03:30.876 --> 01:03:31.951
nobody would write
"I like you" in a note.

01:03:32.034 --> 01:03:32.809
Nothing of that sort.

01:03:32.892 --> 01:03:36.767
They'd use indirect
or oblique expressions instead.

01:03:36.851 --> 01:03:40.027
Expressing affection
had to be implied,

01:03:40.051 --> 01:03:41.101
not explicit.

01:03:43.226 --> 01:03:46.601
It seemed like
a common-or-garden note.

01:03:46.976 --> 01:03:49.726
You have no idea
how complicated this all was.

01:03:50.059 --> 01:03:52.642
The girl folded...

01:03:52.726 --> 01:03:55.351
She'd folded the paper down
to a tiny square.

01:03:56.059 --> 01:03:58.434
It probably took her only
a minute or two to do it.

01:03:58.517 --> 01:04:00.397
But it would take me twenty
minutes to unfold it

01:04:00.476 --> 01:04:02.434
I was scared of tearing it.

01:04:02.517 --> 01:04:04.118
It might have contained
something beautiful!

01:04:04.142 --> 01:04:05.517
And I might have lost it!

01:04:05.601 --> 01:04:07.142
So I was very careful

01:04:07.226 --> 01:04:08.351
I worked hard to unfold it.

01:04:08.434 --> 01:04:10.851
And it turned out to be a criticism!

01:04:10.934 --> 01:04:12.684
But I got her real point.

01:04:12.767 --> 01:04:14.476
In the following days

01:04:14.559 --> 01:04:16.309
I noticed she kept looking at me.

01:04:16.392 --> 01:04:18.309
It made me a bit nervous.

01:04:18.392 --> 01:04:20.934
Eventually I decided to tell her

01:04:23.476 --> 01:04:26.101
that I was interested in her too.

01:04:26.184 --> 01:04:27.726
But I suddenly realized

01:04:27.809 --> 01:04:30.226
that she'd lost interest in me.

01:04:39.601 --> 01:04:41.392
Not long after that

01:04:41.476 --> 01:04:44.267
we went to a place called Ganpu.

01:04:44.351 --> 01:04:45.868
We were in the middle
of some military training

01:04:45.892 --> 01:04:48.309
when we heard
a loudspeaker announcement.

01:04:48.392 --> 01:04:50.351
The Gang of Four had been arrested.

01:04:52.101 --> 01:04:54.517
After that,
college entrance exams started again

01:04:54.767 --> 01:04:56.184
I took the exam in 1977 and failed

01:04:56.267 --> 01:04:57.642
I failed again in 1978.

01:04:57.892 --> 01:04:58.642
So I gave up trying,

01:04:58.726 --> 01:05:00.434
and went to become a dentist.

01:05:05.851 --> 01:05:09.559
In 1977,
the government had already ended

01:05:10.267 --> 01:05:14.017
the 'Learn from Peasants
and Workers' movement.

01:05:14.267 --> 01:05:16.976
Urban students were still stuck
in the countryside...

01:05:19.351 --> 01:05:22.292
But nobody was being sent to

01:05:22.316 --> 01:05:23.392
remote villages any more.

01:05:23.934 --> 01:05:26.017
Some of my classmates
were assigned to factories.

01:05:26.101 --> 01:05:29.017
Some went to work in department stores.

01:05:30.851 --> 01:05:31.902
I ended up in Wuyuan

01:05:31.926 --> 01:05:35.101
County Health Center.

01:05:35.559 --> 01:05:37.392
Maybe it was my fate

01:05:37.851 --> 01:05:39.976
to become a dentist

01:05:40.059 --> 01:05:42.059
I didn't like the work at all.

01:05:42.517 --> 01:05:44.809
All day staring into people's open mouths!

01:05:46.684 --> 01:05:48.559
The worst view in the world.

01:05:48.642 --> 01:05:49.767
Day after day

01:05:49.851 --> 01:05:51.226
I was still young

01:05:51.309 --> 01:05:54.392
I wanted to see the world
and the rest of the country

01:05:54.476 --> 01:05:56.767
I could barely imagine
what the world was like.

01:05:56.851 --> 01:05:58.892
But I wanted to travel and see things.

01:06:00.767 --> 01:06:03.892
The dental hospital had one merit.

01:06:03.976 --> 01:06:06.601
It was bang in the center of the town.

01:06:06.976 --> 01:06:08.671
And my window happened

01:06:08.695 --> 01:06:11.309
to look out on a bridge.

01:06:11.601 --> 01:06:13.601
And the adjoining road.

01:06:15.684 --> 01:06:17.934
Whenever there was no patient to see

01:06:18.017 --> 01:06:19.340
I stood looking

01:06:19.364 --> 01:06:22.142
out of that window.

01:06:22.601 --> 01:06:25.476
I was feeling quite despondent.

01:06:25.559 --> 01:06:28.309
Was my whole life going to be like this?

01:06:29.017 --> 01:06:31.726
I was desperate for a change

01:06:31.809 --> 01:06:35.684
I began notice that people
from the Cultural Bureau

01:06:35.934 --> 01:06:37.934
were always strolling
about on the street.

01:06:40.684 --> 01:06:42.351
The town had a small population.

01:06:42.434 --> 01:06:43.531
Eight thousand people,

01:06:43.555 --> 01:06:45.101
and they all knew each other

01:06:45.392 --> 01:06:47.642
I asked them why they weren't at work.

01:06:47.976 --> 01:06:51.184
And they said strolling
in the streets was their work

01:06:51.267 --> 01:06:53.267
I thought, that's for me!

01:06:55.059 --> 01:06:56.976
I'd love a job like that!

01:06:57.059 --> 01:06:58.468
I asked them how
I could get a job

01:06:58.492 --> 01:07:00.059
in the Cultural Bureau.

01:07:00.476 --> 01:07:01.809
So I started writing fiction.

01:07:02.059 --> 01:07:04.392
To begin with.

01:07:04.934 --> 01:07:06.684
I had no idea how to write

01:07:07.017 --> 01:07:08.537
I couldn't even get punctuation right.

01:07:08.601 --> 01:07:11.142
So I looked for a short
story to learn from.

01:07:11.767 --> 01:07:13.367
I figured out how
to build paragraphs,

01:07:13.391 --> 01:07:14.517
and began writing.

01:07:15.309 --> 01:07:16.184
I had big ideas

01:07:16.267 --> 01:07:18.684
I didn't know if my story
was any good or not.

01:07:18.767 --> 01:07:21.559
But I sent it off to 'People's
Literature' and 'Harvest' magazine.

01:07:21.642 --> 01:07:22.730
When they rejected it,

01:07:22.754 --> 01:07:24.176
I tried less prestigious places.

01:07:24.259 --> 01:07:26.179
Such as 'Beijing Literature'
and 'Shanghai Literature'

01:07:26.226 --> 01:07:29.101
And if that didn't work either.

01:07:29.601 --> 01:07:31.118
I'd try sending it to
random magazines

01:07:31.142 --> 01:07:34.017
in places like Lأ¼liang.

01:07:34.392 --> 01:07:36.184
The postman...

01:07:37.559 --> 01:07:38.601
Every time...

01:07:39.601 --> 01:07:41.851
He didn't knock to deliver the mail.

01:07:41.934 --> 01:07:45.101
He just threw my rejection
letters over the fance.

01:07:45.184 --> 01:07:46.517
Every time we heard one land

01:07:46.601 --> 01:07:49.017
my father said
"Another rejection letter".

01:07:49.684 --> 01:07:51.101
I was determined.

01:07:51.184 --> 01:07:52.184
Being rejected

01:07:52.226 --> 01:07:53.517
would depress me a bit.

01:07:53.851 --> 01:07:56.892
But I mainly wanted to
see who'd rejected it,

01:07:56.976 --> 01:07:59.476
so that I could aim
a bit lower next time.

01:08:00.267 --> 01:08:05.476
In November of 1983

01:08:06.476 --> 01:08:09.184
very late in the evening.

01:08:09.934 --> 01:08:11.726
I received a long-distance call.

01:08:14.809 --> 01:08:17.226
This was before we got direct dialling.

01:08:17.309 --> 01:08:18.552
Long-distance calls
had to be connected

01:08:18.576 --> 01:08:20.476
through a switchboard.

01:08:20.559 --> 01:08:24.142
We had only one switchboard operator
for the whole of Haiyan.

01:08:24.892 --> 01:08:28.267
The person calling was the chief editor
of 'Beijing Literature'

01:08:28.351 --> 01:08:29.559
The executive chief editor

01:08:29.642 --> 01:08:31.476
he nominal chief editors were Yang Mo,

01:08:31.559 --> 01:08:32.934
and his deputy Wang Meng.

01:08:33.017 --> 01:08:35.366
This was the executive

01:08:35.390 --> 01:08:37.184
chief editor, Zhou Yanru.

01:08:37.642 --> 01:08:39.726
When I picked up the phone

01:08:39.809 --> 01:08:41.642
the operator asked if I was Yu Hua

01:08:41.726 --> 01:08:43.309
I said yes, and was told

01:08:43.392 --> 01:08:45.601
that someone in Beijing was calling me.

01:08:45.684 --> 01:08:47.017
It took another half-hour,

01:08:47.309 --> 01:08:48.976
for the call to be connected.

01:08:49.059 --> 01:08:50.392
It was Zhou Yanru.

01:08:50.476 --> 01:08:52.436
She wanted me to come to Beijing
to edit my story.

01:08:52.601 --> 01:08:54.392
My very first reaction was to wonder

01:08:55.101 --> 01:08:58.142
who would cover my travel
and accommodation costs.

01:08:58.226 --> 01:09:00.226
Zhou Yanru was really
nice, a lovely old lady.

01:09:00.309 --> 01:09:01.934
And an experienced editor.

01:09:02.017 --> 01:09:03.892
She said "Yu Hua..."

01:09:03.976 --> 01:09:04.892
Those were her first words

01:09:04.976 --> 01:09:07.101
"I placed this call this morning."

01:09:07.517 --> 01:09:09.243
"The day's almost over,
and I was about to give up"

01:09:09.267 --> 01:09:10.702
"I thought I wouldn't get through today."

01:09:10.726 --> 01:09:11.846
"So I'd try again tomorrow."

01:09:11.892 --> 01:09:13.767
"Then suddenly I got connected."

01:09:13.851 --> 01:09:16.434
She talked about
the three stories I'd sent them

01:09:16.517 --> 01:09:18.226
I'd already forgotten that I'd sent three.

01:09:18.309 --> 01:09:20.267
"One of them needs some editing."

01:09:20.351 --> 01:09:22.142
She went on...

01:09:24.809 --> 01:09:27.767
"We'll pay for your travel
and accommodation."

01:09:27.851 --> 01:09:30.017
"Plus an allowance."

01:09:31.017 --> 01:09:34.267
I was on the coach next morning.

01:09:34.351 --> 01:09:35.601
To Shanghai

01:09:35.684 --> 01:09:39.517
I bought a standing-class ticket
at the rail station.

01:09:39.976 --> 01:09:41.767
And stood all the way to Beijing.

01:09:42.226 --> 01:09:43.851
There I met my editor

01:09:43.934 --> 01:09:45.851
I met Zhou Yanru.

01:09:45.934 --> 01:09:49.476
She discussed the editing with me.

01:09:53.726 --> 01:09:57.642
"Your stories were very well written."

01:09:57.726 --> 01:09:59.142
"But one of them"

01:09:59.476 --> 01:10:01.309
"has a gloomy ending."

01:10:01.559 --> 01:10:03.035
"In a socialist country like ours"

01:10:03.059 --> 01:10:05.601
"such things cannot happen."

01:10:06.059 --> 01:10:09.226
I asked her "Teacher Zhou,
what do you suggest?"

01:10:11.101 --> 01:10:12.976
She said "You need to change it"

01:10:13.059 --> 01:10:16.517
I asked "Do you mean
giving it a happy ending?"

01:10:16.601 --> 01:10:17.851
She said yes.

01:10:19.142 --> 01:10:21.477
I asked if she'd
still publish it

01:10:21.501 --> 01:10:23.351
with a happy ending.

01:10:24.517 --> 01:10:26.142
You see, I was bargaining.

01:10:26.934 --> 01:10:28.684
That was me being me.

01:10:28.767 --> 01:10:30.743
Even the people at 'Harvest'
heard about this later.

01:10:30.767 --> 01:10:33.434
She said "If it has a happy ending,
we'll publish it"

01:10:33.517 --> 01:10:35.293
I said "If you
agree to publish it,

01:10:35.317 --> 01:10:37.267
I'll make it happy
all the way through!"

01:10:37.351 --> 01:10:38.351
She replied...

01:10:38.434 --> 01:10:40.267
"You young people!"

01:10:42.184 --> 01:10:43.229
"A happy ending will do,

01:10:43.253 --> 01:10:44.601
it doesn't need to start happy."

01:10:44.684 --> 01:10:46.241
"The beginning isn't
very dark anyway,

01:10:46.265 --> 01:10:47.284
not so dark."

01:10:47.367 --> 01:10:48.660
"It's just that the
ending is a bit gloomy."

01:10:48.684 --> 01:10:50.118
"A happy ending will do,
it doesn't need to start happy."

01:10:50.142 --> 01:10:51.642
It took me just one day to change it.

01:10:52.642 --> 01:10:55.726
I remember there was a writer from Henan,
famous back then.

01:10:55.809 --> 01:10:56.642
He was bursting with pride.

01:10:56.726 --> 01:10:59.392
Because he'd just won
a National Short Story Award.

01:10:59.476 --> 01:11:00.934
Zhou Yanru introduced me to him.

01:11:01.017 --> 01:11:02.226
"This young man is Yu Hua."

01:11:02.309 --> 01:11:04.934
"He's only twenty-three."

01:11:06.642 --> 01:11:08.976
"He writes good stories."

01:11:09.684 --> 01:11:11.059
"He's very bright."

01:11:11.142 --> 01:11:12.410
"It took him one day to edit his story."

01:11:12.434 --> 01:11:14.809
"Some writers need half a month..."

01:11:14.892 --> 01:11:16.892
"A whole month or
even two months to do that."

01:11:16.976 --> 01:11:19.101
"But he got it done in one day."

01:11:19.601 --> 01:11:21.726
I was thinking, it's just a happy ending.

01:11:21.809 --> 01:11:23.642
Nothing to it!

01:11:24.642 --> 01:11:26.249
She told me my
stories would appear

01:11:26.273 --> 01:11:29.309
in the first issue of 1984.

01:11:29.809 --> 01:11:33.184
I was ready to head home
once the editing was done.

01:11:33.267 --> 01:11:34.517
But Zhou Yanru was really kind.

01:11:34.601 --> 01:11:37.059
She said "Yu Hua,
it wasn't easy for you to get to Beijing".

01:11:37.142 --> 01:11:39.767
It never crossed my mind that
I'd live in Beijing one day

01:11:39.851 --> 01:11:41.351
I just said "Well..."

01:11:41.434 --> 01:11:42.767
She said "Enjoy yourself a bit".

01:11:42.851 --> 01:11:43.976
So I stayed for a month

01:11:44.351 --> 01:11:45.851
I went everywhere I could.

01:11:46.101 --> 01:11:47.767
Eventually I had to ask her

01:11:47.851 --> 01:11:49.226
where else I could go.

01:11:49.309 --> 01:11:52.059
Every place she mentioned,
I'd already been to.

01:11:52.351 --> 01:11:54.559
In the end she had to say
"Time to go home".

01:11:54.892 --> 01:11:57.476
She calculated the allowance
they were giving me.

01:12:00.017 --> 01:12:03.767
I felt rich for the very first time.

01:12:04.309 --> 01:12:07.267
Since I had to take the train

01:12:08.559 --> 01:12:12.226
they bought me a ticket back to Shanghai.

01:12:14.309 --> 01:12:15.677
Since it was a business trip,

01:12:15.701 --> 01:12:18.142
I was entitled to civil
service treatment.

01:12:18.226 --> 01:12:19.976
That meant I got a sleeper berth.

01:12:20.059 --> 01:12:22.434
But I changed it for standing-class

01:12:22.517 --> 01:12:23.684
I didn't even choose a seat!

01:12:23.767 --> 01:12:27.142
And I pocketed the difference in price.

01:12:27.809 --> 01:12:29.642
I'd been there for a whole month.

01:12:29.726 --> 01:12:33.184
My per diem was two Chinese dollars a day.

01:12:33.434 --> 01:12:35.836
That was the going

01:12:35.860 --> 01:12:37.809
rate in 1983.

01:12:37.892 --> 01:12:40.267
When I got home, I had in my wallet

01:12:40.351 --> 01:12:42.142
eighty-odd dollars, almost ninety

01:12:42.226 --> 01:12:43.976
I felt very rich.

01:12:44.059 --> 01:12:47.309
When the train stopped in Shandong

01:12:47.392 --> 01:12:49.851
I bought four roast
chicken for my father.

01:12:51.851 --> 01:12:53.059
Four roast chicken.

01:12:53.142 --> 01:12:55.267
Because he was originally from Shandong.

01:12:56.101 --> 01:12:59.601
After that, I became a Haiyan celebrity.

01:13:02.559 --> 01:13:04.809
My editor had been very thoughtful.

01:13:04.892 --> 01:13:07.184
She asked if I needed a letter
to explain my absence

01:13:07.267 --> 01:13:08.351
I agreed that I did

01:13:08.434 --> 01:13:10.142
I'd been gone for a month.

01:13:10.226 --> 01:13:11.327
And the hospital didn't even know about it.

01:13:11.351 --> 01:13:13.476
So she gave me a letter

01:13:13.559 --> 01:13:14.993
vouching for the purpose of my trip.

01:13:15.017 --> 01:13:18.059
The hospital chief was furious at first.

01:13:18.517 --> 01:13:20.142
But the letter

01:13:20.226 --> 01:13:22.892
convinced him that I
was someone important.

01:13:23.392 --> 01:13:24.892
The leaders discussed the matter.

01:13:25.184 --> 01:13:26.704
They concluded that it was a big deal.

01:13:26.809 --> 01:13:29.142
In all the years of the
People's Republic

01:13:29.226 --> 01:13:30.997
I was the first local person

01:13:31.021 --> 01:13:33.101
to be published in Beijing.

01:13:34.642 --> 01:13:37.267
They suggested transferring me
to the Cultural Bureau.

01:13:37.351 --> 01:13:39.934
So that was when I changed my job.

01:13:40.017 --> 01:13:43.559
Towards the end of 1987...

01:13:43.642 --> 01:13:45.642
Or maybe in early 1988...

01:13:45.726 --> 01:13:47.476
I took delivery of some letters

01:13:47.559 --> 01:13:49.059
I forget if it was three or four.

01:13:49.142 --> 01:13:51.017
They were all asking for stories from me.

01:13:51.101 --> 01:13:52.934
And they all wanted them within a week.

01:13:53.017 --> 01:13:56.017
One was from 'October' magazine.

01:13:56.517 --> 01:13:59.059
I showed my father these letters.

01:13:59.309 --> 01:14:01.517
Laid them on the table and said, "Look."

01:14:01.601 --> 01:14:04.101
My father took a look
and asked what I was getting at

01:14:04.184 --> 01:14:07.267
I told him, "This is fame".

01:14:07.684 --> 01:14:09.177
I started out submitting work,

01:14:09.201 --> 01:14:10.434
now they're asking for it.

01:14:10.517 --> 01:14:13.226
"Your son is famous now."

01:14:13.642 --> 01:14:15.282
People ask me what it's like to be famous

01:14:15.351 --> 01:14:16.702
I tell them that was the only time
I had that feeling.

01:14:16.726 --> 01:14:17.892
Since then, never.

01:14:22.809 --> 01:14:24.099
"Remembering the past or longing

01:14:24.123 --> 01:14:26.976
for your native place"

01:14:27.059 --> 01:14:31.017
"are, in reality,
ways of reaching for reassurance"

01:14:31.434 --> 01:14:34.642
"when we feel some
disorientation in life."

01:14:34.726 --> 01:14:36.378
"Even if feelings are involved,

01:14:36.402 --> 01:14:37.767
they're purely decorative."

01:14:38.476 --> 01:14:42.059
Remembering the past or longing
for your native place

01:14:42.142 --> 01:14:45.767
are, in reality, ways of
reaching for reassurance.

01:14:46.142 --> 01:14:48.767
Yu Hua.

01:14:55.642 --> 01:14:58.601
We swam here every summer as kids.

01:14:58.684 --> 01:15:01.267
One time I wondered where
I'd get to if I kept swimming.

01:15:01.934 --> 01:15:04.101
But then I got caught in a current

01:15:04.184 --> 01:15:05.812
I knew not to fight it,

01:15:05.836 --> 01:15:06.934
I just had to let it carry me

01:15:07.017 --> 01:15:09.142
I was carried along
for some twenty kilometres

01:15:09.559 --> 01:15:10.827
before I finally scrambled ashore

01:15:10.851 --> 01:15:13.517
I had to walk all the way back, barefoot.

01:15:13.601 --> 01:15:15.309
Dawn was almost breaking.

01:15:33.601 --> 01:15:35.476
In October 1989,
I entered Beijing University.

01:15:35.559 --> 01:15:37.851
Life on campus was all peace and joy.

01:15:38.601 --> 01:15:40.434
Through open windows

01:15:40.517 --> 01:15:42.642
you could hear people playing mahjong.

01:15:42.726 --> 01:15:45.934
Around Weiming Lake,
you saw couples dating.

01:15:48.517 --> 01:15:49.754
And then in the
1990s, especially after

01:15:49.778 --> 01:15:53.184
Deng Xiaoping
toured southern China

01:15:53.267 --> 01:15:55.184
the whole nation went into business.

01:15:55.267 --> 01:15:57.226
The result was economic prosperity.

01:15:57.309 --> 01:16:00.726
Some who'd become writers like me

01:16:01.017 --> 01:16:03.454
abandoned their careers

01:16:03.478 --> 01:16:05.142
to become entrepreneurs.

01:16:05.226 --> 01:16:08.434
People who'd been together
went their separate ways.

01:16:08.851 --> 01:16:11.392
Exploring their own paths.

01:16:22.559 --> 01:16:25.851
I finished writing 'Cries in the Drizzle'

01:16:25.934 --> 01:16:28.577
And in 1993 I
published 'To Live'

01:16:28.601 --> 01:16:30.726
I wrote about a man's whole life

01:18:31.409 --> 01:18:34.784
notice: "Wanted by the Police".

01:18:43.642 --> 01:18:45.684
Let's listen.

01:18:46.476 --> 01:18:48.517
Let's share.

01:18:49.642 --> 01:18:51.601
This is Haiyan People's Radio Station.

01:18:51.684 --> 01:18:53.726
FM 106 MHz.

01:19:39.226 --> 01:19:42.142
Physics is the opposite of metaphysics.

01:19:42.226 --> 01:19:43.392
Why?

01:19:43.476 --> 01:19:45.726
Socrates said that.

01:19:45.809 --> 01:19:47.226
Then that's philosophy, isn't it?

01:19:47.309 --> 01:19:48.184
No.

01:19:48.267 --> 01:19:50.559
Since you bring up Socrates...

01:19:50.642 --> 01:19:53.351
How many pupils did he have?

01:19:54.267 --> 01:19:56.017
Yeah... Plato.

01:19:56.101 --> 01:19:58.017
Socrates and Plato

01:19:58.101 --> 01:19:59.851
Plato was Socrates' student.

01:21:22.059 --> 01:21:24.892
In September 1997.

01:21:25.476 --> 01:21:28.809
I was mastering in Chinese
at Zhengzhou University.

01:21:28.892 --> 01:21:30.049
That was the year that Hong Kong

01:21:30.073 --> 01:21:31.410
reverted to China's sovereignty.

01:21:31.434 --> 01:21:33.351
But I wasn't really conscious

01:21:33.434 --> 01:21:35.101
of such momentous things

01:21:35.351 --> 01:21:37.017
I seemed to be immersed

01:21:37.101 --> 01:21:39.101
in my own world.

01:21:43.851 --> 01:21:46.184
I moved to Beijing in September 2000.

01:21:46.267 --> 01:21:48.351
My first impression of
the city was quite good

01:21:48.434 --> 01:21:50.892
I was studying literature at
Beijing Normal University

01:21:50.976 --> 01:21:53.434
September was the best season in Beijing.

01:21:53.517 --> 01:21:56.976
Autumnal, with clear
skies and nice weather.

01:21:57.267 --> 01:22:00.559
But when I'd applied to do
the PhD in April

01:22:00.642 --> 01:22:03.017
the city was hit by
the most severe sandstorms.

01:22:03.101 --> 01:22:04.601
That was in April 2000.

01:22:05.059 --> 01:22:08.267
From the start, I was greeted with
thick, sandy dust.

01:22:08.351 --> 01:22:09.423
That was 23 April,

01:22:09.447 --> 01:22:10.660
the day we had to
sit the entrance exam.

01:22:10.684 --> 01:22:12.726
Despite the sandstorm
I couldn't understand

01:22:12.809 --> 01:22:15.449
why all the girls on the street
covered their faces with scarves.

01:22:16.309 --> 01:22:18.309
Come 2007...

01:22:18.392 --> 01:22:19.767
I'd got my PhD four years earlier

01:22:19.851 --> 01:22:21.434
I'd given birth to my son.

01:22:22.934 --> 01:22:24.976
He was two years old.

01:22:25.059 --> 01:22:28.059
And I felt that a chapter in my life
was coming to an end.

01:22:28.142 --> 01:22:31.101
It was time to move on to a new phase.

01:22:32.476 --> 01:22:34.226
But it suddenly felt very difficult.

01:22:34.767 --> 01:22:36.142
It's hard to explain.

01:22:36.226 --> 01:22:37.726
Life seemed to be good.

01:22:38.059 --> 01:22:41.017
Living conditions were improving.

01:22:41.476 --> 01:22:43.142
But everything felt wrong.

01:22:43.226 --> 01:22:45.017
The word 'betrayal' lingered in my mind

01:22:45.101 --> 01:22:46.642
I couldn't shake it.

01:22:47.059 --> 01:22:50.809
During the summer break,
I made the decision that I'd go home.

01:22:51.059 --> 01:22:52.693
Though I couldn't quite say why,

01:22:52.717 --> 01:22:54.351
even though I did
not quite know why

01:22:54.434 --> 01:22:55.900
I knew I was going
to write something,

01:22:55.924 --> 01:22:57.015
I wasn't sure what.

01:22:57.226 --> 01:22:59.184
But I absolutely needed
to go back for a while.

01:23:00.392 --> 01:23:01.618
This was different from
previous trips home.

01:23:01.642 --> 01:23:02.952
They'd been more like short visits.

01:23:02.976 --> 01:23:05.309
Village tourism, hanging out by the river.

01:23:05.392 --> 01:23:06.702
Seeing what it all looked like...

01:23:06.726 --> 01:23:09.350
But this time,
what I had in mind

01:23:09.374 --> 01:23:10.642
was something more serious

01:23:10.726 --> 01:23:12.226
I wanted to write.

01:23:13.267 --> 01:23:15.517
In 'China in Liang Village'

01:23:15.601 --> 01:23:17.476
I wrote about Liang Village.

01:23:17.559 --> 01:23:19.767
Its elders, its women and its children.

01:23:20.726 --> 01:23:22.934
I included the river by the village.

01:23:23.017 --> 01:23:24.559
The natural environment.

01:23:25.309 --> 01:23:27.184
Also, the current situation in the village.

01:23:27.434 --> 01:23:30.684
When I interviewed the
people, for instance

01:23:30.767 --> 01:23:32.851
when a family received
a call from far away

01:23:32.934 --> 01:23:34.226
everyone was so joyful.

01:23:34.309 --> 01:23:36.216
Or when someone sent money back,

01:23:36.240 --> 01:23:37.934
the day became so festive

01:23:38.017 --> 01:23:39.217
I gradually came to realize

01:23:39.267 --> 01:23:41.434
that the workers
who've migrated to other places

01:23:41.517 --> 01:23:43.485
are still part of village life,

01:23:43.509 --> 01:23:45.476
even though
they're usually away.

01:24:19.684 --> 01:24:20.726
I was born in the 1970s.

01:24:20.809 --> 01:24:23.767
The rural order was beginning to recover.

01:24:24.351 --> 01:24:26.892
I could still recall the
days of the 'production unit'

01:24:26.976 --> 01:24:28.142
But not in any detail

01:24:28.226 --> 01:24:29.142
I think my earliest real memories

01:24:29.226 --> 01:24:30.976
were formed in the 1980s.

01:24:31.851 --> 01:24:32.839
At that point, my
sisters and brothers

01:24:32.863 --> 01:24:35.851
were all in school.

01:24:35.934 --> 01:24:37.017
My family was very poor.

01:24:37.101 --> 01:24:40.309
But my father was very insistent
on one point.

01:24:40.392 --> 01:24:41.912
He insisted that we were all educated.

01:24:41.976 --> 01:24:43.726
Nobody was migrating to other places yet.

01:24:43.809 --> 01:24:46.101
You pretty much lived on
what you could harvest.

01:24:46.184 --> 01:24:48.976
Everyone lived on farmland.

01:24:49.476 --> 01:24:50.684
Food was very limited.

01:24:50.767 --> 01:24:52.452
Sometimes you had to look
for edible wild plants.

01:24:52.476 --> 01:24:55.101
Or grow some tobacco or peppers.

01:24:55.184 --> 01:24:56.767
Stuff you could sell

01:24:56.851 --> 01:24:59.392
to cover some of the cost of living.

01:24:59.934 --> 01:25:03.059
At Chinese New Year
or other big festivals

01:25:03.392 --> 01:25:07.309
we could get up to a kilo of meat
from the county.

01:25:08.142 --> 01:25:09.642
There were six girls in the family.

01:25:09.726 --> 01:25:12.059
And my mother had medical issues.

01:25:12.142 --> 01:25:14.101
In the years

01:25:14.434 --> 01:25:17.447
before I became sensible and

01:25:17.471 --> 01:25:19.476
responsible, she
was already paralysed

01:25:19.726 --> 01:25:22.059
I was admitted to high school at fifteen.

01:25:22.476 --> 01:25:23.976
Before that

01:25:24.601 --> 01:25:26.934
time passed

01:25:27.017 --> 01:25:29.767
extremely slowly.

01:25:31.142 --> 01:25:33.476
My elder sister was another worry.

01:25:34.726 --> 01:25:36.862
As she reached puberty,

01:25:36.886 --> 01:25:38.226
she got into a relationship

01:25:38.309 --> 01:25:40.261
I already knew
that things like that,

01:25:40.285 --> 01:25:41.684
could be difficult.

01:25:41.767 --> 01:25:43.809
And my younger sister had asthma.

01:25:45.226 --> 01:25:46.517
Anyhow, it was

01:25:47.851 --> 01:25:49.517
all very hard.

01:25:52.101 --> 01:25:54.976
It's even hard for me
to talk about these things.

01:25:55.559 --> 01:25:58.059
Not to mention my mother.

01:25:58.642 --> 01:26:00.434
She rarely spoke.

01:26:02.392 --> 01:26:05.559
It's as if she's a shadow in my heart

01:26:05.642 --> 01:26:07.142
which never goes away.

01:26:07.226 --> 01:26:09.544
Even now that I'm an adult,

01:26:09.568 --> 01:26:12.392
it seems I still
can't talk about it.

01:26:21.184 --> 01:26:23.815
I guess there may
be many things in life

01:26:23.839 --> 01:26:25.892
which you never get over

01:26:25.976 --> 01:26:28.767
I once said,
if the day comes when I can

01:26:28.851 --> 01:26:31.392
speak freely and frankly
about my mother

01:26:31.476 --> 01:26:33.280
then that will be the day

01:26:33.304 --> 01:26:36.017
I have my emotions
under control.

01:26:36.101 --> 01:26:38.476
That day hasn't come yet.

01:26:39.642 --> 01:26:43.601
I was six years old
when my mother had a stroke.

01:26:43.684 --> 01:26:46.476
That was common enough in the rural areas.

01:26:46.559 --> 01:26:48.857
Probably caused by
mother's high blood

01:26:48.881 --> 01:26:50.267
pressure but we knew
nothing about that then.

01:26:50.351 --> 01:26:52.517
We had access to only
very basic medical services.

01:26:52.601 --> 01:26:54.767
And we had no money for doctors.

01:26:54.851 --> 01:26:57.318
It started with hemiparesis,

01:26:57.342 --> 01:26:59.142
she could still walk.

01:26:59.226 --> 01:27:01.642
But one side of her body was weakened.

01:27:02.059 --> 01:27:03.851
During my time in primary school

01:27:03.934 --> 01:27:07.059
my mother exercised every morning.

01:27:07.392 --> 01:27:09.517
When I walked home after school

01:27:09.851 --> 01:27:12.976
she was often nearby on the same road.

01:27:13.392 --> 01:27:15.684
I later realized
she was probably waiting for me.

01:27:16.226 --> 01:27:18.476
Maybe she wanted to
pick me up from school.

01:27:18.559 --> 01:27:22.267
But she felt embarrassed
because of her disability...

01:27:22.351 --> 01:27:23.851
She was quite shy.

01:27:23.934 --> 01:27:26.017
Anyhow, we'd head home together.

01:27:26.101 --> 01:27:28.017
By the time she was confined to her bed...

01:27:28.101 --> 01:27:30.851
That was
when she suffered complete paralysis.

01:27:30.934 --> 01:27:33.017
She was in a near-vegetative state.

01:27:33.101 --> 01:27:35.976
Even then, she was eager to communicate.

01:27:36.059 --> 01:27:38.434
The family kept up the basic courtesies.

01:27:38.517 --> 01:27:41.017
When we left for school,
we'd call 'Bye, Ma!'

01:27:42.226 --> 01:27:44.101
By then she couldn't speak.

01:27:45.809 --> 01:27:47.684
She would shed a tear

01:27:48.059 --> 01:27:49.892
to respond to us.

01:27:54.226 --> 01:27:57.309
That had a huge impact on me

01:27:57.392 --> 01:27:59.351
I can't really talk about it.

01:28:03.767 --> 01:28:05.392
Her state...

01:28:08.101 --> 01:28:11.059
She was breathing.

01:28:11.142 --> 01:28:14.059
But she couldn't say a word.

01:28:14.142 --> 01:28:15.559
It was so painful.

01:28:22.726 --> 01:28:25.434
My father had a really good reputation.

01:28:25.726 --> 01:28:27.368
He was the one
who took my mother to hospital.

01:28:27.392 --> 01:28:29.767
And he cared for her devotedly.

01:28:29.851 --> 01:28:33.517
We were all like that in our family

01:28:33.601 --> 01:28:35.368
I still went to school,
despite all the problems

01:28:35.392 --> 01:28:37.351
I remember
when we didn't have the money

01:28:37.434 --> 01:28:38.779
to pay for the tuition,

01:28:38.803 --> 01:28:40.642
maybe six or eight dollars.

01:28:40.726 --> 01:28:41.976
Couldn't afford it.

01:28:42.059 --> 01:28:44.309
So I had to stand outside the classroom.

01:28:45.017 --> 01:28:46.934
Until we'd saved enough money.

01:28:47.601 --> 01:28:49.517
The teacher had no
choice if we couldn't pay.

01:28:49.601 --> 01:28:51.434
He made us stand outside

01:28:51.517 --> 01:28:52.726
I stood there for a month.

01:28:52.809 --> 01:28:54.851
That was the longest period
I had to stand outside.

01:28:55.351 --> 01:28:57.311
As I recall,
the experience wasn't at all shaming.

01:28:57.392 --> 01:28:58.642
Just rather sad.

01:28:59.309 --> 01:29:01.017
Then my father would take me...

01:29:01.101 --> 01:29:04.142
Together with my sisters, I think...

01:29:04.226 --> 01:29:06.684
From door to door in the village
to borrow money.

01:29:06.767 --> 01:29:08.533
Twenty cents here,
thirty cents there,

01:29:08.557 --> 01:29:09.634
or even one dollar.

01:29:11.434 --> 01:29:12.819
He had ideas

01:29:12.843 --> 01:29:15.226
and really wanted
to make more money.

01:29:15.309 --> 01:29:16.684
Because we were so poor.

01:29:16.767 --> 01:29:19.229
But every business he started

01:29:19.253 --> 01:29:20.726
failed in the end.

01:29:21.226 --> 01:29:22.976
After my mother passed away

01:29:23.226 --> 01:29:25.351
his reputation went down.

01:29:25.851 --> 01:29:28.767
He was in his forties.

01:29:29.184 --> 01:29:31.434
Just as I am now.

01:29:33.017 --> 01:29:35.940
Maybe he could find a new wife

01:29:35.964 --> 01:29:38.017
and have more children?

01:29:38.101 --> 01:29:40.101
Actually, there were no more children.

01:29:40.476 --> 01:29:42.033
In those days, country villages

01:29:42.057 --> 01:29:44.809
gossiped about such
matters all the time.

01:29:45.059 --> 01:29:47.434
Anyhow, my sisters and
I reached adolescence...

01:29:47.517 --> 01:29:50.434
And we were always fighting.

01:29:55.184 --> 01:29:56.763
Father tried to start a business

01:29:56.787 --> 01:29:57.884
We didn't know
where he'd got to.

01:29:57.909 --> 01:29:59.017
Actually, he went to Shanxi.

01:29:59.101 --> 01:30:00.309
It should be

01:30:00.559 --> 01:30:01.976
I forgot what was it called.

01:30:02.809 --> 01:30:06.974
And this friend introduced

01:30:06.998 --> 01:30:08.517
him to a local woman.

01:30:08.809 --> 01:30:10.351
We knew almost nothing about it.

01:30:10.434 --> 01:30:12.142
Hardly anything, in fact.

01:30:12.226 --> 01:30:14.226
The woman was a victim of domestic violence

01:30:14.309 --> 01:30:17.642
I heard later that
her husband used to beat her.

01:30:17.726 --> 01:30:19.642
She wanted to leave.

01:30:19.726 --> 01:30:22.059
My father's friend asked him to help out.

01:30:22.142 --> 01:30:23.351
Since we're on the plains.

01:30:23.434 --> 01:30:24.642
Henan is on the plains.

01:30:24.726 --> 01:30:27.309
He asked my father
to get her out of the mountains.

01:30:27.392 --> 01:30:30.184
He didn't ask him to marry her.

01:30:30.267 --> 01:30:33.767
Next thing

01:30:35.601 --> 01:30:38.059
he brought her to live in our house.

01:30:38.142 --> 01:30:40.476
She'd been with us
for about a month when

01:30:40.559 --> 01:30:43.392
we said we'd try to find her a husband.

01:30:43.476 --> 01:30:45.702
But she didn't want to marry anyone
other than our father.

01:30:45.726 --> 01:30:47.351
She said he was such a nice person.

01:30:47.434 --> 01:30:49.601
My father was indeed very kind to women.

01:30:49.684 --> 01:30:52.226
His only weakness was
being so sweet to his wife.

01:30:52.309 --> 01:30:53.559
Very sweet indeed.

01:30:54.392 --> 01:30:57.059
When my father brought this woman

01:30:57.142 --> 01:30:58.892
back to our house in Henan

01:30:59.226 --> 01:31:01.809
my instant reaction was to cry.

01:31:02.976 --> 01:31:04.309
Conflicts followed.

01:31:04.392 --> 01:31:06.559
The local villagers,
it seems to me now

01:31:07.892 --> 01:31:09.267
saw her as something of a joke.

01:31:09.351 --> 01:31:10.823
Many of them watched our family

01:31:10.847 --> 01:31:13.684
as if we were a soap opera

01:31:14.017 --> 01:31:17.809
I hated that feeling of being watched.

01:31:18.392 --> 01:31:19.642
Since I was scared.

01:31:20.309 --> 01:31:22.392
I hid myself away in dark corners.

01:31:23.309 --> 01:31:25.767
My brother was fifteen
or sixteen at the time.

01:31:26.267 --> 01:31:27.767
He was quite obstinate.

01:31:29.017 --> 01:31:30.934
And my sisters were seventeen and eighteen.

01:31:31.517 --> 01:31:33.726
It was an all-round difficult situation,
as I look back.

01:31:33.809 --> 01:31:36.434
Lots of fighting

01:31:37.309 --> 01:31:40.226
both with father and with the woman.

01:31:40.767 --> 01:31:42.017
She was very unhappy

01:31:42.101 --> 01:31:44.392
because she also
contributed to the family.

01:31:45.726 --> 01:31:46.818
If you ask me now,

01:31:46.842 --> 01:31:47.934
I'd say it was all unnecessary.

01:31:48.017 --> 01:31:50.726
But none of us could control their anger.

01:31:51.642 --> 01:31:53.285
And we didn't know
how to deal with the new relationship.

01:31:53.309 --> 01:31:55.309
And my father was kind of helpless.

01:31:55.392 --> 01:31:56.809
Since he was such a kind man

01:31:57.184 --> 01:32:00.309
he wanted to please his new 'wife',

01:32:00.392 --> 01:32:01.934
and us too.

01:32:02.017 --> 01:32:04.059
In the end, no-one was pleased.

01:32:04.392 --> 01:32:05.976
And he faced a big dilemma.

01:32:06.767 --> 01:32:09.068
I used to think I
no longer liked him

01:32:09.092 --> 01:32:10.151
Didn't love him.

01:32:10.234 --> 01:32:12.851
But when I reached this age and

01:32:13.392 --> 01:32:15.351
came to write about Liang Village.

01:32:15.434 --> 01:32:17.767
My father was deeply involved
in my research for the books.

01:32:17.851 --> 01:32:20.642
He came back with me for
'China in Liang Village'

01:32:20.726 --> 01:32:22.476
And for 'Leaving Liang Village'
he joined me

01:32:22.559 --> 01:32:24.202
as I went around the country,
recording interviews

01:32:24.226 --> 01:32:26.476
finding people who
came from Liang Village.

01:32:26.559 --> 01:32:28.392
During that period

01:32:28.476 --> 01:32:31.604
we got to know and

01:32:31.628 --> 01:32:32.767
understand each other again.

01:32:33.642 --> 01:32:34.722
Eventually, the woman left.

01:32:34.767 --> 01:32:36.017
She left my father.

01:32:36.517 --> 01:32:39.101
She probably couldn't stand
the situation any more.

01:32:40.684 --> 01:32:43.059
One time, when we'd grown up,
we went looking for her.

01:32:43.142 --> 01:32:44.601
We were all married by then.

01:32:44.684 --> 01:32:47.726
My father missed her.

01:32:48.642 --> 01:32:49.892
He nagged us.

01:32:50.642 --> 01:32:52.892
We just had to take him to see her

01:32:53.184 --> 01:32:54.184
I didn't go.

01:32:54.267 --> 01:32:56.434
Three of my sisters took him.

01:32:57.684 --> 01:33:00.124
When the two of them saw each other,
they broke down in tears.

01:33:12.142 --> 01:33:15.559
"Father has always been my question."

01:33:16.726 --> 01:33:18.809
"And the biggest question of all"

01:33:18.892 --> 01:33:20.434
"is his white shirt."

01:33:21.101 --> 01:33:22.101
"In those days"

01:33:22.392 --> 01:33:23.394
"the old road from Wu County

01:33:23.418 --> 01:33:25.434
to Liang Village was
still nice and flat."

01:33:25.851 --> 01:33:28.434
"Tall, straight poplar
trees on both sides."

01:33:28.517 --> 01:33:30.851
"Father was hurrying
home from Wu County,"

01:33:30.934 --> 01:33:32.334
"and I was on my way to school."

01:33:32.601 --> 01:33:34.559
"We passed each other on the road."

01:33:35.017 --> 01:33:36.642
"In the shade of the trees."

01:33:37.101 --> 01:33:39.517
"Father's white shirt
was clean and neat."

01:33:39.892 --> 01:33:41.184
"Soft, tidy..."

01:33:41.267 --> 01:33:42.547
"It shone like a beam of light."

01:33:42.767 --> 01:33:46.226
Father has always been my question.

01:33:46.309 --> 01:33:48.767
Liang Hong.

01:33:49.851 --> 01:33:52.642
"What trouble did Father
have to save enough money,"

01:33:52.726 --> 01:33:55.258
"for such a costly

01:33:55.282 --> 01:33:56.767
unnecessary,
luxurious white shirt?"

01:33:56.851 --> 01:33:57.908
"How did he keep it

01:33:57.932 --> 01:34:00.726
stainless all year round?"

01:34:27.892 --> 01:34:31.476
One of my sisters was
the eldest in the family.

01:34:33.059 --> 01:34:34.726
There was a saying in the village.

01:34:35.934 --> 01:34:37.094
My father liked to repeat it.

01:34:37.601 --> 01:34:38.952
"People would rather be mules or horses"

01:34:38.976 --> 01:34:40.476
"than eldest sons and daughters."

01:34:40.559 --> 01:34:41.976
Our family is a case in point.

01:34:42.934 --> 01:34:44.618
My eldest sister went
to a vocational school.

01:34:44.642 --> 01:34:46.851
That used to be considered
a high qualification.

01:34:47.142 --> 01:34:48.642
Once she completed the course

01:34:48.892 --> 01:34:51.410
she had a choice between working
in Beijing and a job in Zhengzhou.

01:34:51.434 --> 01:34:53.267
She had plenty of good offers.

01:34:53.351 --> 01:34:54.809
Because of the family...

01:34:54.892 --> 01:34:58.184
She came back to the county
to work at a local health center.

01:35:03.434 --> 01:35:05.101
This was in the 1980s.

01:35:05.434 --> 01:35:08.101
A high-school diploma counted for a lot.

01:35:08.434 --> 01:35:11.267
She could earn
twelve Chinese dollars a month.

01:35:11.601 --> 01:35:13.934
Unimaginable to the rest of us.

01:35:14.226 --> 01:35:16.559
She would keep two dollars for herself.

01:35:16.892 --> 01:35:18.517
And give the rest to us.

01:35:19.434 --> 01:35:21.642
And every time she visited

01:35:21.726 --> 01:35:23.402
she'd bring me a gift,

01:35:23.426 --> 01:35:24.517
such as a pair of sneakers.

01:35:24.601 --> 01:35:26.184
They cost more than one dollar

01:35:26.267 --> 01:35:27.798
I'd be so excited,

01:35:27.822 --> 01:35:29.726
running around the
village in my new shoes.

01:35:30.184 --> 01:35:31.601
I still keep

01:35:32.017 --> 01:35:35.726
the letters between my father
and my sister.

01:35:35.809 --> 01:35:37.267
They depended on each other.

01:35:37.351 --> 01:35:39.684
And tried to solve the
family's problems together.

01:35:39.767 --> 01:35:41.309
In some sense, I think

01:35:42.226 --> 01:35:43.754
my father's trust in her

01:35:43.778 --> 01:35:45.101
made her more important to us.

01:35:45.184 --> 01:35:48.309
She was always the one we counted on.

01:35:48.726 --> 01:35:50.726
We could hide behind her back.

01:35:50.809 --> 01:35:51.809
We could cry.

01:35:51.851 --> 01:35:52.892
But she could not.

01:35:52.976 --> 01:35:55.476
She had to solve problems.

01:35:55.767 --> 01:35:57.767
When there was no money,
she had to make money.

01:35:58.017 --> 01:35:59.243
And we were always short of money.

01:35:59.267 --> 01:36:00.559
What with my mother's illness...

01:36:00.642 --> 01:36:01.851
With our schooling...

01:36:01.934 --> 01:36:03.642
With our food and clothing...

01:36:04.892 --> 01:36:07.309
It was like a big black hole.

01:36:07.392 --> 01:36:09.476
And she was the one who had to fill it.

01:36:09.559 --> 01:36:11.476
She worried about it for years.

01:36:11.559 --> 01:36:12.851
But my sister has a big heart.

01:36:12.934 --> 01:36:14.802
If life's hard, you
have to be optimistic

01:36:14.826 --> 01:36:16.101
She's pretty and open-minded.

01:36:16.476 --> 01:36:18.485
But because the rest of us were

01:36:18.509 --> 01:36:20.517
so dependent on her

01:36:20.601 --> 01:36:24.101
men from good family backgrounds
would be scared off

01:36:24.184 --> 01:36:25.351
when they heard about us.

01:36:26.017 --> 01:36:27.642
Eventually...

01:36:29.684 --> 01:36:31.351
She found her husband.

01:36:31.434 --> 01:36:33.476
My brother-in-law is great
A very nice person.

01:36:33.559 --> 01:36:35.434
His family was as poor as ours.

01:36:35.517 --> 01:36:37.476
So neither side looks down on the other.

01:36:39.434 --> 01:36:41.434
My sister

01:36:41.517 --> 01:36:43.559
organised the wedding,

01:36:43.642 --> 01:36:45.851
and the banquet all by herself.

01:36:45.934 --> 01:36:48.309
My father was as usual

01:36:48.934 --> 01:36:50.309
caught up in lots of hassles.

01:36:50.726 --> 01:36:53.226
She made it easy for him.

01:36:54.559 --> 01:36:56.392
On the eve of the wedding,
we shared a bed.

01:36:56.476 --> 01:36:57.797
In the middle of the night,

01:36:57.821 --> 01:37:01.809
I knew she was crying.

01:37:03.267 --> 01:37:04.851
I'm lost for words.

01:38:50.851 --> 01:38:54.267
"Xiumei, your letter was received
and read with care."

01:38:54.517 --> 01:38:57.184
"Your father's tears run down his face."

01:38:57.267 --> 01:38:58.851
"And drop on to this paper."

01:38:58.934 --> 01:39:01.517
"You remind me of many things in my life"

01:39:01.809 --> 01:39:02.949
"I shed many tears,

01:39:02.973 --> 01:39:04.434
I cried out loud."

01:39:04.851 --> 01:39:07.726
"You said you had things to say
to your loved ones."

01:39:10.642 --> 01:39:11.934
"You're right."

01:39:12.017 --> 01:39:14.089
"When family
members talk together,

01:39:14.113 --> 01:39:16.184
their words can
relieve heartaches."

01:39:16.267 --> 01:39:18.851
"It's been a long time
since I last had a letter from you."

01:39:18.934 --> 01:39:20.809
"Or heard your voice."

01:39:21.142 --> 01:39:23.684
"It felt like losing my guide."

01:39:24.017 --> 01:39:25.684
"As if the machine had run out of gas."

01:39:25.767 --> 01:39:27.109
"Family life seemed to

01:39:27.133 --> 01:39:30.101
have ground to a halt."

01:39:30.184 --> 01:39:33.601
"Daughter, you have so much on your mind."

01:39:36.684 --> 01:39:38.226
"Studying, housekeeping..."

01:39:38.309 --> 01:39:39.392
"Teaching your siblings..."

01:39:39.476 --> 01:39:40.601
"Caring for your mother..."

01:39:40.684 --> 01:39:42.351
"And persuading your father."

01:39:43.809 --> 01:39:45.892
"Thank you for all of it."

01:39:46.184 --> 01:39:47.934
"It makes me fee I"

01:39:51.767 --> 01:39:54.851
"as if I'm the daughter."

01:40:01.367 --> 01:40:02.909
"Wheat, plant."

01:40:02.992 --> 01:40:04.659
"It's hard to detect growth."

01:40:05.076 --> 01:40:07.992
"Life on this earth is one and the same."

01:40:08.659 --> 01:40:12.576
"In the field, the three
elms fall into silence."

01:40:12.659 --> 01:40:14.076
"Like Father..."

01:40:14.159 --> 01:40:16.326
"Mother, and Child."

01:40:17.409 --> 01:40:20.034
In the field, the three
elms fall into silence.

01:40:20.117 --> 01:40:22.826
Like Father, Mother, and Child.

01:40:22.909 --> 01:40:24.576
Xi Chuan.

01:43:16.201 --> 01:43:17.951
My name is Wang Yiliang.

01:43:19.826 --> 01:43:22.350
I remember I was born in Henan

01:43:22.374 --> 01:43:23.992
and raised in Beijing.

01:43:24.076 --> 01:43:25.201
My mother is Liang Hong.

01:43:25.284 --> 01:43:27.201
And my father is Wang Hengtao.

01:43:33.742 --> 01:43:34.822
I turned fourteen this year

01:43:34.867 --> 01:43:37.201
I study at Renda Middle School.

01:43:38.534 --> 01:43:40.201
I like physics.

01:43:41.451 --> 01:43:43.116
In my spare time, I sometimes

01:43:43.140 --> 01:43:45.409
watch TV and play video games

01:43:45.742 --> 01:43:47.492
I read about this river in my Ma's book.

01:43:47.576 --> 01:43:50.909
She says the river used to be
much closer to the village.

01:43:50.992 --> 01:43:54.784
Over many years,
the river has changed its course.

01:43:54.867 --> 01:43:57.501
"Thirty years on the east,

01:43:57.525 --> 01:44:00.159
thirty years on the west"

01:44:00.242 --> 01:44:03.326
I find that saying especially touching.

01:44:03.409 --> 01:44:06.689
When I was
younger, I had no idea

01:44:06.713 --> 01:44:09.992
how time would change things.

01:44:10.451 --> 01:44:11.992
Every time I came here...

01:44:12.076 --> 01:44:15.140
Mostly I just hung

01:44:15.164 --> 01:44:16.617
out with my cousins

01:44:16.701 --> 01:44:18.409
I didn't see much of my grandfather.

01:44:18.492 --> 01:44:20.659
We didn't see much of each other.

01:44:20.992 --> 01:44:23.742
And towards the end of his life

01:44:24.076 --> 01:44:27.284
I had few chances to see him.

01:44:32.492 --> 01:44:33.784
I'd like to have known...

01:44:33.867 --> 01:44:35.340
When he was young,

01:44:35.364 --> 01:44:37.826
did he have enough to eat?

01:44:38.242 --> 01:44:40.992
I'd like to have asked him...

01:44:43.034 --> 01:44:45.136
Did he ever want

01:44:45.160 --> 01:44:47.867
to see the world?

01:44:48.117 --> 01:44:50.909
See how other people lived?

01:44:53.034 --> 01:44:56.117
Can you introduce
yourself in Henan dialect?

01:44:57.492 --> 01:45:00.242
I've pretty much forgotten
my Henan dialect.

01:45:04.909 --> 01:45:06.659
Give it a try!

01:45:24.951 --> 01:45:26.284
I'll teach you.

01:45:32.276 --> 01:45:34.734
My name is Wang Yiliang.

01:45:35.359 --> 01:45:38.067
I turned fourteen this year.

01:45:38.901 --> 01:45:42.776
I was born in Henan and raised in Beijing

01:45:42.859 --> 01:45:46.734
I study at Renda High School.

01:45:47.109 --> 01:45:49.859
My hobby is physics

01:45:49.942 --> 01:45:53.234
I'd like to be a physicist in future.

01:45:53.317 --> 01:45:55.192
Okay, your turn.

01:45:57.234 --> 01:45:58.859
My name is Wang Yiliang

01:45:58.942 --> 01:46:01.109
I turned fourteen this year.

01:46:01.526 --> 01:46:04.776
I was born in Henan and raised in Beijing.

01:46:05.776 --> 01:46:08.914
I study at Renda

01:46:08.938 --> 01:46:11.026
High School.

01:46:13.276 --> 01:46:15.276
My hobby is physics

01:46:15.359 --> 01:46:19.109
I'd like to be a physicist in future.

01:47:13.359 --> 01:47:15.234
When I was little

01:47:15.734 --> 01:47:19.276
the sea was yellow.

01:47:19.359 --> 01:47:21.901
But the textbooks said it was blue.

01:47:21.984 --> 01:47:24.067
We liked to swim here back then.

01:47:24.151 --> 01:47:27.151
One day, I think I'll swim right out...

01:47:27.234 --> 01:47:29.276
Swim out till the sea turns blue