… In order to strengthen the elementary education, we poor counties in the mountain areas insist on "tightening our belts to support education." Under the circumstances that financial condition is critical and Party and government cadres cannot get their salary, we still squeeze almost half of our financial income to invest into education. Our slogan is that "no matter how poor, education comes first; no matter how difficult, children come first" and "if porridge is little, serve children first." However, the problem is that some children from poor families cannot go on with study. This is deeply bothering us local officials. At present, the county government and township government haven't been able to waive all the study fees for these children yet. Seeing the children of these old revolutionary base areas who have to leave the schoolyards that should belong to them brings great sadness to us. We feel as if a huge stone is pressing on our hearts. Children are the future and hope of our country and the delay of our children's education will lead to the delay of the development of society. Therefore, we appeal to the whole society to care for the children who are deprived of education in impoverished areas and send out your love to help these children in impoverished areas. Like all other children in this country, they should bathe in the sunshine of socialism, live happily and grow up healthily…
How bitter is the appeal!
How grievous is the appeal!
Interview notes II
The Memorandum of Kangle County
Out of Lanzhou, our Beijing Jeep was running fast towards the Kangle County.
Muddy mountains, muddy houses, muddy road… It was a gray world outside the car window.
Kangle is located in the damp cold mountain at the altitude of 1,900 to 2,300 meters. It is high, cold, shady and damp. However, the name of it means wealth and happiness. For example, some places that are short of water are called "Fragrant Spring" ; some places that are so poor that men cannot even afford marriage and are therefore bachelors are named "Daughters' valley" .
Three hours later, our jeep stopped in the shabby yard of the county commission. I looked around and there were only eight rows of low single-storey houses and more precisely, the county commission office looked more like a barrack of a company or a primary school.
This county has a population of nearly 200,000 and the financial income of 1990 was 1.72 million yuan, which had not reached the income of a village in the developed southern areas.
I asked the vice director of the Culture and Education Bureau, "How much educational fund do you have for the whole county for the whole year?"
"Last year it was 3.14 million yuan which meant the whole financial income of the county was not enough for education. The shortfall was made up by the Central Government. As for the 3.14 million yuan, 2.86 million yuan was used for the salary for teachers and with less than 300,000 yuan left what could we do?"
Ma Yimei was the first child I saw. The sparse and yellow hair told of her malnourishment. She frowned and in her eyes there was slight melancholy, which an eleven-year-old girl should not have.
The fate brought Ma Yimei to a poor farmer family in the Gaoji Village, Huguan Township. Her father was sick and her mother bore all the farming work. Her brother went to school twice but twice he dropped out. She begged her father, "Dad, I want to go to school." "We have no money." Her father answered with a mournful face. She had cried several times for she couldn't go to school.
There was a private brick factory at the entrance to the village. When the bricks came out from the kiln, some big children would go to help carry bricks from the kiln to the outside of the yard. One could be paid one fen[6] for carrying twelve bricks. Ma Yimei went too. Since she was too little, she had to carry four times for one fen. She kept carrying one time after another. Her fi ngers were frozen like carrots in winter and her feet were squashed for lots of times.
On the day when school started, she ran to school quickly and said to the teacher, "Ms, I want to go to school and I have money for the tuition fees." after that she took out a cigarette box from her pocket and poured all the coins out, totally eighty-five fen. She thought it was enough for the tuition fees.
All teachers at present couldn't say a word only with tears rolling in their eyes. The school broke the rule to accept this girl.
I arrived at Badan Township which was a small township with a population of 7,000. In this township, the number of children of the school age was more than 600 while the enrollment rate was only 42%. Above half these children had been the labours of the family.
Luzigou Primary School was the central primary school of this township, which was founded in the period of liberation and hadn't been renovated for a long time, thus, it looked quite shabby. There were only twenty-eight students in school (fifteen in Grade One, three in Grade Two, seven in Grade Four and three in Grade Five). All the windows of the classrooms had no glass and in severe winter, children huddled themselves up in classes, shivering all the time. The blackboard that hung in the classroom was made from three planks. The cracks between the planks were so wide that it could hold a piece of chalk. On the unwhitewashed mud wall, there were some terms written in chalk. They were "Primary School Rules" …
