[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]China[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]'I want to be a concubine'[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]An eye-opener for Singaporeans. This translated tale of a peasant girl may partly explain the Geylang phenomenon. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]June 5, 2009[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Why My Life Is Miserable Because I Am Poor [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif](Excerpts of article translated by Shaohua on September 25, 2008)[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I was born in a remote hamlet in the north of China. I have heard from someone, who never been to the genuine villages, that the countryside is very nice. But in fact, no public road was built and the nearest bus stop is 20 kilometres away, so we always had to walk on foot or ride a bicycle to get out of the village. The street in the village was made of soil and was not flat. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]On a sunny day, wind with sound and soil blew you. On a rainy day, rain with the m&d poured you. The m&d on the road was added with shit from animals raised by villagers, because animals always shit on the road but not in their own country yard to keep it tidy and clean. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]No fresh vegetables were supplied to the villagers in the whole year because only radishes and cabbage were planted there. It also had sweet potato, if that is a vegetable. So, as dishes, what they could have were only salted radishes and cabbage. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Some may ask, why did we not fry? The truth was that there was not much cooking oil for frying because of poverty, so fried dishes were always rare for them except in the case of Spring Festival or when some relatives come for dinner. I remember I had my first “you tiao” [a fried bread stick] in the dining hall at my university. And health care was not ensured either. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Take my grandpa for example, he couldn’t help but wait for death once he fell sick. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]After he was sent to the hospital ran by the State, they refused to diagnose my grandpa even though we knelt down begging them to cure him. The reason was simply because we did not have 2 yuan for medicine. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]We could do nothing but see my grandpa die in the hospital. Some may say that the countryside is developing these days. But the truth is that there has been almost no change for my village since I was born. I really cannot say whether change will happen or not in my life.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I was born at the end of the 1970s. We had 5 children, including me, 3 sisters and 1 brother. Some people may wonder why my mother had so many children if my family was so poor? These people may not understand China clearly. These days, only really poor people or rich people can have more than one child, and we belonged to the poor group. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]In the countryside, in my opinion, there are 2 reasons for having more children. First, no entertainment in the countryside. So after working in the daylight, sometimes having sex on the “kang” (bed made by soil and brick) at night may be the only amusing thing for them. Although they did not want more children, no one told them effective means of contraception. I saw with my own eyes that my mother wanted to abort using tied rope or eating tobacco ash for contraception. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]The second reason was the traditional concept and environment of the countryside. There must be a man in every home because working in the countryside is so hard that only men can deal with them, so people in the countryside always held the concept that birthing a boy in every generation is necessary for the continuance of the family. If you could not give birth to a boy, you would be looked down upon. Before my brother was born, my mother was always looked down upon by my family members, I was always hit by other children and had the nickname of ‘jue-hu-guo,” meaning “no boy no generation continuance.”[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]The goodness of the farm is not what you think because of the poor and narrow opinions of countryside life. At that time, there were several children in every family, and every child struggled for subsistence without caring for others. I remembered that when I was 5 years old, my parents had gone to work farming, I took care of my sister at home, and one of my neighbours came to borrow a kitchen knife but also secretly stole a dinner pan. After my parents came back, they found the pan missing, so they went to that neighbour, but failed to get the pan back because my neighbour refused to acknowledge that he took the pan away. The result of this was that I was beat fiercely by my parents and we cooked without the pan for a long period.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]And another time when I was 9 years old, I saw a sister-in-law in my village stealing the cotton from my uncle’s field, then she was caught by my uncle and warned that he would show villagers what she did. In order to prevent this, she promised that she could have sex with my uncle if my uncle would set her free. Then my uncle had sex with her in the field. I did not know what they did when I was 9 years old, but after I realised the meaning of what happened, it made me feel sick every time I thought of it. But, in the end, what they did was discovered and spread in my village. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]My uncle probably told some people, but that sister-in-law thought I had told my mother and that my mother spread it to the villagers, so she came to the gate of my home and scolded for several days. After that, I was beat by her on my way home and she hurt my mouth. When my mother asked what happened with my mouth, I lied that I was not careful and had a fall. I did not think to tell them the truth because I was afraid that my mother would go quarrel with her and cause a bigger conflict. I knew that, at that time, it was difficult for my mother to raise us. In brief, there are good people and bad people anywhere, and farmers are not synonymous with goodness either.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I was the first and only female undergraduate in my village. As a girl, it was a miracle that I could get into university from a place where boys could not always get an education. My father made all of this come true. My father is a veteran, his outside experiences led him to send me to be educated. His original intention was that I could read the characters and distinguish the toilet. At that time, we had to go to the school approximately 10 kilometres away. There were dozens of children for primary school, but after graduating from primary school, I was the only one that persisted with studying.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]'I want to be a concubine'[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]An eye-opener for Singaporeans. This translated tale of a peasant girl may partly explain the Geylang phenomenon. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]June 5, 2009[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Why My Life Is Miserable Because I Am Poor [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif](Excerpts of article translated by Shaohua on September 25, 2008)[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I was born in a remote hamlet in the north of China. I have heard from someone, who never been to the genuine villages, that the countryside is very nice. But in fact, no public road was built and the nearest bus stop is 20 kilometres away, so we always had to walk on foot or ride a bicycle to get out of the village. The street in the village was made of soil and was not flat. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]On a sunny day, wind with sound and soil blew you. On a rainy day, rain with the m&d poured you. The m&d on the road was added with shit from animals raised by villagers, because animals always shit on the road but not in their own country yard to keep it tidy and clean. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]No fresh vegetables were supplied to the villagers in the whole year because only radishes and cabbage were planted there. It also had sweet potato, if that is a vegetable. So, as dishes, what they could have were only salted radishes and cabbage. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Some may ask, why did we not fry? The truth was that there was not much cooking oil for frying because of poverty, so fried dishes were always rare for them except in the case of Spring Festival or when some relatives come for dinner. I remember I had my first “you tiao” [a fried bread stick] in the dining hall at my university. And health care was not ensured either. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Take my grandpa for example, he couldn’t help but wait for death once he fell sick. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]After he was sent to the hospital ran by the State, they refused to diagnose my grandpa even though we knelt down begging them to cure him. The reason was simply because we did not have 2 yuan for medicine. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]We could do nothing but see my grandpa die in the hospital. Some may say that the countryside is developing these days. But the truth is that there has been almost no change for my village since I was born. I really cannot say whether change will happen or not in my life.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I was born at the end of the 1970s. We had 5 children, including me, 3 sisters and 1 brother. Some people may wonder why my mother had so many children if my family was so poor? These people may not understand China clearly. These days, only really poor people or rich people can have more than one child, and we belonged to the poor group. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]In the countryside, in my opinion, there are 2 reasons for having more children. First, no entertainment in the countryside. So after working in the daylight, sometimes having sex on the “kang” (bed made by soil and brick) at night may be the only amusing thing for them. Although they did not want more children, no one told them effective means of contraception. I saw with my own eyes that my mother wanted to abort using tied rope or eating tobacco ash for contraception. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]The second reason was the traditional concept and environment of the countryside. There must be a man in every home because working in the countryside is so hard that only men can deal with them, so people in the countryside always held the concept that birthing a boy in every generation is necessary for the continuance of the family. If you could not give birth to a boy, you would be looked down upon. Before my brother was born, my mother was always looked down upon by my family members, I was always hit by other children and had the nickname of ‘jue-hu-guo,” meaning “no boy no generation continuance.”[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]The goodness of the farm is not what you think because of the poor and narrow opinions of countryside life. At that time, there were several children in every family, and every child struggled for subsistence without caring for others. I remembered that when I was 5 years old, my parents had gone to work farming, I took care of my sister at home, and one of my neighbours came to borrow a kitchen knife but also secretly stole a dinner pan. After my parents came back, they found the pan missing, so they went to that neighbour, but failed to get the pan back because my neighbour refused to acknowledge that he took the pan away. The result of this was that I was beat fiercely by my parents and we cooked without the pan for a long period.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]And another time when I was 9 years old, I saw a sister-in-law in my village stealing the cotton from my uncle’s field, then she was caught by my uncle and warned that he would show villagers what she did. In order to prevent this, she promised that she could have sex with my uncle if my uncle would set her free. Then my uncle had sex with her in the field. I did not know what they did when I was 9 years old, but after I realised the meaning of what happened, it made me feel sick every time I thought of it. But, in the end, what they did was discovered and spread in my village. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]My uncle probably told some people, but that sister-in-law thought I had told my mother and that my mother spread it to the villagers, so she came to the gate of my home and scolded for several days. After that, I was beat by her on my way home and she hurt my mouth. When my mother asked what happened with my mouth, I lied that I was not careful and had a fall. I did not think to tell them the truth because I was afraid that my mother would go quarrel with her and cause a bigger conflict. I knew that, at that time, it was difficult for my mother to raise us. In brief, there are good people and bad people anywhere, and farmers are not synonymous with goodness either.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I was the first and only female undergraduate in my village. As a girl, it was a miracle that I could get into university from a place where boys could not always get an education. My father made all of this come true. My father is a veteran, his outside experiences led him to send me to be educated. His original intention was that I could read the characters and distinguish the toilet. At that time, we had to go to the school approximately 10 kilometres away. There were dozens of children for primary school, but after graduating from primary school, I was the only one that persisted with studying.[/FONT]