Saturday, October 31, 2009

China's Great Wall of Silence: Seeking the Soul.


In a country as centralized as any in the world with a longer history of centralization than any other, understanding Beijing, the center of the center, can go a long way to understanding the country.

But in everything I've read, Anhui comes up again and again. The Good Earth, the first post-college book I read on China, was based there; the Great Leap Forward famine was perhaps more severe there than in any other province of China; the oppression of the peasants at least as brutal as anywhere else; the April 2 incident and others like it happened there.

The Center has always feared rebellion among the peasants. A significant part of the soul of China is there in Anhui.


Above, Brickworker slaves, Anhui province (2007).

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

China's Great Wall of Silence: Seeking the Soul-Jie Li

Ms. Jie Li has sent the following email in response to the October 3 post here.

Hello Mr. Harris,

Thank you for coming to the presentation, but you have misquoted me. First, my
name is Jie Li and not Jie Lie, and Li is my last name. Secondly, I have not
made most of the statements you have attributed to me. I can send you the
parts of the paper related to Song Binbin, from which I was reading, provided
that you will take away the existing misquotations.

Point by point,

1. I did not say that Morning Sun exculpated Song Binbin but that the audience
of the film claim that Morning Sun exculpated Song Binbin. To say this does
not mean I agree with them.

2. The second statement:

Morning Sun also exculpated Song of volitional change of her surname from
Binbin, meaning “gentle and refined” to Yaowu, “be militant.”

implies that the change is volitional, and there is no evidence of it, so I did
not make that statement.

3. “Outrage” by Chinese toward Song after Morning Sun is due to her violation of
expected Chinese gender roles (submissiveness and repentance).

I said gender played a role, but not an exclusive role. My paper is on the role
of gender but not using gender as the exclusive explanation.

4. It is Song “the symbol and not the person” that is responsible for her
demonization.

I agree that I said this and will hold onto this. A person is held innocent
until proven guilty, and I have not seen any hard proof of her personal
violence. I know that Wang Youqin considers her not innocent, but provided no
evidence of her participation in violence. I have also spoken to Hu Jie (by
the way, I have an article about his CR films in the newest issue of the
journal "Public Culture" which might interest you), who said Song Binbin is
guilty only by virtue of her holding power and allowing the violence to take
place, but not by being violent herself. If you have other conclusive and hard
evidence of her personal participation in violence, I would appreciate the
reference.

5. Song is “a scapegoat and victim” of the Cultural Revolution.

Now this contradicts statement #1. If I say Morning Sun exculpated her, then it
would suggest that I agree that she's guilty and the film merely pardoned her.
The CR was a period with many victims, some of them complicit or even guilty
victims. Being a victim does not exclude the possibility of being a
perpetrator, and a scapegoat means who carries other people's guilt, but it
does not necessarily mean "innocent."

We can discuss this further in two weeks or so--I'm on a research trip
currently.

With Best Wishes,
Jie

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Politics & Justice in the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office


Miami-Dade prosecutor charged with punching pizza delivery woman


On the third floor of the Miami Prosecutor's office, outside the offices of three administrators to State Attorney Katherine Fernandez-Rundle is a trial board. The trial board lists those assistant prosecutors who are currently in trial and the charges in their trial cases. It's supposed to be a sort of advertisement for the good crime-fighting work that the office does for the taxpayers.

The trial board also advertises the above newspaper headline.

One of Katherine Fernandez-Rundle's own prosecutors arrested, again. In the past few years one of Rundle's prosecutors was arrested for DUI and causing serious bodily injury to two people. Another was arrested for purchasing marijuana--from an undercover police officer. A third was arrested for possession of a party drug in a nightclub. A fourth was found to have marijuana in her blood after her accidental death.

The drug incidents caused a mini-scandal. Estimates were that 30%-40% of prosecutors in Rundle's office would test positive if they were tested. Some prosecutors voluntarily submitted to drug tests. And asked Rundle to require them of all. Rundle refused, fearful that the estimates might prove accurate, or low.

It is willful blindness. Rundle's office has been in the news for creating crime, not preventing it. The taxpayers of Miami-Dade County deserve better.


This is Public Occurrences.

Above, Rundle and her pet, "The First Laddie."

Monday, October 26, 2009

China's Great Wall of Silence: Seeking the Soul-Providence.




New England Conference of the

Association for Asian Studies

Brown University
October 3, 2009


MARGINAL ON THE MARGINS: AN EXPLORATION OF WOMEN AND

REPRESENTATION IN CHINA'S INDEPENDENT DOCUMENTARY CINEMA


Jie Li: China's Salvation Through Women's Souls? Reception of Documentary Images of Lin Zhao, Chai Ling, and Song Binbin.

.............................................................................................................................


I came across this announcement when I made a periodic search on Google and Baidu for Song Binbin in September.

When the Song constellation dominates your night sky, stumbling upon this during a routine internet search constitutes a "sign" from above.

China's Salvation Through Women's Souls?
Seeking the Soul of Lin Zhao.
China's Legal Soul.
The Struggle for the Soul of Modern China.
of a New China.

This came on top of my restlessness since the "completion" of "Beijing Diary," the gloomy realization that I was not near understanding, that I could not excise this part of all that is China and thoroughly understand it and leave all the rest, because this was a murder and at the center of any murder, and at the center of this murder at the center of the Middle Kingdom, is mens rea which is so close to "soul."

The soul is at the center of murder because every human being, by virtue of having that soul has the capacity to set the world on fire. Or to plunge it into darkness.

We are not shiny bolts.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

China's Great Wall of Silence: Seeking the Soul.


What brought me to that hotel room in Providence, Rhode Island and to contrast--unable to do anything but contrast--the Olympic opening ceremonies in Barcelona, Spain, Western Europe and Beijing, China, Eastern Asia, was an Eastern Asian, Chinese, Beijinger named Song Binbin.

If my consciousness could be depicted in a pie chart with the various subjects accorded slices proportionate to the thought devoted to them in the last three years then Song Binbin/August 5, 1966/Bian Zhongyun/Beijing/China would form a a bizarrely large slice.

Part of the reason for that bizarrely large slice is my profession, certainly. The whole Song/Bian constellation is about murder and I work in a galaxy in that constellation.

But if Song/August 5/Bian/Beijing/China were a constellation about trading in pork belly futures and I did pork bellies the pork bellies constellation would not occupy the same part of my consciousness.

The real Song/Bian constellation is about some hardy perennials that tax us when circumstances force them on our brains. There are the obvious--crime and punishment, violence generally, accountability, morality. But more evanescent things too, like free will. Didn't we dispense with that in the one philosophy course we were required to take in college, the course that changed the trajectory of our education to something practical, like dentistry?

And free will gets all tangled up in other trajectory-changing subjects, like psychology, theology, and sciences like neurology, "hard" sciences both as a term of distinction from those soft others and as difficult ones, not required, and thus ones we didn't take.

When I began this whatever-it-is about China I thought I had bitten off a small enough piece of that beast of a feast for my digestion. It was a murder; I would investigate the murder; I would identify those responsible; I would be sated and would move on--to the Great Leap Forward maybe or who knows what but in terms of that driving hunger, if I had identified the perpetrators I could have pushed myself away from the dinner table and gone to lay on the couch. I went back to Beijing in November of 2008 to do just that, identify the perpetrators and move on.

I was not able to move on.

I asked a lot of questions in Beijing so I got a lot of answers but I didn't get the answer to who the perpetrators of Bian Zhongyun's murder were. I got a lot of information but the days in Beijing were so filled with interviews that I didn't have a chance to (continuing the metaphor) digest at night what I had learned--or un-learned--during the day. And the next day it was more interviews.

When I got back to the U.S. I went back to work, which piles up when one is away for ten days, and which inhibited reflection on things Chinese. Then I got a Providence-like stimulus to my frontal lobe and went to New York City for a long weekend because there were a bunch of American Maoists holding a conference at N.Y.U. and I thought it would be fun, and it was fun.

I never did write about the weekend with the American Maoists because I had to get down on paper whatever it was I learned in Beijing before it, and my memory, grew stale. My friends, Youqin Wang and Rongfen Wang, were able to get Open Magazine in Hong Kong to agree to serially publish what I wrote and a new friend Bei Su Ni assisted in the translation.

So I sat down and began to write. I knew that I had not had time to reflect and so, uncharacteristically, I did not know what I was going to write beforehand but I thought the multitude of facts floating around in my head could be brought together as so many metal filings to a magnet once the process of writing began. In this instance the focusing power of writing was no magnet and the metal filings continued to float free-form in the space between my ears.

It was not writer's block I had but understanding block. I didn't know what to make of it all and I was confused. Daniel Boone once said that he had never been lost but he had been "mighty confused one time for three days." I was confused like that. The result was what Open aptly re-titled a "Beijing Diary." I didn't have an overarching theme so I just faithfully recorded the facts as I learned them on a daily basis.

I remain confused like that. In the eleven months since I have tossed and turned and thrashed about like in a sleepless night. I have started "The Foreigner" and then stopped and started "The Anthropology of the Cultural Revolution" and then stopped and then started a series on Liu Shaoqi and family. I have been looking for the magnet.

Recently I gave up trying to write and went back to reading. I found two new books that may or may not be false starts but the titles seemed to get to what I was looking for. The first was written by a professor of law at the University of Kansas, John W. Head. The second by the former Beijing bureau chief of the Washington Post, Philip P. Pan. Professor Head's book is called China's Legal Soul. Mr. Pan's is Out of Mao's Shadow: The Struggle for the Soul of a New China. I just got Mr. Pan's book but I have finished Professor Head's and what a wonderful book it was and how much it helped me.

The lure of the books was the presence of the word "soul" in both titles. It strikes me, in my present confusion, that to write thematically about Song/Bian/August 5, 1966, etc. as I had intended I have to get more soul.

After I finally turned away from any attempt at The Compleat History of the Murder of Bian Zhongyun to the more pedestrian "Beijing Diary" the writing came easier but near the end I bumped up against "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!" again. The wall I hit was in dealing with the mens rea of the murder and whether the insanity defense applied. Mens rea is the mental component of every crime. For theft, the intent to steal; for first degree murder, "premeditation" which is defined as "the conscious intent to kill." And so on. But, if a person is insane within the meaning of that legal term, then there is no crime, no matter how heinous, not just a lesser degree of the genus, nothing, nada as we say in America.

I got stuck on mens rea and insanity. Something close to frantic, I emailed all my Chinese friends with the legal definition of insanity (without the off-putting label) and asked them if they thought it applied to the behavior of this situation's analog to the Reasonable Man, which I termed "Generic Red Guard." The answers I got were all over the lot.

I had forgotten until I checked just now that I never ended up publishing a conclusion on this topic. In searching Publocc I saw that I ended the "Beijing Diary" series with installment XI which just laid out the definition of insanity. I don't remember exactly if I didn't finish because I got up against Open's submission deadline or if I gave up because of Daniel Boone-like confusion. In my drafts folder however I found five separate installment XII's, which points powerfully to Daniel Boone.

There was so much going on in Beijing in the spring and early summer of 1966 that played with people's psyches. The whole capital was confused, none more so than the C.C.P. leadership. Only Mao knew what was going on. Liu Shaoqi, Zhou Enlai, and Deng Xiaoping hadn't the foggiest idea what was happening and by the time they figured it out it was too late. Liu and Deng were purged before they knew what hit them. Imagine the psychic confusion among other Beijingers.

Trying to imagine what was in the minds of the Beijingers involved in Bian Zhongyun's Passion was the wall I hit. This issue befuddles even Chinese who were at the school that day. Given that, it's unlikely I'm ever going to understand it much less come up with an explanation that sounds plausible to Chinese who were there. But if it is to be understood and explained it may have to do with that thing the soul.

Mens rea and insanity get close to the idea of "soul" and the reason I found the two books mentioned above so intriguing. "Soul" also appears in the title one of Hu Jie's films, Seeking the Soul of Lin Zhao, the first English translation of which, by my friend Ye Weiyou, appeared in Public Occurrences. Maybe what this all comes down to is Seeking the Soul. Put that broadly, maybe I'm seeking my own soul. But certainly if I've now rightly conceived this thing I am seeking the soul of Song Binbin.

And that brings me back to Providence.


Cover: The Rothko Chapel, Houston Texas.

Monday, October 19, 2009


Just stay out there.

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Below, China's gold-medal winning synchronized security team.



Two weeks ago in a hotel room in Providence, Rhode Island my girlfriend and I were talking when, apropos of what I don't remember, she told me about the torch lighting ceremony at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992. Her description piqued my interest and we brought it up on YouTube on her notebook computer. I was enchanted.

"Did you see the torch lighting in Beijing?," Carmen asked. (I hadn't).

"Wait till you see that one!"

"I remember my friends telling me about it..." "Wait, wait," she interrupted in excitement.

The YouTube genie was called forth again.


Sixty, fifty-nine, fifty-eight...It was with that sequence that the segment opened.

"They're people!," Carmen explained. I don't know if my jaw dropped because I wasn't looking at my jaw but I hadn't gotten it until she said that. The jaw in my mind certainly dropped.

"Oh, that's not good," I said when I got it. Carmen's excited smile disappeared.

"Oh, no." The grotesquerie of scene after scene of Chinese-as-rustless-screws continued.


I remembered a friend telling me about the drummers, below, as I watched that part.


"This is so typical of the Chinese," I said to Carmen. "This is what they excel at, this Hollywood special-effects stuff. This is what they think we're all about."



I thought of Rae Yang's comment in Morning Sun about growing up with Lei Feng as a role model:

"A shiny bolt? That's what our generation was to become?"

So she became a Red Guard and beat people, sometimes to death. (1)



I watched to the end, I think it was only seven or eight minutes long, but it was like seven or eight minutes of nonstop hardcore porn, it was so over-the-top that it was dulling rather than exciting.

At the end, there was Hu Jintao, getting up from his seat applauding like a proud Olympic gymnastics coach who had choreographed a perfect-10 performance.

"Oh my god," I said, wincing when it was mercifully, finally over.

Westerners have a very difficult time understanding China, this westerner in particular. Chinese have equal difficulty understanding America.

1. Spider Eaters, 228-231.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

"A man's usefulness to the revolutionary cause is like a screw in a machine. It is only by the many, many interconnected and fixed screws that the machine can move freely, increasing its enormous work power."
-The Diary of Lei Feng.

Above, Lei Feng lionized. Below, many, many interconnected screws at work during the opening ceremony, Beijing Olympics 2008.


May 5 is a day of official celebration in the People's Republic of China known as "Learn from Lei Feng day." It is a day of recommitment to the larger social good. The iconography of self-sacrifice is a trope of transcendence used by all cultures but Lei Feng Day is self-sacrifice with Chinese characteristics:

"I will be a screw that never rusts and will glitter anywhere I am placed."

The Lei Feng legend was begun by Mao Zedong in 1963. A People's Liberation Army soldier, Lei purportedly kept a diary that came to official attention after his death. Quotes from the diary were used to inculcate the spirit of selflessness. The cult of Mao was already under way however and as it exploded on the Chinese people at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution Lei became the example of the ideal new person:

"Whatever Chairman Mao says, that I will do."

Human individuality conceived as a mere cog in a machine is, I suggest, quintessentially Chinese. It is taking the person out of the lesson of personal sacrifice for the common good. This conception has ancient roots in Chinese culture. The moral philosophy of Confucius taught the fundamental "Five Relationships" that began with father and son and ended with ruler and subject. The relationships were reciprocal and ruler owed moral rule to his subjects but obedience was at bedrock. It was thus a small step for the later Legalists to dispense with the reciprocity and rule by emphasizing--and enforcing--total obedience. Mao Zedong openly compared himself with Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor to unite China and who did so with Legalist thought.

How different this Chinese conception of human individuality from that in the West, and how vivid the expression of these differences in the imagery from the 2008 Beijing Olympics and that of Barcelona in 1992:

A lone archer shoots a flaming arrow to light the Olympic torch. And a single individual can set the world on fire.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

A Million Drops of Blood: "State Dongfeng Farm," film by Hu Jie. Translation by Ye Weiyou. Part V



Supplement to Lin Zhao (Part V)

In 1964: On Feb.5 of 1964, she attempted suicide by eating medicated soap. In March she wrote to interrogators. On April 12 she wrote a poem in memory of her uncle who died for CCP revolution in 1927 saying that it was her mother who educated her and it was her uncle who educated her mother in revolutionary thoughts…On Sept. 26 deprived of paper and pen, she began to write poems and essays of about 200 000 words with her blood by piercing her skin with bamboo picks, hairpins and pointed tooth brush handle (rubbing on the ground) on walls, blouses and bed-sheets. That was unique in man’s thought-history and even in the whole human history. On Nov.4, she refused occasional nutritious meat or fish. On 19th of Nov. after a non- agreeable talk with the jail, she was the fourth time handcuffed, which lasted till May 26 of 1965. The next day, Nov.10, 1964, having failed to die by cutting blood vain in her left wrist, she started a fast for ten days. On Dec.2nd, receiving indictment from Shanghai People’s Procuratorate in Jingan District, Lin wrote 3739-word of comment and criticism on the back of the document. On Dec.5th, she appeared in court as the accused. The same month, in her first blood-written letter to People’s Daily (CCP’s leading newspaper) she depicted her case and expressed her view in politics, but got no response. On the 6th, she trusted procuratorate the first letter to Mayer of Shanghai. From Dec. till Feb. 1965, she was jailed in Shanghai First lockup.
In 1965: On Jan.5th, she asked for chopsticks. The end of that month she was raped by a jailer. On Feb.20th, the jail had a talk with her. The next morning, she began to refuse food. And again, in blood she wrote to the People’s Daily the 2nd time reporting her case and expressing her point of views in politics, but did not get any response either. An appeal was unclosed to the world justice to give attention to her cause and case. She asked to pass that appeal to a Japanese lawyer and a Chilean newsman (so naïve Lin Zhao was!!!) On March 3rd, she wrote a 2nd letter to Shanghai Mayer Ke Qing-shi. On the 5th, she received her family visit. On the 6th, she presented blood-written hunger-strike statement and the jail forced liquid through her nose. That lasted 80 days till May 31st. During that period she wrote in blood everyday. In the 22 months of her stay in Shanghai First Prison her family only came once for delivering some grocery though Lin once wrote a long list of food she wanted from home.(so poor Lin was!) On a day in mid-March she wrote in blood: urgent need for trial. From March till May she remained silent for one and a half month. On the 21st, she smelled kind of chemical in the rice water and had diarrhea after taking it so she suspected the rice water of poison. Since then she had often loose bowels and stomachache. On March 23 she started writing <Statement to Mankind> On the 25th, being very weak, on the excuse of her period, she asked for infusion but was refused. At 11 a.m. of April 5th, five minutes after drinking the rice water the jail gave, she had diarrhea, again, she suspected poison in the food. On the afternoon of April 9th, Mayer Ke Qing-shi died and Lin suspected his death was a political plot. On May 31st a second court session opened. Shanghai Jingan District Court gave her a 20-year imprisonment. On June 1st, wounding her finger, she wrote on the back of the court verdict<>---Yesterday, you, the so-called, illegitimate court, made use of and usurped the name of law sentenced me 20-year imprisonment. This is a very dirty and very shameful verdict. But it does give me, a rebel, the highest honor. It proves the free fighter Lin Zhao’s justice and righteousness. From July till December, the 3rd time she wrote to People’s Daily explaining in detail her case and her views in politics mainly attacking class struggle theory Mao adhered and bloc dictatorship, appealing for human right, democracy, peace, justice, 100 000-word in length. On Aug.8th, she was transferred to Shanghai First Lockup.

In 1966: May 6th,at 8 a.m., in the name of Lin’s fiancé, together with her mother, Zhang Yuan-xun (Lin’s rightist schoolmate in BJ Univ. released from a jail in his hometown Shandong province in 1965) came to Shanghai Tilanqiao Jail for visiting Lin—the only visit among her schoolmates and colleagues. Lin looked so pale from lack of blood and so bony, her hair being long to the waist, half white. At the sight of Zhang, Lin gave a sincere smile, the jail leaders said they had never seen such a smile on her face. She took down the handkerchief on which she wrote “Wrong” with her blood. Zhang saw the several white spots on her head skin---wild pulling her hair in the persecution! She said to Zhang in the presence of about 20 jailers and officers with guns:“they want to rape me, so I have to sew my coats and trousers together!” At this, Zhang noticed her connected coats and trousers with thread. In the file it said that Lin was raped by a jailer at the end of January of 1965. When asking Zhang to take a bit care of her old mother and two young siblings, Lin changed from weeping to loud crying and one of the jail leaders said that it was the first time she had such a good cry.(for more in detail of this part please read my first writing from memory after watching the DVD made by Hu Jie) Originally there should be another visit the next day, but it was cancelled by the jail. In custody, Lin was handcuffed back for 180 days, not released even at meals, making bowels and water, and in her period/menstruation. At the end of that year, her sister Peng Ling-fan came to jail for a visit but having waited for five hours before meeting in late evening. Lin Zhao just asked if mother came, if mat was bought. Soon the sister returned home and that was the last meeting between the two sisters.

In 1967: on May 1st , together with Lin’s mother Xu Xian-min, Zhang Yuan-xun who was still in controlled labor, came secretly to Shanghai for a visit to Lin in jail, but he was told the jail is already in military control, all visits are cancelled.

In 1968: on April 29th, all day pouring rain. Lin got the written judgment from original 20-year imprisonment to death penalty (immediate execution) In no time, in her blood, Lin wrote:< History Will Declare Me Innocent > On the very day, she was dragged from sick bed in the jail (Lin was having an intravenous glucose drip, weighing under 70 pounds) So far it is still unknown who issued and who else signed the death penalty court verdict for there is no record.

Before the execution, there was a open trial assembly. Lin was taken out, a rubber plug being in her mouth. This was specially designed to prevent criminal from voicing, expanding and contracting with the victim opening his/her mouth. The more struggling, the more expanding, making the whole face change shape! Meanwhile, a plastic string was tied tightly on the neck. That work-along-both-line method for specially dangerous criminals made Lin’s face red and purple, which greatly saddened and astonished the other prisoners who were gathered to watch. Dumb-frightened, they even forgot to shout ‘down with’ slogans as required. Seeing that, the man in charge of the public trial flew into rage about the silence(inhumane!!!) The son of Lin mother’s friend who was a witness said that at about 3 p.m. that afternoon, he saw Lin was in custody by two jeeps and fast taken to Longhua Airport. Dragged out of the vehicle, Lin fell with a flop on the ground by a kick, and died with three bullets. Her body pulled in, the jeep ran fast. But the exact place where Lin was killed still remains a question.

In 1979: In January Beijing University gave the notice of labeling Lin a rightist was a wrong case.
In 1980: August 22nd, Shanghai Higher Court<…435 Court Verdict > on the excuse of suffering mental illness redressed Lin’s case as mishandled but still as common criminal case. On Dec.11th, Beijing University held funeral ceremony for Lin Zhao. Not finding her bone ashes, there was only a tuft of Lin’s hair, a portrait of her deceased. More than 80 people attended the ceremony with the funeral music
In 1981: on December 30th, Shanghai Higher People’s Court, after reviewing Lin’s case again, declared that Lin Zhao was totally innocent!

From then on till 2007, so many people have written poems, verses and essays to memorized Lin Zhao, including her sister Peng Ling-fan’s essays:<> <>…It turned out in 2004 that Lin Zhao’s ashes were secretly protected by a female in Shanghai and now she has presented the ashes to the Memorial Hall of the heroin………….

So far, Lin’s poems, verses, pen and blood-written works, are still kept in iron-bared cell serving the sentence and Shanghai Tilanqiao Jail has refused any kind of interviews. None of those who persecuted Lin Zhao accepted any visitors.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Wonderful Norway!

Map of Scandinavia.


People who insist on seeing an image of flaccidity here are ice-ists, they are intent on denigrating the great peoples of Scandinavia and the Nobel Prizes.

The shaft of the peninsula is composed of the kingdoms of Norway (head) and Sweden; Finland is located on the scrotal sac.

Scandinavians are an ancient people with a rich heritage of world influence and cultural distinction. Since the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded by Norwegians we here focus on King Harald's realm.

Norway is 116th in world population. Being king of Norway is, in population, like being king of Alabama, in geographical area being king of New Mexico, with a capital city the size of Milwaukee.

But size isn't everything. And it hasn't hurt Norwegian's image of themselves. This is "Jante's Law" which is the way Norwegians, and brother Scandinavians, see themselves:


  1. Don't think that you are special.
  2. Don't think that you are of the same standing as us.
  3. Don't think that you are smarter than us.
  4. Don't fancy yourself as being better than us.
  5. Don't think that you know more than us.
  6. Don't think that you are more important than us.
  7. Don't think that you are good at anything.
  8. Don't laugh at us.
  9. Don't think that anyone of us cares about you.
  10. Don't think that you can teach us anything.

For centuries Norway led the world in the export of SnoCones. In recent years however King Harald has moved to diversify the economy. A domestically produced automobile is a promising example of what Norwegian ingenuity can do when unleashed.


Below, the reigning Miss Norway behind the wheel of one of Norwegian Motors 2010 line of luxury motor cars.
























The Royal Yacht.


















A young Norwegian bride-to-be in traditional sex education class.
































Her husband-to-be.


The beauty for which the Norwegian people are renowned is complimented by the kingdom's cutting edge fashion industry.
















Here, chic unisex head wear.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Norway does have a king and he bears the name "Harald." This individual is pictured below with his consort Queen Sonja. The facial expressions of the royal couple convey the burdens of ruling a country whose judgment the world relies upon to bestow Nobel Peace Prizes. This photograph was taken on the anniversary of the last time the couple had sex (year at Her Majesty's right shoulder). On the cover the Royal Norwegian Orchestra performing on the occasion.




Below, the royal coat of arms.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Errata

Yesterday’s article on the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama was written hastily in response to the announcement. Too hastily for accuracy.

First, after quickly consulting an Associated Press link that gave all appearances of being a comprehensive list of all peace laureates and that began with the 1980 award I erroneously concluded, and wrote that the peace prize was of recent birth and should have been extinguished in utero. Subsequently however I read elsewhere that Theodore Roosevelt had been a recipient, thus dating it to no later than President Roosevelt’s first term in 1932. I corrected the article. Swine A.P.

Also, I believed that a king bestowed Nobel Prizes and after quickly consulting Wikipedia I wrote that it was the King of Sweden and that President Obama would have to bow before that monarch who would drape the medal around his neck. After posting the article I was nagged by doubts that Oslo was in Sweden and upon further research determined that it was not, it was in Norway. I do not know if Norway has a king.

Finally, I was unsure about the technicalities in the relation of all the countries and cities that have intruded unwanted upon thought two Friday’s in succession: Norway, Sweden, Oslo, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Denmark, Scandinavia, to say nothing of Holland and the Netherlands. After further quick research I learned that Oslo is the capital city of Norway, Stockholm is the capital of Sweden, and Copenhagen the capital of Denmark. I also verified that all of these places are located in the far northern hemisphere in the vicinity of Minnesota.

Friday, October 09, 2009


"gasps of astonishment."
"stunned."

Those are the terms Reuters, the most staid of the news reporting organizations, used to describe the effect of President Barack Obama's selection as winner of the Nobel Peace Prize today.

Fridays have not been kind to the president recently. A week ago Obama embarrassed himself and diminished the role of the presidency by dramatically and inexplicably flying to Denmark to lobby for Chicago's bid to host the 2016 Olympics. And then came in fourth out of four contenders.

Now this.

Let us be clear: Obama is not to blame here. He did not nominate himself, he did not lobby for the Nobel Prize. Even David Axelrod, a senior advisor to the president, when told that many were stunned by the announcement, replied, "As are we."

It would be generous to say that Obama, in office just over eight months, has a record of achievement in international peace-making. It is, to employ the term de jour, "astonishing" that any would think that record merits a Nobel Prize.

However in recent years the peace prize has become a blatantly political award that reflects the twee, frozen political fashions current in the frozen north. It is awarded by a cloistered, clueless group of elites whose cluelessness is accurately reflected in previous winners Yasser Arafat, Kofi Annan, Jimmy Carter, and Al Gore.

President Obama now joins that rogue's gallery.

The White House now has a problem on its hands: how to respond. Here's guessing, and hoping, that when they say, as they have, that they are "humbled," they respond with humility: do the closest thing to ignoring it that is diplomatically (he is a certified peace-maker now, after all) feasible.

Other Nobel laureates have refused the reward. Should Obama? To receive it he has to travel again to Scandinavia, which he might want to avoid for the duration of his life. Then he has to bow to the King of Sweden so that His Majesty can drape the Olympic-like medal around his neck.

The image is painful even to imagine.

However to refuse it would probably be too un-peaceful a move. He can't send his regrets pleading the press of world affairs when he has already set the precedent by flying to Copenhagen to lobby the I.O.C. Probably a brief fly-by a la Copenhagen and an "I am literally not worthy" speech is the least bad of the options.

This is Public Occurrences.

Thursday, October 08, 2009

A Million Drops of Blood: "State Dongfeng Farm," film by Hu Jie, translation by Ye Weiyou. Part IV





( Part IV)



问: 你今年几岁啦?
Question: How old are you?

赵孙女儿:我今年八岁半。

Zhao’s granddaughter: Eight and a half.

问: 八岁半。爷爷过去的故事给你讲过吗?
Question: Eight and a half. Were you told the stories of your grandfather in his past?

赵孙女儿:我只知道我爷爷的一小点。

Zhao’s granddaughter: I know just a bit part.

问: 哪一小点呢?
Question: Which is the bit part?

赵孙女儿:就是我爷爷被他们整着、关着。

Zhao’s granddaughter: It is of my grandpa’s being attacked and locked up.

赵福运:有时我们大人讲话她会听,记住。是这么回事。支离破碎的,不全面。

Zhao Fuyun: It was because that she sometimes listened to and remembered what she heard, just fragmented, not a whole.

金雅美: 一个民兵的钥匙掉到后面的粪坑里头,后来就叫那个姓赵的,跳到那个粪坑去帮他找那个钥匙。跳到粪坑里找钥匙,把钥匙再拿上来。

Jin Yamei: A militia’s key dropped to the manure pit at the back, later a man named Zhao was told to jump into the pit

to help him look for the key and get it out.

赵孙女儿:当时的那些人,怎么会折磨像我爷爷他们这样的人呢?大家都是人嘛!

Zhao’s granddaughter: How could the then persons have tortured people like my grandpa? Anyway they are all human being.

赵妻:让他在外边干活嘛,他说,受不了的时候,很想拿锄头给他砸死两个嘛,也赚一个。他就一直有这样的想法。

Zhao’s wife: They made him Labor outdoors, he (Zhao) said, when unable to bear the torture, he simply wished to kill two of them, worthy of dying ( I one, but they two) he kept thinking that way.

金雅美:赵福运就关在那个地方。她一个人要照顾三个孩子,小孩没人管。拎水,还要每天下田劳动。那个女的她那布,背的布,把小孩背在身上,去打饭、打菜。哇,那个日子真的是,他们真的是有骨气,有骨气能被她挺过来。

Jin Yamei: Zhao Fuyun was shut there. And she (Zhao’s wife) had to take care of two small children, often left them by themselves, she had to carry water and go to work in the field. With the youngest child on her back in cloth, she went for meals…Oh, the days were really….They were indeed strong back-boned, so strong a character she had so that she could have endured the hardships.

赵妻: 我就为了他这一点。有一天送饭的时候,送饭,里边放上汤,头天晚上就拿一个小纸条,拿那铅笔削的尖尖的,写的那个字很小很

拿一个塑料薄薄的塑料皮,拿线给它缠上放在那个饭里,放上那个汤,那个纸条就在里边,我说:你一定要坚持,当你绝望的时候,你想想你的女儿和你的妻子,我就写这几个字啊。

Zhao’s wife: Just for his case. One day taking the advantage of bringing meal to him, I put in the soup a slip of paper wrapped in plastic. I tied it with thread and put it in the rice along with soup, all made the night before. On the paper I wrote with very pointed pencil: “Do hold on. When you despair, just think of your children and your wife.” I simply wrote those words.

李泽衡:这个是仓库,开斗争会就把这个门打开。所有的右派分子、劳改释放犯、知青全部集中在这里面, 坐到里面去批斗。仓库这些标语是我写的,(大批修正主义)这是我写的。我们在这个房子里面被打,那不是说可以申辩,随便人家怎么打。那个时候生命力还特别强。不知道怎么又恢复起来了。

Li Zeheng: This was the warehouse the door of which was opened at struggle meetings. All the rightists, discharged prisoners and school leavers were all gathered there sitting for criticism and struggle. The slogans in the warehouse were written by me---Great Criticism of Revisionism--- we were beaten in the room without the right to defend ourselves, just let them beat us at their will. In those days our vitality was pretty great and, without notice, we got recovered.

徐鸿康:我就经常跟我老婆说,不要怕,总有一天,你每天看见太阳就是希望,总有一天会证明俺们到底是不是坏分子。所以我跟我老婆是这样说的,要活下去!

Xu Hongkang: I often said to my wife: “Do not fear, you see the sun everyday and this is the hope, sooner or later it will prove if on earth we are bad elements…” So that was the way I persuaded my wife and encouraged her to live on.

武贵英:当时对这种辩别也很没有这种辨别能力,只是在长期的劳动当中,就是慢慢的就发现,这些人好像有文化,但是 好像又不像领导说的这样坏。

Wu Guiying: At that time we had little ability to distinguish, it was only through the long-time labor we gradually found that those people (rightists) seemed to be literate, and did not look like so bad as the leaders said.

金雅美:在思想最悲观的时候,在想家的时候, 那些右派来劝我们。但他们有时候也有一种顾忌,怎么怕连队干部知道,怕连队干部(说):你们去腐蚀知青,给他们戴这种帽子。

Jin Yamei: During the time that we were the most pessimistic and the most homesick, the rightists would come to comfort us, but sometimes they had some worry that the company leaders would know about it and say that they corroded the school leavers, they feared that label.

武贵英:他们确实是,就不好听的话,真是,就像他说:就像会说话的牲口。根本不给你说话的机会。

Wu Guiying: They indeed, in a bad-sounding word as he said, looked like draught animals able to speak, but never did they get any chance to speak.

金雅美:有一次参加农场对右派,比如讲他某个案子,我们要看他们材料的时候。我们后来就感觉到他们好冤枉。有的只是讲了几句话就被打成右派。我们上次看到一个资料上边,他就鼓励你发言,发言的时候就鼓励你,什么大家都要讲话,有的就讲呢什么外行不能领导内行,就讲了这些话,接下来就打成右派。

Jin Yamei: Once I joined in the investigation of the rightists’ cases and found they were so wronged. Some of them were labeled rightists just because of saying a few words. At an earlier time, we read that the above encouraged them to speak, thus, someone mentioned that laymen should not lead experts, just for those words he was later attacked as a rightist.

(唱):军旗飘扬,战歌嘹亮,革命战士斗志昂,毛泽东思想指引着我们,批林批孔当闯将,一手拿笔一手拿枪…….

(singing) Army flag fluttering in the wind, fighting song being loud and clear, revolutionary fighters have high moral.

In the direction of Mao Zedong thought, we are path breakers in “Criticism of Lin Biao and Confucius, with one hand holding a pen, another holding a gun. (Lin B. was vice Party Chairman before Sept. 13 Event)

汪作民:9。13事件的时候,林彪事件的时候,大家变了。看透了。右派之间和平共处。唉!假的。

Wang Zuomin: After Sept. 13th Event, Lin Biao Event, was revealed, all the people changed, having seen through everything. So there was peaceful coexistence among rightists----Oh, sham!(everything we were told by the above was false)

赵汉科:文化大革命把我们打醒了。

Zhao Hanke: The Cultural Revolution struck us awaken.

汪作民:74年9月份兵团撤销,又恢复到农场,仍然是地方农垦系统的一个场。

Wang Zuomin: In Sept. of 1974, production and construction corps revoked and it again was resumed to farm, still a farm belonging to the local wasteland reclaiming system.

武贵英:75、76年,当时政治气氛稍微松一些。

Wu Guiying: In 1975 and 1976 the political atmosphere became less serious, a bit relaxed. (1/8, Sat.)

张海波:邓小平又复出,复出以后他的一些政策受到一些批判,批判时候,刚好我们就议论,批斗东西正是大家所期望的东西。

Zhang Haibo: Not long after Deng Xiaoping came back to political life, some of his policies got criticized again. During the great criticism of him, we felt that his policies were just what we longed for.

赵汉科:说白了就是说,那尊神不上天,我们是出不了地狱的。

Zhao Hanke: To put it in a plain way, if the ‘god’(referring to Mao) did not go up to heaven, we could not get out of hell.

李泽衡:1977年,毛泽东已经去世了,华国锋上台啦。

Li Zeheng: In 1977 Mao was already dead, Hua Guofeng succeeded him as the top leader.

金雅美:这个路线斗争一转的话,说我们是四人帮的那个了嘛,就让我们这些人全部关在这个地方。那时候还有俩个女孩子守着我。我连上厕所,到那里吃个饭,天天都跟着你,一分钟也不停的。

Jin Yamei: With the turn in the two-line struggle, we were attacked as the like of the ‘Gang of Four’(Mao’s widow Jiang Qing and three other high officials) and thus were locked up here. At that time two girls watched me, following me everywhere: to toilet and to dinning room, without any minute break.

金雅美:三个月。那三个月里面,我坐在里面,自己很冷静的在考虑我自己这一生。

Jin Yamei: Three months. In the three months I sat there, calmly reviewing my past life.

(纪录片解说):(1978年)5月10日,中共中央党校理论动态上,发表<实践是检验真理标准>一文。11日光明日报以特邀评论员名义公开发表。这篇文章从理论上对“两个凡是”作了根本否定。引发了真理标准问题的全国性大讨论。这场大讨论促进了全国性的思想解放运动,为十一届三中全会的召开准备了思想条件,1978年中共中央批准全部摘掉右派分子的帽子。

( explanation in the documentary) On May 10th of 1978, an article was published on the ‘Trends in Theory’, a magazine run by the Central Committee of CCP School. On 11th, the article was published on Guangming Daily in the name of a specially-invited commentator. That article totally negated the “two so long” and hence it aroused throughout the country a hot discussion about the criterion of truth. That hot discussion promoted a nation-wide ideological emancipation, which prepared the condition of ideology for the opening of the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of CCP. In 1978, the Central Committee of CCP approved removing the political label for all rightists.

[Note: the “two so long”]---we must do everything so long as it was said by Chairman Mao and we should not change anything so long as it was decided by Chairman Mao. That “two so long” was proposed by Hua Guofeng, Mao-decided successor after his death, and Wang Dongxing, one of the ultra-Left top officials)

汪作民:1978年5月4号,中共中央的几号文件批准全部摘帽,地富反坏右全部摘了。我跟赵汉科是这时候摘帽的。

Wang Zuomin: On May 4th of 1978, on some document of the Central Committee of CCP there was issue that the Party approves of removing all the labels put on rightists, rich farmers, landlords and bad elements. Zhao Hanke and I got our label cast off at that time.

(纪录片解说):12月18日至22日 中国共产党第十一届中央委员会第三次全体会议在北京召开。十一届三中全会冲破长期左的错误的严重束缚,做出了实行改革开放的战略决策。全会决定停止使用“以阶级斗争为纲”的口号。中共十一届三中全会以后,从中央到地方都按照实事求是有错必纠的原则,加快了平反冤假错案的步伐。

( explanation in the documentary) From Dec. 18th to 22nd, the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of CCP was held in Beijing. That session broke off the grave fettering from the long-time Left deviation, made a strategic decision to reform and open to the outside world. The session decided to stop using the slogan “ keep class struggle as the key link” (Mao’s directive). After that session, from the center to the localities, they all quickened the step in redressing mishandled cases and grievances on the principle of ‘seeking truth from the facts and correcting all errors’

(胡耀邦 中共中央党校副校长 中央组织部部长)

(Hu Yaobang Deputy president of the Central Committee of CCP School)



汪作民:但是,由于毛主席说过:右派不甄别不平反,1978年到79年对右派的处理不是甄别也不是平反,而是复查。经过复查大部分都不够右派。所以就已于改正,不称为平反。那么,历时21年以后到1979年年初,一月份开始的,右派全部离开农场,我个人是1979年1月20号离开农场的。

Wang zuomin: But, since Chairman Mao once said: Rightists get rehabilitated only after being screened. From 1978-1979 handling rightists was neither screening nor redressing but reexamining/checking. Through the checking, most of them were wronged, so they got the correction, which was not called rehabilitation. Then, after 21 years till the beginning of 1977, all the rightists began to leave the farm in January. I myself left the farm on Jan. 20th.

吴德本:我们离开的那一年是1978年,1978年那个时候已经收到500多万斤将近600万斤水稻。

Wu Deben: We left the farm in 1978 when we had already reaped over 2,500,000, close to 3,000,000 kilograms of rice.

汪作民:那么真正右派经过二十几年一查,没有这个事。就是一个历史的玩笑,玩笑开的相当大。

Wang zuomin: After checking the real rightists were actually totally wronged. It was a historical joke, quite big a joke.

(中共云南省委文件:关于改正《郑、王反党集团》冤案的通知

( Document of Yunnan Provincial Party Committee: Notice of Redressing the Wrong Case <<>>) (2/8, Sun.)



张 路: 省委组织部我不回去啦。那是一个整人的窝。每一次运动来就是整人,我不敢回去啦。我到检查院。

Zhang Lu: I would not return to the organizational department of provincial Party committee which was a lair/den of attacking people. In each movement their task was attacking people, so I dared not get back and turned to procuratorate.

金雅美:但我们知青也为他们高兴了。总算他们的冤案能够得到,总算在他们有生之年得到平反。

Jin Yamei: And we school leavers also felt happy for them, anyway, their wronged cases got redressed in their life.

孙梓川:人家说我们都得了癌病,一个是‘干’(肝)癌,一是‘长’(肠)癌。

Sun Zichuan: People said we all caught cancer, one was ‘cadre’(liver) cancer, one ‘head’ (bowels) cancer.

[Note: the two words in quotation marks are homonymic in Chinese]

金雅美:心里面那么多年的冤屈啊,好像一下子得到平反,这个内心真是没办法用语言来讲的清楚。有的是喝酒啊,有的是大家聚头啊。

Jin Yamei: So much injustice they suffered, and now with an unexpected rehabilitation they could hardly express their feelings in words. Some of them drank and some had get-together. (for celebration)

孙梓川:二十一年可算长啦?干挨,一分钱没得,可是干挨。

Sun zichuan: Isn’t the twenty-one years quite long? We had just endured, without any cent paid.

胡同增:我们当初离开农场的时候,当地就有不少的所谓积极分子,对我们离开能够得到改正,恢复原职,他们是很不满意的。

Hu Tongzeng: While we began to leave the farm there were quite many so-called activists who were very dissatisfied with our rehabilitation and reinstatement.

赵汉科:前面我们就提出来了,为死者建个碑吧,那还没考虑到建一个什么碑。只提出为死者建个碑。(拓荒)

Zhao Hanke: Previously we proposed building a tablet for the dead, but did not think of what kind of tablet.( wasteland reclaimation)

刘加强:我这一生在这个农场,实际上是在这批人中,在他们的教育下长大的, 就想为这批老同志树一个碑,

Liu Jiaqiang: I grew up in the farm, in fact, grew up among those people (victims), under their education, so I wanted to set up a table for those old people.

胡同增:立这个拓荒碑赵汉科有功劳, 为什么呢?农场发现了一个深井地下水,这个水作为矿泉水质量是一流的。

Hu Tongzeng: Zhao Hanke made contribution in building the table of reclaiming wasteland. Why? In the farm a deep-water well was discovered and the water was top-classed mineral water.

刘加强:我1990年任党委书记和场长, 我就着手这个纪念碑的设想,作为这个拓荒碑的设计呢,一个是要缅怀和追悼倒在这块土地上的人,被打死 被斗死的这两百人,

Liu Jiaqiang: In 1990 at the post of secretary of the Party committee and the farm head, I set about thinking of the tablet. As for its design, on one hand we must cherish the memory of and mourn the two hundred people who fell on that land, beaten and struggled to death.

胡同增:他们就想发展这矿泉水,就找到了赵汉科替他们招商引资,赵汉科在烟草公司里当会计,认识的资本家比较多,他给他们张罗集资。

Hu Tongzeng: Wishing to develop the mineral water, they asked Zhao Hanke to attract business and draw funds for them. Zhao was accountant for a tobacco company and knew relatively many capitalists, so he got busy about fund raising.

赵汉科:当初大家提了很多意见:能建纪念碑吗?能建吗?

Zhao Hanke: At the beginning people gave many opinions: was it permitted to build a tablet? Permitted?

刘加强:我当时还是有压力的。因为我身为一个党委书记,应该对党的历史要负责。这个纪念碑作党史的要认可、老同志要认可、包括左的一面,造反派也要认可。所以我就选了一个中性的词叫拓荒,

Liu Jiaqiang: At that time I had pressure. As a secretary of the Party committee, I should be responsible for the Party’s history. That tablet must be approved by those writing the history of the Party, by the old comrades, including the ‘Left’ and also by the rebels (of the C.R). So, I chose a neuter word, reclamation of wasteland. (2/8, Sun.)

汪作民:为什么要下去,下去不是为了拓荒。要突破拓荒的思路。

Wang Zuomin: Why we went down (to the farm) was not to reclaim wasteland, but to make a breakthrough in the thinking of wasteland reclamation.

刘加强:因为右派问题我们党终究没有翻案,只是说它扩大化。

Liu Jiaqiang: Since our Party has never reversed a verdict in the issue of rightists, merely admitted scope-broadening.

汪作民:你看(《云南农垦》杂志)关于东风农场它是什么:1958年起,22年以阶级斗争为纲,以粮为主,多种经营。 我们是阶级斗争的产物,没有阶级斗争就不可能有我们,而拓荒是生产活动,处理我们的时候没有提到什么拓荒不拓荒。

Wang Zuomin: Look what the magazine <> said about Dongfeng Farm: For twenty-two years since 1958, they have kept class struggle as the key link, kept grain as the dominant crops, and put multiple management into practice. We were the result of class struggle, no class struggle, no we, and to reclaim wasteland was production activity.

刘加强:正面的塑像应当把知识青年放在前面,因为知识青年最单纯,知识青年实际上也是历史的受害者。背面这块雕塑呢,被错划为右派分子的科学家、老教授。这幅反映了一大批刚刚大学 毕业的大学生。才一毕业就被划成右派,那么这批人在农场二十一年,知识青年在农场十年。他们形成了一种精神。那么这种精神也是我们中华民族一种勤劳、包容、忍耐。一种精神。

Liu Jiaqiang: Statues of school leavers should be in the front of the façade for they are the simplest, and actually they are also victims in history. On the back sculpture are the scientists, old professors who were wrongly labeled rightists. This statue portraits a great number of fresh college graduates who were labeled rightists just as they left school and stayed in the farm for twenty-one years. High school leavers stayed in the farm for ten years. All those people formed a spirit. And that spirit is also our Chinese nation’s spirit of industriousness, tolerance and endurance.

汪作民:我们所要求的倒不是这样的纪念碑,而是希望能够真正接受1957年反右派的教训,提高我们的政治文明。真正落实宪法上的言论自由,没有思想犯,没有言论犯。

Wang Zuomin: What we want is not this kind of monument,but the hope that our people really draw a lesson of the anti-rightists movement in 1957 and sincerely implement freedom of speech in our constitution, no prisoner of thought and no prisoner of speech.



(奥运会解说): 绚丽的烟火,绽放出古老的中国最灿烂的表情,这份喜悦属于奥运的北京。此刻我们看到了现代字体的和,一个和字,荏苒千年,发展变化。表达了孙子人文理念和为贵,彰显出中华民族和谐观, 历史悠久, 传统优良。

(Caption of the Olympics) Gorgeous fireworks burst the most splendid expression of ancient China, this joy belongs to Beijing in Olympics. Right now we see the modern form of Chinese character ‘Harmony’. This word has elapsed quickly thousand of years, developed and changed. It expresses Sunzi’s (Chinese philosopher) logic of human studies ‘harmony is valuable’ and obviously shows the Chinese nation’s view of harmony, long history and fine traditions.

孙梓川:假使按照今天我们讲的和谐社会,中央处理一下,从和谐出发的话,应该说给我们一些和谐的补偿。
Sun Zichuan: If, according to the harmonious society we are talking about today, the Central Committee of the Party should handle from harmony, they would give us some harmonious compensation.

胡同增:有一个人叫袁佳梁 ,公然的就跟我们说,你们还想离开农场,没那么好事,莫做梦,如果真有一天你们能够离开农场了,老子拿手板心煎鸡蛋给你们送行。这是他的原话,多少人听见的。

Hu Tongzeng: A person named Yuan Jialiang, should have said to me openly: “You want to leave the farm? No such a good thing! Do not dream. If someday you could really leave the farm, I would fry eggs in my palm to see you off.” That is his original words which many people have heard.

(奥运会解说):活字印刷板中间出现了一个中国古代的和字。

Caption of the Olympics) In the center of type case there appears a character ‘harmony’ in ancient scrip of China.

孙梓川:现在不是我一个人有怨言,而是连家属受牵连的一百多万人,在这个问题上是有怨言的。

Sun Zichuan: Now it is not merely I myself, but over one million family members connected with ( the rightists) have complaint.

解传宝:我是1979年2月2号,县委派专车把我拉到了蒙自,征询着我的志愿,我愿意到教育系统工作,就把我分在教师进修学校,恢复了我的党籍。

Xie Chuanbao: It was Feb.2nd of 1979 that the county Party committee sent for a car to drive me to Mengzi. Asked for my will, I expressed the wish to work in educational circles and they allocated me to a teachers’ vocational study school. And my Party membership was reinstated.

孙梓川:打右派到现在我都莫明其妙。

Sun Zichuan: I have been baffled since the beginning of the anti-rightists movement.

解传宝:党组织还承认我这个党员。

Xie Chuanbao: The Party organization still recognized me as a communist.

孙梓川:到改正我的时候,打开档案一看,什么都没的。

Sun Zichuan: At the time to redress my case, file opened, there was nothing written in it.

解传宝:恢复我那党籍,我就补交了二十一年的党费。补交了一百三十九块五,每个月就是交五角钱。

Xie Chuanbao: With my Party membership reinstated, I paid a 21-year overdue party membership dues.

孙梓川:所有的右派占百分之九十五以上的都离婚啦。我的老婆苦苦的、死死的等了我二十一年。

Sun Zichuan: Above 95% of rightists got a divorce but my wife expected me for twenty-one years, miserably, firmly and unshakably.

解传宝:他一直不要,那个组织委员说是:我们不忍心要你这个党费啦,袁伟祥是组织委员,支部上组织委员,他一再表示不敢要我这个党费,我说:不怕,你先拿着,这个是我的一份心意。

Xie Chuanbao: The committee member in charge of organizational work Yuan Weixiang did not accept my money, saying: “We are reluctant to take your party membership dues.” Once and again he showed that he dared not accept the money. I said: “ Do not worry, you just take it, for this is token of my regard .”

问: 为什么这样呢?

Question: For what?

解传宝:我当时是这样想, 既然你们给我改正了,我就认为这二十一年我还是正常地在党组织的教育下,尽管它是过左一些,手段比较恶劣些,但是,我还在党的温暖的怀抱里面度过。尽管他们恶作剧,打我、捆我、吊我,但是我对这个共产主义信念,我说总是有一天要恢复到党的这个本质,党的有错就纠嘛,党一再教导,有错就纠,批评自我批评,自己有错误要审查到自己的错误,要改正嘛,勇于改正嘛,党都是倡导嘛,任何时候都是像这样嘛。所以我相信这么大的党,这么大的一件事情,到了时候它会改正的。我还是相信。

Xie Chuanbao: Then I thought: since you redressed my case, I believed that in the past twenty-one years I still lived normally with the party’s inculcation though it was a bit ultra-Left, its means was a bit too dirty, anyway, I still spent my time in its warm embrace. Though they played prank/mischief, beat me, bound me, hanged me, I still believed in communism. I said that sooner or later this party’s intrinsic quality would return to normal. Our Party has always been teaching us to correct any mistakes, to practice criticism and self-criticism. One should introspect his own mistakes and correct them bravely. The Party has initiated that. So I had been sure that such a big party, for such a serious thing (rightists), there would be a time for it to correct its own mistakes. I still have faith.



据官方宣布:

全国共有55万2877人被划为右派分子。

According to official sources:

There are 552,877 people in the country that were labeled rightists

据解密后的中央档案:

According to the secret-revealed dossier of the Central Committee of the Party:

全国共有317万8470人被划为右派分子。

There are altogether 3,178,470 people were labeled rightists

另有143万7562人划为中右

Another 1,437,562 people were labeled middle-rightists

(引自《炎黃春秋》2009、2郭道暉的文章

(quoted from Guo Daohui’s article on <mn>>, Feb. 2009)

《毛澤東發動整風的初衷》

<’s Original Intention to Mobilize the Rectification Movement>>



本片作者无法统计全国共有多少改造右派分子的农场。

The maker of this documentary has no way to count how many farms there were

throughout country for rightists to remold their ideology



鸣谢

Formal Gratitude t

为东风农场走出历史阴影保留记忆做出努力的人们

those who made efforts in keeping memory for Dongfeng Farm

to walk out of the shade of history

鸣谢

Formal Gratitude to

提供音乐图片文字资料的朋友和网站

the friends and websites that provide musical pictures and written data

导演 摄影 编辑 胡杰

Director/ Photographer/ Editor: Hu Jie

2008年10月------2009年5月制作

Making October of 2008-May of 2009 (3/8, Mon)

Wednesday, October 07, 2009

A Million Drops of Blood: "State Dongfeng Farm," film by Hu Jie, translation by Ye Weiyou. Part III






( Part III )


小标题 五七幹校·知識青年······

Subtitle: May 7 Cadre School & School Graduates/leavers

(Note: “May 7” : named after Mao’s Directive of 1966, he gave it on May 7th of 1966)

汪作民:文化大革命开始以后,由于适应机关斗、批、改的需要, 云南省的省级机关把它的第一五七干校设在了东风农场这个地方。

Wang Zuomin: After the start of the Cultural Revolution, to meet the needs of struggle-criticism-transformation (important tasks of the C.R.), provincial bodies of Yunnan established their first May 7 cadre school in Dongfeng Farm.

五七战士:在1968年11月份,省委机关组织上千人的队伍,坐着车子来到了东风农场。

May 7 fighter: In Nov. of 1968, bodies of provincial Party committee organized a procession of a thousand people to arrive at Dongfeng Farm in vehicles.

(Note: in those years all people in the cadre schools were usually called May 7 fighters, though they were not in the army)

五七战士:当时这里叫云南省第一五七干校。

May 7 fighter: Then here it was called The First May 7 Cadre School of Yunnan Province.

(歌)‘办学习班是个好办法, 很多问题可以在学习班得到解决’

(Song) ‘It is a good way to run a study class, many problems can be solved in it.’ (Mao’s words in C.R.)

刘加强:当时省政府的秘书长都下放到这里,五七干校嘛。

Liu Jiaqiang: At that time secretary general of the provincial government was transferred here, May 7 cadre school!

五七战士:五七道路,走五七道路。

May 7 fighter: May 7 Road, go on that road.

刘加强: 那些干部下来后,白天强制劳动,有些重点还有人守着。

Liu Jiaqiang: Having been transferred there, those cadres were forced to do labor, some with serious problems were

guarded.

汪作民: 当时的省委副书记高志国就关在原来农场的仓库里,和农场的批斗人员关在一起。

Wang Zuomin: The then deputy secretary of the provincial Party committee Gao Zhiguo was locked up in the storehouse

of the farm, together with those targets of criticism and struggle.

57战士: 干校是这样的,分为连、排、班。

May 7 fighter: Cadre schools were divided into company, platoon and team/class.

五七战士:被抓出来的这些走资派,叛徒,特务,反革命分子,这些以莫须有罪名定的罪人, 全部都要弄到农场去斗、批、改。
May 7 fighter: All the caught capitalist-roaders (people in power taking capitalist road), traitors, spies, counter-
revolutionaries---the fabricated offenders, were sent to the farm for struggle-criticism-transformation.

刘加强:晚上批斗,天天晚上批斗,排着队。

Liu Jiaqiang: Every evening was for criticism-struggle meeting, the offenders stood in line.

汪作民: 他们也批判、斗争、游街。游街的时候我们也看到,比如,知名的作家赵季康,《五朵金花》的编剧,他挂个牌子。

Wang Zuomin: They were also criticized, struggled and paraded through streets. We saw them when

they were paraded. For instance, the well-known writer Zhao Jikang, screenwriter of

<<>> , was tied with a plate on his neck.

57战士:挂着大牌子,你是走资派就是走资派,你是叛徒,就是叛徒,多大的牌子用铁丝挂着,我们都整过的。

May 7 fighter: Tied with a big plate, noted differently according to what you were: capitalist-roader, traitor, etc.

However big a plate, it was just tied with a wire on the victim’s neck. We all did such things.

李泽衡: 我跟那个《五朵金花》的赵季康一样的去游街。我们的街不是什么街,就是农场的场部。从长塘子游到场部是两公里,就从那转一大圈敲着锣,我们没有锣,就是敲铜盆。说自己是牛鬼蛇神,反党反社会主义的牛鬼蛇神。自己咒骂自己。你要是叫的轻,后面的脚就蹬过来了。为了减少皮肉之苦,你只要叫。
Li Zeheng: Together with Zhao Jikang, the screenwriter of <>, I was also paraded through streets,

but ours was not a real street, just the farm headquarters. It was two kilos’ parading fromChangtangzi to the headquarters. Having no gong, we had to strike brass basin in the parade saying that we were monsters and demons, all kinds of anti-Party and socialism class enemies, cursing ourselves. If your voice was low, the feet would strike you from behind. So, to lessen the physical pain, you had to shout loud.

57战士:斗批改时,从昆明拉下来三个领导干部,一个是宣传部部长王甸,一个是党校的副校长梁维州,

May 7 fighter: In the period of struggle-criticism-transformation, three leading cadres were driven there, among them one was Wang Dian, minister of Publicity Ministry, another was vice-president of Party school Liang Weizhou.

57战士:边斗边打,活活打死。活活打死的。

May 7 fighter: All the way they were struggled and beaten, beaten dead alive, simply beaten dead alive.

57战士:哪一个人不想好好表现革命啊。

May 7 fighter: Which person did not want to show how revolutionary he/she was (in the beating)?

57战士:就在东风农场打死的。
May 7 fighter: They were beaten dead just in the Dongfeng Farm.

赵汉科:群众专政是不讲政策的。

Zhao Hanke: There was no policy in mass-dictatorship.

57战士:这个时候右派我们看见他们,他们都不敢抬头看我们。右派中间有两个是我的老同事,我说我到处眼睛看你们,找不到你们?农场赶街的时候,她说:远远看到你时,我就躲起来。我们怎么敢看你,你看我们是什么人啊。

May 7 fighter: In that period when we saw rightists, they dared not raise head to look at us. Among them two were my old

colleagues. I said : “I looked for you everywhere but why no see?” Later, going to the farm fair, she said: “when seeing you from distance, I hid myself far. How dared we look at you? What kind of people we were in your eyes!”

胡杰问:你们见了五七战士,他们和你们打招呼吗?

Hu Jie asked: When you saw May 7 fighters, did they greet you?

汪作民:一个也不理,谁也不理谁,当时人与人之间的关系是很紧张的,那不是多找麻烦吗。

我们右派之间一般来说也不说,熟悉的,住在一个房间里的才交谈,跟其他队的一般也不说话。

Wang Zuomin: No, none of them did. At that time relationship between people was quite tense and who would have

wished for trouble? Usually, we rightists seldom talked to each other, only those familiar living in the same

room did a bit talking, but did not talk to those of other teams. (23/7, Thur.)

冯永琪:早上先唱大海航行靠舵手,唱完后就是早请示,他们是跪着,而且有些人还要叫他们披上麻布,他们怎么能够像我们站着早请示晚汇报,跪一排啊 !我们连队就和他们右派连队隔的不远啊。就东风农场那个地方,有上千的干部是五七战士,还有这么多的右派啊。早上请示他们得跪着请示,晚上的汇报跪着汇报。还有经常听到打的啊啊的叫喊哭。那时候最喜欢对右派采取的比如:你打了牛了,这就是右派阶级斗争的新动向。你发明个打牛,在牛身上出气是吗?!发泄你的仇恨, 你的不满。明天又是哪的花生被偷了一点,他们太惨了,挖点花生吃,也是阶级斗争新动向。谁偷的,谁就被吊着斗。其余所有的人都上来批啊打啊,

Feng Yongqi: In the morning was the song (referring to Mao), after that was ‘morning for instruction’ (studying the teaching in Mao’s works). They (the victims) did that kneeling and some people ordered them to put on sackcloth. How could they do the ‘morning for instruction’ and ‘evening report (usually criticizing oneself to Mao’s portrait) in standing way like us? A line of them kneeling! Our company was not far from that of rightists. Just in the place of the farm, about thousand of cadres were May 7 fighters, along with so many rightists. While kneeling for ‘morning instruction’ and ‘evening report’ they were often heard crying from the beating. The most usual way to treat the rightists was: when they hit a cattle, it was thought of new trends of class struggle----you create a way to vent your anger on cattle, vent your hostility, your dissatisfaction----.

And the next day some peanuts were found stolen…they were so miserable. To get a few peanuts to eat

was considered new movement of class struggle. He who stole peanuts was to be struggled by hanging, while all the rest went up to criticize and beat him.

解传宝:我们是挂牌的监督生产人员。

Xie Chuanbao: We were production supervisor with plate tied on our neck.

王元庆:我就是每天挂着一块,死不悔改的右派的大板板

Wang Yuanqing: Everyday I carried a big plate on neck with the words---stubborn-to-death rightist.

57战士:整个干校就是这样,然后举行点联欢晚会,永远唱不完的样板戏。其他的歌不敢唱啊。

May 7 fighter: The whole cadre school was like that, just with an occasional evening party, everlasting typical operas,

other songs nobody dared sing.

胡同增:哪些人在文化大革命受到的冲击最厉害呢?就是我们这些难友当中早期摘了帽子的人。

Hu Tongzeng: What kind of people were lashed the most? Among us fellow sufferers, it was those whose labels of rightist

were cast off in early stage.

解传宝:好像自己摘帽了,就是人民内部了,他们就稍微放肆了一点,

Xie Chuanbao: They had a bit unbridled behavior thinking that with the label removed/cast off, they were already among the

people, not enemies.

胡同增:他们认为他们可以得到彻底平反。

Hu Tongzeng: They thought that they could get a complete redress/rehabilitation.

解传宝:军队一入农场,就把他们管理起来。

Xie Chuanbao: With troops getting to the farm, they were administered by the army men.

汪作民:林彪提出来备战,大概是备战的要求,把农垦系统的国营农场改编为军垦,就是中国人民解放军生产建设兵团。弥勒县的东风农场70年3月份,当时改编成云南生产建设兵团4师17团,原来的场部就变成团部,原来的生产队就变成连队,原来的生产队长就变成连长,原来的农工就成为战士,那么,摘掉帽子的成什么呢?摘掉帽子的成农场的职工,还戴着帽子的就是兵团的编外人员,你在编外,但是要干活。

Wang Zuomin: Lin Biao (Vice Party Chairman during the C.R.) advanced preparation for war, probably it was the need of Lin’s instruction, the state-run farms in agricultural reclamation field got reorganized to military reclamation

i.e. Production and Construction Corps of PLAC (People’s Liberation Army of China) Dongfeng Farm in Mile county was reorganized to Yunnan Production and Construction Corps, 17th regiment of 4th division in March of 1970. The former farm headquarters changed to regiment’s and the original production team became company and the former production team head became company commander, the former agricultural workers became fighters. But, what did those become whose rightist labels were removed? They became staff and workers while those with labels became non-permanent staff. Non-permanent, but they had to work.

57战士:斗批改整了两年多时间,

May 7 fighter: The ‘struggle-criticism-transformation’ went on for over two years.

吴德本:大概一年多两年,下放知识青年就来了。

Wu Deben: Around over one or two years, school graduates were transferred there. (24/7, Fr.)

(上海 唱歌):我们都是来自五湖四海,为了一个共同的革命目标走到一起来了。

(Shanghai Singing) We come from all corners of the land, for a common revolutionary objective we’ve come together.

季志刚:(上海知青 )在那个年代,像我们学校刚刚毕业,你必须要走这条路,接受贫下中农再教育,你不去也不行,不去上海有很多工作组,敲锣打鼓到你家做思想工作。

Ji Zhigang: (school leaver from Shanghai) In those years, we fresh school graduates had to go that way, to receive reeducation from the poor and lower-middle peasants. It was impossible to refuse since in Shanghai there were many work teams that came to your house for ideological persuasion with drums and gongs.

刘家强:知青主要来自上海、重庆、成都、昆明、北京,这部分知青有1500人。

Liu Jiaqiang: School leavers came mainly from Shanghai, Chongqing, Chengdu, Kunming, Beijing, 1,500 people.

赵汉科:知青和我们搭了10年,70年知青来。

Zhao Hanke: The school leavers stayed with us for 10 years, they came in 1970.

刘家强:这些知青,你本来叫他到农村,接受贫下中农在教育,还可以理解,本来这个农场就是一个改造单位,你把这些知青搞到这里来。

Liu Jiaqiang: It was understandable that the school graduates were got there to receive reeducation since the farm itself was

a unit for thought reform.

金雅美:(上海知青 ):火车汽笛一叫的时候,那心里离家的感觉,大家都,那时,场景也是很悲的,我们都流眼泪了,我们做了两夜三天的火车到了昆明。

Jin Yamei : (school leaver from Shanghai) While the steam whistle rang, our feelings for leaving home…oh, quite sad, we

shed tears. We got to Kunmin by train in two nights and three days.

杨校长:知青来了以后那就热闹多了,知青来了以后,这些右派,当地的富农,地主,这些知青就拿他们出气。

Headmaster Yang: With the school leavers coming, it was much more exciting. And they vented their anger on the rightists,

the local rich farmers and the landlords.

金雅美:(上海知青 )农场盖了很多新房子,专门给我们知青住的,我们知青住的比较集中,都在新房子里。

Jin Yamei: Many new houses were built in the farm specially for us school leavers, so we lived relatively closer, all in

the new houses. (25/7, Sat.)

赵汉科:来的就是兵团了,到连队的政治干部都是现役军人。

Zhao Hanke: Those who came were production and construction corps made up of school leavers, but the political cadres having come to the company were all servicemen. -----------------

金雅美:因为农场的教育气氛,在我们知青里老是讲他们有多坏多坏,这方面农场对我们的教育是蛮多的。

Jin Yamei: Due to the educational atmosphere in the farm, we school leavers were often told how bad they (rightists) were, that kind of teaching the farm gave us was quite much.

刘家强:很多知青到农场,接受贫下中农在教育,是写下血书的。咬破手指写下血书的。扎根农村一辈子的誓言连篇啊。

Liu Jiaqiang: Many school leavers wrote a letter in their own blood for the reeducation from the poor and lower-middle peasants and the oath we wrote to strike root all their life in the countryside was one after another.

吴德本:文化大革命期间,把右派当成五类分子,五类分子是阶级斗争的对象。

Wu Deben: During the Cultural Revolution the rightists were taken as one of the five kinds of people: landlords, rich farmers, counter-revolutionaries, bad elements, and rightists. Those five kinds of people were the target of class struggle.

金雅美:那时候,学这些东西以后,像这种概念还是比较清楚的。

Jin Yamei: Then, after learning about those things, such a concept was quite clear in our mind.

吴德本:抓革命要促生产,抓革命促生产是咋个抓法呢?

Wu Deben: To grasp revolution was to promote production, but how to do it?

金雅美;每次春耕之前,都要以阶级斗争为纲,都要弄几个典型右派来开批斗会。

Jin Yamei: Before each spring plowing, we had to keep class struggle as the key link and got a few typical rightists

for criticism and struggle.

吴德本:要抓到地、富、反、坏、右这些人来斗争。

Wu Deben: It was necessary to catch some landlords, rich farmers, counter-revolutionaries, bad elements and

rightists for struggle.

金雅美:要以阶级斗争为纲你的春耕才做得好,不以阶级斗争为纲,你的春耕就做不好。

Jin Yamei: With the class struggle as the key link, your spring plowing could be done well, if not, out of the question.

吴德本:斗争了过后促进生产,来把生产哄起来。

Wu Deben: After struggle it was to promote production, to have production stired.

金雅美:当时就是这样一个形式,也是这样一个背景,我们连队也是这样,整个农场都是这样,要开上几次批斗会。

Jin Yamei: It was such a situation then, such a background. It was the same with our company, with the whole farm

that several struggle meetings were needed for spring plowing.

孙梓川:二营要开斗争会。

Sun Zichuan: The second battalion would start a struggle meeting.

金雅美:那些老右也习惯了,反正春耕之前要拖几个人上去斗一斗。

Jin Yamei: Those rightists were used to it that by spring lowing a few rightists would be dragged there for struggle.

孙梓川:把他捆起来,结果那两个知青就不动,不动他就亲自上来把我捆起来,捆起来以后我说:你们不符合政策这做法,他就上来就是,什么政策,什么政策。就打了我几个嘴巴。

Sun Zichuan: Hearing the order “Bind him”, the two school leavers did not move. So the man who ordered approached in

person and tied me up. After being tied up, I said: “your action is against the policy.” At this, he went up again and clapped me a few times, saying: “ What policy, what policy?!”

金雅美:你在什么时候做错了什么事,他都有理由让你上去批斗一下.。

Jin Yamei: Whenever you did whatever wrong thing, he would take that as the reason for you to be struggled at a meeting.

孙梓川;送到二营,到了地方,就看到有7、8 个人排队都是右派,就上来一个四川重庆的知识青年,这个人现在我还记得名字,叫白占华。

Sun Zichuan: When sent to the second battalion, we saw seven or eight people in a line, all rightists. At this, a school leaver from Chongqing (Sichuan province) went up. I still remember his name, Bai Zhanhua.

汪作民:他认为你哪句话说的不对要批判你,(就说)伟大领袖毛主席教导我们:凡是反动的东西,凡是毒草都应批判。

Wang Zuomin: When thinking any words you said wrong, he would criticize you saying: “ Our great leader Chairman Mao

teaches us: all the counter-revolutionaries, all poison weeds must be criticized.

金雅美:每个连队就这么一排排坐着,前面放了一个桌子,斗到谁,那右派就站在台上低着头,有的时候还弄两个人押着他。

Jin Yamei: Every company were sitting there row after row with a desk in the front. When it was his turn, the rightist

had to stand on the desk, head lowering, and sometimes with two people escorting. (27/7, Mon.)

汪作民: “革命不是请客吃饭…”,他读这一段,这个他马上可以斗争你了,打你了“跪下来!”

Wang Zuomin: “Revolution is no invitation to dinner…” he read aloud that paragraph (in the quotation of Mao’s works)

With this, he had the right to struggle against you, beat you. “ Kneel down!”

孙梓川:他上来,一个人打一个嘴巴打过去,从头打到尾,打了后又是一脚,就是这样就叫斗争会。

Sun Zichuan: They went up to clap you, one after another, from the first to the last person, then gave you a kick, that was

the class struggle.

金雅美:我们知青,在农场的政治待遇还是比较高的,但是那个气氛给人一种恐惧感。

Jin Yamei: We school leavers had relatively high political treatment, but the atmosphere gave us a sense of terror.

吴德本:他说:我今天要教训你一下。

Wu Deben: He said: “ I will give you a lesson today.”

金雅美:我们也不叫白色恐怖,总是感觉到你必须要干。

Jin Yamei: We did not call it white terror but always thought you had to do it anyway.

吴德本:“你对右派的错误你没有认识,我今天要教训你一下。”
Wu Deben: “You do not yet understand the rightists’ mistakes, so I must give you a lesson.”

金雅美:你在农场,在那个环境下,你不干也要干,连队有这么多田,秧不插下去是不行的,他总有方法把这些田插下去。

Jin Yamei: You were in the farm, in that situation, you had to do though you did not want to. There was so much land

in the company, seedlings had to be transplanted. They always had some way to have it done.

吴德本:因为我被捆起来了,他就从我背后一拳 ,打得我,我就向前倒下去了。

Wu Deben: Since I was tied, he gave me a punch on my back, which sent me fall.

金雅美:我们一个连队有2000多亩水稻田,春耕的季节很短,要奋战一个月,一定要把秧全部插下去。

Jin Yamei: We had more than 2,000 rice/paddy fields in our company. Spring plowing season was very short, so we had to

fight bravely for a month so as to by all means transplant all seedlings.

吴德本:倒下去,就倒在他那个办公的桌子边边上,把我的三颗牙齿整掉了。

Wu Deben: I fell down to the edge of his desk, which made my three teeth drop.

金雅美:整个春耕我们知青很辛苦,从来没受过这么大的苦。

Jin Yamei: In the whole period of spring plowing we school leavers went through great hardships which we had never

had in the past.

吴德本:那个血呀,就喷了一衣服,一嘴,

Wu Deben: The blood gushed out to all over my coat and mouth.

金雅美:那是大干红五月,那个时候整个连队是上上下下总动员的。

Jin Yamei: It was “go all out in the red May”, the whole company was aroused high and low.

吴德本:他还不认为满意,他把我的头发抓住,把我,连续做了若干次把我做的跪在地上,头发也扯掉了一嘬。

Wu Deben: Not yet satisfied, he grasped my hair and made me kneel on the ground a few times running, a tuft of my hair

pulled down.

金雅美:除了开誓师大会,动员大会,批斗大会,就把这些人从这个角度调动起来,

Jin Yamei: Besides the gathering for making oath, mobilizing and criticizing-struggling, all the victims were mustered

from every corner.

吴德本:他说:把他放掉,那两个打手就把我放掉,放掉过后,他说:你回去好好地反省,明天给我写一个反省材料。

Wu Deben: He said: “ Let him go” and the two hatchet men did so. After that he said: “ Go back for a good introspection

and write it on paper.

金雅美:另外一方面再从入党,入团,我们叫火线入党、入团。对我们知青从这方面教育比较多。

Jin Yamei: On the other hand, we school leavers were educated through the admission of the Party and the Youth

League which we called joining the Party and the Youth league at the battlefront, more education from that.

吴德本;东风农场,类似我这样的事情的人,那还多的很。

Wu Deben: In Dongfeng Farm, people with similar events like mine were quite many.

徐鸿康:(上海知青 )这是我们最早的一张照片,1972年6月15号,东方农场,我才17岁,

Xu Hongkang: (school leaver from Shanghai) This is the earliest picture of us, June 15, 1972, Dongfeng Farm, I was 17.

徐夫人:(上海知青 )我们俩个经常接触,被他们看到像捉贼,看到了就不得了,我们俩这时认识了,在谈朋友,现在说谈朋友,我们经常在一起,他就说:我们乱搞男女关系。就给我们戴坏分子的帽子。

Mrs. Xu: (school leaver from Shanghai) We two often got in touch with each other, and when seen by them, we felt as if being caught like thieves, serious problem. We became known and dated. We were often together, and he (a leader) said that we acted recklessly in man-woman relationship/sex, thus, a label of bad elements was put on us.

金雅美:除了劳动,就是晚上政治学习,学毛主席语录,学些政治上的东西。

Jin Yamei: Apart from labor, there was evening political study---study of the quotation of Mao’s works and something

on politics.

徐鸿康:(上海知青 )共产党的本事大在哪里?大在就那么一点,不知右派给你谈过没有,你没帽子给你加顶帽子,你头上没角给你加个角,屁股上没尾巴给你装条尾巴,就这么整你,

Xu Hongkang: (school leaver from Shanghai) Where is CP’ s great ability shown? Actually, just a little, I wonder if rightists

have told you about it, for example, when you have no cap, they put one on you, if you have no horn, they give you one, seeing you have no tail on buttocks, they fix one for you, just attack you this way.

徐夫人:我也有给他们绑、打,给他们绑起来的时候,关在仓库里,就是粮食仓库里。

Mrs. Xu: I also had the time being tied and beaten by them, locked in the storehouse, storehouse of grain.

金雅美:整知青也整的很厉害,

Jin Yamei: School leavers were attacked severely as well.

徐鸿康:当时情况考虑到,不能正式结婚,正式结婚了万一回不了上海,那就同居吧,同居他也不承认你是同居,说你是乱搞男女关系,

Xu Hongkang: In the then situation, in fear of being unable to return to Shanghai, we dared not get married formally, so we merely lived together/cohabited, but they did not accept that and blamed us for reckless action in sex.

金雅美:我们的保卫干事,把知青打得一塌糊涂,他就是屈打成招,打了你你就要招,你不招他就打。

Jin Yamei: The man in charge of defense beat the school leavers so bad that it made them confess to false charges under torture. You had to confess, otherwise they would go on beating.

徐夫人:都是这些军人,连长什么的,都是军人干的,军人指挥的,军人指挥老乡。

Mrs. Xu: It was all the army men, company commanders or the like. All the bad things were done and directed by the army men/servicemen, they directed the fellow villagers to do.

徐鸿康: 1972年,12月29号,整个东风农场,整个东风农场,开宣判大会,宣判我和我老婆两个人,当时的罪名是,一个是乱搞男女关系,一个是小偷小摸。

Xu hongkang: On Dec.29, 1972, in the whole Dongfeng Farm there was a announcing-judgment gathering on which my wife and I were charged with, firstly, reckless action in sex, secondly, theft.

金雅美:我们吃完饭休息的时候,路过一个会议室,看到一个知青,反吊,两只手用绳子吊起来,倒吊在梁上,吊知青,一个知青姓徐的叫徐红康。

Jin Yamei: While having a rest after a meal, we walked past a meeting room and there we saw a school leaver tied up to

roof beam down-headed, his name was Xu Hongkang.

季志刚:(上海知青 )你知道五花大绑是怎么绑的,拿着一个绳子往肩膀上一搭,然后把绳子绕起来,绕起来,不是和电视上演的一样吗? 然后绳子一收。

Ji Zhigang: (school leaver from Shanghai) “Do you know how to do wuhuadabang? It is placing a rope on the victim’s shoulder, then coiling the rope up and up around the body and finally drawing the rope in.

徐鸿康:很简单就这么绑,打也不要打你,你吃得消吗,我告诉你要绑的紧的话,半个小时你就昏掉。

Xu Hongkang: It is simple just to tie you that way, no need to beat you, but can you bear it? I tell you, if bound tight, in half

an hour, you will lose consciousness.

金雅美:这样吊下去人会吊死的,我们和开会的知青一商量,我们就跑到那时候连队的警卫排,我们就敲警卫排排长的门,我们就讲,他犯了什么法,你们该怎么处理,不要吊,这样吊会出性命的,后来排长看我们给他提意见,他就叫了警通排的几个民兵,把他从梁上放了下来,

Jin Yamei: If hanged that way on and on, he would die. After a discussion with the school leavers for a meeting, we ran to the guard platoon of the company. Having knocked the door, we said that they could handle whatever offence he had made, but should not hang him that way for it would make him die. Later, thinking of our opinion, the platoon leader told a few militias to put him down from the roof beam.

徐鸿康:你看我这个手,就是绳子绑断的,这小子当时还看着我。

Xu Hongkang: Look at my hand, it was bound by the rope and that guy was guarding me.

季志刚:我拿着一把枪看着他,

JI Zhigang: I watched him with a gun.

徐鸿康:你看我的手一粗一细。

Xu Hongkang: Look at my hands, one thick and one thin.

武贵英:(重庆知青 )把那个棕绳啊,用水浸泡,泡过以后再绑,让绳子慢慢慢慢的干,就越勒越紧。

Wu Guiying: (school leaver from Chongqing, Sichuan province) First soak the coir rope in water and then use it to bind,

letting the rope dry bit by bit and the strap will grow tighter and tighter.

徐鸿康:绑了整整15天,不给我睡觉,整天站着。

Xu Hongkang: Bound there for fifteen days on end, no sleep, I stood all day long.

金雅美:他一放下那两个手根本都回不来,还是反在后面的,后来就给他点水喝,那个碗都是破的。

Jin Yamei: When placed down, he could not get his hands normal, still at the back. Later he was given a little water to drink

but the bowl was sort of broken.

徐鸿康:后来,我们连队的王泽民是个老右派,他专门是学军医的,以前部队里学军医的,给我打针吃药后来才好的。

Xu Hongkang: Wang Zemin in our company was an old rightist majoring in medicine in the army. Later I got well after he gave me an injection and medicine.

金雅美;那碗破了里面总还有点水嘛,那他手又够不过来,他口很干嘛,可能吊在上面血液的关系,口很干,他就把一个头伸到很破的碗里来喝水。我们那时候看到真的很凄凉,这人不像个人,真有点像畜生一样。

Jin Yamei: Anyway, there was still a bit water in the sort of broken bowl, but he could not reach for it with hands. Tied up for so long, very thirsty, he put his head into the half-broken bowl for drinking. We saw that so sad, he did not look like a person, something like a livestock.

徐鸿康:想起来我真的(哭)。一般我真不掉泪。我想起来心里不知道多难受。

Xu Hongkang: When thinking back, I really (crying), I seldom shed tears, how sad I was when I reviewed that.

徐夫人:我跟猪圈住在一起,隔一个房子,跟猪住在一起。我这个时候也没办法,有什么办法,你是坏分子嘛!我们自己俩个人,自己肚子大了就自己生小孩,很危险的。这个时候没有人,也不敢到医院去,也没有钱嘛,是偷生的。因为正好认识营里头那个医生。

Mrs. Xu: I was enclosed with pigs, a room apart, living with pigs. I had no way out either, what way could I have? I was a

‘bad element’! We two---with an embryo. It was quite risky to give birth by myself. At that time nobody

was there, and I dared not go to hospital and had no money for that. So I gave birth to the child in secret since fortunately, I happened to know the doctor of the battalion.

徐夫人:半夜三更就到那个医生家里敲门。他跟医生说:医生麻烦你,你看我老婆大概要生小孩,你不要跟人家说噢。这个时候悄悄地,叫他不要跟任何人说啊。

Mrs. Xu: Late at night he (my husband) went to knock at the doctor’s door, saying: “ Oh, doctor, sorry to bother you, but you see, my wife is to give birth soon. Please do not tell this to others…” I quietly asked him to keep silent about that.

徐鸿康:叫他以后,他很紧张。我跟他说啦,我讲你无论如何帮帮忙。

Xu Hongkang: My pleading made the doctor quite tense. I said “by all means help us out”

徐夫人:当时我们的想法,想生出来就想把这个小孩送掉。

Mrs. Xu: At that time we thought of giving the baby away after it was born.

徐鸿康:他也会接生,那么他就来,正好那个时候我老婆要生啦。

Xu Hongkang; He(the doctor) was also able to deliver, so he came just at the time my wife was having her baby soon.

徐夫人:小孩不是要哇哇哭了嘛,我也害怕这个时候,说老实话很害怕,拿被子把他盖起来,又不敢蒙住他,就这样盖着。实在没办法,生下来也就算了。到后来个个都知道,传开来啦,传了很开,说我生小孩,生小孩嘛我就生小孩。

Mrs. Xu: As all infants will cry, I feared that time, very much. I covered it with a quit but dared not cover its head. We just covered it there, no other way. Let it be born. And later everyone got to know about that and it

spread widely that I gave birth to a baby. Yes, I did, so what?

问: 这就你是吧?
Question: This is you, yes?

金雅美:对。

Jin Yamei: Yes.

问: 你在指着什么呢?

Question: What were you pointing to? (28/7, Tue.)

金雅美:指着我们农场一大片土地嘛。从1974年我就提为党委副书记,一直到我走的时候。这段时间,即使我干部下到连队去,只是在田埂上走走,看看。像那个生活就要好多呢。每个连队都有个民兵班,每个分场都有一个民兵连。那个时候叫什么?叫全民皆兵。那个时候,整个农场是民兵团。

Jin Yamei: Pointing to a large tract of land in our farm. From 1974 I was promoted to deputy secretary of Party committee and I remained in that position till my leaving. In that period, even if I went down to companies, I just walked on ridges, looking around. That kind of life was much easier/better. There was a militia class in every company, in every branch of the farm there was a militia company. What was it called then? It was called ‘every citizen a soldier’ . In that period the whole farm was a militia regiment.

(唱)‘军民团结如一人,试看天下谁能敌。’

(singing) If the army and the people are united as one, who in the world can match them?” (Mao’s words)

孙梓川:后来改成建设兵团,建设兵团来的这些干部就有问题啦。

Sun zichuan: It was later changed to construction corps and the cadres from the corps had problems.

徐夫人:军人最坏啦!

Mrs. Xu: The worst were the servicemen/army men.

徐鸿康:搞就是这些军人搞的。
Xu Hongkang: All the bad things were done by the army men.

徐夫人:军人他自己也搞我们这些知青。把肚子搞大了,他自己也在乱搞。他还来搞你。
Mrs. Xu: The servicemen themselves did us school leavers, making girls pregnant. He himself acted recklessly in sex and

in turn, he should have attacked you!

孙梓川:很多女青年都被他们奸污啦。

Sun Zichuan: Many female youngsters were raped by them.

(唱)我们共产党人,好比种子,人民好比土地,我们到了一个地呀方,就要和那里的人民结合起来。

(singing) We communists are like seeds while people are like land. When arriving somewhere, we should integrate with

the people there. (Mao’s words)

王元庆:上海知青遭踏的更多了。因为上海知青比较娇嫩。

Wang Yuanqing: More school leavers from Shanghai were raped for they looked comparatively tender and lovely.

王元庆:从书记、队长没有那一个不是无恶不作。

Wang Yuanqing: From secretaries to team leaders, all of them stopped at nothing in doing evil.

金雅美:唯一的出路就是表现好点。农场把你送出去,表现好一点农场能把你送出去。只能是这种形式。我们连队以前有个叫赵福运,那个眼睛大大的人,那个时候说他用报纸上厕所,那个报纸后面正好是毛主席像嘛,后来就把他关起来,他真的是很惨,打的很厉害。因为他挨打的时候都关在一个小房子里面。他农场专门有一个班叫民兵班,这民兵班就是专门搞这些事情的。

Jin Yamei: The only way out for us was to behave better so that the farm could permit you to leave, the only way was that. There was one in our company whose name was Zhao Fuyun, a man with large eyes. It was said then that in the toilet he used a newspaper the back of which happened to be a portrait of Chairman Mao. He was later shut up, very pitiful, beaten severely, locked in a small room. There was a special class called militia class and that class

did simply that kind of things.

赵福运:我被关着很长时间。后来春天来啦,他们提出来,要我干劳动,就放出来干劳动,这样的话头发长的几个月啦,胡子、头发都长的像鬼一样,然后怎么样呢?他们拿着热水瓶里的水啊,直接往头上浇,烫啊。

Zhao Fuyun: I was locked up for a long time. Later when spring came, they proposed that I do labor and thus released me for that. The long time being locked up made my hair and beard quite long, I looked like a ghost. What happened then? They used the water in a thermos and directly poured it out on my head, so hot!

问: 为什么要给你浇到头上?
Question: Why did they pour it on your head?

赵福运:浇,给你理发。

Zhao Fuyun: “pour, to give you a haircut.”

金雅美:押着他上厕所,押着给他吃饭。

Jin Yamei: He was escorted to toilet and to meals.

赵福运:其实那时候就是没整死你,想着法就这么整你。

Zhao Fuyun: Actually I was merely not attacked to death, but they thought of every means to attack me.

赵妻: 我怕他出问题在里边嘛。当时搞那个运动,死的人很多,就是受不了他那个东西,把他吊在大梁上,开斗争会。我带着孩子,背着一个抱着一个,旁边坐着老大,就坐在第一排,就看着他还吊在梁上,有的就受不了,呀,我受不了就承认。但是,他不承认,他死都不承认。

Zhao’s wife: I worried that something would happen to him since he was shut in. In the movement then many people died, simply because of being unable to endure those tortures. He was suspended to the big roof beam, together with struggle meetings for him. I took care of our kids, carrying one on back and holding one with arms. My older kid was just sitting by me, in the first row, watching him hanged there on the roof beam. Some victims could not endure that, saying: “ Oh, I can not stand it, I confess (what they in fact did not do)…” But he did not yield, at the risk of his death.

金雅美:他找的老婆是个旧知青。

Jin Yamei: He got a wife from the past school leavers.

知青:噢,是个旧知青,我还不知道。

School leaver: Ah, an old school leaver, I did not know.

金雅美:对啊。是个旧知青。

Jin Yamei: Yes, she was an old school leaver.

赵妻:结婚了,我就觉得他,一是东北人,那么远来到这里,举目无亲。一个人太可怜啦,挺可怜的。实际上有点同情,有点可怜,有点那

个,喜欢嘛, 就是这样就结婚了。我家里都反对。

Zhao’s wife: We got married. I just felt that he, a man from the Northeast, came from so far an area, having no one to turn to, so poor to be alone. Actually I had sort of sympathy, felt sorry for him, and, that kind of feelings…. One word, I liked him and thus got married, though all my family were against it. (29/7, Wed)