Nai Nai is one of those lovely graceful old ladies. Every day her hair
is done up in her traditional head gear and in her ears she wears pretty
earrings from her minority group. Nai Nai is Xu’s grandmother on his father’s
side and came with his parents to visit them.
Xu’s parents have already returned to the south of Yunnan, but Nai Nai
will spend the hot season here, where it is not nearly as stifling as in the
south.
“How many children do you have, Nai Nai?” I asked while I visited with
Yana, Xu’s wife, this afternoon. I was curious about her life, which stretched
over some of the most tumultuous years in China’s history.
“Oh” she said, “I had ten”. “Well, I was pregnant 16 times, but I only
raised ten. And only eight survived to adulthood.”
At least, that is what I thought she said. Nai Nai’s Mandarin is not
very standard and she has lost most of her teeth, which considerably changes
the way she pronounces her words. I started asking more questions, about how
old her oldest is, how many boys and how many girls she had. Karl and I had
speculated about the changes she had seen, but I did not really think about the
implications of living through The Great Leap Forward and The Cultural
Revolution. I soon realized that the stories I read, the stories nobody speaks about,
are the stories she lived through.
“Ah yes,” she continued, “Chairman Mao wanted us to have lots of
children and not prevent pregnancies, so every year or two, I had a baby. The
problem was that we were so very poor later and we didn’t have food for them.
But I kept getting pregnant. So grandfather took some of the babies outside
when they were born“.
Yana tried to stop the conversation: “Let’s not talk about that Nai
Nai.”
“I know about this time, Yana.” I said. “I have heard about it and read
about it”.
“Oh, no-one knew any better. And there was no food and they didn’t know
Jesus.” Yana replied, embarrassed.
“I know. It was a very hard time. So much suffering.” I replied.
Millions of people died during the Great Leap Forward and the horror stories
speak of a desperation that very few of us in the west have ever known.
And then Nai Nai shared her stories. She told me about the time she was
working in the commune, eight months pregnant, and had an accident, which lead
to the baby being born early. “Miscarriage” she said at first, but then she
explained to us how the little baby’s cries sounded like a cat. “The strangest
thing… It didn’t even hurt when he came out. And then he cried. So strange that
a baby that little can cry. So strange that he was even alive.”
“How long did the baby live Nai Nai?” I asked “Oh, he died that day. Grandfather took him outside because he would
have died anyway. A little boy. Beautiful child.” Her voice trailed away. “I
really couldn’t bear when he took them outside. I really couldn’t. He was
determined though. We couldn’t care for them. Didn’t even have food for the
children we had.”
“So many years ago and I still feel so much pain when I speak about
that time. Many people died. Children were always hungry. We had no food in our
homes, but only ate at the cafeteria that was in the commune. If children
didn’t eat at mealtime, they would go hungry until the next meal. It was
difficult. And even then, there was not enough food to feed all of us. We were
always hungry. Not enough food, no clothes to wear, so much work to do.”
Yana and I just listened. What can you say to someone who has lived
through so much pain?
“I still dream about those days. I dream about being hungry. Of all the
things, I fear an empty stomach the most. I see on the news how people suffer
in these countries with wars, and all I think is how hungry these people must
be. An empty stomach… such a terrible thing.”
Nai Nai continued to tell us about how everyone got a share of food,
but that their family didn’t get what they should have, because they were
counted as family of landlords. I assume this is part of what lead her husband
to want to get rid of their babies. They went into the mountains and collected
every kind of plant that was edible. People
ate tree bark. There was hardly any wildlife left and most of the mountains of
Yunnan was stripped of its trees.
We listened, Yana and I, while cradling our healthy toddlers who would
continually run inside for a hug, a kiss, milk or water. Our children, who
argued about toys, not food scraps. We thought about our full tummies. We
thought about the blessing of our children. We thought about the horror of
taking a baby “outside”. We thought about the pain of being so trapped by
circumstances, so hopeless, so desperate that you lose your very humanity.
So much has changed. China opened up to the outside world and most
people don’t even remember the time when you had to have ration cards to buy
food, not to even speak of communes and famines. Now everyone wants a new car,
a bigger house and overseas trips. Children complain about their old cell
phones and young people feel entitled to find a “suitable and likeable” job
with a good salary. Some families even have more than one child. All the while
the old people watch. They very rarely share their stories, which no-one wants
to hear. Maybe they can see how full tummies don’t change our hopelessness.
Maybe they remember that it doesn’t take much to lose one’s very soul.
For many years Nai Nai was “crazy”. She couldn’t talk and only giggled
when anybody tried to communicate with her. Xu’s family started to pray for her
after they got to know Jesus and she slowly got better. I would never even have
suspected that there was a period of confusion in her life. “How else do you
heal, but by prayer, if you have gone through a life like that?” Karl said when
he first heard her story. For her, it does end happily. She has a caring family
and she is well loved. Most of all, she found the One who was with her in all
of her guilt, shame and pain. The One who tenderly embraces each of her babies
for her to hold when she gets home.
For so long Nai Nai carried a heavy burden on her narrow shoulders.
This is the burden the women of China carry. It turns out that they hold up
more than half the sky.
