Interviewer: Hello! Thank you for accepting my interview.
Interviewer: Would you please tell me when you were born? You can just say the decade if you like, such as “1950s,” “1960s,” etc.
1950’s.
Interviewer: Between 1966 and 1976, where did you live in China?
Beijing, [then] Heilongjiang, [then] Beijing.
Interviewer: Since you were born in the 1950’s, you probably have many memories of the Cultural Revolution.
Interviewer: You might be able to talk about it for days on end.
Interviewer: But if I only give you about ten minutes to speak
Interviewer: -in other words, in the first ten minutes of the interview -- what would you most want to share with us?
I did not prepare, so it’s hard to focus on it immediately.
However, I think the experience was different for every individual, maybe due to family background and class in China.
My parents were university teachers, so I grew up in a college campus.
The Cultural Revolution occurred first in universities.
When it began, I had just graduated from elementary school.
I thought this was especially interesting: I remember August 18 [1966], Mao Zedong's Reception of the Red Guards at Tiananmen Square.
There was a ceremony at our university to relay the happenings of the reception at Tiananmen.
Everyone cheered. At that time, we didn’t go to school; this was really something.
Prior to that, I was a good student, and had a very good relationship with our homeroom teacher.
It wasn’t just me; my family also had a good relationship with her.
Because our elementary school was beside the university campus, almost all of the students were the children of university employees.
The teacher liked us very much, because of our classwork, our clothes,
and our classroom discipline--we were more teachable than those classes made up of kids from different backgrounds.
Therefore, the relationship between our teacher and all the parents was very good.
I remember that before the Cultural Revolution, she often did home visits.
However, because of the influence of the Cultural Revolution, we began to put up “big-character posters” concerning our teacher.
I was about 10 years old at that time. I took the lead, and we four children—of course,
we were just parroting others—we criticized the teacher for Revisionism, or something like that.
I remember the scene so clearly: I drafted the poster, and others copied it down.
Just as we had put it on the wall of the classroom, Teacher Zhang—who has passed away now—suddenly came in.
We got so scared, we hid behind the door, watching the teacher read the poster.
We were particularly afraid: such a good teacher, and we wrote so many awful things!
Eventually, the teacher finished reading, but did not say a word, just turned around and went out.
The four of us looked at each other, not knowing what we had gotten ourselves into.
Our teacher had a so-called "problematic history."
There was something in that teacher’s past, but even now I do not know what the problem was.
I remember the teacher was more than 40 years old, and single. She may have had a tough life; I do not know the exact situation.
Interviewer: Was this a male teacher, or a female teacher?
A female teacher. In general, there were few male homeroom teachers in elementary school.
So then, she walked away very seriously. The four of us looked at each other; we were really nervous.
It was like before the Cultural Revolution, when we’d get into trouble, breaking people’s windows and such–we were really anxious.
Later, the teacher was actually brought in front of the whole school to be struggled against.
I remember very clearly, the struggle meeting was held on the sports field.
Bricks were stacked up, and that teacher was made to stand on the stacks, along with the principal.
Suddenly, our teacher jumped down from her brick stack, went over to the principal's brick stack,
grabbed the principal's collar, and slapped the principal across the face.
We were all just teenagers; we did not know what was going on.
We just thought it was scary; we felt really nervous. Then of course, some other people pushed her away.
Later, teachers probably were among those who were persecuted the most in the school.
I remember she was living in the school. There was a house on our campus that looked like a temple.
This teacher lived there with her mother and nephew, because she was not married.
With my own eyes, I saw some students throw lizards onto the rack of their pancake maker.
The rack was blazing hot, so the lizards burned to death after being thrown on it.
Of course, I did not do such a despicable thing. All I did was write a “big-character poster” about her.
Later, I came back from going “up to the mountains and down to the countryside” and went to see our teacher.
I did not try to tell her the guilt I felt at that time. It was a feeling that really gnawed at me.
Later on, I think she continued teaching. She has since passed away.
This was a heavy emotional burden of mine related to the Cultural Revolution, but I’ve never had a way to express it.
Of course, it wasn’t that serious – just a “big-character poster.”
But later, we understood: another teacher, a so-called rebellious young female teacher, had incited us.
This teacher had some political ambitions; in the Cultural Revolution, she served some position in a revolutionary committee.
I forget what she told us at that time, but we listened to her incitement.
Maybe it was because our own teacher and our class had been awarded many top honors, so many people were jealous of her.
During the Cultural Revolution, we lived in the university campus.
We didn’t have classes, and all manner of comedy, farce, and tragedy were constantly being played out.
We also got involved. I remember when we criticized Peng Dehuai, Peng Zhen, [and] Luo Ruiqing.
Those on the stage criticized them; those of us in the audience booed.
When criticizing other "bad elements,” we also gave a kick in the behind.
My [immediate] family was not impacted since my parents did not have a so-called "problematic history."
However, my grandfather, who was a surgeon, had studied abroad long before.
He went to Fengfeng [Hebei] and worked at a hospital there.
He was struggled against during the Cultural Revolution, which caused his death.
Interviewer: Being struggled against caused his death?
Yes, or [we could say] being cruelly persecuted and tortured caused his death.
During those ten years, we didn’t know; we only found out later.
He held a lot of prestige in the local community,
and was a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.
He was a devout Christian, a medical doctor, and opposed the family planning policy.
So, the local people thought he was a reactionary, and he had the background of studying abroad—[they] accused him of being a spy.
He was cruelly struggled against, and after he died there was no place he could be buried, so he was just wrapped in a mat and buried near the jail.
When his case was rehabilitated, my grandmother tried to find him; reportedly, he was buried under a tree.
After digging around, they found a nylon sock; that nylon sock did not decay.
At that time, we didn’t know any of this, so of course it had no impact.
But later, when thinking about it, I thought the whole situation was so cruel.
I went to Germany in 2007, and went to the place where he went to school, where I found his files.
In the future, I would like to write a book to record the generations of intellectuals in our family.
I still think the Cultural Revolution is fascinating [to study].
Before I left Beijing to go "up to the mountains and down to the countryside," though there were some little mishaps,
I don’t have memories of any deep suffering.
My next period of going “up to the mountains and down to the countryside” in Heilongjiang Corps was stressful,
because I did not come from a good family background.
In the troop, we trusted each other; we were all Educated Youth, and there wasn’t too much discrimination,
yet there were political tensions, like striving to be chosen for "soldiers of the corps" and so on.
I was in the Corps for four years; overall, things went pretty well for me.
Now there is a serious polarization in evaluating [the experience of] Educated Youth going “up to the mountains and down to the countryside.”
One group says they have no regrets about their youth; the other says their youth was ruined.
I wrote something about it—that there are two different ways [of viewing it]:
if you see it as milk, you will never stop suckling; if you see it as a scar, you will continue to lick the wound.
Interviewer: Can these two ways of looking at it coexist?
You can’t avoid that. Co-existence is the only way.
Certain people hold certain opinions, and this argument is getting more and more intense.
If you go to participate in the discussions about Educated Youth, you’ll find it hard to take.
Those who prospered later feel that experience was meaningful.
[But] those whose social status was lower afterwards because of going “up to the mountains and down to the countryside” feel that experience was painful.
What about me? I still belong to the group that has no regrets about my youth.
I personally feel that going “up to the mountains and down to the countryside” was good for my personal growth, including my emotional development.
Because, after all, my family condition is pretty good, as is my lifestyle,
and I also have some feelings of what Marx called “bourgeois rights,”
that is, some resentment about inequality in society as well as actual inequality.
I just want to be an ordinary person. I don’t wish to be superior. It is just a simple and honest feeling.
So I don’t evaluate “up to the mountains and down to the countryside” too severely.
I felt it was good for my growth and maturation.
I went back to Beijing after the Cultural Revolution ended,
then took the college entrance examination, and started another kind of life.
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