This year, I suddenly remembered an abandoned baby I had helped 20 years ago, so I decided to visit him.
Into the old county street that narrow blind alley, the two new buildings, originally only a meter wide alley more narrow. There was a fishy smell in the hot, humid air from the end.
A thin man heard that I was looking for the abandoned baby, “Tao MAO Died long ago,” said pointing to the new three-story building in the south of the alley, “this is not, the house has been sold to others.”
“A lively child, how can die?”
“The boy suffered from leukemia, no one took care of him and he died in Zhengzhou.”
1
In the summer of 1997, when I was working at the county civil affairs Bureau, I was working with the director and a deputy director, as well as a newspaper reporter, on a survey of poor households when I first entered this puddle full of trees.
Despite my preparation, I was surprised by the devastation.
There were two old houses in the courtyard, one to the south was already open, and the collapsed rafters had fallen over the door, making it impossible to get in. Less than 10 square metres were left in the north hut, which had no Windows and walls blackened with smoke. A small bed against the wall takes up a third of the space. An iron pot was propped up in the doorway with broken bricks, and there was no place for feet among the rotten cardboard boxes and discarded plastic bottles scattered on the floor, drenched with rain.
The owner of the old house is a widowed 73-year-old woman named Tao Shuqin.
That day, as soon as she saw us, she cried out, “It’s raining heavily at night and the water is flowing straight into the house. My child and I bailed out with the washbasin. We scooped out fifty basins. Dawn, the child shouted straight lumbago, go to the hospital for examination, acute nephritis, 4 + number…… For Heaven’s sake, what a thing to do!”
Tao Shu-qin sobbed and pulled the child into her arms. Tao Zhongyang was 13 years old, white and clean, but the ball of her left eye looked like an apple blossom, covered with a white light.
On that day, on behalf of the government, we delivered 200 jin of flour and 100 yuan relief to them. Then the hired men tore down the old house and built two new tiled ones.
I interviewed Tao Shuqin several times during the construction of the house, and that’s when I learned the story of her and Tao.
2
Tao Shuqin was born in a scholarly family. Her parents married her to the only son of a rich family in the countryside to avoid the war and flood. After marriage, they gave birth to a boy and a girl, but both died. When she gave birth to a daughter, she lost her fertility due to illness.
Tao Shuqin’s husband saw that the incense was going to stop stubble on his generation, so he poured all his resentment on his daughter-in-law. Tao Shuqin could not bear it, so she wanted to go back to her parents’ home to hide for a few days. But her parents only think, married out of the girl splashed out of the water, just drove her out of the house in the middle of the night.
In this way, Tao Shuqin in her husband beat and scold endure decades.
On The 10th day of the 10th lunar month in 1984, her husband attacked her again for trifles. Tao Shuqin braved the cold wind back to her parents, when her parents had died, home only sick in bed.
Tao Shuqin was halfway down the road, resting in the roadside brick kiln, when she suddenly heard a cry coming from inside. Looking for the voice, I found a flower-covered roll on the ground, with a baby wrapped in it.
Unlock the bedrolls, inside is a congenital invalid boy. The child’s astigmatism was covered with a layer of fog, bilateral hernias were swollen and blue, and his belly button was red and swollen.
Tao Shuqin did not have the heart to let him die, will carry the child home. The husband saw and swore loudly: “Hurriedly throw this waste to Lao Tze, don’t throw to you fall dead!”
Said rushed up to rob the child, Tao Shuqin quickly ran out of the house, holding the child back to her mother’s house.
3
Tao Shuqin’s second brother, Tao Zhen, was wrongly labeled a “rightist” in his youth. His marriage broke down, he had no children and he was lonely in his old age.
Tao Zhen saw his sister took a baby boy into the door, very happy, immediately to the “dragon flag Yangyang, and bell central meaning, give the child named” central central “, looking forward to grow up, people and things live in the center. Also will be little central as a grandson, will make a will, let the children inherit the family property.
In order to raise the young central committee, Tao Shuqin often ran to the county town. In the end, the couple divorced, Tao Shuqin clean out of the house, home to live in the old house.
The appearance of little central central, also let the old silent house full of vitality in the past.
After a long journey, the brother and sister finally left the house for their child. In order to treat his illness, he traveled all over Kaifeng and Zhengzhou, and miraculously restored the child’s vision to 1.5 in the right eye and 0.6 in the left eye. Tao also sought a folk remedy from an old Chinese doctor to treat her baby’s congenital hernia with boar eggs. When there were few pig farmers in the county town, Tao Shuqin went to the countryside, picking up rubbish and looking for a pig craftsman. Over the years, the child’s hernia gradually dissipated, even the big red belly button also caved in.
Little Central began to babble about the yard like a normal child. Tao Zhen also often holds her child on her lap and teaches the Three Character Classic hand in hand.
4
In the winter of 1990, when Xiao Yang was six years old, Tao Zhen fell ill.
On his deathbed, Tao Zhen took him by the hand. “Grandpa taught all his life, and left nothing for you except a box of books. The road ahead is up to you. Read more books and be a good man.”
Tao Zhen called Tao Shuqin to the bed again. “Give the child to you and raise him up.”
Tao’s eldest brother and sister-in-law died early, leaving a daughter. My niece and Tao Shuqin got along very well with them and often visited them. When Tao Zhen died, my niece was the first to handle the funeral.
But a niece heard uncle made a will, to the old house adoptive to a pick up the children, the in the mind is unreasonable, she looked for Tao Shuqin theory, that this is her single-handedly caused.
At that time, as land prices soared in the county, nearly half an acre of homestead in the center of the old city had become a piece of “fat meat”. Niece home children, housing tension, want to build a new house on the west of the old house in the Tao.
Tao Shuqin refused to let her land go. For this, the niece will Tao Shuqin to the court. County court after hearing, the homestead divides into two, the old house on the east belongs to Tao Central Central, the vacant lot on the west gives the niece of Tao Shuqin.
Tao and her niece have been strangers ever since.
Not only is the niece, the daughter of Tao Shuqin also had tried to urge, let Tao Shuqin will leave the homestead transfer to his name. Tao Shuqin angry, scolded her daughter unexpectedly have this undesirable. The two of them broke up on bad terms and have had little contact ever since.
5
After The death of Tao Zhen, Tao Shuqin and xiaoyang lost their source of livelihood, all rely on scavenging for a living.
Every night, Tao Shuqin with a small central, from the east of the city to the west, running in each point of garbage. Waste paper, orange peels, drink bottles, discarded rags, old shoes, anything she could wear to protect her from the wind and rain. A night on the road is no more than a few dollars.
At that time, the little central school is only one road away from tao’s home, but Tao Shuqin still insisted on picking up every day at the school gate. Sometimes, little central central met some kind person to send him snacks, reluctant to eat, always run home, let Tao Shuqin eat a bite first.
Tao Shuqin suffering from senile pulmonary heart disease, throat eyes hiss hiss pull straight wheeze sound. She was afraid that she would die one day, leaving little Central nobody to take care of. So, she can only often pick up the central place around, and to the surrounding villages to inquire, hoping to find the children’s biological parents.
I heard that I was doing propaganda work, Tao Shuqin asked me to write the story of the little Central central, “can give the child find home, an this life also die close eyes.” That year, I wrote an article based on interview transcripts, “A Lonely old man and an Abandoned Baby in 13 years of Ups and downs,” published in two newspapers.
However, in spite of clues from warm-hearted people, they were unable to find the biological parents.
However, since then, Kaifeng City Hope Project has decided to subsidize the central government’s scholarship of 85 yuan per year, and the school has also exempted some tuition and miscellaneous fees. The county civil affairs Bureau provided a monthly stipend of 68 yuan and also covered the rest of xiao’s tuition fees.
Although the money alleviates some of their living pressure, there is still a big gap in medical expenses and living expenses for the two grandfathers and grandsons.
In the early winter of 1999, When I went to the east of the county to sell clothes, I noticed That Tao Shuqin was stooping and wandering slowly in front of the clothes stand. In her hand, she held a handful of the six dollars she had saved from her dippers to buy a pair of pants for her grandson, who had grown taller.
I took a pair of woolen pants from the counter and gave it to her. She insisted on giving me the change, but I stopped her. Tao Shuqin gasped, “I know you, will let the child remember the good man.”
Tao died soon after.
6
After SARS ended in 2003, the head of the epidemic prevention section told me a story: on a sweltering summer night, he went into a cul-de-sac in the old city to block the door of an orphan. Tao Central brought home several unidentified people from Kaifeng, need to focus on epidemic screening. I was shocked.
Soon after, the county held a public arrest and sentencing conference, several large trucks carrying the trial objects, paraded through the streets. As the truck passed my shop, I could see a tall, thin boy standing on it, facing south, facing me, with a yellow cardboard box around his neck, on which was written in bold Chinese ink — Tao Yang Yang.
While all the other suspects in the truck lowered their heads, Tao Yang held her head high as she scanned the crowd of onlookers and showed no fear. His childish face was still pale and thin, and his left eye, which had not yet been cured, was white.
Nothing was heard from me until This year, when I went back to the old alley.
7
“Tao Shuqin shouldn’t have wanted this child in the first place. She left him to fend for himself.” The neighbors in the alleyways of the old city heard that I was looking for Tao Yang, they went out of their homes and talked about it.
“Is, from the 18 cards can not look, but also to take care of the children thrown by others, ask for trouble.
“After Tao Shuqin died, this child would hang out with bad people all day long. How could he not learn bad things?”
The neighbors complained about Tao, complaining that he was bringing social idlers to their homes every day and letting the neighbors worry like thieves.
After Tao Shuqin’s death, Tao Was first sent to re-education through labor, then to the Palace, where she was sentenced to prison. After be released from prison, the life is out of control, in those days, tao Shuqin disloyal to the masses, try hard to keep half tao jia old curia, also was sold by him 20 thousand pieces.
After 2004, he went to Zhengzhou to sell newspapers, found leukemia, no money treatment, soon died. To this day, the neighbors do not know where he is buried.
Unexpectedly, I had hoped to find his relatives for Tao, but got such a result.
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