“The Terrible Winter of 1968: A Memoir of China’s Cultural Revolution, Part III - The Epoch Times” plus 1 more

The Terrible Winter of 1968: A Memoir of China’s Cultural Revolution, Part III - The Epoch Times

Posted: 26 Dec 2010 09:00 PM PST

This poster, displayed in late 1966 in Beijing, shows how to deal with a so-called 'enemy of the people' during the Cultural Revolution. (Jean Vincent/AFP/Getty Images)

One week after my father left home to escape being beaten to death by the village Cultural Revolution committee, the people from the committee still came to terrorize us every day. We became more and more scared, and my grandmother became sick and stayed in bed.

I was now the only man at home, an 11-year-old boy, and I felt a great responsibility. I told myself that I had to be strong, and kept encouraging my mom and grandmother not to worry, father would soon come back home with good news. As our house was very cold, I went to the mountains to get firewood with a simple snow sled I had built. At least we could keep warm. We didn't have much to eat; potatoes were our main food. At night we'd sit near the mud-brick fireplace and sometimes my grandmother would roast a few potatoes while I studied the homework my father had given me. The smell and taste of the potatoes was such a treat.

One day, as usual after dinner, my mom opened the door to check on the dog and make sure he had enough food. But Won wasn't there. I realized that I had not seen Won the whole afternoon.

While we were looking around for the dog, we suddenly saw my father coming home with Won by his side. Somehow the dog sensed that my father was on his way back home, so he had run all the way to the train station to meet him. My father was touched to tears. He looked thinner, but calm and confident.

My mother however was very anxious, and she quickly pulled my father to the storage room, asking him to be quiet and hide because the militiaman would be here any time. I followed my parents into the storage room and my father told us not to worry anymore, he had been to Beijing and talked to an official at the Central Committee of the State Council. "My award certificates are still valid and prove that I am not guilty of any crimes. Besides, this Cultural Revolution is just a soul-revolution movement; force and torture are not allowed. They cannot do anything to me."

Suddenly we heard our dog barking, and knew the militiaman had come and was already outside our house. My father opened the door of the storage room while my mom started shaking uncontrollably. My father said calmly, "Don't worry, I will talk to him. I am ready to talk to them."

My father went to the door and let the militiaman in. The man looked startled at first, and then happily greeted my father, "How have you been? Has your aunt recovered? We missed you so much, and I came to your home everyday to look for you. Are you ready to follow me to the meeting tonight?"

My father looked at him kindness and confidence and said, "I did not visit my aunt. I went to Beijing and met an official at the Central Committee of the State Council at Zhongnanhai to discuss my case. I was told that I am an honorary person of the nation and not guilty of any crimes. I will share more with everyone. Please go with me to the meeting."

The militiaman was silent for a moment. Then he said, "You have so much courage, you even went to the top level of the government. I am proud of you. Aren't you afraid the committee may now brand you a 'present-day' counterrevolutionary in addition to 'historic' one?"

The Village Meeting

My father went to the village criticizing meeting with high spirits. After the villagers heard that my father went to Beijing and came back, most all of them came to the meeting that night. All the leaders of the Cultural Revolution committee also attended, including my uncle who was very anxious. My mom and I also went. We didn't know what to expect, but I was hopeful and proud because of my father's courage.

At the meeting my father gave a speech: "Dear fellow villagers, greetings! I have missed you all during these 10 days while I was on a long trip to Beijing. I met an official at the Central Committee of the State Council in Zhongnanhai. I felt my appeal would be meaningful not only for myself, but also for all of you. I wanted to find the truth and tell everyone. I inquired about my case and also about this Great Cultural Revolution movement. I now have a much clearer understanding of everything. You can continue to criticize me as before, but please give me the opportunity to share what I found out."

People seemed moved by my father's courage, and surprised by his appealing in Beijing. It seemed the leaders too were interested in listening and all remained silent.

My father continued: "I was told that the certificates the government issued to me previously are still valid and demonstrate that I am a well-achieved person and have benefited the nation.

"I was also told that this Great Cultural Revolution is just for touching everyone's soul to improve ourselves as individuals. You may criticize me if I am wrong, but I am a person of value who has contributed to the nation, and not an enemy. Chairman Mao himself said the Cultural Revolution is not meant to torture or abuse people. From now on you can criticize me if you have evidence, but not slander me. And you also cannot physically and psychologically abuse me and my family. Anyone doing so, he will be held accountable in the future."

A few of people were looking at each other while my father continued: "Dear fellow villagers, during the past five years since I and my family have come to this village, we have been good neighbors. Do you really think I am a bad person or your enemy? Do you remember, when your children were sick in the middle of the night, I went with you to see the doctor, and on the long mountain road, we took turns carrying your child on our backs?

"Do you still remember, most of you have come to my house to ask me to write and read letters for you because you cannot read?

"Do you remember when you had problems in your marriage, you came to me for advice and I helped you save your marriage?

"Do you remember that I started a project to bring electricity to our village, and we hoped to have electric lights by New Year's Eve this year? Unfortunately it seems this is now impossible because I have been treated as your enemy and all of you also stopped the project. I believe none of us really want this to happen.

"And do you remember every year before New Year, you all used to come to my house and ask me and my son to write 'duilian' poems for you so your family would have good luck during the next year. This year, we have not started yet, and I'm not sure we still have time."

People lowered their heads and started murmuring, "It's true." Some of them looked sad and regretful.

Then the head of Cultural Revolution committee stood up and said in a loud voice, "Quiet, everyone! We need to be careful! This is how our class enemy uses sugarcoated bullets to lull our class struggle vigilance!"

Everyone's eyes turned to him. My father also looked at him, and then continued his speaking while looking at the head leader.

"Someone with political ambition and selfishness wants to achieve his political goal and takes advantage of a political movement to slander innocent people. Such a person has lost his conscience and heart. By causing innocent people suffering he satisfies his own interests. How ugly is such a person's soul!

"Remember, I am giving a friendly warning to such a one here: Good is rewarded with good, and evil receives retribution, this is a heavenly law that delivers justice for everyone. If you are such a person, you should feel conscience-stricken, and then stop doing bad things right now. Otherwise it will be too late for you."

My father's words hit the head leader like a bomb. His face became contorted from anger and humiliation. People all turned their attention to him. They all knew that he was the instigator of the accusations against my father. There were in fact no "class enemies" in the village, but he needed one to advance his political career.

My father had made his points, and the people were moved. In a moment of silence, another leader said, "We better end our meeting here and will reopen after our committee has had a discussion."

After the meeting people seemed a little friendlier to us, and a few showed guarded support with a nod or a smile.

Labor Camp

Once someone was branded a "counterrevolutionary," it was not easy for that label to be removed. After my father's appeal in Beijing, and his fearless and rational speech at the meeting, the Cultural Revolution committee of the village no longer organized such criticizing meetings. Because they knew that without strong factual evidence, it was no longer easy for them to arrange speakers to continue slandering my father. In fact, up to that point most of the speakers at the meetings had been hired by the Cultural Revolution committee. Each criticizing speech was rewarded 10 work points, corresponding to one day work on the village farmlands. If someone did not comply, 10 work points would be deducted from his account.

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The Terrible Winter of 1968: A Memoir of China’s Cultural Revolution, Part I - The Epoch Times

Posted: 26 Dec 2010 09:00 PM PST

By Yukui Liu, Ph.D. Created: Nov 12, 2010 Last Updated: Dec 26, 2010

This poster, displayed in late 1966 in Beijing, shows how to deal with a so-called "enemy of the people" during the Cultural Revolution. (Jean Vincent/AFP/Getty Images)

Yukui Liu is a doctor of Chinese medicine now living in the United States. The story that follows is his personal experience, that of his mother and father, and of Chinese communism, from the Cultural Revolution to today. The account was prepared and edited as an exclusive memoir to be published in The Epoch Times. The names have been changed to protect family members still in China.

I grew up in communist China during the Great Cultural Revolution. Life for Chinese people was bitter when the state-initiated "class struggle" swept through our country like a wildfire of violence, lasting ten long years. Although the central figure of this story is my father, the things perpetrated upon him affected our entire family. For me, the eldest son, the suffering and stress is still ever-present in my mind—as intended by this regime that uses extreme brutality to make examples of people in order to spread fear and subjugate the masses.

When I was six years old, in 1963, during a period called "Socialist Education Movement" just prior to the Cultural Revolution, our family was banished to a small village in northeastern China because my father had received a few years of Japanese education during World War II. The area we were sent to was poor and undeveloped, without transportation or electricity, and there were no jobs. My father was a university professor and suddenly had to become a farmer to support the family—my parents, grandmother, younger sister and myself. Since my father had never farmed before, we could not grow enough food on the countryside paddies, and we suffered much hunger during those years. My parents had no income, so my mom raised a few chickens to sell eggs so she could buy paper and pencils for me to go to school.

It was an unusually cold winter in the year of 1968, when I was 11 years old. It continued snowing every day, covering the village. We never saw the sun or the moon all winter, while enduring freezing cold days and nights of up to -30 degrees Celsius (-22 degrees Fahrenheit). I was attending the village elementary school. One day, an event at school caused an unforgettable blow to my soul. As usual, I walked the two miles of snow-covered mountain road to school. But when I walked into my classroom, there was nobody there—no teacher, no students. Instead, the walls were covered with posters filled with Chinese brush characters in black ink. As a fourth grader I could already read all the Chinese characters, and I was startled by the content of those posters. They were all attacking my father, saying things like: "Overthrow counterrevolutionary Liu Shibao!"

Scared and confused I walked around the campus and saw more of these posters everywhere, all over the school. I realized that many village people, including some students, had posted these.

This was in the third year of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, a political movement launched by the Chinese communist party (CCP) in May 1966, to control and purge the educated elite, including teachers and scientists, through terror and persecution. This cruel and destructive movement in total lasted for 10 years and spread all over the country.

From that day on, my father was ordered to attend nightly public criticism meetings, also called "struggle sessions" (Pi Dou Da Hui or Pi Pan Da Hui in Chinese). Several hundred villagers were also ordered by authorities to attend and to "struggle" with the "struggle target" or "class enemy" by verbally, and sometime physically, abusing him or her.

My father was labeled a "history counterrevolutionary" and was required to have that title pinned to his clothes on a card at all times, in public and at home. The criticizing meetings were organized by a Cultural Revolution Leading Committee, a special governing agency of the Communist Party. During the meetings my father had to kneel for over three hours while people berated him loudly and violently. People shouted over and over: "Beat down Liu Shibao! Beat down Liu Shibao!" Some people made up false stories about my father, making people hate him. Some people became very riled-up and out of control that they would spit at him and beat him.

With this kind of abuse being repeated over and over, night after night, my father was eventually nearing breakdown. He became sick and exhausted, always dizzy, with headaches, nausea, and sometime he nearly passed out. His emotions went between anger, fear, hate, hopeless, helplessness, and depression.

We were very scared and worried for my father. My grandmother was crying all the time. My mom and I were afraid that he might die. Every night before the struggle sessions started, my mom and I hid outside the meeting place. With temperatures at -22 degrees Fahrenheit, we were shaking from the cold, and our feet were painful and numb. Even so, we still kept staying there to listen to the meeting, and maybe help my father, should his situation become dire. My mom's plan was that if my father became too weak, we would go into the meeting room and kneel down in front of the village people, begging them to stop.

"If they still have a little bit of human heart left, they may stop, and we may be able to save your father's life," mom said.

The struggle session sometimes went on until midnight. After it was finally over, we helped my already exhausted father to walk back home. On the way home, we passed a well—the only well from which the village people got their water. My mom always worried if my dad walked home by himself, he might commit suicide by jumping into the well. This was another reason why my mom and I waited outside the meeting place during those freezing cold nights to take my father back home.

Such dark days and nights continued. Each struggle session produced more fake stories about my father, so people's hatred against him became ever more extreme. Those fake accusations were made up under pressure from the leaders of Cultural Revolution Leading Committee, the Communist Party members. Without providing any factual evidence, these fabricated reports were used to slander and destroy "the enemy." They were loudly read in front of the people and then posted on walls at school and all public places throughout the village, for everyone to see.

The frenzied and irrational mob-like environment of these class struggle meetings created such hateful energy that it even pushed people into a killing mood. Many innocent teachers, professors, engineers, scientists, and religious leaders were thus beaten to death. My father was facing this situation too. Our whole family was in fear that any day my father would be beaten to death.

One night, after the struggle session had finished at about 1 am and all lights in the village were out, with everything dark and quiet, we had a visitor come to our home. Our family had just fallen into light sleep, when my mom heard a man's voice outside our house, saying over and over: "Brother, open the door! Brother, open the door!"

My mom ignored the voice as she thought it was an illusion in her head because she worried about my father too much. Then I too woke up, but I was scared and kept quiet. However, the man's voice kept pleading, "Brother, open the door!"

We finally realized that it was my uncle, my paternal aunt's husband, who was outside our home in this dark, cold night. He said he had something important to tell us.

My uncle was one of the members of the Cultural Revolution Leading Committee in our village, and a Communist Party member, and he was a major participant in the criticizing meetings against my father. His wife, my father's younger sister, was very worried about this, but neither she nor my uncle could have any contact with us because anyone who has close relationships with an "enemy" of the Cultural Revolution would also be in trouble. So in public, my uncle had to actively participate in all the activities of the struggle sessions against my father, but when he came home, he would suffer from guilt, especially when he saw his wife silently crying. Sometime my aunt would ask him if there wasn't any way that he could help, but his answer was always, "There is nothing I can do, I am upset about it too."

My uncle, and countless millions of Chinese people, were trapped like this. The class-struggle was devised by the communist regime to force people into doing the regime's dirty work for them. Many people were thus drawn into committing crimes against others against their own conscience, simply out of fear. The regime's plan was to replace people's conscience with the "party spirit." Party spirit is about putting the regime's survival first, and treating one's "enemies" without mercy or humanity even though they may be one's own family members or best friends.

My uncle finally could not endure and be silent anymore because the criticizing meeting was supposed to be upgraded to another level—physically torturing my father. My uncle told us that there had been a meeting about it within the leadership on that day, and afterwards they started to prepare many torture instruments such as bricks, wire, metal whips and sticks. It was decided that in next criticizing meeting, they would force my father to kneel down on the bricks, and they planned to bundle together several bricks and hang them on my father's neck. Then they would have people use the metal whips and sticks to beat him.

They decided that if my father would still not admit to being a Japanese spy, they would beat him to death. My uncle has been a close friend of my father's before the Cultural Revolution. He knew that my father would not admit to something that is untrue. He also knew that this would be the last struggle session, and that my father would be killed if they did as planned.

The conflict in my uncle's mind became intense. If he kept silent, my father would be killed, and if he tried to stop those people, he would then be in the same situation as my father. If he warned my father about it, it would be considered that he had divulged secrets to the enemy, and he would become a counterrevolutionary himself and receive the same or worse torture.

After painful mental struggle, my uncle decided to secretly come to our house and persuade my father to flee. My uncle had thus walked through the very heavy snow in the dark of night. He had to be very careful and quiet not to make any dogs bark. If anyone saw him going to our house, he would have been arrested right away.

We all sat on the floor in the dark room, listening to my uncle talk to my parents in a hushed voice: "Brother and sister, please take my words very seriously. They have already prepared everything to torture brother at tomorrow's struggle session. The only way to save yourself is to escape before daybreak, otherwise they will kill you. I finally decided to come tell you under risk of my own life. Now there are only a few hours left, so please hurry up and get ready to escape somewhere far away!"

After this, my uncle left quietly, and we hastily moved into action. My mom used the only two pounds of bread flour we had for the entire year to bake a few Chinese pancakes for my father to take along. I sat on the floor, helping my mom by keeping the wooden fire going.

We got my father ready to leave in about 30 minutes. All our family members, including my little sister and my grandmother, were crying as we said goodbye and watched my father gradually vanish into the darkness of the blizzardy night.

With just a few pancakes and 50 yuan my uncle had given him, my father left home in that cold winter night of 1968 to escape being beaten to death at the struggle session set up for the following evening.

End of part I of II of Yukui Liu's account. Part II will appear shortly, and be linked to this article.

Cultural

Sunday, December 26, 2010