A Life Changing Trip

Hello and welcome to a special edition of China Horizons on China Radio International. I'm Ning Yan.

On today's show, we'll take you to meet a girl from the Miao ethnic minority group in a remote mountain village. Although they're threatened with poverty and starvation, she and her friends still fight to complete their schooling.

Out reporter Xiaohua takes us to their village to hear her story.

REPORTER: The winter school holiday has come to an end in Beijing and the subway is crowded with tired adults and drowsy children shouldering heavy schoolbags.

The students in the cities may be weighed down by their school books, but at least they don't have to worry whether poverty will force them out of school one day.

That's the harsh reality some children in China face every day. 

You're listening to 17 year old Wang Huaxiang singing her love for the mountain where she was born and grew up.
I met her eight months ago during my trip to southwest China's Guizhou Province. 

"When I was in second grade in 1998, I stopped studying for about 2 years, because my family couldn't afford the tuition fees - about 80 yuan per year."

80 yuan, or about 10 US dollars, is a small amount of money for many city kids. But even this small sum of money can kill some kids' dreams of going to school in rural China. 

I wonder how Wang Huaxiang is now? Listening to her takes me back to my trip to Guizhou half a year ago, to that dream landscape of green hills, blue streams, clear skies and white clouds. 

On July 10th, 2006, we, a bunch of young reporters from the China Radio International headquarters in Beijing, got on the train bound for China's southwest. It was a region we knew little about.

We were on a special mission, not just another reporting trip. We were going to help some poverty-stricken kids go back to school with money donated by CRI staff.

We were born in the 1980s and we'd grown up in the cities. Words like "mountain", "thatched cottage" and "poverty" conjured up little more than scenes from movies or TV programs. They had never been part of our reality.

Over the course of the 30 hour journey, the train rocked with a regular rhythm as the scenes outside the window changed from the familiar to the strange. More and more green swam into our view. Soon the mountains appeared close enough to reach out of the window and touch. I started feeling anxious. I knew almost nothing about our destination--Machang Village in Panxian County. What was life really like for a child who lived in such an extensive mountain range? And why couldn't some of them go to school? 

Panxian County is situated at the border of three provinces: Yunnan, Guizhou and the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. It covers around 4,000 square kilometers and has a population of nearly 1.2 million people. It's also been designated one of the target counties for China's poverty alleviation efforts. The local government work reports show the farmers in Panxian county earn an average annual income of just 250 US dollars last year. That's less than the United Nation's extreme poverty line of a dollar a day. Machang is one of the poorest areas in Panxian. 

When we arrived, the only road that could be called a street in Machang Village was crowded with students from the county. They stood in line on both sides of the street and held floral garlands and paper ribbons high as they called out "welcome" altogether. The scene was stamped on my mind from that moment on. I remember it all ... The heart-felt, childish voices, their expectant-but-shy eyes, the simple, sweet sound of their songs and the thick bamboo tubes containing rice wine they carried in their hands.

I was totally shocked the very moment I saw all these elements together. But their enthusiasm soon melted all my nerves away.

A girl caught my eyes with her smile. She was wearing the complicated handmade traditional costume of the Miao ethnic group and had a pretty face, with cheeks made rosy by the sun. She had a pure and plain beauty, free of any decoration. Her name is Wang Huaxiang, which means the fragrance of flowers. She reminded me of a nameless flower blooming quietly in the deep mountain.

That was my first meeting with Wang Huaxiang, during the welcome ceremony in front of the primary school of Machang Village. She was singing the Miao drinking song and held a full tube of rice wine in her hands. 

I'm now sitting in McDonalds' with my friends on Wang Fujing Pedestrian Street, a popular shopping area in Beijing. It's already getting dark, but the fashionable young boys and girls don't want to leave. The pedestrian street is brightly lit. Cars run back and forth on the broad and flat street. The whole world is amazed by China's economic miracles. Living in a big city like Beijing, you can automatically exclude words like poverty or dropping out of school from your dictionary of daily life. But as I eat French fries, I'm suddenly reminded of the grilled potatoes that I ate at Wang Huaxiang's home. 

"Usually we eat potatoes and corn rice as our staple food. Vegetables and rice are a sort of luxury to us."

Huaxiang's family belongs to the Xiaohua Miao branch of the Miao ethnic group in southwest China. The group's name literally translates as "little flower". They were named for their love of colorfully embroidered costumes. 

Huaxing's home was a simple, crude log cabin built on the side of the hill. Some plantain and corn plants stand in front of the house. As I stepped into the room, I saw little of note apart from the undulating floor. Pieces of blue sky filled the cracks in the roof. A traditional weaving machine and some simple furniture constituted the family's entire wealth. Even the curtain that served as the door to their home was made from fertilizer bags. On the wall were several award certificates for the kids' outstanding performance at school, reflecting a few of the happy moments the poor family had enjoyed together. They had no electrical appliances, unless you count a 15 watt light bulb.

In 1998, Wang Huaxiang dropped out of school because her family couldn't afford to pay her school fees, which were less than 10 US dollars per year.

Instead, she helped her family by working in the field, drying herbs in the sun or taking care of her younger sisters and brothers. 

"At that time I really wanted to go to school. Every day, I saw lots of my friends go off happily to study. I felt envious of them. But I knew my family didn't have the money, so I never told my parents my true feelings."

The family has four children and Huaxiang is the second-oldest. The entire year's rations for this family of six depend on a piece of land the size of a basketball court.

Sometimes the parents go to the mountains to collect medicinal herbs to sell and supplement their income. But they still only make around 300 yuan or about 40 US dollars a year.

In 2000, 189 nations including China adopted the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals and pledged to reach them by 2015.

Universal primary education is one of the eight goals.

That year, the Chinese government issued special policies to cut tuition fees in some remote rural areas. So Huaxiang finally got to continue her primary education in 2000.

But even with the government subsidy, Huaxiang still had to pay 40 yuan or about 5 dollars per year.

That may not be enough for a city kid's pocket money, but it was a huge burden for Huaxiang's family, who only make 40 US dollars a year.

So Huaxiang was forced to give up her education again just one year later. Luckily her maths teacher, Zhang Youfu, gave her some personal assistance.

"When he knew my family could not afford my tuition fees, he dipped into his own pocket and paid the fees for me. I didn't know how to thank him. No words could express my feelings. The only words I said to him were: 'Thanks. I will try my best to study hard.'"

Tears quietly dropped from her bright eyes as she told me her story. Huaxiang said she would always remember and appreciate what her Maths teacher's actions.

But even after Huaxiang finally resumed her education, studying still posed more challenges for her than for the students in the cities. 

"I get up at half past six every day and walk about half an hour along the mountain road to my school. My sister and I go back home for lunch at noon, which we cook ourselves. And then we go to school again at about two in the afternoon. After school, we have to help the family cut fodder to feed the only pig my family has. In the evening, when we finish all the housework, the four of us share the dinner table and do our homework."

To provide me with a feast, Huangxiang's family served up the preserved ham they usually reserved for the Spring Festival, or Chinese New Year. And of course, I also ate their everyday meal of grilled potatoes with pepper powder and corn rice.
It may have seemed like a simple - even slightly rough-and-ready meal - to us, but it was a feast comparable only with the New Year's dinner for all the children there.

Every year, the family kills their only pig for the Spring Festival. Half is preserved and becomes the family's only source of meat for a year. The other half is sold to pay for other festival necessities. 

"If my family had more farmland, we could harvest more grain and feed another pig or cow. Then we would have a better life. Now, we have to borrow a cow from our relatives to till the land."

In the mountains, animals like cows and pigs are considered more precious than men. If you want to know whether a family is rich or poor, you just have to count their cows and pigs. They usually house their animals in the family bedroom to stop their lifeblood from being stolen. 
"I'll fly to the boundless night sky,
Pick a star as a toy for you.
I'll touch the moon,
And write on your name."

Just like Emil Chow sings, every parent wants to give everything they have to their children. Nike shoes, Nokia cell phones, iPods, IBM laptops, all kinds of reference books and training courses... as long as the kid asks for it, the modern urban parent will provide.

But Huangxiang's mom Tao Chunxiang struggles to help her kids fulfill their dreams of going to school. 

Tao Chunxiang is 35-year old woman with a round face and short figure. Unlike the older generations of Miao people, she didn't ask her daughters to learn weaving and embroidery with her at home. She sent them to school. Though it cost the family no small quantity of money, she insists that attending school is the way out of poverty for them and their family as a whole. But where would they find the money to pay the school fees? I still remember Huaxiang mother's expression of desperation. 

"We have to live and my children also need to go to school. But sometimes, to allow the whole family to live, we have no choice but to give up their studies. We cannot always afford their school fees."

Huaxiang's mom knows that without others' help, she will always be a real desperate housewife, pinching pennies to survive and pay her kid's school fees.

After CRI learned about the situation in Machang village, it asked it staff to make donations to help the kids and collected more than 40,000 yuan or 5000 US dollars. Besides the money, there were also thousands of books, stationeries and even computers and clothes sending to the kids. Huaxiang was one of the 80 kids who received a donation.

When Huaxiang's mom heard we would visit their house, she embroidered some delicate bags as gifts to express her appreciation. I can still remember the feeling when she grasped my hands and gave those bags to me. They were heavy with the feelings from her heart. 

To meet the Millennium Development Goal for basic education, the government last year exempted students in rural areas of underdeveloped western China from paying tuition fees and related costs during nine years of compulsory education.

That includes six years of primary education and three years of junior middle school. This year the exemption was applied to the whole of China.

City dwellers may not find the 200 yuan, or 25 dollars a year, required for school expenses expensive. But it's simply unaffordable for many poor families in remote mountain areas.

The Chinese Minister of Education, Zhou Ji, says the new move will substantially improve the financial situation for many rural families. 

"I have worked out that, every year, each primary student will save 140 yuan and every junior middle school student will save 180 yuan."

The central government will also provide children from poor families with free text books. Poor students in boarding schools will receive living subsidies as well. Huaxiang is just one of the students who has benefited from this policy. 

"Without the policy I couldn't have finished my primary education and, of course, I wouldn't still be here in my last year of junior middle school." 

Although they leave their house early every day and only return at dusk, the children of the mountains face their life with optimism as they struggle on the edge of poverty.

Going to school is the happiest part of their life. Luckily, in Machang, where Huaxiang lives, most school-aged children can actually go to school.

Xue Yueqiong is the head of Panxian County's education department. 

"Last year our primary education enrolment ratio reached 99.28 percent, almost one percentage point higher than in 2003 before tuition and related fees were first waived."

99.28 percent sounds really encouraging, but it's still not 100 percent. In Machang, that means more than 1,100 school-aged children miss on out a basic education.

Wang Guishan is an experienced reporter, who follows education issues in rural areas. He told me that when it comes to kids' education, there's not a lot of difference between families in poor remote regions and families in big cities. 

"There's a saying that's well-known in Machang: if you want to have a promising life, go to school. People are realizing that they will only be able to overcome poverty and prosper if they gain enough knowledge. Parents want to send their kids to school."

But it can be hard to set schools up where they're needed because people live scattered all over the mountain. And in certain remote villages, a so-called primary school may only have three grades and three teachers taking all kinds of classes, from maths to music. Children in the upper grades have to walk for hours to attend big school and finish their primary studies.

Wang Guishan says boarding schools could help these children out. 

"My solution is to build more boarding schools, so the children can bring a week's worth of food and live at the school. Then they won't have to walk a long distance every day. But of course it'll increase the burden on the kids' families, so government subsidies for education would need to be increased and the whole of society should lend them a hand. Ordinary people are a big source of help to poor families in rural areas."
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao mentioned the same ideas in this year's government work report. The Premier revealed the central government is committed to increasing its investment in compulsory education in rural areas. 

"Educational investment in rural areas will total nearly 224 billion yuan this year, an annual increase of almost 40 billion yuan, so that all children will receive education - a better education." 

Huaxiang is still rushing along a rugged mountain path to school every day, while I returned to my life in Beijing after my ten day trip to her village.

With my busy office, crowded subways, noisy streets, big shining shopping malls...The small mountainous village seems so far away from me. But I know there is something deep in my heart, a smiling face I will never wipe from my mind, a sweet voice that will forever hover around my ears, a fragrance to remind me of a small village thousands of miles away in the mountain.

This year is the last school year in Huaxiang's life, I hope her life will be as sweet as her voice.