China's lost history of famine
The great famine that devastated China half a century ago killed tens of millions of people - but is barely a footnote in history books.
There are few open public records of an event that is seared into the memories of those who survived this largely man-made disaster. A documentary maker now hopes to redress that imbalance by collecting the stories of hundreds of people who lived through the famine. He has sent young film-makers across China to video the survivors' testimonies. Some of those videos have already been shown to the public in screenings at the 798 arts district on the outskirts of Beijing. Stories are still being collected and the long-term aim is to bring all these video memories together. Wu Wenguang, the man behind the project, said: "If we don't know about the past, then there will be no future."
Armed with video cameras, Mr Wu's researchers have already travelled to 50 villages in 10 provinces across China. So far they have collected more than 600 memories from the famine, the result of a disastrous political campaign launched by Mao Zedong. The Great Leap Forward was supposed to propel China into a new age of communism and plenty - but it failed spectacularly. Agriculture was disrupted as private property was abolished and people were forced into supposedly self-sufficient communes. Interviews for this new project reveal that even though the famine happened a long time ago - between late 1958 and 1962 - memories are still sharp.
Li Guocheng is just one of those who still have fresh memories on what happened 50 years ago
Those interviewed seem to remember exactly how many grams of rice they were allocated in the period's communal kitchens. It was sometimes as low as 150g a day, occasionally they got nothing
Just one of those featured in the public screenings was Li Guocheng, a pensioner from the village of Baiyun in Yunnan province. He told the story of a relative who was so hungry that he stole a few ears of corn and took them home to cook. "After he ate them he was caught and tied up with a vine. They bound him to a post at his house," said Mr Li. But the next day he said the relative did the same again. He was once more caught and once more tied up as punishment. His 10-year-old daughter was told not to release him. "The next day he didn't steal again. He stayed home, put a rope over the beam of his house and hanged himself. He was so miserable," said Mr Li.
The researcher who recorded this story is Li Xinmin. The 23-year-old comes from the same Yunnan village as Mr Li, but it was not until she went back there to video its elderly residents that she realised the full horror of the famine. "Only occasionally would older people talk about these bitter times - when they had to eat wild vegetables or other stuff that humans wouldn't usually eat," she said. The 23-year-old is now finding out about a famine she learned little about in school.
Calculating how many people died is difficult. Not every government organisation kept accurate records at the time and there is little official appetite to investigate this dark episode in China's modern history... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17987733
There are few open public records of an event that is seared into the memories of those who survived this largely man-made disaster. A documentary maker now hopes to redress that imbalance by collecting the stories of hundreds of people who lived through the famine. He has sent young film-makers across China to video the survivors' testimonies. Some of those videos have already been shown to the public in screenings at the 798 arts district on the outskirts of Beijing. Stories are still being collected and the long-term aim is to bring all these video memories together. Wu Wenguang, the man behind the project, said: "If we don't know about the past, then there will be no future."
Armed with video cameras, Mr Wu's researchers have already travelled to 50 villages in 10 provinces across China. So far they have collected more than 600 memories from the famine, the result of a disastrous political campaign launched by Mao Zedong. The Great Leap Forward was supposed to propel China into a new age of communism and plenty - but it failed spectacularly. Agriculture was disrupted as private property was abolished and people were forced into supposedly self-sufficient communes. Interviews for this new project reveal that even though the famine happened a long time ago - between late 1958 and 1962 - memories are still sharp.
Li Guocheng is just one of those who still have fresh memories on what happened 50 years ago
Those interviewed seem to remember exactly how many grams of rice they were allocated in the period's communal kitchens. It was sometimes as low as 150g a day, occasionally they got nothing
Just one of those featured in the public screenings was Li Guocheng, a pensioner from the village of Baiyun in Yunnan province. He told the story of a relative who was so hungry that he stole a few ears of corn and took them home to cook. "After he ate them he was caught and tied up with a vine. They bound him to a post at his house," said Mr Li. But the next day he said the relative did the same again. He was once more caught and once more tied up as punishment. His 10-year-old daughter was told not to release him. "The next day he didn't steal again. He stayed home, put a rope over the beam of his house and hanged himself. He was so miserable," said Mr Li.
The researcher who recorded this story is Li Xinmin. The 23-year-old comes from the same Yunnan village as Mr Li, but it was not until she went back there to video its elderly residents that she realised the full horror of the famine. "Only occasionally would older people talk about these bitter times - when they had to eat wild vegetables or other stuff that humans wouldn't usually eat," she said. The 23-year-old is now finding out about a famine she learned little about in school.
Calculating how many people died is difficult. Not every government organisation kept accurate records at the time and there is little official appetite to investigate this dark episode in China's modern history... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17987733
