- Yingying Lu, 2008 Beijing Volunteer
Sunday was the fastest I had ever walked out of the Zufang village
migrant worker community. I wasn’t rushing to anything, but
desperately trying to escape from a seemingly unconquerable pile of
mental frustrations: problems that began as minor difficulties had
seemed to morph into major roadblocks in the span of a few hours. I
needed space to process my own emotions and sort out the conflicting
thoughts. After saying goodbye to the two girls I spent the afternoon
with and finding myself alone for the first time that day, I let the
smile fall from my face, erasing the façade of happiness I put on for
the kids. Patches of wetness clung to the edges of my eyes and
threatened to explode, ready to burn an even hotter path down my
already-flushed cheeks.
I clutched my purse closer and walked even faster. The sun was
setting, and the mass exodus of commuters who left the neighborhood
early every morning was beginning to trickle back. Men with dirty
sleeves and sweaty foreheads, returning from plumbing and construction
jobs; women heading back to their own homes after ten hours of
cleaning strangers’; girls my age with their uniforms on from selling
clothes at roadside stalls or doing low-end clerical jobs for small
businesses. Whether walking or on bicycles, the migrant workers always
looked forward, no doubt driven on by tender thoughts of their
children, spouses, or parents waiting for them to eat dinner.
This was only the first wave. At around eight or nine, those who
worked even longer hours would be returning home. They would look
markedly more exhausted, but tell themselves that they were lucky to
even have a job and a source of income—at least for the time being.
Watching the influx of migrants used to conjure up deep feelings of
compassion and even empowerment—here was a reason for me to keep
working, to keep caring—but lately I felt only irritation. These men
and women represented just one of the problems with China’s rapid
development; they were the manifestation of an ever-widening gap
between urban growth and rural opportunities. Gazing across the sea of
tired faces, I felt the heavy weight of a country’s collective dreams—
and saw clearly the depth of change that would be required to realize
them. Against this tide of people rushing inwards, did I still have
the strength to push back, to swim the other way?
These thoughts had contributed to an increasing disenchantment with my
project. I had just finished reading James Kynge’s China Shakes the
World, and concluded that fairy tales can be harmful. The world does
not have the resources to sustain 1.3 billion Chinese living as
Americans, yet dreams of living like Westerners drives urban
consumption. Certainly, many of the migrant parents I had talked
harbored lower expectations or none at all, but they are nonetheless
trying to make the best life for themselves and their children given
their situations. A theme of my conversations with these parents was a
ubiquitous awareness of Beijing’s growing inequality, encapsulated by
the oft-repeated phrase “有钱的人很有钱，没钱的人特别没钱”—“those with money have lots
of it, while those who don’t really don’t.”
I had to keep reminding myself of the purpose of my work, fighting
against doubts that that continued to resurface. What good was making
recommendations for Dream Corps if the organization may never be able
to measure the direct impact of its work? At the Beijing site, the
majority of children leave the city once they reach middle school.
They return to their rural hometowns, or “老家,” to continue school
there. This reality makes it difficult to ascertain a long-term
impact; how do we know that the same children who frequent the New
Century Library (Dream Corps' library in Beijing) now will continue to
see the value in reading and learning once they return home?
The impatient, policy-minded aspects of my personality fueled my
doubts and contributed to my insecurities. If not supported by
appropriate top-down policies—such as those that would make it easier
and more financially feasible for children without household
registration (户口）to enroll in quality, local schools—how could
families hope to break out of vicious cycles? I enjoy helping others
with their problems—I am an RA at Duke—but here, I was constantly
listening to people talk about problems I felt utterly powerless to
fix. I believe in the power of dialogue in building mutual
understanding—but how much was too much? Was I spending so much time
talking with people when I could be taking on a more proactive
project? And if I did, what would this approach look like?
“Yingying 姐姐!” Hearing my name jolted me out of my thoughts. I looked
around for the source of the call, recognizing the voice as belonging
to Li Qian, one of the girls I had said goodbye to not long ago after
she and her friend, Yu Jiao, walked me to the main road. After buying
the girls popsicles, I had told them to go straight home, since it was
about to get dark. They had reluctantly turned around… but yet there
they were, looking down at me from behind the railing that bordered
the other side of the road along which I was walking. I felt my
insides swell up as I realized what was happening—the girls hadn’t
gone home! They must have watched and seen where I was headed, and
then trailed along on the nearby hill. “姐姐, 再见! Goodbye!”
I stopped walking. As I turned around to face the two girls, they
moved closer to me, gripping the metal bars that separated us. “Li
Qian! Yu Jiao! 你们快回家吧!” I was screaming across the street, trying to
tell the girls to stop following me. They seemed not to hear me. We
stood there for what must have been a mere minute, but felt like an
eternity—me on the sidewalk, telling them to go on home, and the girls
behind the railings, illuminated by the setting sun, with nothing but
pure happiness written across their faces. Next to them, a green
banner with the phrase “One World, One Dream,” fluttered, attached to
a lamppost. Less than thirty days to go until the Olympics, and these
streamers had gone up this morning, in line with a citywide trend. I
marveled at the irony of the juxtaposition: even within a single city,
there is definitely more than one world.
And finally, the tears that had been waiting to fall did, and I cried
for the first time since I had been in Beijing. But these weren’t
tears of frustration, or of helplessness. Here, right in front of me,
was the reason I had committed myself to this community in the first
place. Fueled by my own idealism, I had gotten too wrapped up in the
big picture of China’s interconnected problems, as well as the small
troubles of my daily run-ins with logistical issues. I had forgotten
that, in the end, I could only do my best in working towards what I
believe in. I had option of walking out of this community—and did so
every day—but these girls were caught behind the rails of limited
opportunities. They could only follow me so far before the metro
tracks prevented them from going further. Perspective and strength
came in the form of two children with smiles on their faces.
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