No matter how future generations judge education, there is no doubt that going to school is the only shortcut to success for children from mountainous areas or poor families.
But the poorer the parents are, the more ignorant they are, or rather they are more realistic. Families that are not already well-off will undoubtedly make things worse if they have to pay for their children's school fees. If the children do not go to school and do some farm work at home, it can also reduce the burden on the family.
You can't accuse these parents of being short-sighted, not when they're still hungry. You can't expect him to have too many fantasies about the future. Filling his stomach is their first need.
Therefore, aiding Hope Primary Schools in impoverished mountainous areas is not just about building the school and finding supporting teachers. There's no point in building a school if you can't get nearby parents to send their kids there.
Every time a Hope Primary School is built, how to recruit students is a major difficulty in supporting teaching projects, because even if tuition and fees are waived. Many parents are still willing to let their children work or herd cattle at home rather than send their students to school.
As for the nine-year compulsory education stipulated by the state, in their view, as long as they don't kill someone, it is not a crime, and there is not much deterrence in the legal understanding. It is natural for their own children to be killed even if they decide.
After trekking through mountains and rivers for more than four hours, Yang Dongxu, Yu Yi and others finally arrived at a place called Xiaotun Township deep in Liangshan. The township is actually a slightly larger village, with a population of thirty or forty households and A small market.
After walking through the market for about ten minutes and going up a gentle slope, you can see the red-brick and white-walled Hope Primary School. The five-star red flag is flying on the flagpole in the center of the school. However, the school that originally gave people hope at first glance has some signs of being demolished on the wall to the west. Now the gap is blocked by a wooden fence and it looks like A scar on the white snow.
"What's going on?" The panting Yang Dongxu put down the heavy package he was carrying. Inside was a very heavy exercise book, pencils and stationery.
"The villagers demolished it." Yu Yi sighed.
"Huh?" Yang Dongxu raised his eyebrows. He had personally participated in the volunteer education and Hope Primary School projects, and he knew about some conflicts and even encountered some, but this was the first time he had heard about the demolition of schools.
"A villager's house fell down. He saw that the school building was very strong, so he demolished some and went back to build the wall. He secretly demolished it bit by bit at night, and when he found it, it was already demolished like this. The school asked the villagers The cadres negotiated and wanted to bring back the bricks he had stolen and put them back on, but he didn't agree. It wasn't worth carrying the bricks in from the outside, so we had to make do," Yu Yi said with a sigh.
It is not easy to build a house in the mountains. It is a big problem to use local materials and polish them with stones. Moreover, building a house is very troublesome. Therefore, when we aided in the construction of Hope Primary School, because the roads were different, the entire school cost tens of thousands of dollars to build. Bags of cement and steel bars were carried or carried into the mountain from outside the mountain little by little by manpower.
Therefore, in order to fill such a hole, it is not worthwhile to transfer from outside and then carry bricks and cement. And even if you carry it, you may not be able to use it to repair the wall.
During the construction of the school, nearly one-third more building materials were used than expected. Why did the original accurate calculation exceed so much? Naturally, it was stolen by nearby villagers, who even hired nearby villagers to carry these building materials. It's nothing new for them to carry it directly back to their homes instead of sending it to the construction site.
In their understanding, since it is a donation, it makes sense to use it to build a school or build a pigsty for their own home. It was not until later after consultation with the local village cadres that this was a government project, and the bad habit of being shot for stealing and taking advantage was finally suppressed, but from time to time things would still be lost in the school.
You can't blame anything for this phenomenon. For these poor households who are still hungry and digging for food in the fields, it is useless to talk about the truth. The warehouses are practical and they know the etiquette, and the food and clothing are enough to know the honor and disgrace. When they are still hungry, the only thing they think about is how to fill themselves up and anything else is meaningless to them.
When Yang Dongxu came to school, he didn't see his brother Leslie Cheung. After asking, he found out that three more children from deep in the mountains had dropped out of school last week. After waiting at school for several days without seeing each other come to school, his brother went to the school in person dozens of miles away. I went to the village to personally persuade the parents of the children.
"No, no, how can I charge money for the things my children need to go to school? If I accept this, I will get stabbed in the spine." The wrinkles on the faces of several people who looked very thin showed traces of time, but they shouldered the heavy burden of a family. The man waved his hand, gave in to Yu Yifa's money, and left in a hurry without waiting for Yu Yi to say anything else.
Some people like to take advantage and steal things from the public, while others are kind and heart-warming. Maybe they don’t have enough food and clothing, but when the reason is explained clearly and they understand that going to school is for the good of their children, it can make their children have a better future, and even be able to go out of the mountains and have enough to eat.
No matter how hard or tired they are, these parents are willing to grit their teeth and support their children in going to school. Some of them sneak home carrying construction materials on their backs. There are also people who don’t pay a penny to build a school for their children, as long as they can keep their mouths watered.
"Next time you have nothing to carry, treat them to a meal in the city." Yang Dongxu waved his hand to stop Yu Yi from pursuing him.
"It will get better in the future, right?" Yu Yi turned her head. For the first time, what Yang Dongxu felt from her red phoenix eyes was not the coldness and charm of a different kind, but the trembling fear of the future like a frightened little animal. Hope.
"It will be fine, as long as this generation can read and write, and go out of the mountains to see the outside world. Then their lives will not be nailed to the ground, and their children will live a better and more hopeful life." Although. Appropriations are made to the Yunyu Fund every year, and more and more are allocated every year.
But there are some things that you don’t see and experience with your own eyes. You can never feel that heart-wrenching feeling. Although he hasn't seen his brother yet, Yang Dongxu seems to understand why such a big star no longer wants to leave after coming to the depths of this isolated mountain.
The school's conditions are very difficult. Although the school has been built, there are only three teachers assigned to support teaching. Including my brother's voluntary help, there are only four teachers, but they manage five classes.
It is normal for a teacher to hold half of the class in this classroom and six students to study by themselves in the second half of the class. It is normal for them to go to another classroom for the second half of the class.
When Yang Dongxu and Yu Yi arrived, the children were having physical education class in the afternoon. Watching a child with a smile on his face chasing a football on the playground, after the physical education class, a child carefully wiped the football clean and put it back in its place.
He couldn't help feeling that his nasal cavity was a little sore, and he looked up at the blue sky. He seems to have a deeper understanding of the need for high-level officials to develop the economy even if they make huge sacrifices. Poverty is a disease that plagues a country. Only when this disease is cured can you have the capital to talk about other things.
When it was getting dark, my brother rushed back from dozens of miles away, accompanied by three children whose clothes were somewhat damaged, but whose eyes were so clean that they could see their own reflections clearly.
"When did you come?" He saw brother Yang Dongxu was stunned for a moment, then smiled and asked the child to go back to the dormitory and walked over.
When we aided in the construction of the school, we considered that it was very dangerous for children in mountainous areas to walk dozens of miles of mountain roads to go to school, so the school built student dormitories and had a canteen to minimize the time children spent traveling on the road.
"Just arrived this afternoon."
"This batch of stationery arrived very timely. The children's pencils are almost used up and there is not much chalk left. If I hadn't gone to the mountains today to persuade parents to send their children to school, I would have gone to the town outside the mountains to carry them myself." My brother laughed. Then he patted Yang Dongxu on the shoulder.
Compared to the dashing Leslie Cheung on screen, he is a handsome brother at various award ceremonies and commercial performances. Now he is wearing a somewhat old Chinese tunic suit, with slightly longer hair lying on the top of his head. His handsome face does not have that charming and unrestrained look, with unconcealable weariness and exhaustion, but the smile on his face is like that from the heart.
"Didn't we arrange for someone to deliver it regularly?" Yang Dongxu frowned.
"There are not many ways for people to make money in the mountains. If there is such a fixed income, everyone else has an opinion. Some parents are kind-hearted and don't want to accept money. It's not good to bother others if they don't give money. After all, they still have money. There is a lot of farm work to do and I have to support my family, so I carry it myself when I have time. Anyway, it only takes a day to go back and forth, and one carry is enough for a week."
My brother smiled and said, "What do you want to eat tonight? I have learned several good local dishes, especially the yellow sesame leaves and the ones learned from the villagers are very delicious."
In addition to being a teacher to his students and a coolie traveling dozens of miles through the mountains, he is also a cook in the school cafeteria. With my not very good cooking skills, I occasionally add some vegetables to the children who bring steamed buns or sweet potatoes from home for a week's ration.
"Well, it tastes very good, especially the big dumplings." Yang Dongxu suddenly felt that it was unnecessary for him to persuade his brother.
"Expert." The elder brother turned around and glanced at Yang Dongxu unexpectedly.
"Don't look down on people, okay? I am also a child from the countryside. If it comes to yellow sesame leaves and pickled wild vegetables, my skills are definitely better than yours. I often help my mother do these things when I am at home." Yang Dongxu rolled up his sleeves.
Yu Yi and the two village women hired to help started picking vegetables. In addition to a large number of stationery and books, the things they carried to school this time also included hundreds of kilograms of flour. The children can have a good meal of white flour today. Dumplings. How to find ways to keep children fed and well fed is also one of the focuses of the school.
It's just that this kind of subsidy fund is too huge, even if Yang Dongxu increases his investment in Runyu Charity Fund every year. Aiding in building schools, paying the salaries of supporting teachers, freeing all expenses for poor children, all kinds of books and stationery, etc., the expenses are getting bigger every year. So when it comes to how to ensure that children have three meals a day, we can only do our best to ensure that children have three meals a day. No guarantees can be made.
