Thursday, December 08, 2011

A Good Kid, Sun Yue

Sun Yue, a four years old girl, looked at the reporter with an alert eye.  She was afraid the reporter came to adopt her from her parents.  Her parents had been talking many times to give her to someone else, so that she could have a better life.  Yue does not want to leave them, because 'who will take care of you if I am not here?'

Yue lives with her parents in a remote village named Bajiazi Tun(Eight Family Hub) about 100 kilometers from Harbin, Heilongjiang Province.  Both of Yue's parents are disabled and constraint to lying on the bed whole day.  The mother, Zhan Juan, got severe arthritis after fishing in cold water for years.  The father, Sun Yuemin, was hit by a construction site accident in June, and paralyzed from chest down.

The reporter found some coal bricks donated by some volunteers the previous day (after Yue's story made news).  Two bags of potato are the only vegetables for the whole family through the winter.  The room is icy cold, nor surprisingly in a house made by mud.  There is no table, not even a chair.  Her pants are torn with holes, and she was still wearing sandals in -17 Celsius weather.

Yue was the only one in the family that can got off the bed.  Four years old Yue's daily routine includes making fire, cooking, washing clothes, feeding her parents, attending her parents.  Since the father's accident, the couple had been discussing giving little Yue to some other people so that she can live a child's life.  Yue refused, 'who will take care of you if I am not here?'  After the conversation, Yue is feared whenever she sees strangers in the house, as she is afraid he may adopt her to another family.

No comments: