When I was little boy, my family lived in Zhijiang Normal School, Hunan, China. There was a middle aged disabled man in school. He was a special person in the school, not teacher, not staff, or student.
He had been a manager of a constuction company, which undertook construction project on campus. He was young, handsome, smart. just graduated from college at that time. There were very few college graduates at that time in China, his future was very bright.
One day, when he was checking the project on the construction side, he falled down from the top of a building, he was suvived but was serious injured. It was 1950s when he was only about 30 years old.
At that time, China had no insurance companies. After negotiation between the constrction company and the school, he remained in school. School was responsible to pay him living expense for his entire life.
He was paralyzed of his left side of the body, and partial of his right side. He had to hold a crutch with his right hand all the time to support him. Even though, it was still very difficult for him to walk because his left leg was very still, he had to kick it left and made a circle curve to move it forward. He had to shake his body very big in order to walk. He couldn’t speak, only make some noise. He couldn’t eat smoothly, had to take much longer time to swallow food.
People called him “Fool Wang” because his last name is Wang, looked like Fool. But his mind was still very sharp, and smart. He read newspaper, understood what people said to him. If he agreed, he nodded his head, if he disagreed, he shook his head with some noise.
He couldn’t dress and undress, could not take shower, and even brush teeth himselves. There was no caretaker assigned to him. Master. Zhang, an old man who was the only full time service man in School, took sometime to help Mr. Wang in daily life.
He liked to dress up, took shower as often as normal people, put everything in order. He took long time to do those with Master Zhang’s help. He liked walking on campus even though some kids called him “Fool Wang” behind him, he just ignored. He smiled and happy whenever someone talked to him.
What he liked most was to go a few restaurants in the town, order couple dishes he wanted, and drank a couple of alcohol. He went to the restaurants once or twice a week before 1965.
The School moved out of the town, the new site was 4.5 miles east to the town. The site had been as U.S. Air Force base in world war II. Mr. Wang still wanted to go restaurants in town, but there was no car by individuals or even by school. But he just walked to town himself about once a month. It took normal people 45 -50 mins to get there, but took him about 4 hours or more one way.
When the day came, he got up early, dressed up with help of Master Zhang. After breakfast, he started to walk. He had to cross the discarded airport to get the town. He walked so slow, got to the town at lunch time, and had a good meal. Then he walked back to get there before dark.
It was extausted for him to do so in the sunny and warm day. It was more difficult in the winter. Sometimes there were thunderstorms in his way, there was no shelter in the middle of discarded airport. He got wet, and almost blew down by the wind. If it happened, he got home after dark. A few times, he got very sick after he walked home in the thunderstorms, slept on the bed for days to recover. But he continued to go town to eat in restaurants until the school moved back to the town three years later.
In the cultural revolution, the Red Guards critisized him as a Captalism expert because he had been the manager of the construction company. He was angry to rise his crutch. Red Guards band him with a big “bad guy” characters board hanging on his neck, put him on a flat cart, forced Master Zhang to push him around the campus to punish him. He cried and his body was shaking. It was his most angry situation I had ever seen.
He continued to go restaurants in his late years. When he couldn’t walk, he asked Master Zhang to order some dishes and delivered to him until he died at age 60s in 1980s.
Read other answers by Lewei Shang on Quora:
- What is it like to have your parent as your teacher in school?
- What was the strangest thing you have experienced as a foreigner/visitor in the United States?
from Quora http://ift.tt/2ev34D7
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