War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 2025 Half the Sky

Amidst the loud sound of suona horns, Wei Ran, carrying his briefcase, was the first to emerge. This time, he had specially changed into the old-fashioned Zhongshan suit from the small Western-style house in Tianjin.

"Are you Comrade Gao Hongyan?" Wei Ran walked up to the old lady and asked in a very formal manner.

It's me.

The old woman nervously tugged at the hem of her clothes. "Is it a letter from my family's millstone?"

"yes"

As Wei Ran spoke, he helped the old lady sit down on the large millstone next to him. Then he opened his briefcase, took out the canvas shoulder bag full of bloodstains and bullet holes, and placed it on top of his briefcase.

Under Gao Hongyan's tense gaze, he carefully opened the satchel, took out the sheepskin knee pads, opened it, and carefully unfolded a plastic notebook with bullet holes, showing the letter tucked inside.

"This is his letter to you, and I'm willing to risk my life to guarantee that no one has ever read it."

Do you need someone to read the contents to you?

"I can read, I can read."

Gao Hongyan stroked her knee pads and said, "Before he left, he told me to learn to read so I could write letters to him. I can read."

As she spoke, she picked up the pair of knee pads. "I knew he was going to fight against the US and aid Chaozhou, so I slaughtered the sheep that was allotted to my family overnight and had Uncle Chunian in the backyard skin and sew these knee pads for me."

At this point, Gao Hongyan finally picked up the plastic-covered notebook, took out the letter from it, and said, "My family's mill writes me a letter every two weeks."

From the time he started sending the goods, although the intervals between deliveries varied, they never stopped.

Until June of 1951, I waited and waited for that June letter, month after month, from summer to autumn.

People from the county came and told me my family was honored for our achievements. I knew then that I probably wouldn't receive that letter.

"I'm sorry I'm late," Wei Ran said apologetically.

"Oh! I wouldn't dare say that, it's not your fault."

Grandma Gao quickly pressed down on Wei Ran's wrist and said, "My family deserves to be honored, and I have never complained."

Resisting America and aiding the tide, protecting our homeland—what a glorious thing that is! "That's it!"

At this point, the old woman finally couldn't hold back anymore. She took off her old-fashioned military cap, which she had treasured for who knows how long, covered her face, and muttered, suppressing her long-suppressed sorrow, "I was just thinking, what if? What if there's another letter on the way? What if the post office comrades can't find the address? I..."

"Old comrade, please read the letter first."

Wei Ran offered words of comfort, hoping only that the letter Wang Cheng sent back would soothe this woman who had been strong for so long.

As he spoke, Wei Ran waved to the people around him, and they all tacitly left the secluded courtyard for the time being.

"Mr. Wei, I want to thank you."

"Grandpa, you don't need to thank me. We should be thanking you." Wei Ran didn't give Li Weihe a chance to finish expressing his gratitude.

He was even more afraid of this gratitude; he didn't feel that he deserved it, and felt increasingly less entitled to it.

Those who survived should be the ones to be grateful to those who sacrificed themselves.

"Grandpa, I heard you're a hero too!"

Sui Sui keenly sensed Wei Ran's panic and took the initiative to change the subject.

"What kind of hero am I? I'm just one of those who sacrificed their lives."

Li Weihe paused for a moment, then sighed softly. The open space outside the courtyard was now filled with a poignant silence.

“Little one, I saw you on TV last year.” Li Weihe finally changed the subject. “How did you find this place?”

"It's because of the two kettles."

As Wei Ran spoke, he took the two water bottles handed to him by Lu Xinda, then called Xia Shushi over and briefly described the discovery process.

"I know about those two kettles."

Li Weihe sighed, "My mother has brought this up countless times."

"Old man, could you tell me about it?" Xia Shushi asked casually.

"The ashes inside are those of my father's comrade-in-arms, Zhao Cunliang. This story begins with the Battle of Shenjialing."

At the entrance of the courtyard, Li Weihe gave a simple yet detailed account of what Wei Ran had experienced, and Xia Shushi finally learned the truth of the whole matter.

Amidst the sighs of the crowd, Old Mrs. Gao in the courtyard finished reading the letter and began calling out to her and Wang Cheng's son, Li Weihe.

As everyone rushed into the exceptionally clean courtyard, Old Mrs. Gao said, "Weihe, keep your father's letter safe and tell the village secretary that we should move to the new village. We can't cause any more trouble for the country."

"mother"

"I'm fine"

Grandma Gao was surprisingly nonchalant. "Your father is honored. I was prepared for this before he passed away."

It's heartbreaking, but your father held off the American devils. He was a soldier, and so were you. It's only right for soldiers to defend their country.

Don't blame your mother for being heartless. If I didn't have this much awareness, I wouldn't have dared to marry your father, and I wouldn't have had the will to raise you.

As she spoke, the old woman picked up her knee pads and Parker pen, put her hands behind her back, and walked hunched over toward the cave dwelling. “I’m packing up to move down now. The things your father left behind, and the letters he sent back before, the county has been saying they want to send them to some museum, hasn’t it?”

"Take everything except these knee pads and this pen. These two items will have to be buried with me when I die."

"Old lady"

"What your father did is honorable; there's no need to hide it."

Grandma Gao stopped in her tracks, saying, "The ashes of your father's comrade-in-arms, Zhao Cunliang, are buried in our family's cemetery."

"Let those two kettles be taken by that damn museum too. They can take anything they want from our house, even if they just drag me away and find somewhere to put it."

With that, the remarkably clear-headed old lady gracefully walked into the cave dwelling and closed the door.

Not long after, the old woman, now dressed in a different outfit, came out hunched over, carrying two bundles which she tossed onto a small tricycle parked to the side of the door. “Take good care of the young comrade who delivered the message. Make sure he has plenty of cigarettes, alcohol, food, and a thank-you gift. Don’t let him find fault with your manners and embarrass your father.”

"Hey!"

Li Weihe quickly replied, "Mom, where are you going?"

"I'm going for a stroll. I'm staying at my grandson's house tonight."

Grandma Gao said nonchalantly, "I have to keep living. Before your father passed away, he said he was still planning to fight the Japanese devils on their beds and have them take off their pants to poop and pee."

You good-for-nothing, you're useless. You wasted your time in the army eating the government's food. I have no choice but to live on until the day I die.

As she spoke, the incredibly cool old lady slowly rode her tricycle out of the courtyard, along the cement road that was practically built just for her, slowly making her way towards the village not far away.

"When I get old, I want to be this handsome too," Sui Sui said with almost worshipful admiration.

“Me too!” Qin Qi, who had followed, said, “That old lady is absolutely stunning.”

"My mother served as the chairwoman of the Women's Federation in our county until her retirement."

Li Weihe said proudly, "Before she married my father, she couldn't even write her own name."

Later, when my father went to fight in the American invasion of Chaozhou, she even learned American English from the letters he sent back.

“This is what women truly mean by holding up half the sky,” Sui Sui said, her expression becoming increasingly admiring.

"Do you remember what the boss said?" Anfisa asked in a low voice in Italian after Lu Xinda finished translating.

"Which sentence?" Anfia asked subconsciously, watching the figure riding the tricycle disappear into the distance.

"The boss once said that women's rights never need to be fought for from men, but rather they are won by working together with men to break through class oppression."

"Just now, I saw a living example," Amfisa exclaimed.

"We can live here for at least 10 years from now on."

Anfia asked expectantly, "We'll encounter many more examples like this, sister. Perhaps we should learn Chinese."

"I've already started learning."

What a coincidence!

"The same to you?"

“I’ve learned to greet anyone with my 'knock-li-ma' greeting,” Anfia said proudly.

“I learned from my ancestors who knocked eight times over,” Anfisa said. “It seems our teaching materials are different.”

"Uh-huh!"

While the twins were whispering to each other on the outer edge of the crowd, Wei Ran, taking advantage of the fact that no one was paying attention to him, pulled Sui Sui and began to move away from the crowd.

This time, Xia Shushi took the initiative to cover for him, so much so that by the time Li Weihe and the others realized that Wei Ran was missing, he had already led several girls, including Sui Sui, and personally drove away from here to the place where the kettle had been found.

"Why did you run away again this time?" Sui Sui asked curiously from the passenger seat.

"It's not about escaping."

Wei Ran vehemently denied deserting, saying, "I don't like what's about to happen. Those who should have come didn't, and those who shouldn't have came."

He abruptly stopped the conversation midway through, a topic rife with negative emotions and self-blame.

“It’s not your fault,” Sui Sui said, placing her hand on Wei Ran’s hand.

"Since you've enjoyed peace, don't expect gratitude from their descendants."

As Wei Ran spoke, he had already floored the accelerator.

"Therefore, the defender is a great scholar."

"From now on, I'll be a photographer."

When Wei Ran said those words, his tone didn't seem much lighter.

Upon hearing this, Sui Sui didn't try to comfort her. Instead, she said enthusiastically, "Then you'd better take good photos. Each of us models earns 25,000 yuan a month."

"Why is it so expensive?" Wei Ran changed the subject.

"Otherwise, how can we call them talented?"

Sui Sui patted her thigh triumphantly, "With legs like mine, waist like mine, and looks like mine, I'm not exactly a saint."

"Stop right there, there are children behind us," Wei Ran said quickly.

"It's okay, it's okay, I'm already an adult."

Lu Xinda chimed in with a joke, "Boss, you can film me too, I'm pretty good-looking! I'm willing to go all out, I..."

"Hey broom, how's your Russian learning going?" Wei Ran was successfully diverted from the topic, and he quickly started to change the subject as well.

At the same time, Sui Sui thoughtfully put both her and Wei Ran's phones into airplane mode.

That noon, Wei Ran led the girls to the Yellow River again. Sui Sui and a few other girls set up a canopy and sun tent that they had specially bought at a high price from an outdoor equipment store on the way. They acted as models, and Wei Ran took one photo after another for them as the photographer.

"Guess what that hiccup was—"

In the farmhouse courtyard of Li Weihe's second son, Xia Shushi, who had been plied with alcohol, let out a hiccup and asked drunkenly, "Guess where that scumbag went?"

"What's it to me?"

As Qin Qi spoke, she raised her glass and clinked it with Li Weihe's eldest son's, then downed it cleanly in one gulp—this Sichuan-Chongqing tyrant's alcohol tolerance far surpassed that of Xia Shushi, a complete slacker.

In the hurried morning and noon, Xia Shushi and the other two, who tacitly covered for Wei Ran's escape, were all successfully gotten drunk.

On the same bright and dazzling midday, in the courtyard next to the banquet, Old Mrs. Gao also tied her sheepskin knee pads to her knees, sat on a recliner, and basked in the sunlight with her eyes closed.

In her hand, covered with age spots, lay a small, round piece of porcelain with a patina.

This small round piece has the outline of a map of China on it, and in the center are the four red characters "Sacrifice to Save the Country".

"The letter has been received."

Grandma Gao murmured to herself, "The children are all fine, the common people have enough to eat, and the bandits... the bandits have been wiped out long ago."

That young man today seemed to know you.

His eyes are just like yours when you were young—eyes that have killed countless people.

"That's great, there are still young people like this. The Japanese will have a hard time later."

"Grandma, what are you muttering about again?"

Just then, a woman who looked to be in her fifties came over carrying a plate of washed fruit. "Want to dry in the sun? I'll set up an umbrella for you."

"Set it up."

Grandma Gao readily accepted the younger generation's kindness, while seemingly casually asking, "I heard from the third son's family that the young comrade who delivered the letter ran away?"

"That's right, he ran away with several of his wives and they've all disappeared without a trace."

"You can't just say things like that."

Grandma Gao said seriously, "This is not the old society anymore. We can't gossip and tarnish our daughter's reputation."

I was just joking.

"I wouldn't dare make such a joke."

Grandma Gao said, "Eldest daughter, go and get me some stationery."

"Hey!"

The woman who brought the fruit quickly agreed, first setting up a parasol for the old lady, then going into the house and handing over a stack of red lined paper, a bottle of ink, and an envelope to the old lady.

Taking the letter, Grandma Gao unscrewed the Parker pen and wrote down her longing line by line, before finally folding the heartfelt sentiments and stuffing them into the envelope, which she then sealed with the help of her granddaughter-in-law.

"Granddaughter-in-law, please ask the young people who stayed behind to pass this letter on to that young comrade. Please ask him to help me. Wherever you find that satchel, please deliver this letter there."

"Hey!"

The granddaughter-in-law, who had been taking care of the child the whole time, quickly agreed, took the envelope, and went to the next room.

But would the letter even arrive? Perhaps even Old Mrs. Gao had no hope at all.