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clippings (incl. Russian)

Includes one digital video; digital prints in various sizes, transparency film prints, and various paper materials for project in 40 in Chinese (Mandarin) and English.

Zhu Guangjian (b. 1941) is a resident of Diaoyutai Village, Yindian Town, Suizhou City, Hubei Province. Zhu believes that the grain shortage was because China needed to pay debt to the Soviet Union with grain. But later in the interview, he also talks about the boasting and exaggeration of grain production during 'the transitional period'. Since 1958 people could eat in the People's Commune Canteen for free. Soon the commune canteen failed to feed the people, who began to eat wild herbs, tree barks, corn leaves, water grass and chaff. In 1959 Zhu participated in the construction of Handan Railway because he could have more food there. Zhu recalls that most fellow villagers died of starvation were adults. The transcript of this interview has been translated into English.

articles (incl. Russian)

Includes speech drafts, in Russian

Zhu Shunlian (b. 1937) was born in Zhushan County, Shiyan City, Hubei Province, and moved to Diaoyutai Village (Yindian Town, Suizhou City, Hubei Province) in 1988. Her husband was once the production team leader. In this interview, Zhu recalls that she and her husband worked at Zhushan mine and ate at the People's Commune canteen in 1959. The food available in the canteen and households included buckwheat, corn flour, grass root, rice chaff, tree leaves, chingma abutilon seed and wild walnut, as well as a mixture made of soy milk, pumpkin leaves, string bean leaves, potato leaves and wild plants. Zhu also remembers that some people from Sichuan escaped to Hubei because of the famine.

Best Time: An Autobiographical Insight and Other Stories