My Childhood

Ke Xu

I was born in a small town on the east coast of China. My parents were both too busy working to take care of me after I was born so I was sent to my grandparents (on my mother's side) when I was 6 months old. My grandpa was home all the time since he was blind. He lost his sight when the Japanese bombed my hometown in the mid 1930's. My grandma had to take care of my grandpa and me at the same time. She was busy all the time, inside and around the house, handling all the cooking, cleaning and washing, and sewing. My grandparents basically depended on my parents for living since my mother was their only daughter and my grandpa's pension was very much limited. My grandpa was a man of few words. Whenever the weather was good he would move a chair to the sunshine, put me on his laps, and then started to hum some tunes only he himeself knew. While he was humming, I used to touch and play with his beard and sideburns. He died of a stroke when I was 10. I cried my heart out at his funeral. Even now, I still remember his humming when I was sitting on his lap. The deep voice and the melencholic tune.

During the years from 1959 to 1961, China suffered from serious flood in some regions and draught in others which caused famine across the whole country. To save food for me, my grandma got very sick until my parents found out about it and sent us some food which my father managed to find through his connections in other government agencies.

When I was two, I had a little sister and two years later I had a brother. They all joined me and added much fun to my life. Although both my parents worked for the government, their salary was barely enough to cover the expenses. We didn't have much good food except the kind commonly found then in lower-middle class families. I remember if someone gave my parents some food, such as a box of cookies or some apples, we would all be wild with joy and excitement, thinking abou them even in my dream. The excitement could sometimes last as long as a month. When moon fesitival came, the whole family often had to share one or two moon cakes. My brother and siter would sometimes fight for a bigger cut of the moon cake. Once, a bigger boy in the neighborhood was eating a carrot and promised to let me take a bite of it if I could catch him. I chased himm all the way onto a bridge and then fell into the river through a hole on the bridge. I was lucky to be rescued by a passer-by. When my motehr learned that I fell into the river just for a bite of a carrot, she cried.

Despite the deficiency of food, I still enjoyed the time I spent with my sister and brother. I used to play with them around my grandma's house. Of course the game we played most often was "Catching the Bad Guy", a kind of hide-and seek game. We needed someone to be the bad guy, but none of us wanted to be the bad guy. Then we had to draw lots to decide who would be that unfortunate person. Of course we also did all sorts of things that scared my grandma and my mom to death. Once, my brother and sister both fell into a river at the same time time and would have been drowned if they hod not been saved by a passing boat. Another time, I almost blinded my sister by asking her to look at me through a hole on the wall and then poked a screwdriver into her eye. She was lucky that I missed her eye by half an inch.


My grandma's house was sorrounded by a small river on three sides. It was actually dug when the house was being built to elevate the gound so that the house would stand higher to avoid the damp moisture from underground. So it looked like that the house was built on a small hill. On both sides of the river were growing tall reeds whose leaves I often used to fold some little boats. The house, which had a thatched roof and brick walls, was also surrounded by many tall trees, among which the biggest one was a peach tree in front of the house. The tree was as old as the house and it was so big that two people embracing its trunk couldn't reach each other's hands. In spring, when the tree was in full blosom, my grandma's house looked like a little boat sailing among all the pink clouds (just like what we saw in some fairy-tale movie) Whenever the season came for all the peaches to turn ripe, we would hear birds chirring in the tree all day long, and breathe the sweet fragrance in the air which was tinged with smell of the mature peaches. Peaches were perhaps the only luxury we could afford during that time. Even though, the biggest and the best peaches were still kept out of our reach. My grandma had to sell them on the market so that she could make some extra money, which she would then use to cut some fabric and make some clothes for my sister, brother and me. Although my parents told her she didn't have to do this, she insisted that we should have some new clothes made at her expenses. She was a woamn with a strong character and would never let anyone look down upon her.


I loved my grandma a lot not only because she cooked us tasty food and loved us intensely, but also because she never forced me to go to school or do my homework. Whenever I did anything wrong and my parents decided to punish me, she would always stand up for me and find some excuses for me to escape the punishment. Some of the excuses were actually so lame that my parents would sometimes laugh at them. One thing, however, my grandma didn't do well when I was in her care. That was my education. When I reached school age, she sent me to the only elementary school in the small town where we were living. I didn't like the school and all my grades were so poor that it looked like I was going to fail at the end of the year. When my mother found out about it, she decided to take immediate action to rescue me. Then I was picked up by my parents and taken to the city to live with them. Then my mother started to teach me to read and count. Being a school teacher herself, she was very strict on me. I remember that it took her quite some time to bring me on the right track. I was often rewarded with cookies if I pronounced a sound or spelt a word correctly, and punished with a slap in the face sometimes if I repeated the same mistakes despite my mother's instruction. At that time, I really missed the days I had spent with my grandma. But now the good time was over.


I was sent to an elite school, the best in the whole region, where, by comparison, I was even poorer in academic performance than my peers. I felt discouraged and even frustrated sometimes. One of the subjects I hated most was drawing. We were given some pictures and were told to copy them. I tried so hard but could never make it. So I gave up completely. Then I started to play truant. I went to school early in the morning, but in stead of going to the class, I stayed outside the school gate and played under a big tree. I waited and waited, until the school was over, and then I would join other kids to go home. One day, however, I was caught by one of my father's colleagues and got a good beating by my father. For whatever reasons, that was the last time I ever played truant. From then on, even if I didn't like the school, I still chose to go there since I didn't like to be left alone at home or on the street. You need some company even when you play truant.


From the first grade to the third grade I was blacklisted as the top 5 naughty kids in the class. But my grades were not that bad somehow. Both my teachers and my parents found it hard to understand. I had a terrible time in my third grade particularly. My teacher was a newly graduated young man who had just startd teaching. In his eyes, every bad thing I did was a direct challenge to his authority. So I was repeatedly singled out for punishment. He often wrote letters to my parents listing every single thing I did which was regared as "misconduct". What I hated most was that he always wanted me to be the messanger to deliver the letter to my parents. Knowing exactly what would happen to me when my dad read the letter, I would toss the letter in the garbage bin on the street. Having failed to getting any response from my parents for a while, the teacher suspected that his letter had never reached my parents' hands and started to demand for a reply in writing from my parents. This really got me and I thought hard to find out a way to "work around it". I went to my father's office and asked an uncle there to sign the letter for me. When my dad found out about it, I got another beating.


Things took a turn for the better, however, when I moved up to the fourth grade. This time I had a very experienced teacher who was very nice to me. He respected me and encouraged me. When he found out that I loved to read, he asked me to set up a small library for the class. It was the first time that I was given such responsibility and I felt being trusted and respected. As the result, I took all the books, magazines from home and shared them with my classmates. My dad soon found out that his collection of books and magazines was shrinking and started to complain, but my Mom laughed and told him to shu up. It was only a few books and magazines, my mother said, no big deal. You are too busy to read them anyway. Besides,this small sacrifice is worthwhile if it can change our son, she added. From then on, I started to behave better,and worked harder at my lesson. My grades imporved. So did my image. My teachers, classmates and especially my parents were all happy to see the change that had happened to me. I then started to work for the class wall-newspaper and soon joined the Young Pioneers, China's version of Boy Scout. By the time I entered the 5th grade, I was elected as the vice class president. I was also a member of the school recitation team and an editor of the school student newsletter.
student newsletter.
student newsletter.
student newsletter.