Niu Binggui is a cook in charge of catering for a construction company in neighboring Ningxia province. For 10 years, he has been working as a cook in restaurants and dreams of opening his own place, but so far he lacks the funds to do so. He was home with his family for Chinese New Year and won’t see them again for several months.
Yang Fanxiu spends her days making straw hats. Their only son died in 2008.
Peng Jinjin is all smiles with his newborn granddaughter, Xiyuan, lying on the kang by an open window. One of his two sons committed suicide after his wife left him, leaving Peng in charge of another granddaughter. To Peng’s left is his older brother, who never married.
An is a strong believer in Buddha and says he is helping her with her ailments, mainly her back pain. Her husband was working in the fields when this picture was taken.
Chen and Liu, husband and wife, are cared for by one of their two daughters who recently gave birth to a daughter of her own. They say she is unhappy to have to stay in the village and would rather be in Shanghai, where her husband is a migrant worker. At right is the couple’s altar for their ancestors and calligraphy with a quote from former Communist Party Secretary Jiang Zemin.
Before the revolution, Zhang’s family lived in a cave with no land of their own. He keeps a huge poster of Mao Zedong, whom he credits for getting his family out of poverty. But he also laments the destruction of the local Taoist temple during the Cultural Revolution. The temple was recently renovated through financial contributions from all the villagers. Zhang says it’s nowhere near as beautiful as it was before, but he is still happy to see it alive again. At right, next to the kang is Zhang’s coal-burning stove.
Wang believes that her feet were first bandaged starting around the time she was four years old. In those days, all girls would get their feet bound. The practice died out throughout the first half of the 20th century, in part due to anti foot-binding campaigns, and the practice had almost completely stopped by the time Mao took power. “But my grandmother’s feet were even smaller!” she says. Today, Wang uses a cane when she walks.
China’s last war against deflation was waged in 1998, the year the nation’s consumer price index and producer price index suddenly plunged in tandem.
The central government responded by launching economic and administrative reforms, hastening steps for joining the World Trade Organization, and steering public funds into infrastructure projects. The efforts paid off quickly: In a couple of years, the war was over and the economy was growing again.
For some American students about to embark on a study abroad trip to China, the U.S. media reports of Chinese Internet censorship, jailing of dissidents, and draconian population control laws may dominate their perception of the country. But after more than 30 years of reform and opening, the nominally communist country now combines economic liberalization, lumbering social and legal reforms, and spurts of ideological entrenchment to create a dynamic mix of restriction and freedom that’s hard to parse.
