God Is Red - Liao Yiwu [75]
My father was locked up in a small, dark cell, measuring about two meters long and two meters wide. There was no window and no ventilation. My father said it was like being sealed in a grave. Twice a day, someone would push food through a small opening at the bottom of the door, the “dog feeding hole.” My father lived in there for six months. He was ordered to sit, back straight, and reflect on his mistakes. He was monitored by the guards. If he did not sit straight, they would beat him.
As the political situation deteriorated outside, more people were purged and thrown in jail, and the prisons grew quite overcrowded. In order to accommodate the rising number of “bad” people, the prison forced my father to sometimes share his tiny cell with another inmate, but most were only being given extra punishment for a few days and would soon leave. My father was a permanent resident.
He was in the cell for six months—six months without washing, without a change of clothes, without seeing the sun—and when he emerged, he looked like a skeleton, filthy and so weak he could barely walk. When he stood up, the floor was showered with fleas. Sunlight blinded him for a long time. But he slowly recovered.
Liao: When I saw your father the other day, I couldn’t believe that he was almost ninety. His hair remains dark, and he looks strong and energetic. He bears no mark of having suffered so much.
Yuan: His longevity and good health are much commented upon. This may sound strange, but his jail sentence actually sheltered him from more severe persecution in Beijing. During the Cultural Revolution, many pastors were beaten to death by the Red Guards. Beijing was at the center of the turmoil. Luckily, the situation in the northeast wasn’t as intense.
In the spring of 1969, my father’s jail was overcrowded, so he and other serious offenders, about a thousand prisoners, were sent to the remote Nenjiang region. Again, they built their own dorms and resettled.
Liao: How many times did he have to build his own prison?
Yuan: That was his fourth time. Soon after he arrived at his new place, he ran into an old friend, Wu Mujia, one of the eleven church leaders who refused to endorse the Three-Self policy. Wu was serving a fifteen-year sentence. My father spotted him when he was working in a vegetable field. The prison rules forbade inmates talking to each other. So my father began to hum loudly a hymn as a way of greeting. Wu heard the tune, looked up, and recognized my father. They stared at each other for a few seconds, and then Wu turned away. My father thought that Wu would join him in humming the hymn. But Wu did not, and my father was shocked by his friend’s reaction. The two of them used to be friends and had gone through a lot in life. My father later found out that Wu had given up his faith. That news made my father quite despondent.
Liao: Wasn’t it the case, though, that while some caved in under political pressure, more became determined to endure? I remember a Christian preacher with the name of Ba Fo in the northwestern city of Yinchuan who was jailed for many years. When Chairman Mao died, he was released ahead of schedule. In his release papers, the authorities claimed that he had confessed to his crimes. He had not, and Ba Fo wanted them to correct the record. “You don’t have to release me. I’ve never confessed my crimes.” His request was rejected, so Ba Fo asked to be sent back to jail. They refused. So he built a small shed outside the prison and lived there, fasting five days a week to appease what he called the wrath of God. He lived inside the shed for twenty-some years before his death.
Yuan: My father’s belief sustained him spiritually, enabling him to live on. None of his family members