HARBIN, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) — Inside the bustling Harbin Taiping International Airport within the northeast of China, Liu De-wen, a person from Kaohsiung in China’s Taiwan area, dropped to his knee and unzipped the backpack slung throughout his chest.
Liu fastidiously eliminated an urn wrapped in gentle yellow fabric, which contained ashes of Zhang Hongkui, a veteran initially from Harbin, capital metropolis of Heilongjiang Province. “Uncle, we’re home,” stated Liu, gently saying the deceased elder’s eventual return to his hometown after 76 years.
Liu is the chief official of Xianghe Community in Kaohsiung. Since 2003, he has volunteered to hold the ashes of over 300 deceased veterans on the island of Taiwan again to their birthplaces on the mainland, fulfilling their remaining needs — to lie ultimately within the soil of their dearest hometowns.
Contrary to many assumptions, Liu, now hailed as a “soul ferryman” for mainland-born veterans, isn’t a descendant of them however a local Taiwanese.
Raised in Pingtung County, Liu constructed a profitable profession in banking earlier than shifting to Xianghe Community in 1997. This neighborhood is the place mainland-born veterans settled in clusters. It was there that he first stepped into the world of such individuals, a lot of whom have pale into oblivion.
Liu recalled that when he first visited the veterans, he was intrigued by their numerous accents — and he quickly seen that almost all of them lived lonely lives.
Xianghe Community is one among many “military dependents’ villages” scattered throughout Taiwan. The settlements are house to these veterans who arrived in Taiwan with the defeated Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) regime within the Chinese civil warfare.
For a long time, as the 2 sides of the Taiwan Strait have been trapped in protracted political confrontation, the veterans have been unable to return to the mainland to look after getting older dad and mom or reunite with siblings or wives. Many of those males, hindered by language boundaries and thought of outsiders on the island, remained single and childless.
Liu started serving to such veterans tidy their houses, and rapidly befriended these elder “uncles.” He step by step gained perception into their deepest longing — a craving for house.
“Returning to one’s roots and reuniting with family are the most sincere desires of the Chinese people — and this longing burned especially painfully in these veterans who lived out their lives in solitude,” Liu stated.
Although the Taiwan authorities lifted the ban on visiting relations on the mainland in 1987, many veterans didn’t make the journeys resulting from their age or well being situations. Those who made largely didn’t transfer again to their hometowns, resulting from numerous causes.
Liu remembered being invited by an 80-year-old veteran for dinner at his house. Seeing two additional pairs of chopsticks on the desk, he was puzzled and requested if these chopsticks have been for his veteran comrades.
“The veteran replied softly, saying they were for his parents, as he always held out hope that one day they’ll be together again,” Liu stated, recalling the profound sorrow which stuffed his coronary heart that evening.
“Of the over 1,800 veterans in my community, more than 1,100 had fought the Chinese people’s war to resist Japanese aggression in the 1930s and 1940s,” Liu famous. “They shed blood for their country and nation. Their later years deserved better than this.”
From that time on, at any time when a veteran handed away, Liu would see them off as a son may — carrying their portraits and escorting their stays to the ultimate resting “home.”
In a yr that noticed the passing of many veterans, he ended up escorting over 100 of them “home,” even when this “home” was only a humble grave.
Liu famous that it was a request from a veteran in 2003 that guided him to his present path.
Born in central China’s Hunan Province, the previous man requested if Liu may assist bury his ashes in his hometown, and Liu agreed. It was his first journey to the Chinese mainland to satisfy such a want, and he set off apprehensively but determinedly.
From Kaohsiung, he traveled over a thousand kilometers — by airplane, practice and bus — to ship the urn to the previous man’s ancestral village in Taoyuan County, Hunan.
“They never got to reunite with their parents and never got to watch their children and grandchildren grow,” Liu stated. “That regret weighed on them all their lives. By helping them realize their dreams of returning home, no matter how hard it gets, my heart is filled with relief.”
After returning to Taiwan from Hunan, increasingly more veterans got here to him, expressing their want to be buried of their hometowns.
Whether they have been veterans he had identified for years or strangers he had by no means met, Liu’s response was unwavering — “Don’t worry. I’ll take you home.”
This is how Liu ended up turning into the “soul ferryman” for mainland-born veterans in Taiwan — a title he has held for 22 years.
On each journey escorting a veteran’s ashes house, he would wrap the urn in fabric of auspicious colours and carried it near his chest.
“In Chinese culture, we honor and revere our elders,” Liu defined. “Carrying the urn on my chest is like asking the elders to walk ahead, with me carefully following them on their journey home.”
Liu hopes that when his kids and their descendants communicate of him sooner or later, they’re going to keep in mind this dedication and carry ahead the Chinese individuals’s devotion to hometown and reunion.
Liu introduced house the ashes of Zhang Hongkui in August — a veteran who had resisted Japanese aggression — forward of China’s Sept. 3 commemorations marking the eightieth anniversary of the victory within the Chinese People’s War of Resistance towards Japanese Aggression.
He stated he wished Zhang may “see” how the land he had defended all these years had grow to be so robust and affluent.
“The land of Harbin is steeped in the courage of heroes who fought against Japanese aggression. They left home in their youth, giving their best years to the national cause. Helping them return to their birthplaces fills me with both joy and pride,” he stated.
For Liu, whether or not it is in Harbin or Taiwan, the resolve of patriots to defend their nation has by no means wavered.
“This spirit, like the longing to return to our roots, is etched deep in the hearts of all Chinese, and it will be passed down through generations,” he stated.