The Commoner Commissioner

In September 1958, the people’s communes were established. In the countryside, people began eating in communal canteens organized by production teams, with everyone in a team eating together. The rice was steamed in earthenware pots fired in a clay kiln, and people called it pot rice. From then on, apart from the canteens steaming rice in pots, all kinds of water-conservancy projects also served pot rice to workers organized by production brigades. Every year, as soon as the winter sowing was finished, able-bodied men and women would shoulder their tools, bring bedding and a jar of pickled vegetables that could last more than half a month, and head to the waterworks. Pot rice and pickles accompanied the farmers through campaigns to build waterworks for a full twenty-two years. Across the country, more than 80,000 reservoirs, 170,000 kilometers of major embankments, 30,000 kilometers of smaller dikes, and countless small water projects in towns and villages were all built by farmers carrying loads on their shoulders, one after another. The labor was grueling. At a single reservoir construction site, there could be tens or even hundreds of thousands of people, yet no one ever rioted or caused a disturbance. They worked in orderly fashion, more than ten hours every day, without any pay. Though the work was punishing and exhausting, they had no regrets, because they could see the country changing. Matches, kerosene, iron goods, nails, cloth, and thread, all once imported, could now be made at home. The cadres worked just as hard and ate the same pot rice, and everyone felt there was finally something to look forward to.