In a village in the northern Jiangsu Plain, Chen Guilan (28 years old) and her husband Zhou Jianjun (30 years old) have been married for seven years and have not had children. The villagers talked about them as "hens that can't lay eggs." In the spring of 1965, they brought back a 1-year-old baby girl Xiuxiu from a neighboring village.
Three months after Xiuxiu's arrival, Guilan unexpectedly became pregnant. In 1966, his son Jiabao was born. The family burden increased, and Xiuxiu was forced to drop out of school when she was 6 years old. She cut pig grass and took care of her younger brother every day.
Xiuxiu was caught stealing Jiabao's pencil to write, and Jianjun broke the pencil in public: "Girls waste food by studying!" Xiuxiu hid in a haystack and cried, and Jiabao secretly gave her a butterfly hairpin exchanged for toothpaste skin.
