In sun-scorched Singapore in 2024, Lin Zhaoran is sorting through his grandmother’s belongings after her funeral when he stumbles upon a yellowed diary titled “A Record of Making a Living in Nanyang in the Thirty-Sixth Year of Guangxu.” Strange phrases such as “Coolie Husband” and “Fushou Opium Shop,” along with a chilling drawing of a skull painted in blood, serve as a key that quietly unlocks the long-buried secrets of his family and plants a seed of curiosity in his heart. Just then, the National Museum of Singapore puts out a call for historical materials on the coolie trade from 1910 to 1914. Lin Zhaoran brings the diary to the museum, where Dr. Chen, a historical researcher, tells him that parts of the truth about that blood-soaked chapter in the history of Chinese laborers have been deliberately downplayed. Determined to uncover the dark past buried by time, Lin Zhaoran sets out in search of the truth. He travels through Singapore’s old neighborhoods, piecing together the tragic experiences of Chinese laborers under colonial rule through the recollections of elderly shopkeepers, dusty archives in the National Library, and the accounts of retired professors. In 1910, countless Chinese workers, including Chen Afu, Lin Ashui, and Zhou Mingyuan, came to Singapore dreaming of making a fortune in Nanyang, only to be deceived and reduced to “piglet coolies.” On rubber plantations, they endured sixteen-hour shifts and overseers’ whips. The colonizers set the honeyed trap of “Fushou Opium Shops,” using free samples and promotions to get the workers addicted and drain them of every hard-earned cent. Under the weight of addiction and oppression, some workers lost their families or turned against their own kin, while others rose up in resistance. Led by Chen Afu, the workers secretly joined forces, hijacked ships to deliver evidence, and launched strikes, composing a tragic song of resistance amid blood and fire.
