In 1983, Chen Yongfu, a native of Chaoshan, took his wife and children with him and went to Shenzhen with all his savings. He built a ten-square-meter shop under the old banyan tree in Luohu Old Street and named it "Jiaxiang Porridge Shop". A pot of white porridge and two kinds of pickles began their years of taking root in the Special Administrative Region. From the construction site workers' first bowl of porridge, to late-night conversations with frustrated Hong Kong businessmen; from helping a desperate working girl, to witnessing the heartbreak and reunion of a mother who lost her child... This humble porridge shop has become a microcosm of Shenzhen's immigrant society. As the city's bulldozers approach the old streets, the fate of small porridge shops is closely intertwined with the development of the special zone. After thirty years of ups and downs, the porridge shop moved from an old street to a shopping mall, and developed from a bowl of white porridge to a "Jiaxiang" brand that is sold all over the world. This is a story about food, family and the wild growth of a city, with a lasting taste.
Purpose: This article tells the story of a Chaoshan family's thirty-year struggle to run a porridge shop in Shenzhen, seeing the big from the small, and reflecting the great changes in Shenzhen from a border town to an international city since the reform and opening up. The core idea is that behind the grand narrative of the times and "Shenzhen Speed" are the survival epics written by countless ordinary people with sweat, warmth and tenacity. The story praises not business miracles, but the cohesion of "family" and the obsession of "roots" in the fireworks of the market, and explores what true acquisition and perseverance are in an era of rapid change.