A Girl Comes of Age in the Mountains

The careers of the 1960s: Lan Huahua, the first highly educated person in the entire village, returns to the mountains and becomes the children’s teacher.

The love of the 1960s: Ma Daqing uses a scarf to marry Lan Huahua and bring her home.

There are also popsicles that cost two cents each, first-grade pork, the fattiest kind, selling for only seventy-eight cents, third-grade pork, pure lean meat, selling for only seventy-two cents, green beans at five cents a bundle, red hair ribbons at one cent a piece...

Generation after generation of children leave the mountains. They pass the entrance exams for technical schools and universities.

Teacher Lan’s hair turns white, and she retires. She often sits beneath the old locust tree at the village entrance, chatting with people.

Which children were mischievous when they were young, which year each child passed the entrance exam for a technical school or university: she can often recite it all like a treasured family history.

This is a tribute to my parents’ generation, to all the rural teachers who stayed behind in the mountains and the countryside. You have worked so hard! Thank you all!