Zhou Guiying supported her son's college education by picking up garbage every day. She, 68 years old, still moves through the snow and wind every day despite her illness in this cold winter, bending over to pick up garbage to support her son's college education. In her eyes, her son is her spiritual pillar. Letting him finish his college education, no matter how hard or tired she feels, it is worth it.
Reported and photographed by journalist Xu Qi-yong.
Her residence.
Her food.
On the 19th, snowflakes were falling in the city of Shizhu. In front of a garbage can at the entrance of the Shizhu County Education Committee, an elderly woman was bent over picking up garbage. Unable to reach into the garbage can, she had to support herself on the edge of the can with one hand while searching through the pile of garbage with the other, almost half of her body inside the garbage can, her face frozen red, and her clothes covered with snow.
This elderly woman is named Zhou Guiying.
Her residence:
Living in a 10 square meter small room
In a dimly lit small room on the first floor of the traffic building in the urban area of Shizhu County, two iron wires were temporarily pulled on the wall, with a few pieces of clothing hanging on them. On the cement ground, there was a pile of glass shards.
"Bang, bang," the reporter knocked on the wooden door. "Who is it?" The person who opened the door was a young man. His name is Li Junlin, 22 years old, and he is the son of the elderly woman Zhou Guiying. He is studying in the second year of Changan Normal University. Two days ago, he returned from school to help his mother with some housework during the winter vacation.
"I thought it was mom coming back!" Little Li said that he had already prepared lunch, waiting for his mother to return. The elder has no phone, wandering around collecting garbage, so he does not know where his mother is now. At around 1 PM, past the lunchtime, Li Junlin got up several times to open the wooden door and look outside, hoping to see his mother's figure.
This is a less than 10 square meter small room, dark and damp, used both as living space and storage: collected plastic bottles and other garbage are packed in woven bags, leaning against the head of the bed. On the adjacent dining table, it is full of turtle shells, wet and dripping. These are what Mother Zhou Guiying picked up from restaurants, to be dried and then sold to pharmacies as Chinese medicine. "It can sell for 10 yuan per catty!" Li Junlin said.
Her food:
Often just pickled vegetables mixed with rice
At around 2 PM, Li Junlin finally waited for his mother to return. Although she wore a raincoat when she went out, Zhou Guiying's clothes were soaked, her hair wet, and her face frozen red. "It's so cold today!" She spoke while rubbing her hands forcefully. With the help of her son, the elderly woman took off her heavy raincoat. "I am old, my body is not as strong as before." Zhou Guiying kept blaming herself for not being as robust as she used to be. A recent hospital diagnosis showed that she suffers from migraines, lumbar disc herniation, coronary heart disease, arthritis, and other diseases.
This lunch was very simple: a pot of rice, a plate of shredded potatoes, and a plate of pickled vegetables. The mother and son sat at the table, eating with great relish. "Today's meal is quite sumptuous." Zhou Guiying said that her life alone at home is even simpler, most of the time just pickled vegetables mixed with rice.
On the temporary stove built in the house, a bottle of salad oil that the elderly woman bought half a year ago for 50 yuan was still there. She didn't dare to eat it, saying she would wait until her son came back for the holidays to cook with it. Not daring to spend money on vegetables, Zhou Guiying always goes to the market late every day to pick up leftover vegetable leaves. Besides, she also bought a few bundles of noodles, cooking a bowl in clear water every two or three days, which she considered as nutritional supplementation.
Zhou Guiying said that ten years ago, her husband Li Zhonghai passed away from colon cancer, leaving the mother and son to depend on each other for survival. After her husband's death, she lost her source of income and had been supporting her son's life and studies by picking up garbage. What made the elderly woman feel comforted was that her son was very ambitious and even got admitted to university.
Her income:
Picking garbage earns her 200 yuan a month
In the last six months, garbage in the urban area of Shizhu has become harder to collect, so she thought of restaurants. To collect garbage from restaurants, she has to pay a price.
To avoid delays, Zhou Guiying gets up after 5 o'clock every morning and then goes out to pick up garbage. At 10 o'clock in the morning, she must go to a restaurant called "Chunmanyuan", helping the waiters arrange tablecloths and sweep the floor. Her task is to be responsible for setting up tablecloths for 50 tables, which will keep her busy until 2 PM. By this time, she who has been hungry for a long time can have free lunch together with the waiters. After 5 o'clock in the afternoon, she starts collecting various kinds of garbage in the restaurant by herself.
Zhou Guiying is 1.5 meters tall and weighs less than 50 kilograms, yet the garbage cleared out from the "Chunmanyuan" restaurant alone amounts to more than 400 pounds every day. She has to transport these garbage to a garbage can 500 meters away. Finally, she begins to sort through these garbage by hand in the cold wind.
There are paper cups, wine bottles, and plastic bottles in the garbage. After sorting them out one by one, Zhou Guiying transports them to a scrap recycling station one kilometer away. When she returns home in the evening, it is already around 10 o'clock. She said that on the best day, she could earn 10 yuan, and her monthly income was less than 200 yuan.
"These money I don't dare to use, most of it needs to be saved for my son's tuition and living expenses." Zhou Guiying said that the New Year is approaching, and she originally planned to buy some meat and smoke it for consumption during the Spring Festival, but eventually, she canceled this plan. She needs to prepare for her son's next year's tuition.
Neighbor Ms. Liu said that Zhou Guiying is very frugal, many times she doesn't even eat breakfast, and when she is really hungry at noon, she spends a few cents to buy two steamed buns to simply solve her hunger...
"After I start working, I will let my mother live a happy life." Talking about his mother picking up garbage to support his schooling, Li Junlin shed tears. To reduce his mother's burden, he uses his spare time at school to repair computers for others, earning some living expenses. He originally planned to stay at school and work during the winter vacation, but thinking about his mother being alone at home, he finally chose to come home and accompany her.
Currently, Zhou Guiying's situation has attracted the attention of the county union, which is helping her apply for low-income assistance.
(If you want to help them, please contact our newspaper's news hotline 966988)
The hands of the mother:
Cracked and bleeding
Because of the cold weather, the son proposed to buy a pair of gloves for his mother. "No!" Before the son finished speaking, Zhou Guiying refused. "Not only is it wasteful, but it is more convenient to pick up garbage with bare hands!" As she spoke, the elderly woman spread out her hands.
What kind of hands are these? The palms are full of calluses, and the back of the right hand has several cracks, constantly bleeding. "I'm used to it, I've been used to it long ago!" The elderly woman regretted letting her son see her hands, and quickly pulled them back.