On December 1, in the bamboo hall of the Babaoshan Funeral Home, surrounded by flowers, Wang Linqi (Japanese name: Watanabe Koichi), an orphan of the Japanese War, peacefully completed the last journey of his life in the send-off of relatives, colleagues and friends. Everything is no different from the normal farewell ceremony, but the details reveal a different life he has walked.
"Harvesting great love in a foreign country through bloody storms and taking care of friendship and peace in the land of China throughout his life" -- This painting hanging at the venue condenses the ordinary and extraordinary life of the old man.
In August 1935, Watanabe was born in Wadamura, a village with beautiful mountains and water in Yamagata Prefecture, Japan, and was the eldest son of the family. When he was 5 years old, his parents signed up for the "Manchurian-Mongolian Pioneer Group" formed by Japan to colonize northeast China, and led the family to Longyao Town, Linkou County, Heilongjiang Province, China. In August 1945, Japan was defeated, the "Manchurian-Mongolian Pioneer Regiment" as the first to be abandoned by the military "abandoned", watanabe family in the flight of hardships, before the end of the year six members of the family or lost, or died, only he as the only survivor of a Japanese refugee in Shenyang all fortunately received the help of China's adoptive father Wang Dianchen and his wife, and became the son of the royal family, named "Wang Linqi", since then has his warm home in China.
At the end of 1948, the family of his adoptive father, who was engaged in small business in the northeast at that time, came to Beiping City, and the family has been living in the courtyard of No. 143 Zhengyang Avenue near Fengtai Railway Station.
As the eldest son in the family, the adoptive father loved this hard-working, intelligent son very much, did everything in the family to treat him and train him to enter the school for education, Wang Linqi had excellent academic performance, was a high-quality student favored by the teacher, and then due to sudden illness, he did not have the opportunity to take the college entrance examination, and became a technical worker in the machine repair workshop of Beijing Heavy Machinery Factory. He loves to learn and is willing to study, and has overcome technical problems many times and won the respect of colleagues and apprentices.
Wang Linqi is not only technically proficient, but also because he is good at painting, he has become a part-time propagandist in the factory, writing slogans, painting murals, publishing propaganda columns, blackboard newspapers, and holding various exhibitions. In the old man's home, there have always been oil paintings he created, including waves on the seashore, cute small animals, autumn scenery in Beijing's parks, etc. During his tenure, the Huangshan Pine landscape oil paintings he created have also been given as gifts to visiting international friends as factory gifts.
The adoptive parents later gave birth to 6 children in succession, but "Lin Qi" is the "big brother" that no one disrespects the younger siblings. In 1960, the adoptive father died early at the age of less than 50, and the "big brother" who had just joined the work took out his own salary to subsidize the family, and was the most powerful assistant of the adoptive mother, "The eldest brother contributed the most to the family, and we all thanked him from the bottom of our hearts!" —The youngest sister who had come to see her off spoke passionately.
Mt. Fuji is highly affectionate,
I sent my brother to dawn.
Mt. Fuji is suspicious and has no way,
Not an inch of affection.
This is Mr. Lao's close friend and former editor-in-chief of International Machinery Magazine, but Gongpu specially created a link for the old man's long journey. Promoting peace and friendship between China and Japan runs through the second half of the old man's life.
In 1981, Wang Linqi returned to Japan for the first time to visit his relatives, returned to Wada Village, where he had lived as a child for five years, and also met his mother's youngest sister, "Aunt Mei Nai". Since then, although he has visited his relatives for a short time many times, he has firmly rooted his roots in China, "The adoptive mother is still alive, of course, should do filial piety, thank the adoptive parents for their nurturing grace." ”
Every time Wang Linqi returns to Japan to visit relatives for a short time, he will take advantage of the visit to the Ministry of Health and Welfare to put forward suggestions that the Japanese government or civil society organizations express their gratitude to China's adoptive parents. On June 1, 2011, his wish was finally fulfilled. On this day, at the ambassador's residence in Beijing, then-Japanese Ambassador to China, Uichiro Niwa personally handed over to his adoptive mother a letter of thanks from the Japanese government to the Chinese adoptive parents who adopted Japanese orphans after the war. A total of 4 orphans attended the ceremony at the same time, but unfortunately, the only person who could survive and personally receive the letter was Wang Linqi's adoptive mother.
In 2015, on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People's War of Resistance against Fascism and the victory of the World People's Anti-Fascist War, the old man published his autobiography "My 75 Years in China".
He writes in the book.
"Looking back on my nearly 80 years of life experience, I feel that I am a lucky person with destiny. The war of aggression launched by the Japanese imperialists made me a 'Chinese orphan' who had lost my family and all my possessions, and at the critical moment of life and death, I was fortunate to be rescued many times by my Chinese adoptive parents and well-wishers, and only then was I able to save my life. In the warm big family of the Chinese nation, I received a good education, engaged in the ideal profession, and had a warm home. As an 'alternative' identity, I was accepted into the Chinese family and came to Beijing, the capital of China, in a central environment of politics, culture and education, never discriminated against or insulted, and like ordinary Chinese residents, I was protected by the law, enjoyed civil rights, fulfilled my civic duties, and lived in peace and happiness to this day. This is the ancient and great country - China! This kind and tolerant nation, who opposes wars of aggression, opposes all foreign invaders and cares for the people of the aggressor countries, especially for the orphans left behind by the trauma of war, as they treat their own children and their brothers and sisters. This is the tradition and charm of a great nation, and the mind and morality of this nation have also deeply nourished my soul as a war orphan. ”
The elderly are optimistic, open-minded, enthusiastic to help others, care about the society, in 2020 the outbreak of the new crown epidemic, he also generously donated money. In the spring of the same year, he was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer, and until his last hospitalization, he maintained an open-minded and peaceful attitude.
At the memorial service, her daughter Haiyan selected a Japanese nursery rhyme "Red Dragonfly" for her father, "that was the song that his mother used to sing to him when he was a child." ”
Before dying, the old man's last wish to his daughter was: Please engrave the names of me and my parents and siblings who died in China on the tombstones of the Watanabe family in Yamagata Prefecture, Japan, so that people can remember that there was such a family in China. Let the descendants of the two countries remember that there can be no more war between China and Japan, and remember the preciousness of peace and friendship.
Source Beijing Daily client | reporter Yan Tong
Editor: Cai Wenqing
Process Editor Tai Shaofeng