Since the day her son Zhang Yikui was lost in 2008, Yang Yanxia has also "lost" herself. She lost her life, quit her job, and threw herself all herself into finding her son. Over the years, she has traveled to nearly half of China, participating in one family search after another. She once wrote in the circle of friends: "The extravagance of the rest of life: looking forward to reunion."
Fortunately, this "luxury" came true. In early 2022, Yang Yanxia received a notice from the police in yuncheng, Shanxi, her hometown: Zhang Yikui was found in Heze, Shandong. However, due to the impact of the new crown epidemic, the two sides have not been able to see each other for a long time.
On the morning of February 9, Yang Yanxia told The Paper (www.thepaper.cn) that she had left for Heze from her hometown and was about to meet her son Zhang Yikui. "I haven't been in touch with my son yet, but I saw a recent photo of him and it looks a lot like his dad did when he was younger."
Zhang Yikui's childhood photo. Courtesy of respondents
His son disappeared in the village when he was 5 years old
Yang Yanxia told The Paper that her son Zhang Yikui was born in 2003 and was lost on November 18, 2008 in liu zhan village, Yuncheng, Shanxi. Zhang Yikui's appearance when she was a child was deeply imprinted in Yang Yanxia's mind. She said her son was only 5 years old at the time of his disappearance, about 110 centimeters tall, "white skin, big eyes, double eyelids, a hair spin, hair is sparse and yellow, the ears are large, each ear has two ear cavities, the sides of the head are slightly convex, the guts are particularly small, and I like to be clean."
Yang Yanxia was a substitute teacher at the village primary school at the time, and she remembers that the day Zhang Yikui was lost coincided with the end of the exam in the middle of the small semester, "I went to school in the morning to approve the papers, the child and the grandmother were at home, and when I came home at one o'clock in the afternoon, the child was gone." Yang Yanxia told the surging news, "The neighbor said that at ten o'clock, he still saw the child at the door of the house, and around twelve o'clock the child went to the small shop in the west of the village to buy something. "Another villager told her that Zhang Yikui was taken away by a red van.
Yang Yanxia immediately called the police, but Yi Kui's grandmother was deaf and mute, and there was a great obstacle to communication, and she failed to provide more effective information.
Yang Yanxia told the surging news that she felt that the sky had fallen, and in the months when she had just lost her child, she did not think about tea and dinner, and even relied on hanging needles and other ways to maintain her life. Like a madman, she "didn't comb her head, she didn't wash her face, she cried all day, and her eyes were broken."
"I just feel sorry for the child, I owe the child, and I didn't take good care of her." Yang Yanxia always thought about a small thing: her son wanted to buy a bag of five-cent instant noodles as a snack, "I let him finish his homework first, write the words before buying", but then did not buy it for his son, "I am really afraid that my child will remember it for a lifetime."
"At that time, I didn't have the energy or the heart to do anything else, I just wanted to find children." Not long after, Yang Yanxia gave up her job as a teacher and embarked on the road to find Zhang Yikui.
For 14 years, Yang Yanxia has traveled all over the world in search of her son. Courtesy of respondents
After more than 13 years, they will finally be reunited
Yang Yanxia told the surging news that in the past ten years, she has traveled nearly half of China, Shandong, Henan, Gansu, Hebei, Shanxi, Anhui, Guangdong, Shaanxi... She's been there more than once. "It's just hope again and again, and the result is disappointment again and again, mixed with each other, over and over again." Yang Yanxia summed up these years in this way.
Yang Yanxia introduced that in the days of looking for children, she will report to the group with many families with the same situation to warm up and support each other, "We will rent a car to find relatives and publicize everywhere, share the oil fee, and pass the toll." Sun Haiyang and Li Fang, who have recently successfully searched for relatives, were once Yang Yanxia's "comrades-in-arms." "I cry every time I see someone successfully searching for relatives, on the one hand, I am happy for them, and on the other hand, I wonder when will my children find it?"
In early 2022, the police in her hometown informed her that after DNA comparison of blood samples, Zhang Yikui was successfully found in Heze, Shandong. Yang Yanxia, who received the news, was overjoyed and planned the day of reunion with her son. She told the surging news that Yi Kui's birthday is the eighteenth day of the lunar month, and this year is Yi Kui's eighteenth birthday, and she wanted to give her son a good coming-of-age ceremony and a reunion year with his son. However, due to the impact of the new crown epidemic, these visions have been lost, and the day of the two people meeting has been forced to delay.
Yang Yanxia said that as of now, she has not contacted her son, only looked at a recent black-and-white photo handed over by the police to identify, she feels that her son has changed a lot from when he was a child, but it is very similar to when her husband was young. On the morning of February 9, Yang Yanxia had set off for Heze accompanied by the police in her hometown and was about to recognize her son.
"I want my child to go home with me, but I am also afraid that my child will not come back," Yang Yanxia told the surging news, saying that she will respect her child's wishes. At the same time, she said that she would not forgive the adoptive parents of the child, "I have an opinion about them in my heart, I will not choose to understand them, who can understand my pain?" ”
Source: The Paper
Editors: Wu Bing, Li Yingxuan