His name is Gao Binghan, and his hometown is in Shandong.
He had been away from home for the first half of his life, and at the age of 13, he fled south alone and ran more than 2,000 kilometers on foot.
Along the way, he went through all the sufferings and misery of the world.
I spent the rest of my life looking for a home. Not only are they looking for a home, but they are also helping others find a home.
For decades, he sent the ashes of many Taiwanese back to the mainland and their hometowns.
A veteran who has never returned to his village in his life, a child who misses his mother all his life, a lover who has never been able to meet in his life...
He lived as if he wanted to accomplish it.
This is the thing he has been looking for all his life:
Go home.
01
At 9 p.m. on April 20, 1949, the Yangtze River was so quiet that only the sound of water could be heard.
Gao Binghan, who had been walking for a day, was drowsy and could only drag his steps forward slowly.
Suddenly, a rush of artillery broke the tranquility. Then, shells roared like a sea of shells.
He witnessed another necessary scene of dynastic change in Chinese history:
Crossing.
Caught off guard, the sound waves of the shell explosion had penetrated Gao Binghan's eardrum, filled with sharp noises.
At this time, a red signal flare dragged a long tail of flame into the air, illuminating the heavens and the earth like day.
In a trance, Gao Binghan saw that the entire river was covered with countless sailboats, and the boats were full of soldiers.
For a while, the sound of gunfire mixed with the sound of people swept in, and the Kuomintang army was about to collapse. Wuyang's defeated soldiers instantly scattered Gao Binghan and his classmates.
After the chaos, Gao Binghan lost almost all his luggage, including his father's belongings.
Fortunately, he still escaped, at least he was not trampled to death, not hit by gunfire.
Gao Binghan chose to run to the place where the crowd was crowded, so that he might have a better chance of survival.
On the way, Gao Binghan encountered a remnant Kuomintang soldier who was burning, killing and looting in the village. However, as soon as the remnants heard the sound of the wind that was in pursuit from the opposite side, they would immediately run wildly.
Once, the opposite side had already chased after him, and a Kuomintang officer was still picking up mahjong cards that had been spilled in panic.
Seeing this situation, Gao Binghan seemed to understand something.
But this is not important to Gao Binghan, the important thing is to live. Because he has always been determined:
To go home alive to see my mother.
In the days to come, whenever Gao Binghan wants to give up, this belief will always support him to cheer up again.
But from now on, this teenager who fled alone will learn to face all this alone.
In 1935, Gao Binghan was born in Heze, Shandong. Their family was composed of landowners, and they also came out of the Kuomintang.
When she was 13 years old, seeing the war at her doorstep, Gao Binghan's mother was worried and washed her face with tears all day long.
After several psychological struggles, she decided to send Gao Binghan to the south to avoid it.
Before leaving, she put three things into Gao Binghan's baggage:
Father's relics, twenty oceans, and a junior high school admission letter.
This thing can be used as a certificate that Gao Binghan has read books, so that he can have the opportunity to continue his studies in the future.
When Gao Binghan got into the car, his grandmother shoved a pomegranate that was ripe to crack into his hand.
Looking at the red and bright pomegranate seeds, Gao Binghan swallowed his spit and couldn't help but lower his head and ate it.
At this moment, the person in the car pushed him: Your mother called you.
Gao Binghan looked up, the car had already turned a corner, and he couldn't see his mother's figure.
This is Gao Binghan's last memory of his mother.
At the age of 77, Gao Binghan said:
I will never eat pomegranates again in my life.
02
This journey of struggling to survive allowed Gao Binghan to experience the suffering and kindness of the world.
The road gradually turned into a mountain road, and it became more and more difficult to travel. Along the way, there were people like him who had fled, as well as some bodies lying on the side of the road.
At dusk one day, Gao Binghan, who was exhausted, heard the rumbling of the engine, and he came across a truck climbing a hill.
Gao Binghan realized that this was a transport vehicle of the Kuomintang army, the road conditions were not good, and it drove very slowly.
Facing the slowly driving truck, Gao Binghan didn't think about it, reached out and climbed into the car.
At this time, the car had climbed over the slope, the speed increased, and Gao Binghan was almost thrown off.
Out of survival instinct, Gao Binghan used the last bit of strength to grab the car and climbed into the carriage.
The officer escorting the car ordered two soldiers to drop Gao Binghan, and one soldier said:
This gravel road, throw it down and the child will die.
When passing a shallow river, the speed of the car was slightly slower, and two soldiers pushed Gao Binghan out of the car.
Although his clothes were soaked, fortunately he was not injured, and Gao Binghan climbed ashore and continued to walk.
Gao Binghan walked woodily until he reached a cliff corner, and the sight in front of him shocked him.
For the first time, this teenager experienced first-hand what the concept of impermanence is.
The truck had fallen off a cliff and got stuck between two trees, and the carriage buckled downward.
The officer and two soldiers were nowhere to be seen, only the driver was blocked by the cab and saved a life.
If he is still in the car, Eighty percent is already a wandering ghost thousands of miles away from home.
Gao Binghan did not expect that he would see more and more miserable things along the way.
When Gao Binghan walked to Majinling, on the border of Anhui, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, he mixed in with a group of fleeing people.
The road was treacherous, and in a few days he witnessed many people sliding down the cliff with pack horses.
In the chaos of war, human life is like grass mustard, and life and death are not enough. The most pitiful are the porters who have been forcibly captured.
These porters could not bear the brutal labor of the Kuomintang, fled countless times at night, and were all shot back.
One Kuomintang leader simply killed a hundred and dragged a porter to the edge of a cliff and kicked him down.
These cruel pictures caused great psychological trauma to Gao Binghan.
His family background made him afraid to turn around and go home. Witnessing the current situation is even more desperate.
He was so hungry that he chewed leaves every day to feed himself; I was so tired that my feet were already festering.
Gao Binghan, who had no way out, began to have world-weary thoughts.
This time, it was maternal love that pulled him back from the brink of courting death.
While hurrying, Gao Binghan clearly heard someone shouting for his mother.
A child fell down the mountain!
The childless woman stood stunned on the edge of the cliff, and then burst into a mournful cry.
Gao Binghan didn't know how to comfort, so he could only walk in front of the woman and stand silently.
In the midst of grief, every second is as long as tens of billions of disasters, and Gao Binghan stood for a long time.
The woman noticed Gao Binghan and raised her head to talk to him.
How old are you?
A baker's dozen.
As old as my son, he just fell from here.
......
What about your mother?
She is in her hometown in Shandong.
Finally, her gaze fell on Gao Binghan's feet, which were a pair of rotten feet wearing rotten shoes.
She unwrapped her baggage, took out a pair of her son's shoes from the inside, and helped Gao Binghan put them on.
Then, the woman stood up and said a word to Gao Binghan:
Child, remember that your mother is waiting for you at home, and you don't forget your way home.
After that, she jumped off the cliff.
03
In October 1949, Gao Binghan boarded his last boat to Taiwan.
This year, he was only 14 years old.
During the day, Gao Binghan was eating at a garbage dump near Taipei Railway Station and was chased and bitten by wild dogs;
At night, he slept in the waiting room, and from time to time he had to be beaten out by patrolmen.
If it weren't for the sweeping master at the station who gave him food and introduced him as a small worker, he would not have lived long.
When Gao Binghan was in trouble, it was such ordinary people who extended a helping hand to him.
In April 1951, Gao Binghan came to Taiwan for more than a year, and his fate was about to usher in a new turning point.
Gao Binghan remembers that it was Saturday, and he met an elementary school teacher while working at the train station.
Listening to what happened to him, the teacher burst into tears. I felt that this was not the way, and that the child should continue to study.
So he introduced Gao Binghan to a middle school, hoping to let him enter the school's night department.
The principal of the middle school agreed, but Gao Binghan had to prove that he had a primary school education.
During the escape, he lost almost everything, but kept the junior high school admission notice.
It was this thin piece of paper that proved Gao Binghan's academic qualifications, and he was allowed to take the middle school entrance examination.
Gao Binghan's previous grades were good, and after a review, he was admitted to the exam, and he had a bright future.
So he worked during the day and went to night school at night, so he barely survived 996 every day.
No matter what the era, workers are always bitter, and just living is exhausting.

One night, on his way home from school, Gao Binghan found someone following him.
He made a bold move, hid around the corner, and in turn blocked the man.
It turned out to be a junior high school student from the same school, named Gao Huxiong, 12 years old, a native of Taipei.
Because his parents didn't have time to pick up, and he was afraid of the dark, he followed Gao Binghan's butt every time.
Gao Binghan listened, the small universe of Shandong people in the body is burning, what is this, I will send you in the future!
He's a man of truth. One day when it rained and the river swelled, he carried the child on his back.
This scene happened to be seen by the child's father, and he was so moved that he thanked Gao Binghan one after another.
At that time, the contradictions between the provincials who followed the Kuomintang to Taiwan were very sharp and they hardly interacted with each other.
The Gao family was severely beaten by Kuomintang soldiers, and they had no good impression of the people in the provinces.
Gao Binghan's sincerity moved the family and made them change their views on the provinces.
Because they are all surnamed Gao, every time the ancestor of the Gao family worships him, they will call him together. They are Gao clansmen, a family in a broad sense.
In this way, Gao Binghan, who left home as a young child, can be regarded as having relatives in Taipei.
During this period, he encountered many heart-warming things like this.
A classmate's mother accidentally learned about Gao Binghan's situation and gave him several sets of new clothes;
The small restaurant owner saw that he had only bought a bowl of rice, so he added him a fried chicken leg and a bowl of soup.
These people who are so ordinary that they can no longer be ordinary have lit up every stage of Gao Binghan's life.
In the summer of 1958, Gao Binghan graduated from high school and was admitted to the law faculty of a military academy.
From street children to high-achieving law students, Gao Binghan's class directly rises to the sky.
After graduation, Gao Binghan was sent to Kinmen as a military judge.
Kinmen and Xiamen were separated by the sea, almost 10 kilometers apart, and were at the forefront of the confrontation between the two sides.
As soon as he took office, Gao Binghan's first case made him feel guilty for the rest of his life.
The defendant was a Xiamen fisherman named Zheng Fengsheng, who was forcibly arrested by the Kuomintang in 1949 and taken to Taiwan.
Fifteen years later, Zheng Fengsheng was transferred to Kinmen to garrison, he missed his hometown, and he was even more worried about his mother, who was paralyzed in bed.
So while standing guard at night, Zheng Fengsheng went into the sea with a tire and wanted to swim back to Xiamen.
However, at dawn, Zheng Fengsheng was washed back to the shore of Kinmen by the tide and was immediately arrested.
The above demanded that he must be shot, and that those who had the idea of defecting to the mainland must be frightened.
Zheng Fengsheng's homesickness, Gao Binghan must be able to experience it best, he sympathizes with Zheng Fengsheng, but he said it or not.
Before his execution, Gao Binghan got a bottle of sorghum wine and asked Zheng Fengsheng to drink it, so that he would suffer less crime.
Unexpectedly, something went wrong, and the soldiers who executed it were not accurate. Only after another shot could be made up, Zheng Fengsheng died completely.
Gao Binghan could not forgive himself from then on, saying:
I felt like I had become the executioner of a man who went home to visit his mother.
After the reopening of the two sides of the strait, the first thing Gao Binghan did was to go to Xiamen.
He searched the fishing village near Kinmen, but could not find Zheng Fengsheng's home.
Zheng Fengsheng unfortunately failed to escape, but then a young man named Lin Yifu succeeded.
Tires don't work, but basketball does.
In 1979, Lin Yifu swam from Kinmen to the mainland, and his life trajectory turned from then on.
From a company commander in the national army, he became the deputy president of the World Bank.
If Zheng Fengsheng had returned home that year, how would his fate have changed? Will it be the same as Lin Yifu?
There are no answers anymore.
04
In 1967, Gao Binghan came to Taiwan for the eighteenth year.
It was also this year that a classmate from his hometown married Gao Binghan, and the woman was a medical worker.
Teacher Guo Degang said: May there be lovers in the world who will eventually become dependents, it is a matter of previous life, do not miss the marriage.
In this way, Gao Binghan married his daughter-in-law, he had a home in Taipei, and finally stopped wandering.
The couple have always had a good relationship, and they have two sons and a daughter.
In this life, the warmth of family has always been Gao Binghan's greatest comfort in a foreign land.
In 1973, Gao Binghan retired from the army. He immediately obtained his lawyer's license and became a lawyer.
He set himself the principle of not being a lawyer and not earning money with an unconscionable conscience.
Some people laughed at him, lawyers rely on lawsuits to eat, how do you always persuade people to reconcile, he just laughed when he listened.
Gao Binghan's more than 40 years of legal career, word of mouth is not generally good.
So good that his opponents who had gone to court admired his character and married his daughter to his son.
During this period, he helped many poor people in litigation. Many fellow villagers in Shandong come to him when they encounter injustice.

As he grew older, Gao Binghan's nostalgia became stronger and stronger, and he had reached the point of not thinking about it all the time.
Seeing no hope of returning home, he wrote 15 diaries, recalling various impressions of his hometown in his childhood.
These diaries were borrowed and read by homesick Shandong villagers, and they were all rotten.
It records flowers and plants, the neighbor's black dog, the magpie chirping in the tree...
And his childhood best friend - a child nicknamed "Dung Fork".
Because this child always eats mulberries, stained with juice on his face, and the wind blows the soil and pastes his face,
There are always flies flying around his mouth, just like around.
At that time, Gao Binghan would not have thought that they would still have a day to reunite, but that was a later story.
That year, there were more than two million people like Gao Binghan who retreated to Taiwan with the Kuomintang.
This also permeated Taiwanese society at that time with a general mood - homesickness.
The Kuomintang boss, a native of Shaanxi, was homesick in his later years. Shortly before his death, he wrote a poem:
Bury me on a high mountain, looking at my continent; The mainland is not visible, only crying!
Bury me on the mountain, looking at my hometown; The hometown is not visible, never forgotten!
The sky is pale, the wilderness; Above the mountain, the country is killed!
Nanjing people Yu Guangzhong also missed home and thought of not working. The poem he wrote about homesickness is included in the ninth grade Chinese volume of the People's Education Edition:
Childhood
Nostalgia is a little stamp,
I'm on this end.
Mother over there.
When I grew up,
Nostalgia is a narrow ticket,
I'm on this end.
The bride is over there.
Later, ah,
Nostalgia is a low grave,
I'm out there,
Mother is inside.
And now,
Nostalgia is a shallow strait,
I'm on this end.
The continent is over there.
In 1979, Gao Binghan went abroad to participate in legal seminars.
Seeing that there were representatives from the mainland, Gao Binghan wanted to ask them to forward a letter from home to his mother.
In this family letter, he is almost crying in words:
Mother, I will come back alive, and I am also convinced that I will definitely see my surviving mother-in-law, and you must wait for me to return...
The letter was written, but he did not dare to hand it over.
This was because the Taiwan authorities adopted a hostile policy of no contact, no exchanges, and no photo taken together with the mainland at that time.
And asked their group to monitor each other, and whoever dared to contact the other side would deal with whoever went back.
So did this happen later?
Some. Gao Binghan was instructed by others and sent the letter to his classmates in the UK. The classmates sent the letter to the United States, and then sent it from the United States to Shandong, almost half of the world.
Unfortunately, Gao Binghan's mother did not receive the letter from the family, and she died just the year before, in 1978.
In the early 80s of the 20th century, a Shandong folk who immigrated to Argentina returned to China to visit relatives and passed through Taiwan.
She brought some local and special snacks from her hometown and distributed them to her fellow Shandong villagers in Taiwan.
Gao Binghan was given a small spoonful of soil, and in this way he realized the reunion with his hometown.
When he got home, he divided the soil in half, wrapped half tightly, and carefully put it in the safe;
The other half was soaked with water and drunk. He said:
The water was drunk into the stomach and turned into tears.
And the piece of Shandong sesame candy and a package of spicy soup given by the fellow were later put in his refrigerator
- exactly 28 years.
He was reluctant to eat, and even more reluctant to throw it.
In the 1987 CCTV Spring Festival Gala, Fei Xiang's song "Clouds of Hometown" evoked the hearts of countless wanderers at home and abroad.
It was also the year that Chiang Ching-kuo lifted the 38-year-old martial law and allowed people to visit relatives in the interior.
Since then, the two sides of the strait have ended decades of blockade and finally resumed exchanges.
In early 1991, Gao Binghan was ready to go home. Before setting off, he did something very terrifying.
I went to the cemetery and brought the ashes of a fellow villager home.
He had an agreement with Gao Binghan before his death, and behind him, if he had the opportunity, Gao Binghan would take him home.
Seeing an altar of columbarium suddenly appear at home, Gao Binghan's children were scared enough.
The children did not understand why the father made such a frightening act. Others thought he was embarrassed and hid when he saw him.
Only his wife understood, and she knew that Gao Binghan did this out of empathy.
In desperation, he could only move the columbarium to the basement, set up a bed to sleep next to it, and accompany his old friend.
Gao Binghan dissected his heart at that time in his memoirs:
I understand these reactions.
......
But since I promised people, I had to keep my promise.
What's more, the leaves fell back to their roots, they couldn't go home if they were alive, and they had to go home when they died,
This is the last voice of a veteran, how can I bear not to help?
After nearly 43 years away from his hometown, Gao Binghan has returned.
These 43 years are long enough, long enough to make Gao Binghan's youth whitehead, and let the old friend turn his body into dust.
For this reason, he lingered at the entrance of the village for a long time.
In the poem of the Tang Dynasty Song Zhiwen, it is:
The Lingwai sound book is broken, and the winter repeats the spring.
The hometown is even more timid, and they dare not ask people.
An old man passing by asked who he was looking for. The two looked at each other and recognized each other at once.
It turned out that the old man was Gao Binghan's cousin. The old man went to call out Gao Binghan's childhood friend again.
Yes, the child nicknamed "Dung Fork" is now also a dying old man.
This unexpected joy made the three old men who added up to nearly 190 years old burst into tears.
On this hard journey home, Gao Binghan spent almost his whole life walking.
And the first thing he had to do was to hand over the columbarium to the daughter of the deceased friend.
This is the first time Gao Binghan has brought the deceased home.
In the days to come, he will successively send the ashes of more than 100 fellow villagers back to their hometown for burial.
Help the deceased achieve their wishes before death, bring them back to their families, and rest in peace under their homeland.
That's right, this is the ultimate task that God arranged for Gao Binghan.
These deceased have their own joys and sorrows. Fortunately, Gao Binghan made their story not drowned by history.
05
Over the years, Gao Binghan returned to the mainland from Taipei, and his suitcase always contained an altar of ashes.
Each jar is almost ten kilograms long, and it is manual work to carry with you.
He didn't think it was much work. But what tiring him was another thing.
The procedure for collecting veterans' ashes is too cumbersome.
The process is as short as one year and as long as three or two years, and the notarization process alone requires a lot of effort.
On one occasion, when the formalities were complete, he issued seven notarizations in a row, but the relevant departments in Taiwan did not let go.
Just don't ask, and don't give any explanation, making the old man anxious.
The same thing Gao Binghan has encountered in the mainland.
In order to apply for a notarization, it was even necessary to issue the birth and death certificates of the deceased's parents.
Gao Binghan was angry enough, where did people from more than a hundred years ago find these old Huang Li?
From this point of view, Taiwan and the mainland are indeed one family.
The above is nothing, and Gao Binghan, who was running on the road, almost lost his life.
Once, Gao Binghan went to a cemetery deep in the mountains to collect the ashes of a veteran.
Just after receiving and about to leave, suddenly the wind and rain were fierce, and there was a taxi on the wilderness.
The rain was so heavy that Gao Binghan could only hide from the rain in the memorial pavilion of the cemetery.
The fierce wind swept bean-sized raindrops into the pavilion, and he drenched himself all night holding the urn.
In the end, the water in the mountains was too strong, and it was the rescue helicopter that got him out.
He later learned that heavy rain had caused flash floods that had washed away the only bridge leading to the cemetery.
It's good that he didn't brave the rain to go down the mountain, otherwise he might not know what would have happened.
Coincidence, accident, this kind of thing can be explained.
But I prefer to believe that the veteran had a spirit in the sky and blessed Gao Binghan to avoid this calamity.
Later, Gao Binghan was noticed by the media and made many continuous reports on his story.
Since then, people have contacted Gao Binghan everywhere, and he has not refused in the face of a flood of help.
There is a Heze man named Sang Shunliang, who came to Taiwan in 1949 and has been separated from his fiancée ever since.
Until his death, Sang Shunliang wrote a farewell letter to his fiancée, which was really heartbreaking:
Thirty years of separation, thirty years of lovesickness, tears are all dry, do you remember me ?!
......
In the future, if the two sides of the strait are reconciled, if you are still alive by then, if you are still keeping your promise and waiting for me,
Then give you this letter and my ashes, and have another underworld marriage.
......
Although we did not marry in our lifetime, we only married under the Nine Springs.
Dear Xiao Juanjuan: I am crying at this moment, Xiao Juanjuan! Xiao Juanjuan!
I love you, always, always...
Your fiancé: Sang Shunliang Weeping Book
June 1, 1978 at Taipei Vinh General Hospital
Miraculously, Gao Binghan heard Xiao Juanjuan's whereabouts.
She is alive and unmarried.
When Gao Binghan handed the altar and letter to Xiao Juanjuan, her gaze remained on Sang Shunliang's photo.
The dust is dim, the providence is vague.
Decades later, I finally waited for a good man to return.
Even if the other person has turned to dust, love is eternal.
The next day, under the witness of everyone, she and Sang Shunliang held a long-overdue wedding.
Soon after, Xiao Juanjuan, who had her wish, passed away and was buried with Sang Shunliang.
Nothing can separate the lovers anymore.
The body can't help itself, which is especially evident in the people of that era.
After decades of blinking, Gao Binghan is already half a year old to know friends, and there will only be many partings in the future.
He was either on his way to find a family for the deceased or on his way home to the deceased.
He has been doing this for more than 30 years.
In the face of praise and praise from all walks of life, Gao Binghan spoke his heart:
I don't think hate, because doesn't this big time make me cry? Leave me covered in bruises?
Then since I have survived, I have already washed ashore.
I want to shine a little light in this life, I want to make this dead person less painful, and I can't hate it.
In 2012, a female reporter from CCTV interviewed Gao Binghan and made his life experience into a special program.
After that, the female reporter posted the interview notes on the blog, which was read by more than 70 million people and touched countless people.
The title of the article is "No one who cries long nights, not enough to talk about life".
From Gao Binghan's original words in an interview:
For us, people who have not cried late at night are not enough to talk about life.
Because we have wandered and wept for long nights.
So our life is different from ordinary people, and it is also a return to the soul.
In the same year, Gao Binghan was elected as the 2012 "Moving China" figure.
As he accepted the award, he was asked a question: What are you thinking at the moment?
Gao Binghan blurted out:
I'm a girl!

06
This Spring Festival, 86-year-old Gao Binghan paid New Year greetings to his old family through the Internet:
I am Gao Binghan, born in 1935 in Heze, Shandong
……
Now, the annual Spring Festival has arrived.
I would like to greet you to all my fathers and brothers on the mainland.
This year is the Year of the Ox, I wish you great luck in the Year of the Ox, a safe and happy New Year, and all the best!

After a lifetime of wandering, his accent has been polished and thinned by the years.
Only the word Heze is still thick in Shandong dialect.
In the video, he said that now that Heze has built an airport, it will be convenient to go home in the future.
Yes, China has gone from devastated to the world's second largest economy, infrastructure madness.
Recall that the Beijing Olympics have passed a zodiac cycle, and joining the WTO came 20 years ago.
But the difficulties of a generation have a generation, and they are all due to the situation.
At every moment, there are people standing at the threshold of decision-making and facing the difficulties of life.
Last year, the whole world was infected by the new coronavirus, and to this day we still cannot take off our masks.
The natural and man-made disasters in the world have not stopped for a moment. From a car accident on a street corner knocking down a delivery boy to Japan about to dump nuclear-contaminated wastewater into the Pacific Ocean.
What's more, on the island of Taiwan, there are our compatriots and relatives whose blood is thicker than water.
I don't know if such a person will wake up late one night in the future.
These days, I always think of Gao Binghan. Think about his life when he has been looking for a home and helping others find a home.
It seems that like him, he has courage and hope.
He told me in his actions that life never gives you very few options, but it never means being at its mercy.
Despite the bumps we have to face, we still have a choice.
As Wang Xiaobo said in "The Golden Age":
In this life, people have few choices, they can't choose how to live, and they can't choose how to die.
There are only two things we can choose:
How to love in this life, how to live in this life.