Reading "The Tree of Childhood": Planted in the Soil, Planted in the Lines, Planted in the Heart - The "Childhood Tree" on the Saihan Dam
Good book recommendation
★★★★★
Saihan Dam, this place name is both unique and strange, but also beautiful and lofty. It is a mixed Mongolian and Chinese language, "Saihan" is Mongolian, meaning beautiful, and "Ba" is Chinese, meaning Gaoling, and the full name can be translated as "beautiful Gaoling".
The Saihan Dam more than 100 years ago and the current Saihan Dam are indeed worthy of their names. In the middle of the century, it did not live up to its name. This makes people wonder: what happened to Saihan Dam in those 100 years?
Saihanba is more than 400 kilometers away from Beijing and is located in the northernmost part of Weichang Manchu and Mongolian Autonomous County in Hebei Province. During the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, the water and grass here were abundant and the forests were luxuriant, and it was the royal magnolia enclosure. However, in the last years of the Qing Dynasty, the enclosure was opened and reclaimed, and during the War of Resistance against Japan, it was plundered and logged by the Japanese invaders. However, in a hundred years, it has become a sea of sand and no grass. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the cold current in Siberia drove straight into the country, and the sand moved southward, directly threatening the ecology of the north. In 1962, the former Ministry of Forestry decided to establish Saihanba Mechanical Forest Farm, 127 college graduates from 18 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities across the country, graduated from Northeast Forestry College and other colleges and universities went to Saihanba, and together with 242 cadres and workers of the local forest farm, formed a afforestation team with an average age of less than 24 years old, and dedicated the fiery years to this northern high ridge buried by wind and sand. Over the past 60 years, three generations of Saihanba people have braved hardships and continued to work hard to build the world's largest plantation ecosystem.
Saihan Dam is a Chinese story, which is of global significance, and has contributed China's experience to the cause of global ecological protection. Only the Chinese people under the leadership of the Communists can have such a mind, will and foresight to create such a green miracle for the harmonious development of man and nature. The success of Saihanba lies in the plan of "planting trees by predecessors and enjoying the shade by future generations" and "drawing a blueprint to the end", and by the hard work of "insisting on the green mountains and not relaxing" and "doing it from generation to generation".
It is the childhood of the tree, but also the childhood of the man
Saihanba's achievements are well known, but behind a string of figures, children's literature writer and author of "Childhood Tree" Bao Dongni saw the hardships of the Saihanba people: the average life expectancy of the first generation of Saihanba people was not high, and most of their children did not go to the city, but chose to become the "second generation of Lin".
At present, the Saihanba is like an eagle with wings spread, firmly guarding the southern edge of the Hunshandak Sandy Land on the Inner Mongolia Plateau, tightly guarding the ecological security of North China, and becoming a barrier to block the wind and sand and a "guardian" of water storage. However, these barriers, "guardians", seem to be still in childhood compared to trees of the same age that grow in warm and humid areas. After all, in the arid plateau, where the average annual temperature is minus 1 degree Celsius, the growth rate of trees is also slowed down.
The story of "Childhood Tree" takes place in Saihanba in the 70s and 80s of the 20th century. In the book, the parents of the little "second generation of forests" on the dam are nursery workers and teachers, some are tree planters and land planters, and some are foresters and forest rangers.
Chen Yanxian, one of the archetypal characters of the "Lin Generation" in the book, once said in an interview: "We ate black noodles and pickles, drank snow water, rainwater, water from ditches and ponds, and lived in ...... manholes, shacks, mud and straw houses." "At that time, I never thought about how hard and tiring life was, and my mind always echoed that we wanted to go to the place where the party and the people needed it most!" "Our generation threw away its youth, sweat, and even life here, without complaint or regret!" We are very grateful, not only fulfilling the tasks entrusted to us by the party, but also leaving a piece of green for future generations. ”
The "second generation of Lin" and the "Childhood Tree" are the same age and grow together, and when they grow up, most of them relay their parents and become the cultivators and guardians of the "Childhood Tree". "Childhood Tree", as the title throughout the whole text, shows how many hardships and hardships this world's largest plantation experienced in childhood, and also demonstrates the great dedication of two generations of Saihanba people to "return the accounts of their ancestors and leave food for their children and grandchildren". Trees are long, and life is even more difficult, but trees and people will be flourishing in the future, creating a better future of harmonious coexistence between man and nature.
It's a great story, but it's also a real map
Against such a difficult backdrop, "The Childhood Tree" is still a fun, interesting, vivid and beautiful story for readers. Thanks to the author's unique story structure and in-depth study of children's psychology, the whole story reads like a stream that flows naturally after the ice breaks in early spring, with a sense of cracking, shattering, and impacting, as well as a stiff and warm and gurgling vitality, as well as a cute sound of gurgling and gurgling.
In "Childhood Tree", there are not only many seedlings and tree planters, but also Uncle Xianglin, who pulls oil for the dam day after day, Uncle Goat, who works hard to supplement nutrition for the people on the dam, Dazhu's mother who works hard for insect control and insect control in the forest farm, and Xiaolin, Pinecone, Dazhu and other children who help adults plant saplings and catch caterpillars...... It is the long-term cultivation of the people of Saihanba from generation to generation, who have closely combined their personal ideals with forestry undertakings, personal pursuits and national interests, fulfilled their duties and selfless dedication, and built a "blue wave" on Saihanba.
To write this story well, the writer needs to be familiar with the customs of Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei and Mongolia, need to know the natural ecology, animals and plants of Saihanba well, need to be skilled in children's literature and natural science creation, need to know the changes and development of people and things in Saihanba Machinery Forest Farm, and need to have a language style that fits the theme and regional characteristics...... The most important thing is to have a heartfelt love and cherishment for Saihanba.
And all of the above can be seen from the details. The big names or nicknames of the "second generation of Lin" and "fourth generation of Lin" in Saihanba are all related to trees, such as the names of the little protagonists in the book are "Xiao Lin", "Little Pine Cone", "Little Pine Nuts", "Big Pillar" and so on. The hooded cotton jacket worn by the child is called the "little cotton monkey". In the book, there is a staple food called "King of Noodles", as well as the special animals and plants of Saihan Dam, such as black grouse, red deer, demoiselle crane, nasturtium, false rat grass, rabbit tail seedlings, etc. Without meticulous accumulation of materials and collection in the early stage, the details involved in the manuscript cannot be implemented. Everything in the book has a source, and on the basis of not affecting reading, try to restore their local conventions, so that the author really feels the life and working atmosphere of the first generation of Saihanba people.
Visually green and spiritually red
Reading "The Childhood Tree", visually green, thriving, and full of vitality, restores the plateau between the lines, but inside, it allows the author to see the red blood of countless "childhood trees" born between the veins of the earth at a deeper level.
Sixty-one Jiazi, trees are more people, Saihanba people take a development path of protecting the environment, adhering to green development, persistently promoting the construction of ecological civilization, and exchanging lucid waters and lush mountains for gold and silver mountains. The people of Saihanba have created the miracle of the wasteland dressed in green and the sand land into a forest sea, and have written an ecological poem of green development, and the spirit of Saihanba condensed has been integrated into the spiritual pedigree of the Chinese Communists, which is the unity of the naturalism realized by man and the humanism realized by nature. A great cause breeds a great spirit, and a great spirit promotes a great cause. Generations of Saihanba people day after day, year after year, with a shovel, a pickaxe, a pit and a seedling, have worked hard to plant trees like raising children, protect Saihanba like protecting their eyes, and treat the forest like life.
Chen Yanxian, who is now full of silver hair, recalls the hardships of the year but has never regretted it: "Every time I see the saplings I planted with my own hands grow into big trees, my happiness is indescribable. "Under the call of the party, batch after batch, generation after generation of builders like Xiao Lin and Dazhu's parents, continue to carry out green relays, and the spirit of Saihanba has been passed on from generation to generation across time and space.
At the beginning of the story, Xiao Lin, who has become a grandmother, tells the story of the "Childhood Tree" for her granddaughter Duoduo in a unique way. At the end of the story, Dazhu, who has become a university professor, returns to the dam with graduate students to establish a research station and work hard to establish a stable and healthy ecosystem in Saihan Dam. and Li Lin, who left Saihanba as a child and became an excellent song and dance director, directed a children's song and dance drama that praised the spirit of Saihanba. In the book, it is more about ordinary laborers who, like Sanfu and his sons, became foresters, took root in Saihanba, and worked silently for future generations to leave a China with bluer skies, greener mountains, and clearer water.
The spirit of Saihanba, forged on the desert sand where "yellow sand covers the sky and birds have no perch", - "keep in mind the mission, hard work, and green development", highlights the importance of green development in the spiritual pedigree of the brilliant Chinese Communists. Generations of Saihanba people have obeyed the call of the party, always kept in mind the historical mission of restoring and protecting the ecology, and worked from generation to generation, creating a human miracle of turning wasteland into forest and sea.
Trees are planted in the soil, and the ecological concept and great spirit are planted in the heart. The green legend of Saihanba is rare and has eternal significance, and it deserves to be a book for adults, but also for children.
[Xin Xiangyang: Member of the Chang'an Street Reading Club, Secretary of the Party Committee of the Institute of Marxism of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences]
Note: Authorized to publish, this article has been selected and included in the "Chang'an Street Reading Club" theoretical learning platform (People's Daily, People's Political Consultative Conference Daily, Beijing Daily, Chongqing Daily, Xinhuanet, CCTV, National Party Media Information Public Platform, Vision, Beijing Time, Surging Government Affairs, Phoenix News Client "Chang'an Street Reading Club" column synchronization), reprinting must be uniformly marked "Chang'an Street Reading Club" theoretical learning platform source and author.
Editor-in-charge: Qiu Shiyi, preliminary review: Cheng Ziqian, Chen Jiani, re-examination: Li Yufan
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