Text/Yangcheng Evening News all-media reporter Ouyang Zhiqiang Figure/Data Map
On June 25, the Yangcheng Evening News all-media reporter received a letter from Cai Yisong, an overseas Chinese born in Shunde District, Foshan City, who recounted what he had seen and heard at the Ganzhutan Flood Power Station with the title of "The Endless Ganzhu Love in the Pacific Ocean - Memories of an Overseas Chinese's Ganzhutan Flood Tide Power Station", and reproduced the arduous and brilliant years of the construction of the Ganzhutan Power Station in Shunde.
Cai Yisong said that every time he recalled that the people of Shunde had created a large-scale water conservancy and hydropower project that was rare in All Of China at that time with only a pair of meat hands and the strength of a county, he was very touched, and hoped that today's descendants of Shunde would inherit the courage, arrogance and pride of Shunde who dared to think and dare to be the first!
The reporter learned that GanzhuTan is the entrance of a tributary of the lower reaches of the Xijiang River to the Beijiang River, and is an important waterway from Guangzhou to Jiangmen, Zhaoqing, Wuzhou and other places via Shunde. Ganzhu Beach, the beach mouth is narrow, it is affected by both the flood of the West River and the North River, but also by the influence of the tide, plus there is a stone vein at the bottom of the beach across the two banks, the reef under the beach is lined up, during the flood period, the waves are turbulent, the turbid waves are gushing, the ships cannot be navigated, and there is a danger of hitting the reef even during the navigation period.
On January 1, 1971, in order to turn water damage into water conservancy and make full use of hydraulic resources to meet the increasing needs of electricity consumption in the development of industrial and agricultural production, the Shunde County Party Committee concentrated 10 communes and 2 towns of youth militia, and spent three years and four months to build China's first micro-hydropower station - Ganzhutan Flood Tide Power Station, which won the National Science Conference Award in 1978 and is the spiritual driving force of science and technology Shunde.
It is worth mentioning that in that year, the Ganzhutan Flood Tide Power Station was designed to generate 12 million kWh of electricity per year, which solved the problem of power generation in the neighboring areas at that time; improved the waterway so that ships from Guangzhou to Jiangmen, Zhaoqing, Wuzhou and other places could be safely navigated throughout the year, shortening the sailing distance by 21 kilometers; regulating the flow of the west and north rivers, reducing the downstream water level, and reducing the downstream flood pressure.
Later, with the development of the times, the Ganzhutan Flood Tide Power Station was discontinued. Since 2018, Longjiang Town, Shunde District, has gradually revitalized the Ganzhutan Hongchao Power Station Park, and built the Ganzhu Hongchao Power Station History Exhibition Hall, the Party School of the Longjiang Town Committee of the Communist Party of China, the Shunde Central Ditch Reclamation History Exhibition Hall, the Ganzhutan Square, the Sangyuanwei and Longjiang Water Conservancy History Exhibition Hall, the Longjiang History and Culture Exhibition Hall, and the Longjiang Ganzhu Art Exhibition Hall.
The full text of the letter is as follows:
Xinwen Ganzhutan Hongchao Power Station has now been converted into a historical exhibition hall and has become a red education base. Recalling that half a century ago, I threw myself into the great construction that can be sung and wept with my mother, and those unforgettable people, things, and things unconsciously came to mind, and Wrote with their own pens, I hope that the Shunde people after that can inherit the Shunde courage, pride, and pride of the predecessors who dare to think and dare to do and dare to be the first.
First, unprepared business trips
I, Cai Yisong, was born in Rongqi Town, Shunde County (now Ronggui Subdistrict, Shunde District, Foshan City). At the end of 1970, I was only 8 years old. I clearly remember that one morning, before dawn, my mother Feng Keren (who worked at the Hydrological Station of Rongqi Town) woke me up from my sleep, simply packed up my clothes, and dragged me to the Rongqi Ferry.
At Shatou Station, we took the first bus to Daliang. Before driving, the ticket inspector and the driver took the whole car of passengers and routinely sang a song "Dongfang Hong" in unison, and then the bus began to drive on the 6-kilometer road paved with sand and mud. When we arrived at Daliang Station, we immediately transferred to Longjiang Caspian Sea's car (the original Longjiang Caspian Sea Station is now located near Longjiang Dongtou Village Market).
When I arrived at the Caspian Station, my mother carried a backpack (with mats, sheets, and a few pieces of clothing), two pairs of chopsticks, two rice bowls, water cups, toothpaste toothbrushes and an iron bucket of soap in her right hand, carried a military bag containing hydrological materials, and dragged me in her left hand. I was carrying my school bag (with three or two pieces of clothing), just that simple pack, and we started walking to Left Beach.
In those years, my father worked in Gaohe County (now Heshan and Gaoming) and rarely returned home once a year. My family's ancestral home is from another province, there are no relatives in Shunde, no one takes care of me, and I am used to traveling with my mother. During the first, second, and third grades of elementary school, I hardly attended school for several months.
Along the way, I learned from my mother that I was going to build a hydropower station in a place called Ganzhutan this time. But how long it would take, the mother shook her head and said she didn't know.
At that time, the road from caspian sea to Ganzhu beach was being built, and we were covered with stones and dirt under our feet. The migrant workers who paved the road were all local members, and they did not have a decent iron tool in their hands, but relied on bamboo baskets to hold the gravel and dirt, carry it with flat shoulders, and then scraped the dirt and rubble on the road with their hands with wooden sticks and wooden blocks, and then stepped on them and pounded them with sticks.
I was still young, I didn't eat breakfast that day, and the road under my feet was extremely uneven, and I walked very hard and slowly. My mother kept urging me to speed up, because I arrived at the power station engineering headquarters before noon, so that I could catch the lunch in the canteen.
On the way, I met my uncle and uncle I knew. They were all migrant workers from various communes who had rushed to Ganzhutan beach to participate in the construction after completing the tanzhou waterway dredging project in Chencun and their mother a few months ago.
Second, Li Ziliu's gun
Seeing the acquaintance came to the spirit, before the Chen Cun Tanzhou River Dredging Commander-in-Chief was Li Ziliu. When I was in Chen Village, I saw Li Ziliu with a pistol inserted in his waist (I later learned that the commune secretaries at that time were equipped with pistols, and some deputy secretaries were also equipped). I sometimes took the opportunity to touch his pistol, and touching it was enough to get me to go home and brag to my neighbors for months. Li Ziliu gave a very serious impression, and every time he found me touching a pistol, he always stared at me with his eyes for a while.
On the way, I asked my mother, is Li Ziliu also going? Got a positive answer from my mother. I think I can see Li Ziliu again, and there is a pistol to touch again. So, all at once, I quickened my pace.
Before the noon meal, we finally rushed to the Ganzhutan Power Station Headquarters in the Ancestral Hall of Zuotan, received the meal tickets, and then registered, grabbed the number, and ate a beautiful lunch (in that era of lack of materials, if we did not register in the canteen and hold the number, the meal might not be able to eat).
I met Li Ziliu at the headquarters, but to my disappointment, I only saw him in a hurry, and I never saw him again. Many years later, I learned from other people that the commander-in-chief of the Original Ganzhutan Power Station was Li Ziliu, but later considered that he was leading the dredging of the Tanzhou River in Chencun, he was transferred to take charge of the more arduous reclamation of the hengqin central ditch.
3. People and things in GanzhuTan
Due to the construction of the hydropower station in Ganzhutan at that time, I attended the second grade intermittently at Zuotan Primary School for several months. In order to solve the electricity shortage in Shunde County at that time, the construction of the power station was to allocate excellent technical personnel from the county's water conservancy, hydropower, hydrology, and electric power systems, and to gather the superior resources of financial resources, transportation, and transportation of all parties, and almost all the labor force of each commune joined the labor.
The headquarters is used as an engineering design site, an office, and a dormitory, with beds used as office chairs during the day and slept at night. I was still young and used to walk around and play in the groups of the headquarters. Adults rarely go home because of their work and can't see their children, so they often tease me.
Everyone is busy with work and rarely entertains. Soon, the construction site had a kind of lighting to steam, so everyone had a recreational activity to play volleyball in the headquarters patio at night. The basketball court was built half a year later on the embankment, and everyone had to play basketball before dark.
At that time, the national popular revolutionary model drama, Shunde County Propaganda Team also came to perform "Wisdom to Conquer the Tiger Mountain", "Sha Jiabang" and other plays, to comfort the project builders, everyone often hummed a few pieces of model drama songs on their lips. My mother was nicknamed "Sha Grandma" by everyone because she could hum one or two pieces of "Sha Jia Bang", so I was called "Sha Zai" by everyone.
The winter of 1970-1971 was very cold, the water vapor of GanzhuTan was heavy, and the lack of winter clothing and cold protection immediately thought of sewing clothes (commonly known as sackcloths) with sacks containing supplies to protect the ambiguity. Regardless of the leaders, technical personnel, and migrant workers, everyone wears a linen jacket to work through the winter, which can be said to be no distinction between the top and the bottom, sharing weal and woe, and concentrating on building a hydropower station.
After Li Ziliu was transferred, Ye Shengjun took over as the commander-in-chief of the power station, Ouyang Hong was the deputy commander -- later the vice mayor of Foshan City, and the head of the engineering team of the headquarters was Liao Rongchu. The chief engineer is Huang Guoxian, director of the county hydropower bureau, he only learned well, everyone respects him Xianshu (with the meaning of prestige), the backbone of technical design is a thin and tall man, called Zheng Lianxiang, he is a rare hydropower and water conservancy talent in Shunde County, everyone respects him Long uncle (including the meaning of high and talented). The technical construction of hydropower stations is all based on the strength of the "two uncles", who are from Shunde County, and at that time they could be regarded as rare and practical water conservancy and hydropower experts in Guangdong Province.
In addition, the head of the logistics team of the command is Wu Kongsheng, the director of the county agricultural bureau, who is very busy and has to purchase food for the entire power station labor force every day. Wu Kongsheng was so busy that he often didn't have time to shave, he often used his beard to wipe my face, and I called him bearded guy.
I studied at Zuo Tan Elementary School, a school with a small number of students, only one class per level in grades one to five, with one class each for the first and second grades, and the school building is also the warehouse of the production team. Students only have classes in the morning and have to go home in the afternoon to help their families do farm work. Classmates my age, feeding pigs at home, collecting firewood, and helping in the fields, are already experts in labor.
Because of the relationship between propaganda and broadcasting, the political work group of the command headquarters always has to go down to the company to visit and write a draft. After school, because I didn't have to help with farm work, I often followed Fan Guiqiang, an electrician in the political work group. He loved to take me to the construction site to build handles and pull wires to install horns. I especially enjoyed riding a boat with him across right beach, which was my only entertainment after school.
At that time, He Guihong, deputy secretary of Guizhou Commune, served as the head of the political work group, and there were Ou Boliang (then secretary of the Communist Youth League of Rongqi Town), three radio propagandists, Huang Xiaocai (graduated from the School of Foreign Languages), Wu Guichan and so on. There is also a young man Xue Hongze who writes well, draws well with one hand, and is versatile, he is responsible for publishing posters, the older generation of Ganzhu people, I think he is the youngest. He later became the director of the Foshan Municipal Grain Bureau, and he should be very clear about the history of building a power station in Ganzhutan.
In order to enrich the writing of the political work group, a teacher Li Mingru was transferred from Shunde No. 1 Middle School at that time. He brought an airsoft gun and often took me to fight birds during his lunch break. His marksmanship was extremely accurate, I picked up the beaten grass finches, plucked the hair and washed them, asked for a few grains of coarse salt in the kitchen, folded a few branches and burned them, which was a supplement to my nutritious meal.
The leader of the security group of the command headquarters is Mao Runtian, director of the county public security bureau. I was mischievous and always wanted to touch the pistols of the leaders' waists. I confirmed that two people in the headquarters were armed with them, one was Mao Runtian, perhaps the majesty, sensitivity, and seriousness of his profession, he did not look angry and arrogant, and he had a intimidating momentum, so that I never dared to go near Mao Runtian, and only peeked at the pistol bulging around his waist; the other was Ye Shengjun, who may be busy with work, and he often ran on both sides of Ganzhutan and Daliang. But every time he came to Ganzhutan, he would always kindly lead me to tour the construction site, and I would take the opportunity to pick up his clothes and touch a pistol, which felt more exciting than touching gold.
The work of digging up and moving stones to block the flow of water in the construction of power stations fell on the migrant workers drawn from various communes. The migrant workers of each commune formed their own companies, all living in the embankments and areas of GanzhuTan towards the Jiujiang River, and the dormitories built of bamboo and grass poles were not kept warm in winter and leaked in the summer. Every day, the company commander and the instructor led the procession, a flag bearer carried a large red flag with the conspicuous name of his own commune, and the migrant workers lined up, sang revolutionary songs, and walked out of the work in a straight line.
Ganzhu beachhead is a hard stone field, in the morning civil work is divided into multiple groups, each group of one and a half kneeling on the stone ground, first holding or supporting a short iron bar, two or three migrant workers next to them to pick up a large hammer, do not know how many hammers; then change to the middle bar, and then use the long bar, hard to beat the iron bar into the stone. Some migrant workers cracked the tiger's mouth, and some accidentally hit their hands and injured them, but everyone punched a stone hole on the stone ground and cut a stone hole more than a meter deep. At noon, the migrant workers stuffed the explosives into the stone cave and lit the stones with their hands, and some migrant workers could not run to the protective shed and were injured by the falling stones that were blown up, which was not a big problem. When the smoke cleared, the cooks of the companies brought wooden barrels containing meals, and everyone gathered around the construction site to eat lunch. In the afternoon, migrant workers use ropes to hoist exploded stones and carry them by two people who are larger; and three to five people who are larger carry them shoulder to shoulder and carry them to block the flow of water and build a stone dam. Sometimes because the stone is too heavy, the rope is broken, and the migrant workers are hit to the feet... There is a saying in the team that minor injuries cannot be in the line of fire, which is true.
There is a water level monitoring station in Ganzhutan, and there is only one staff member named Liang Bihui. Like the workers of all monitoring stations in the country, they faithfully guard the water level platform and accurately record the water level data for each time period. His son, Liang Changshou, is 6 or 7 years older than me, and when he grows up, he enters the power station to work.
The mother does not know how to ride a bicycle, and often walks to the monitoring stations for the historical water level data of the river. I often stayed on the embankment where my mother was far away, hoping that she would come back soon...
Fourth, the food of Ganzhu Beach
In the early seventies, transportation was poor, material transportation was difficult, and food was scarce. Ganzhutan has concentrated so many builders at once, and the rice bowl is full of white rice, green vegetables, and little meat; the extra two cents of one brick curd, or three cents of two bricks of curd, are already added.
One day in the summer of 1971, near lunchtime, a four-seat military jeep came to the entrance of the headquarters, and I saw the driver move two cardboard boxes into the kitchen, and we had a small piece of red meat on our noon meal, which tasted like swan meat in people's mouths. Everyone excitedly said that the lunch meat was so delicious, and I kept remembering, remembering, and forgetting the name. Until decades later, my wife wondered why I would buy a jar of lunch meat to taste from time to time.
Later, I learned that it turned out that a certain leader had inspected Ganzhutan that day and brought two boxes of canned lunch meat to comfort the builders of the power station.
I remember that the canteen had a dish, salted fish steamed fat pork. After I've eaten it once, I wish I could eat it every day. The chef of the canteen said that this dish does not use salt or oil, but only add some ginger and green onion. For everyone, this dish is far better than today's mountain treasures and seafood. For this reason, I often run to the canteen and ask the master loudly, is there any salted fish steamed pork today?
Fifth, the indelible sweet bamboo love
Because I could not go to school well and had no playmates, a year later, when I took two shifts a week with my mother to and from Ganzhutan - the "March 8th Red Flag" ferry in Rongqi Town (a wooden boat that can accommodate more than thirty people, the helmsman and the boat machine room were helmed by young women), when I returned to the Rongqi testing station to collect information, I refused to return to Ganzhutan again. My life depends on the care and help of dr. He, a good neighbor and factory doctor of the silk weaving factory in Rongqi Town at that time, and at the same time, I am particularly grateful to their five children who grew up with me, such as everyone's sister He Kaimei, second brother He Xianming, three sisters He Shaomei, fourth brother He Xianguang, and fifth sister He Xiaomei.
Less than three years after leaving Ganzhutan, the hydropower station was completed, and after that, the people's livelihood in Shunde County rarely lost power. At the beginning of the construction of the power station, it has been more than half a century, and the difficulties, hardships and hardships of the construction in that year have been vividly remembered..............
Even if you have immigrated overseas for many years, you often recall that the Shunde people only relied on a pair of meat hands and the strength of a county to create a large-scale water conservancy and hydropower project that was rare in all of China at that time, which is rare in the world today! May today's descendants of Shunde inherit the courage, pride and pride of Shunde who dare to think and dare to be the first!
Cai Yisong
Summer 2021
Book on the west coast of the Atlantic
Source | Yangcheng Evening News Yangcheng Pie
Editor-in-charge | Lee Si Rui