They are not black-haired and yellow-skinned, but they have traveled far and wide, devoting their precious youth and even their life's energy to the land of China; they are not mediocre people, they could have joined the upper class with their wisdom and knowledge, but they gave up their ease to come to China to live in caves, sleep in grass huts, and eat coarse grains.
A few days ago, General Secretary Xi Jinping replied to the relatives of Snow, Ma Haide, Eli, Epstein and other international friends, and expressed his deep remembrance to those international friends who have been in the same boat with the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people, shared weal and woe, fought side by side, and made valuable contributions to China's revolution, construction and reform.
Chen Yixin, the 90-year-old former vice president of the Shanghai Friendship Association and honorary president of the Shanghai International Friends Research Association, is one of the few people in Shanghai who has received Ma Haide, Ai Li and Epstein. This old friend who has worked as a foreign friend for 40 years is familiar with these names and is very kind. "We must not forget the foreign friends who shared weal and woe with us during China's most difficult times." In his recollection, these names, which are a little unfamiliar to the "post-80s" and "post-90s", have become flesh-and-blood stories.
The second from the right is Louis Eli, and the first from the right is Chen Yixin.
"Always believe that China has a bright future"
Chen Yixin still remembers meeting these old Chinese friends in March 1987, when he was still the secretary general of the Municipal Friendship Association, and participated in the "ThreeS and Other International Friends in Shanghai" seminar held by the Shanghai Friendship Association and the China Three Ss (Smedley, Strong, Snow) Research Association, and many international friends were invited to attend.
"Ai Lao was 90 years old, he was tall, wearing a coffee-colored suit, and shaking hands very hard. Chen Yixin squinted his eyes and recalled that on March 6, at the Municipal Workers' Cultural Palace, Louis Eli said in Shanghainese after taking the stage, "Hello everyone, I have been in Shanghai for 11 years", and the audience laughed.
Back in April 1927, Louis Eli, a 30-year-old New Zealander, set foot on Chinese soil from Shanghai's 16 shop piers. Here he saw the miserable life of the working people, came into contact with the Marxist group organized by Soong Ching-ling and Snow, and gradually transformed from a hot-blooded youth into an internationalist fighter. He set up a secret radio station in his apartment at No. 4, Lane 1315, Yuyuan Road, connecting Shanghai with the Soviet district until he traveled to Shaanxi in 1928.
"At the time of the seminar, Elder Ai's health was not very good." Chen Yixin said, but he still encouraged the young people present, "I have been to Yan'an three times in China in my 60 years, and I have also been to Honghu Lake, and I always believe that China has a bright future, and I hope that Chinese youth will continue to carry forward the spirit of Yan'an and Honghu lake and build a good new China." At the end of that year, Louis Eli died of illness in Beijing, and Comrade Xiaoping wrote an inscription for him - "The great internationalist warrior is immortal."
The third from the right is Ma Haide, and the first from the left is Chen Yixin.
It was also at that seminar that Chen Yixin met Ma Haide and Epstein, the first and second foreign friends to join the Chinese nationality. Ma Haide was a consultant to the Ministry of Health at the time, contributing to the treatment of leprosy in China. Epstein, who uses his pen as a sword, served as the editor-in-chief of the external propaganda journal "China Construction", just like Smedley, Strong, and Snow in those days, using his own brushstrokes to introduce the real China to the world.
"As foreigners, of course, they understood that there were still many gaps between China's material conditions and the capitalist countries at that time." Chen Yixin also remembers Epstein's answer that year that China can accept this challenge (referring to the large gap between Chinese and foreign material conditions). "These foreign friends did not put themselves outside the challenge, but stood with the Chinese people. ”
Epstein on the right.
What gives them such confidence? In The words of Ma Haide, "I have lived in China for most of my life, and finally I have learned a secret, that is, the Communist Party of China can do what it says, that it can lead the people to establish a new China in the past, and that it will certainly be able to complete the grand cause of building the four modernizations today." ”
Today, Chen Yixin still holds the Youth Daily published on March 13, 1987, and the page column on that day is the inscription of Huang Huawei, then vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, for that seminar - "Never forget you, a respectable international friend."
Shanghai was their first stop for "drastic changes"
One year, during the Tomb Sweeping Festival, when Chen Yixin went to the Soong Ching Ling Cemetery to visit the tomb of his father, Chen Heqin, the "father of preschool education" in China, he met the family of Wei Lushi, an international friend and expert of the China Foreign Language Bureau, who also made a sacrifice here.
This situation is not alone. Shanghai is dormant with many old friends of Chinese people who were born in China and who were born in China. Also at the Soong Ching Ling Mausoleum, there were Mr. Lu Xun's friend and emissary of Japanese-Chinese exchanges, Mr. Uchyama Andizo and his wife Mikiko Inoue; Mr. Yumiya Reisan, former vice chairman of the Japan-China Friendship Association, who promoted the friendship between Osaka Prefecture and Shanghai in Japan; and Ko Lieran, a Romanian doctor who joined the international medical team to aid China in 1939 and supported the Chinese people's War of Resistance.
The tombstone of Correjan is unveiled.
This is no accident. "At that time, Shanghai was the most important window for China to connect with the world, and it was also the first stop for many foreign friends to come to China." Chen Yixin said that at that time, Shanghai became an important town for the spread of Marxism in China, and many foreign friends, like Louis Eli, received enlightenment from advanced ideas in Shanghai and thus embarked on the revolutionary road without hesitation. Examples include Ma Haide, an American M.D., who runs a private clinic and provides a liaison place for Chinese underground organizations; Snow, an American journalist who traveled from Shanghai to Yan'an; and Zheng Lucheng, a Korean musician who studied at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.
Back then, when these young foreign people with favorable living conditions set foot on the land of Shanghai and saw all kinds of injustices under the rule of old China, the seeds of faith were sown. "They are full of justice and selflessness." Chen Yixin was very emotional, and Shanghai became the first stop of their "drastic changes".
Even after 1949, these friends often visited Shanghai. In addition to the one received by Chen Yixin in 1987, at the invitation of the Municipal Friendship Association and the Shanghai International Friends Research Association, Epstein visited Shanghai more than 10 times before and after visiting jewish refugees in Shanghai and reliving the difficult years of watching out for each other.
Time flies, and for most young people, these names may not be so familiar, and it may be difficult to mobilize feelings. Therefore, for Chen Yixin and the friendship associations, it is important and urgent to publicize their deeds, not only to let our countrymen know the precious years of knowing each other, but also to do a good job in the work of "second generation of friends" and "third generations of friends", so that this sincere feeling can continue and be passed on. Because in Chen Yixin's view, the descendants of these international friends will also have a "natural feeling" for China, "we must convince future generations that the path chosen by their relatives is correct, so that future generations will continue to walk." ”
Yes, the international friends of the older generation have contributed to China's progress, and the sincere friendship and deep feelings with the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people are precious assets that should not be forgotten. This is especially important in the changing international situation. In the words of Chen Yixin, a 90-year-old man, it is not to forget the old friends who shared happiness and hardships in those years, and continue to make new friends with like-minded people.
Source: Shangguan News