民工分离撕裂中国家庭－一个工人母亲

A Factory Mother

一个工人母亲

 
The outdoor market in Baoding is a patch of dirt where farmers have laid out mushrooms, tofu, cabbage and carrots. Cuts of meat are arranged on a flatbed, but Ran Heping cannot afford those. She and three relatives have just finished a 12-hour night shift at their factory and are making a weekly grocery run.

A handsome vendor 1 haggles 2 with Ms. Ran over the price of a head of cabbage. He is flirting 3 and offers her a ride home. She laughs and walks away. She later says distance has destroyed the marriages of several workers at the factory.

Her factory in Baoding, about 90 minutes south of Beijing by train, makes metal balls for lawn games, to be exported to Europe and America, and smaller balls that Chinese manipulate with their hands as a form of traditional therapy.

It is dirty, difficult work, but the factory is a popular destination for migrants from Shuanghu because of word-of-mouth referrals. More than half the 70 employees are from around the village. The job is piecework, so workers get paid for each ball. During peak months, a worker casting metal or polishing can make more than $100. Usually, though, workers make less than $50.

Ms. Ran came here in 2000 when she left the village to support the family. Leaving her daughter worried Ms. Ran, but Shan was starting school and tuition was due. Ms. Ran also knew that her husband's illness gave her little choice.

"I knew we couldn't survive like this," she said. "I told Shan, 'I will go to work, and you be a good girl at home' "

She returned home nearly two years later. She brought almost $1,000, which went for medical bills, clothes, food, school fees, fertilizer and other farming costs. "When the money was gone, we needed more," she said. "I decided 4 to go out again."

This time it was a shorter trip, from July 2002 until February 2003. She brought home only $210 after the factory deducted 5 $72 for leaving without working a full year. She was furious and filed a complaint with the local labor 6 bureau. Nothing happened.

The Yangs were together in the village for a year. But medical and school bills forced them apart again. When Mr. Yang left for Beijing last March, his wife left for a plastics factory. She later quit and tried to join her husband in Beijing.

"We are a family," her husband told her. "When we can, we should be together."

 
They were together for less than 10 days. Ms. Ran worked at a pastry 7 factory but quit because the pay was so bad. She also said the cost of renting a room and living together in expensive Beijing would have erased 8 the couple's savings 9.

She returned to Baoding and the metal ball factory in September. She is an inspector 10, an easier job that pays up to $40 a month. She is not lonely because several cousins work at the factory. They talk about their children or visit a local park together. There are days when she says being away in a big city can be exciting.

"There are no department stores where we are from," she said.

In November, she bought a bottle of shampoo for her long black hair. It was first time in her life she had ever bought shampoo. It cost $1.50.

These lighter 11 moments are leavened 12 by the dark. On the telephone, she pleads with her husband to see a doctor. "I said, 'When you get paid, spend all your wages to get better.' I said I would send my money home to take care of the family."

"But he doesn't really want treatment because it will cost so much," she said.

The grandparents called in December to ask for another $25 for Shan's tuition next year. Mrs. Ran wants to visit her daughter in February at New Year's. But her bosses insist she must work until July or again lose pay. She is angry but has decided she must stay. Her daughter does not know yet.

"I just hope that Heqing will recover and we can work together to put Yang Shan at least through high school," Ms. Ran said, when asked what she wanted for her future. "If his health doesn't improve, I'm worried we'll only be able to send her to middle school."

"It's a hard life," she added, "but we have no other choice."