0.cached.png
By Melinda Liu
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
This had to be Yu Hongbin's worst vacation ever. The Sichuan native had worked in Shenzhen, the Chinese boomtown near Hong Kong making chips for Nokia cell phones. It was a good life for an 18-year-old: he pulled in nearly $200 a month—more than some Sichuan farmers make in a year—and often blew it all on karaoke restaurants and a gym. On May 12 he was visiting his home village when the ground started bucking. Houses crumbled; dust filled his mouth and nose. He found his mother, dazed, near the "1,000-year-old tree" that locals believed is a protective talisman. A group of weeping villagers kneeled before the tree wailing, "Our god! Our heaven!"
Now Yu sits in a bus-station waiting room, on his way back to Shenzhen. The best way to help his family, he figures, is to keep on working. "But I'm not going to waste money like I did before," he says. "Now I'm going to send $140 a month back home to my folks. The earthquake made me regret I never sent them money before." Multiply Yu's sense of responsibility by 20 million to 30 million—the estimated number of Sichuanese migrant workers like him—and you begin to see a silver lining for this western province. The magnitude 7.9 quake killed some 86,000 people and caused tens of billions of dollars in economic losses. But up to a third of Sichuan's 85 million natives are working away from home and many have—or may find—jobs outside the devastated disaster zone. The money they send home will be critical to helping Sichuanese recover.
This diaspora is a relatively new phenomenon. Under Mao, rural Chinese rarely moved outside their hometowns, let alone their province—and had to get special permission to do so. Since Deng Xiaoping launched sweeping economic reforms three decades ago, however, tens of millions of Chinese have begun moving yearly in search of good jobs, many traveling from interior provinces like Sichuan to the export powerhouses on the coast. In fact, Sichuan is the largest single source of migrant workers, accounting for at least a tenth the estimated 200 million rural-born laborers now working in Chinese cities.
Read More on World
These mobile masses aren't always welcomed. Migrants have been blamed for rising crime and urban unrest. But they're also the engine of China's economic boom—helping stabilize the country and now in the quake zone. Sichuan-born artists contributed works to a May 25 charity silent auction in Beijing that raised more than $80,000 for quake victims. The following week featured another Sichuanese art auction and a benefit concert. Migrants are sending money, going home to volunteer and more. He Meiling found her 7-year-old niece Sun Qi covered with dust and shivering with cold the day after her parents died in the quake. Soon Sun was on her way to far-off Anhui province, on China's east coast, where another relative had arranged for schooling and accommodations. "So many people are giving Sun Qi toys and clothes I'm worried she might be distracted from her schooling," says He.
Sichuanese—Deng himself was one—have a reputation for boldness, stamina and pragmatism and are renowned for their willingness to travel for a decent job. In 2007, 20,000 Sichuanese went abroad for work. Last week the Qingdao Construction Group shipped 35 workers from the quake-stricken city of Guangyuan to new construction jobs—in Algeria, where 3,000 Chinese laborers will build a university. "We plan to recruit as many as possible from the disaster area," says company official Sun Hongjun. Another quake survivor, Chen Dagui, is preparing for a third stint as a farm worker in Russia. "After the disaster, people say I'm lucky to have such a good job," he says, surveying the toppled ruins of his house in Mianzhu.
That resilience will be key to rebuilding Sichuan. Entire cities have been buried; some companies have gone bankrupt and others are planning to relocate. Peasants who'd never sought work away from home before are flocking to job fairs where they can apply for urban jobs elsewhere. Says Su Zhengjun, one such applicant at the crowded Liulichang labor market in Sichuan's capital, "I worry about being cheated, but so long as I get insurance and 1,000 yuan a month, I'll go anywhere."
Such signs of nervousness are widespread. Many are concerned about Sichuanese youths forced to grow up without parents. Sun Qi, the 7-year-old from Beichuan, still trembles when trucks thunder past. Her relatives in Anhui may not recognize posttraumatic stress, and even if they did, professional help may not be available because she's far from the quake zone. Even before the quake, Chinese authorities had started to work to better integrate migrant workers, making it easier for migrants' kids to go to school and for rural-born workers to seek legal help against unscrupulous bosses. Yet many migrants have no stronger support than their old Sichuan connections.
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines