A farmer turned entrepreneur adopted 199 children in a 10-year span. He uses up his family assets and accrues huge debts to care for and educate them.

"After mom and dad died, my older brother and I depended on each other to get by. I don't know how many tears were cried. We got thinner by the day." This is what 12-year-old fifth-grader Shen Jinrong wrote. She couldn't recall her experience without breaking down into tears.

When this author saw Shen on June 12, she was all smiles, her clothes were spotless and she emanated an adorable exuberance. "One day in 1998, an old man stretched out his warm hand to me. From then on, my life has been so happy. We live and eat here. It's like our home."

The old man, Shen mentioned, is 64-year-old Wang Jiayu, a farmer from Yingshang County in central Anhui Province. Wang set up a special school five years ago that specializes in caring for children, whom he himself has adopted. There are currently 199 kids there. Shen Jinrong and her older brother are among them.

While giving these children who have lost their family warmth, Wang Jiayu has braved near debilitation. In putting his all into supporting the operation of this school, he used up all his savings. His business also hit a snag. Wang ran up a 220,000-yuan (US$26,579) debt in acquiring assets for his orphanage. Meanwhile, there were five handicapped children back at his own home that required his care.

"There was a flood in 2003 that water-logged the school, throwing us into a financial plight. I couldn't sleep or eat. It was like I caught some disease. But I had to grit my teeth and keep going out of fear that these kids would be back on the street," Wang said.

This past February, a few influential media ran in-depth reports on Wang's acts of philanthropy. In the wake of the coverage, outside aid gradually came in. The local government also intensified support, among the most valuable of which was a stipend last October. The Yingshang County Government covered all the children Wang adopted in the subsistence guarantee scheme for the poorest of the poor. Every month, every child receives 99 yuan (US$11.96) in subsistence allowance, which basically solved any issue of food. Indeed, Wang Jiayu's predicament was changing for the better.

Calamity Before Sacrifice

Wang Jiayu was an ordinary farmer. Because the conditions of his family life were quite bad, he discontinued his studies, never completing elementary school, and entered agriculture. It wasn't until age 30 that he married a girl from a neighboring village, which in his hometown is considered a long time to be a bachelor. However, the joy of marriage seemed to have eluded Wang. His wife developed epilepsy while she was pregnant. As medical care was dismal, they birthed four mentally retarded baby girls in a row. Although the fifth was mentally sound, she was both deaf and mute.

Misfortune once again befell Wang Jiayu in 1980. Wang, 40 at the time, left his hometown for work in other provinces. While on the job, he injured his lower back seriously. His lower limbs have been less than 100 percent since, and may never fully recover. After that, Wang diligently studied woodworking, mastering the skill in little time.

In 1993, seeing that the market for bamboo and wood furniture was hot, Wang invested in establishing his own furniture factory. He later moved into the handicraft business. Wang Jiayu was well known in the region as a "millionaire" by 1998.

Wang speaks quite proudly when bringing up the past. "I became the first person in my hometown to install a private phone in 1994. Although a phone couldn't be more common these days, it was a really luxurious thing for locals at that time."

One day in the early spring of 1994, Wang went to the county town to take care of something. Passing a street corner, he spotted a small boy digging in a pile of garbage looking for something to eat. His hair was full of dirt and his clothes were extremely ratty and messy. Having witnessed such a scene, Wang bought two pancakes for the boy. Obviously hungry, the boy grabbed the cakes and stuffed them in his mouth. Wang rushed off to attend to his business and left without inquiring about the boy. But Wang saw the poor boy several times again. After thinking about it, he took the boy home with him. The boy, six at the time, said his name was Pan Dianlong. Both his parents were deceased.

About five months later, Wang brought another severely mentally retarded abandoned street kid home. Perhaps it's because of personal family misfortunes, but Wang has much more pity for these street-wandering derelict kids than others. At any rate, his financial situation was in pretty good shape at the time, so, by 1998, Wang had adopted 39 orphans.

In the wake of more and more adoptions, Wang Jiayu's house could not hold any more people. Nor could one individual look after all these children. So, Wang converted some spare rooms in his furniture factory as well as requisitioning some land to build about 10 new houses. An orphanage, commonly called "Children Village," was born. From then on, these kids would have a stable "home."

Finances Get Tight

Several of the children Wang adopted reached school age in 1999. At this time, the government of Yingshang, a nationally recognized poor county, was strapped for public funds. This disabled the implementation of the national requirement to establish a welfare school providing special education for abandoned and mentally retarded children. Wang concluded that sending these kids to a regular school would be both too expensive and hard for them to handle. He was also worried about the kids lacking instruction regarding traffic safety. To address these concerns, Wang decided to set up his own school.

Wang started to invite teachers from the surrounding areas. Because the salary provided was much lower than regular schools, it was very difficult for a time for Wang to recruit suitable teachers. Finally, a retired principal named Sun Xueshun willingly forwent a high-salaried position at a private school to become the first teacher at Wang's Children Village. Sun even assisted Wang in drafting the school's regulations.

Sun recalls that, initially, the school only had one class and one full-time teacher. Bricks were often piled up for makeshift desks and seats. A wooden slab with black paint smeared on it served as the blackboard.

After 2000, word that Wang Jiayu had set up a school for orphaned kids got around fast. Some villagers brought their physically or mentally handicapped children to the school. Wang could hardly refuse them, though he had every reason to do so. This precipitated rapid expansion and swelling of the number of children at Children Village: There were 100 kids by 2001; 154 by 2002; and 199 in 2004.

Sun Xueshun, who is in charge of the school's general educational affairs, told Beijing Review that the school, which still has no official name, now has nine teachers altogether. Six of them are retired teachers. There are also 16 administrative and logistics personnel, whose wages are only 300 yuan a month on average (less than half that of public schools). The students are divided into four grades, which include 42 deaf-mutes, 36 mentally retarded kids and eight blind children. These special students are put together in one class. Besides this, there are 20 kids, who, being seriously mentally retarded, must be attended to by a specially assigned staff member.

With more and more children, and little energy for business management, the school's primary financial source-savings from Wang Jiayu's abundant handicraft factory sales-dried up. "Things got tight, money wise, after 2000 until last August. Everyone depended on borrowed food. The pressure was too great," Wang said.

After all the savings were spent, Wang had to borrow to support the kids. It is for this reason that he has accrued a 220,000-yuan debt, which has yet to be repaid. The situation remained bleak until October last year, when government cash ensured the schools survival.

Can't Leave 'Home'

Very few people are unaware of Wang Jiayu and his Children Village now. Around seven in the morning on June 12, something immediately caught this writer's attention on the road next to the school. A boy sat squatting on the ground using his thin, frail hands to wash his clothes. Next to him were children in twos and threes eating porridge.

The boy is called Xu Nannan. He is 12 this year and in the fourth grade. Three years ago, after his father died, his mother took his sister to remarry somewhere outside their hometown. Little Xu was then brought here to the school. He says that kids at Children Village start washing their own clothes at age seven or eight. Those who are too young find someone older to help them. Among the younger children, especially the boys, few wear clean clothes.

When speaking about life at Children Village, Xu Nannan, who usually has little good to say, mostly uses the words "very happy." One can tell from his emotion that this is heartfelt. However, when asked about life before this special school, especially when recalling his parents, he becomes reticent and silent. Not long after come a flood of tears.

Bitter family experiences have made these kids both mature and emotional at a very early age. A teacher called Li Yun, who has been at Children Village for half a year, said that there are always several students by her side after class. They don't say anything, but just silently look at her. This kind of phenomenon is unusual at regular schools. Li Yun could only explain it one way. "Perhaps it's because they have lacked motherly love since childhood that they unconsciously regard me as their mom," she said.

Heaving a heavy sigh, Li Yun brought up a time not long ago when a teacher left the school to visit her relatives abroad. The kids attentively lined up to see her to the car. When the teacher was just about to leave, they all cried out loud and grabbed on to her clothes to prevent her from leaving. Many passersby saw the scene and cried along.

Li Yun said that the teaching staff is very transient because the salary at the school is so low. Many teachers stay less than a month. But Li, a retired teacher who has poured her heart into Children Village, usually eats and sleeps at the school. She has developed a deep relationship with the kids.

Li also points out that the kids have particularly high self-esteem, though they don't like others bringing up their past. Once this topic was touched upon during a class. The students immediately fell into a hush, after which it is hard to enliven them.

Liu Chuanya is 12 this year. Her parents died when she was very young. At the age of five, an uncle brought her and her old brother to Children Village. Now the two siblings are in the same fifth grade class.

Liu is quite a lively girl. Her grades are excellent and her teachers like her very much. Once a vice mayor, who came to Children Village for an inspection, really took a liking to young Liu and wanted to adopt her on the spot. But Liu rejected this request without hesitation because she says she is "content with her life at Children Village" and "doesn't want to leave here."

Liu says the mood among her classmates is very good. After class, the boys like to play ping-pong, while the girls play Chinese checkers. These are the two main forms of entertainment at Children Village.

An administrator said that for the sake of convenience, if the students don't have anything else to do, they stay at the school, attending class everyday. On weekends, the students can leave to visit their relatives, usually for no more than two days.

Being asked how they would feel if daddy Wang Jiayu one day could no longer take care of them, Shen Jinrong and Liu Chuanya took on expressions of gloom and became quiet. A teacher standing by explained that, in their mind, the children have made Children Village a second home. No one would dare think how it would be to lose that again.

(Beijing Review July 19, 2004)