Special Report: Spring Festival Special 2009
by Chinese media writers Zhou Yan and Jiang Yi
MIANYANG, Sichuan, Jan. 27 (Chinese media) -- Li Yunxiang sat quietly in front of her family's tent as her daughter Lin Ling helped powder her face, and beamed shyly as the neighbors watched and said "You look great!"
Lin is not her biological daughter. What brought them together was Li's Sunday marriage to the girl's father, Lin Xingcong, and the sorrow they all experienced after the devastating earthquake that toppled their homes last May 12.
"I began to like her at our very first meeting. She's soft-spoken and tidy just like my mom," said Lin, 24. She teared up at the mention of her dead mother.
The new couple haven't fully recovered from their heartbreak.
After the 8.0-magnitude quake toppled their home county of Anxian in Mianyang City, Li ran frantically searching for her husband's body, which was never found. Lin, for his part, carried his dead wife home drenched in her blood.
They struggled helplessly with their own grief, until Li needed help with a little housekeeping matter in July.
"That day the tent community was about to distribute liquefied gas, but I was not home," said Li. "Lin was a village official and was always ready to help others, so I asked him if he could carry the tank to my home."
Lin did. "When the neighbors saw me carrying her gas tank, they jokingly asked if I 'had something for her'."
The humble tank brought the two lonely hearts together. In months that followed, Lin was impressed by how hard Li worked to support her teenage son and her mother-in-law.
Li, meanwhile, saw Lin as warm-hearted and reliable.
Still loving their deceased spouses but believing they had to move on for their children's sake, Li and Lin married Sunday, on Lunar New Year's Eve. She is 36 and he is 46.
Their wedding was simple. It was held in front of Lin's new home, a two-story structure that is due for completion in a month or two.
Lin Ling, who's finished school and found a job in the provincial capital Chengdu, bought them new clothes and leather shoes. She and her teenage brother Lin Shunping, joined by Li's 15-year-old son Qiu Chao, witnessed the wedding.
The new couple agreed to take care of their own parents as well as the families of the deceased and treat all three children as equals. When they move into their new home, they will keep photos of their first loves on the night table.
"Do you love me, Old Li?" Lin called out in front of the neighborhood. "I promise you, I'll support the two boys through college and take care of all our parents and in-laws."
Li reddened as she tried to hide a smile, while the children watched with tears in their eyes. "It's the first time I've seen my mom smile since the quake," said Qiu Chao. "I wish mom and dad will be happy together, forever."
There are no exact figures on how many people lost their spouses in the quake or how many have remarried.
In Beichuan, the worst-hit county, the quake shattered more than 2,000 families. At least four new couples had registered for marriage by the end of last year.
The county's deputy civil affairs chief Yang Yongfu predicted about 70 percent of those left single would remarry within a year after the quake. However, Yang said, previous emotional attachments and potential disputes over property and children meant remarriage would be "anything but easy."
Yang added: "These new families often have children and in-laws from the previous marriage to look after. Some families need to care for eight elderly people and four children."
The county's first remarried couple, Zhang Jianjun and Mu Xianbi, both 40, got hitched five months after the quake. Each had a son who strongly opposed the second marriage.
"They think we have betrayed the dead. Even now, they rarely spend weekends and holidays at home," said Mu.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment