Every year towards the end of spring, the Literature Evangelism Director of the West China Union Mission, Mr. Law Wai-Au would come to the school to hold the training sessions for the students. Many were interested in attending. After the training sessions, those who had attended would separate into different district groups in order to do the colporteur work in summer.
At the end of the spring of 1945, Lan Wan-Hwa, a Tibet student from Xikang couldn’t find a partner to do the colporteur work, so I volunteered to team up with him to do the work in Xikang.
At the beginning of the summer, we took a car from Chongqing to Chengdu. After we got all our supplies and hand bills from the West Sichuan Mission, we had to carry a load of nearly 50 kilos which included our Chinese costume, Western costume and shoes. On top of that, we each had to carry a chunk of rock salt. Treasurer Lee Tien-Fu gave us a valuable lesson on how to deal with the money business.
From Chengdu, we changed to another car and traveled towards South West. First we passed by Sichuan Basin, then West Sichuan Plateau. We saw all the beautiful scenery, those nicely irrigated field and rich soil. From Shuanliu and Xinjin, we finally arrived at the biggest city of Xikang, the City of Yaan. We were received by an elderly man, Mr. Lu Shou-Dau and were arranged a place to stay. The next day we walked around the city and found many sign boards of the government organizations, but the city looked quite deserted. Shops were not few, but there were not many pedestrians or much business. Therefore, we seceded to go back to the capital city, Kangding, before going on visiting other cities and villages.
Although there were highways between Yaan and Kangding, most were in such bad condition that no car could go through there. We had to carry our 50 kilos of backpack and climbed over the mountains everyday, 40-50 kilometers uphill and 10-15 kilometers downhill. We had our meals in town and could choose only from string beans, peanuts or sweet potatoes. If we wanted to have some taste with our food, we could stir in the rock salt that we brought along, and the taste depended on how many times we stirred our rock salt in the food.
After several days, we came to a place close to Erlang Mountain, where there were mostly rocky and steep roads. We had to walk through ditches and creeks, so our shoes were often wet. As we looked around, we could see the high mountains after high mountains. Sometimes the weather changed suddenly and before we could find a sheltered place to hide ourselves, heavy rain was already pouring down and left us soaking wet.
Yet, we were not afraid of difficulties or danger. We continued to advance bravely. We stayed overnight at a thatched shack along the way and dried our wet clothes and the books and materials that we brought along separately. When we got up in the morning, we saw the blue sky with the white clouds. The snow mountain afar was gleaming in the clouds. It was beautiful like a fairy land. As we looked back at the thatched shack, we found that it was built by the mountain side, next to the deep valley. The torrents down the canyon were moving swiftly. It was awesome. We quickly said goodbye to the owner of the thatched shack and took off.
Along the highway toward the west, many places had been destroyed by heavy storms. We had to walk on windy and rocky paths against swift water. It was dangerous. On the road were some merchants carrying different merchandise such as clothes, tea, silk and herbs. They too had to pay special attention to the height of the mountain and the width of the paths. If not careful, we would easily fall to the depth of the canyons and be driven away by the torrents.
After we arrived at Luding, we wanted to walk across the iron rope bridge which was of historic value. There were many people on the bridge, each one looked very busy. From the middle of the bridge, we could see the rolling water below. The roaring sound of the water reminded us of our great creator.
Kangding was the capital city of Xikang, 3,000 metres above the sea. The air was clean. We could see the Han and Tibet brothers walking to and fro on the street. We could easily tell them apart by their different outfits. The old city had gone through a lot. In olden time, this city was called Cattle Country, which was built along the rich pasture of the Chedu River and Yar River where there was many cattle. During the Han Dynasty, Emperor Han Wu Di (B.C. 135) established the Cattle County. During the Ming Dynasty, Emperor Ming Jo (A.D. 1407) built the castles there for the horsemen during war time. During Qing Dynasty, Emperor Qinglong (A.D. 1793) made it the main entrance to Tibet. The tea business was flourishing then. A county named Dajinlou was established to be the main entrance to Tibet. The name Kangding was given in A.D. 1901.
The Mission President Mr. Kung Pin-Shan and his wife arranged for us to stay in the preparation room of the hall and welcome us with supper in the hospital cafeteria. Besides the director and the accountant, Bi Sou-Ming, there were the nurses Lee An-Lok and Su Mai-Yun. They were our fellow school mates in Honan Sam Yuk school. During our meal, Mr. and Mrs. Kung mentioned about how they first came to work at Kangding in the year 1935. That time, my brother Wan Wai-Chung and sister-in-law, Fong Chi-Lan, answered the calls to pioneer the mission work at the border. Right after they got married in Honan, they came to Kangding to join the service at Sikang Sanitarium. Thus, they named their eldest son, now a surgeon at Yellow River Hospital at Honan Changjou, Wan Kan-Ming, meaning the people of Kangding. At that time when my friend Mr. Lian Wan-Hwa heard this, he said, “I was running errands in the Sanitarium then. Later, I was sent to West China Sam Yuk School to study. Today, by God’s grace I can come back to serve and witness for the truth with Wai-June. I feel most honored to be able to work with the two sons of Pastor Wan Jing-Po in God’s vineyard.”
The next day, we all dressed neatly to visit the Governor of the Xikang Province, Mr. Liu Wan-Hwai. The secretary took us to Mr. Liu Wan-Hwai. We told him the purpose of this visit and introduced to him our Signs of the Times magazine and the benefits of reading it. We asked him to autograph for our magazine. During the conversation, he affirmed that the work of our Kangding Sanitarium was well recognized by the people there and he was grateful for the support of the church. Later he asked his secretary to arrange further visits with various Department Heads. Besides autographing, each department subscribed the Signs of the Times magazine according to their neds. In one day, we had good results. We thanked God for His leading and arrangement during our evening prayer.
Wan Hwa suggested for us to go to visit the Chief of the Tibet tribes the following day, then to visit the Kangding Business Association and other shops. We were invited to go upstairs sitting on the special rug which was embroidered with Tibet designs and with special fragrance. After drinking the hot milk tea and eaten their well known butter cake, Wan Hwa started to tell the purpose of our visit and asked him also for his autograph in the Tibetan language and subscribe for the Signs of the Times monthly magazine. After he considered, he subscribed for several copies for each hotel in the town, the post office couldn’t send them to the western cities of Kangding. He wanted us to send all the copies for the western cities to the capital Kangding, then they could hand carry them to those cities. It was quite an enormous order. He himself was a business man dealing with transporting silk, tea, clothes, salt, and herbs. His inns were of the rectangular shape. People lived on upstairs and animals lived downstairs. He used different colored bamboo plates to write his orders to signify different kinds of merchandise and different amount. People who helped to transport the merchandise had to carry the bamboo plates along and delivered to the manager of the next inn together with the goods.
This Tibet leader invited us to visit the green pasture. We did not think it was serious and simple said “yes, yes, thank you.” Two weeks later, his assistant brought us two horses and invited us to the pasture for horse riding. Girls wearing silver earrings of different styles and beautiful Tibet costumes of different colors, carrying Tibet knife on the back and long boots made with cow leather on their feet, with butter, cakes and hot tea, came to the colorful tent that has been built. Soon after that, boys and girls engaged in different dances. They danced merrily until the moon arose, then they sang the love songs in pairs, “Up in the horse riding mountain, there hung a piece of cloud, over the sky of the City of Kangding.”
We worked at Kangding for three weeks, then we returned to the three big cities, Luding. Tienjin and Yaan to work. We visited from door to door in those towns of 30-40 houses, to tell of Jesus’ love and His soon coming. It didn’t matter whether the people subscribed the magazine or not. We gave them some Christian handbills to read.
As we looked back to that summer, we got not only the scholarship, most importantly, we experienced God’s blessing and leading. God’s grace is sufficient for us. I myself have a motto that I learned from life experience, that is, ‘Be a genuine person, be honest, be sincere, be natural; Work realistically, not boastful, not impetuous, not hypocritical.”
President Longway told me once in the Pine Castle Church, “You have done a good job.I saw you as if I saw your father in mirror.With this success, I can guarantee you that you can be successful anywhere you go.”