The Last Monkey Trainer

Some of us have lived like this
CCTV and Phoenix TV have made special reports, with Yang Jinlin writing the preface to recommend the use of real images and text to record a disappearing folk China. Photographers from China National Geographic have been following and recording for nearly 20 years. Douban has 5,000+ reviews and 8.8 points. Among the Chinese folk, those monkey trainers who lead monkeys and travel around the world are mostly from Xinye, Henan. The monkey trainers in Xinye migrate north and south like migratory birds every year. After the wheat harvest in June and the autumn harvest in October, a large number of monkey trainers finish their farm work and start going out to perform with monkeys to make money.
Since 2002, Ma Hongjie, a reporter for China National Geographic, has been visiting the monkey trainers in Xinye, following them as they hop on trains and sleep on the streets, documenting their daily joys and sorrows and the vicissitudes of their fate.
Yang Lingui, a monkey trainer, has been performing monkey shows for more than 20 years. He has been to Heilongjiang, Tibet, Hainan, Vietnam, Myanmar and Russia. In Jingdezhen, a 16-year-old girl said to him after watching the monkey show: "Grandpa, you have brought happiness to so many people in your life!" After hearing this, Yang Lingui was very happy all the way that day.
Qiao Meiting, a monkey trainer, used the money he earned from his monkey shows to help his five younger brothers get married. He remained unmarried, but his brothers thought he was biased. The 180,000 yuan he had saved for retirement was also swindled away.
Monkey trainers Bao Fengshan, Bao Qingshan, Su Guoyin, and Tian Junan were unreasonably detained for over a month by the local Forestry Public Security Bureau while performing monkey shows on the streets of Mudanjiang, Heilongjiang Province. A monkey they relied on for their livelihood died after being confiscated by the police, and they themselves are facing charges of "illegal transportation of wild animals."
In addition, there are female monkey trainers, monkey trainers who used to be Kuomintang spies, and craftsmen who make props for monkey shows... The stories of monkey trainers are like a cross-section of Chinese society. Their era is an era we have all experienced. Ma Hongjie has used records lasting twenty years to testify to us that not long ago, some people lived like this.

2023-01-03

上海文艺出版社

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9787532185610