The Diary of Ma Yan (13 page)

In Ma Yan's little house in the village of Zhangjiashu, a photograph of a class of French schoolchildren was hung with pride on the wall next to the family photographs. On the back of the photo the students had written, “Carry on with your schooling. French children are with you.”

Pierre Haski and Ma Yan

As soon as the diary was published as a book, the responses started pouring in. A teacher in the east of France, whose pupils came from a particularly poor background and had real schooling difficulties, wrote to us to say that he regularly read the story of Ma Yan to his students, adding, “Some of them were genuinely touched by Ma Yan's story and expressed a desire to send her something or at least to try and correspond with her.” What resulted were some twenty letters, drawings, and poems addressed to Ma Yan. Each of them had a ballpoint pen taped to it—a response to the diary entry in which she says she hadn't eaten so that she could buy a pen.

Dozens of letters from young French people, moved and indeed disturbed by Ma Yan's story, came to us, and through us went on to Ma Yan. The teenage magazine
L'Actu
voted Ma Yan “best-loved of the year 2002.”

Indeed, the publication of Ma Yan's diary led to a great deal of support for the Association for the Children of Ningxia. The initial handful of members increased to three hundred by the end of the year. Donations allowed it to expand its work. At the beginning of the second school term in February 2003, the association gave out more grants, mostly to students at the middle school in Yuwang and the elementary school in Zhangjiashu. Children who would have had to leave school could now continue their education.

The association has also donated computers and purchased books to create a library at the Yuwang middle school. Additionally, the association has undertaken work to benefit the whole community and is exploring the possibility of digging a well in Zhangjiashu so that the villagers have clean water.

It is difficult to summarize the utter change in Ma Yan's life. A girl who never had enough to eat and seemed doomed to give up school and take up the miserable life of a village peasant is now a celebrity in Europe and to a certain extent in China as well. Thanks to the royalties from her book, she can eat her fill.

A Chinese magazine in December 2002 summed up the impact the book has had on its young heroine: “Ma Yan is happy, but stressed out!” Happy, most definitely, because she and her family have moved out of dire need, have proper winter clothes, and have bought some sheep and also a new television, which sits at the very center of the single room that is still their home. Happy, too, because she knows that the education she values so much is now secure for her. In 2004 she started high school in the city of Wuzhong, three hundred kilometers away from her home village. Ma Yan may attend a university too, if she works well—something that was almost unthinkable for a native of this impoverished village.

But she's also anxious, as the magazine said. First of all because in this village, like anywhere else in the world, success provokes jealousy and hostility. And also because Ma Yan has become a “model,” an example to her comrades, which means she isn't allowed to make mistakes. On top of it all, she's had to assume a status that is challenging for a young peasant girl: it has involved being flown to Beijing to talk on national television. In March 2004 she was flown to Paris for a book fair, and there she was interviewed by media from around the world. The
New York Times
said of her diary, “Thanks to its publication, her family is no longer poor, and 250 Ningxia youngsters, mostly girls,
now have scholarships to continue studying.” The number of scholarships had grown to three hundred and fifty by the end of the year.

Chinese national television interviewed Ma Yan and her mother no less than three times, which gave her story extraordinary impact. Her diary, described as “legendary” by the Chinese media, is now published in China itself. Even Ma Yan's mother has begun to learn how to write.

But this courageous and intelligent young woman has taken on these changes with modesty and generosity. When we visited her in February 2003, she gave us a handwritten letter in which she made a solemn announcement:

Pierre Haski
Beijing, 2005

Ma Yan and her mother wave farewell.

Find out more about the Association for the
Children of Ningxia at its website:
www.enfantsduningxia.org

 

Or write to the association at:
Enfants du Ningxia
45, rue Notre-Dame de Nazareth
75003 Paris
France