No bodies hang from the streetlamps running along Utopia Parkway.
Huang Ai Yi, a 61-year-old home-care worker, grew up in an unstable China as the newly formed Communist government attempted to rapidly industrialize and cement its power. One such attempt, known in the West as the Cultural Revolution, made violence a nearly every day occurrence. The bodies of persecuted and/or criminals were hanged from roofs and streetlamps.
But today, Huang was turning the corner towards her patient’s house, her lineless face scrunching up against the wind on a chilly, October morning.
“I really don’t like the cold,” she says as her right hand pushes her glasses up before it retreats to her jacket pocket.
While it wasn’t particularly cold for those used to the chilly autumn air in New York City, Huang, wearing a scarf and a puffy jacket, lived in Guangzhou all her life before immigrating to the United States six years ago.
Few pedestrians were on the sidewalks, though many cars kept the street humming with the sound of running engines. Those few not in cars were congregated near signposts that read “Q30 Little Neck and Q31 Bayside” or “Q30 Jamaica and Q31 Jamaica” across the street. Two dog owners were talking as their dogs pawed softly at each other underneath an old oak tree that rustled when a breeze blew past.
“I don’t understand how some people can wear shorts in this weather,” she says as a morning jogger runs past her.
When she was a child, neighborhood schools were closed after she attended just one month of 7th grade. Huang doesn’t remember exactly what she did to fill her day while at home. But the fears of the Cultural Revolution have stuck with her.
“I was scared every day that something bad might happen,” she recalls.
These days Huang helps with her patient’s household chores, cooking and cleaning. Even in early afternoon, heavy curtains drawn over each window blocked most of the sunlight. Sunlight peeking through the cracks in the curtains and the television was all that lit in the room. It was dusk inside.
“Their family is really secretive and protective,” Huang says. “But it’s nothing I can’t deal with.”
Unluckily for Huang, both sides of her family had been wealthy in the years prior to the Communist takeover in China – and wealth in a Communist China was a dangerous possession. Her paternal grandfather was the owner of multiple soap factories in the southern Chinese providence of Guangdong.
When communism took hold, her family was persecuted and their wealth seized. Huang’s father, the son of the wealthy factory owner, had to wear a sign around his neck identifying his affluent background when walking to and from work every day. Capitalism and wealth were treated with animosity; those who came from wealth were abused, humiliated, jailed and even killed.
“Me and my sister would sit on the steps of our house looking up and down the streets for him at night,” said Huang. “We honestly feared for his life and wondered every day if he would make it home.”
The sights and sounds of the city streets vindicated her fears and suspicions as bodies dangled from streetlamps and rooftops, where lawlessness wasn’t an exception but a norm. Each body would be preceded by an identifying cry to notify all those within earshot that a delinquent was being hung up.
“You would hear ‘delinquent’ being shouted and a few people would gather around on the streets to see who it was,” Huang says. “I couldn’t look.”
Troublesome individuals roamed the streets and buildings. Neighbors would warn each other of their imminent arrival before running inside and closing their doors. One time while home alone, Huang heard such a warning.
“I grabbed a knife from the kitchen and ran upstairs to hide behind the bed,” Huang recalls. “The doors and walls were old and weak. They could easily break in.”
Before long, Huang was sent to the countryside to farm. The rural high school was soon reopened and Huang started the 10th grade.
“There was a lot of pressure on me to do well,” Huang says. “City-educated children were expected to be much smarter than rural-educated children.”
In addition to not understanding her textbooks, Huang, along with the other schoolchildren, would have to help the school by farming and collecting dried hay and bushes from the mountains for the kitchens. Having grown up in the city, all this was foreign to Huang.
“I would try to plant the rice crop but they would never stay in the ground,” Huang recalls. “When I planted them, they would all bob back up to the surface.”
Huang was taken further out of her comfort zone as her glasses made her an easy target. She would be the subject of pranks where students would make her plant in an area of the rice field were leeches were common.
“They would call me over and tell me to plant over there,” Huang recalls. “I would start planting and the leeches would latch onto my legs and I would start jumping and kicking trying to get them off.”
Luckily, Huang did have one friend who looked after her and helped her do the chores that she couldn’t do as a short, thin 16-year-old.
“He would go into the mountains with the other students and tell me not to follow them,” Huang recalls. “He would then cut twice the amount of dried hay and bushes and gave half to me so that I would meet the quota.”
Now, at 3:00 PM, and Utopia Parkway is still busy. More pedestrians crowd the sidewalks. Huang wraps the scarf around her neck and walks toward the bus stop. Another day of household chores and cooking had come to an end and while the work still tires her, Huang says it’s due to old age and not the relatively stress-free work.
“It didn’t seem like it at first,” Huang says, “but those years I spent in the countryside were probably the happiest two years of my childhood.”