Pursuing the Dream to the Very
End
and
Cutting
Paper with Teeth
5
Aril 2007
Shan
Guojun (单国军) isn’t the only
child in his family. When he was born in
1963, Chinese were yet to appreciate the
heavy burden placed upon the earth, and big
family was still very much in fashion with
highly productive women branded “proud mom”
(光荣妈妈). So as it happened,
Shan was born to one of such proud moms and
became the proud seventh child of a family
living in Harbing, in the Northeast of China.
The
pride he brought to the family, however, did
not last very long. Soon it was discovered
that the baby was born with a condition of
cerebellar vermis maldevelopment, which led
him eventually contracting a viral disease:
the infant paralysis. He was kept prisoner in
home ever since.
But
that did not stop him dreaming. When he was
ten, he fell in love with folk art paper
cutting, and aspired to be a paper cutting
artist. Ten years later, he indeed became a
master in the field and he was about to once
again make Shan family proud. Then Fate
stroke again. His condition deteriorated and
he was paralysed from the neck down – he
could no longer cut paper using his hands.
It
would be a lie to say that he did not
consider giving up his dream all together. He
did, as he confessed to the Chinese reporters
twenty years later – he once secretly put
aside the pills his mom gave to him and
swallowed them in one go. He was saved, and
eventually touched by the heart-rending tears
and tender love of his parents and family. He
decided not to back down, and began to learn
how to cut paper with a knife held between
his teeth.
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Mr Shan
Guojun working on
paper cutting by holding the
knife between his teeth
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It
often takes days, even weeks, for him to
finish one paper cut-out. There were
dangerous instances that the knife got stuck
in his mouth, and painful moments when his
lips and gums were badly swollen to the point
that they kept dripping blood. But at all
times his grey-haired mother was by his side,
taking care of his physical needs and
strengthening his spirits.
Gradually,
his accomplishment on paper cutting becomes
widely known in his neighbourhood and beyond,
and his cut-outs are hotly sought after.
Although bedridden and quadriplegic, he is
busier than many people who are able to run
around.
Now
aged over eighty, his mother’s devotion to
help him following his dream is as strong as
it ever was. She acts as his toolmaker and
material purchasing officer. A thousand paper
cut-outs have witnessed both a man who is
staunch and unbowed to his ill fate, and a
mother whose unconditional love and support
for her son never fades.
But
his physical condition keeps worsening, and
early this year he was diagnosed with
prostate disease. Knowing he might not have
much time to spare, he set an ambitious final
task for himself: to produce 108 paper
cut-outs as his gifts to the 2008 Beijing
Olympics. He is determined to pursuit his
dream to the very end and to leave proud
legacy behind.
China stories are told at wenhousecrafts.com
.............................................
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