Zhou Chao’s Story
William Hicks, Group 2: Fiction, International College Hong Kong Hong Lok Yuen
y name is Zhou Chao. I was an ordinary rice farmer. Every day was the same: I rose at sunrise and
toiled on my farm until sun set. My life was hard but free. I was happy with the way I lived.
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One day, all the villagers were abuzz with the news that our revered Emperor was ordering a
made to keep out the Mongols. He had thousands of workers slaving to create his Great Wall
hina. It was a tough sacrifice for their country. What it was like for the workers there? Were
hungry, thirsty, stressed, tired? I heard that the imperial guards were unimaginably strict,
sometimes killing the workers for making a tiny mistake. We heard people died working on the wall and never
came back. It was a world away from our simple life in the country.
M
Until one day, Fate took away the life I knew. One bright morning, just like any other morning, there was a
hard knock on my door. “Yes?” I asked, opening the door. Standing in front of me was a mean looking officer in
the imperial army uniform.
“
Come with me now,” he said. “You have been chosen to help construct the wall up north.”
I gasped with shock and terror.
“
NO! I will not leave!” I resisted.
“
You have no choice!” The officer barked. “You must serve your country.”
“
But I…”
“
NO CHOICE!” the officer interrupted. “You must do the Emperor’s bidding. How dare you oppose the
Great Leader?”
Outside, I saw many familiar faces from our village- the strongest and fittest men, who had been dragged,
like me, away from their homes and families, away from the life they knew and could depend on.
Scores of the Emperor’s guards roped all of us together in a long chain. They whipped us to force us to
move- out of our village and away from our homes. All our loved ones, our wives, children, parents and
neighbours could do nothing to stop it. They could only stand there powerlessly, speechlessly watching us
being dragged away to an uncertain destiny.
For hard days that seemed like forever, the guards marched us to the section of the Great Wall nearest our
village. It was there that we had to labour and probably would die. By the time, we got there, many of us were
already half dead from exhaustion, starvation, thirst and sorrow. But it was only going to get worse….
The guards set us to work digging the dry red clay ground that would be formed into bricks. Others
laboured to drag up huge mounds of earth that was used to pack the bricks together. Yet more forced workers
slaved at the brick kilns battling the burning heat to fire the bricks.
Day after day, week after week, month after month, our life of hell kept grinding on and on. The only thing
that kept my spirit and hope alive was the thought of my family and my home. Also, I had found a friend named
Li, who had been forced there, just like me. It turned out he was from the next village. Li looked out for me and
without him; I would have surely lost my spirit to survive. When I despaired that I would ever escape from this
agony, Li would encourage me. “Come on, Zhou,” he whispered at night when we huddled, trying to sleep in
the biting cold winds from Mongolia. “Hope is still there.”
I knew we had to escape or else we would never survive. The Wall would take years to complete, I didn’t
know if I could hold on much longer. I shared my worries with Li and together, we thought of a plan to escape.
We figured out the best chance was at midnight when they changed guards. We would creep out of the camp
and run up the slope behind it. Hopefully, there would be safety on the other side.
One cloudy night, when the moon was covered by fog, we decided it was our time to escape. We crawled
on our hands and knees to the edge of the camp. Then we sprang up and ran as we had never run before. This
really was the race of our lives!
“
Just make it to the slope, be safe!” I kept thinking. I could feel Li right behind me. Suddenly, we heard
the shout of the guards, the alarm was raised and they were on the chase. Somehow, I made it to the bottom of
the slope and scrambled up on my hands and knees. The rocks on the ground cut my hands but I didn’t care. By
a miracle, I made it to the top of the slope.
“
Li, come…” I shouted turning round.
I saw Li half way up the crumbling slope behind me. Right on his back, there were five guards gaining on
him. I could see Li was tiring and slowing down. I started to scramble down desperately wanting to help him
but it was too late.
Li shouted up to me, “Zhou, you go on! Live for both of us. Remember, hope is still there…”