Xiao Yi brought Nie Cai and Shen Lan to Hope Primary School.
A long river flows through it, which is the provincial boundary between X Province and neighboring provinces. The Hope Primary School in Bancheng Town is on the edge of the river.
The houses in Bancheng Town are dilapidated, but this school is a brand new cement building with a very eye-catching white exterior wall. Just looking at this, Nie Cai has a good impression of this school.
The school had already gone on winter vacation, and the campus was deserted. A haggard old man with gray hair, holding a claw hammer in his hand, opened the school door with a limp leg.
"Principal Wu!"
Xiao Yi was stunned for a moment, with a surprised look on his face, as if he didn't dare to confirm.
"Xiao Yi, is that you?"
Principal Wu was stunned for a moment, and then said in surprise.
Xiao Yi was one of the six teenagers who committed suicide by taking poison. Of course, Principal Wu was deeply impressed by him.
"Why is your hair gray?"
Seeing the old man appear, Xiao Yi's eyes turned red, he hugged Principal Wu and asked.
"Good boy, I'm fine. I just feel uncomfortable. I'm under too much pressure and my spirit is about to collapse."
Only then did he notice Nie Cai holding a camera behind Xiao Yi.
"You reporters?"
He glanced at the hut outside the school gate. Seven or eight big men were squatting at the door. Some were smoking and some were playing cards. They didn't seem to notice him.
"Come in quickly, don't let them find out, otherwise you will be in trouble."
He quickly opened the school door, let Nie Cai, Shen Lan and others in, hurriedly closed the door, and then let out a long breath.
"Don't be nervous."
Nie Cai smiled at Principal Wu and said, "Hello, Principal Wu, I am a reporter from the x province TV station. My surname is Nie, and this is our location host Shen Lan."
"Hello, I am Wu Can, the principal of Hope Primary School."
He quickly combed his gray hair with his hands and said sheepishly: "I was so tired during this period that I didn't even have time to tidy myself up. My image is too ugly. I'm sorry for the teacher's image."
"Are you the only one in school?"
Nie Cai looked around and said at the deserted campus.
"It's winter vacation. They must have gone back to celebrate the New Year. They just left in the morning."
Principal Wu looked slightly sad and said, "I will stay here and take the opportunity to repair the roof of the school canteen to prevent the students from getting cold when the school starts next year."
"Principal Wu, I'm sorry for you... I didn't expect that our suicide would cause such a big reaction..."
Xiao Yi's eyes were red and he said: "I still remember that year when there was a flood. You carried us out of the classroom with chest-deep water. Your legs were hit by a rolling stone in the water and became lame at that time. You are like this How can a good person be removed from office!"
Nie Cai vaguely remembered that in this case file, the education department and the principal were dismissed, including Wu Can.
When such a big thing happens, someone has to take responsibility. As the principal of this Hope Primary School, Wu Can, if he is not the scapegoat, who will be
"It's okay. Regardless of whether I am dismissed or not, I will be here. At most, I will be an ordinary teacher and I won't leave you behind."
Principal Wu touched Xiao Yi's head and said with a smile: "There are only about ten teachers in the whole school. The teachers who support teaching never last more than three months before running away. I have to wait until a new teacher comes before I can leave with confidence."
The conditions in Bancheng Town are too difficult. There are no young teachers in the school who are willing to come here. One teacher has to be responsible for several classes, and manpower is very scarce. He, the principal, is no exception. He also teaches four or five classes, and there is one person missing. It's almost unsustainable.
Wait until a new teacher comes before leaving? I don’t know what happened in the Year of the Monkey, but Principal Wu can only continue to teach here without salary or establishment.
In fact, places like Bancheng Town are pretty good. At least they have built a Hope Primary School with five or six teachers.
Further into the mountains, conditions are even worse. There are only one or two teachers in each school, food and accommodation are all in the school, and living materials are almost non-existent. It is that kind of place that is truly difficult.
Principal Wu led Nie Caizou and others into the campus. After the mass suicide case, slogans such as "Adhere to the Mass Line" were removed from the school blackboard newspaper and replaced with "Cherish Life" and "Look at Healthy books, don’t form gangs, don’t participate in feudal superstitious activities” and other slogans.
"Principal Wu, your foot was injured during the last flood? Can you tell us about it?"
Looking at Principal Wu's limping legs, Shen Lan intuitively felt that there should be a story in it.
I heard from Xiao Yi that Principal Wu's legs were lame because he saved children from the flood. There should be a touching story in this.
"It all happened last year. As long as the children are fine... It's a pity that I didn't keep an eye on them this year. It would have been nice if I could have learned more knowledge when I was studying psychological education."
But Principal Wu had no interest in this matter. As he talked, he seemed to think of something.
He looked at the iron gate, looked at the group of big men outside worriedly, sighed and said: "You have almost finished taking pictures, you can go, be careful of being discovered."
As the former principal of the school, the media must have been looking for him a lot, but Nie Cai didn't see a word of him in any reports. Maybe he had been given a silence order long ago.
There are people guarding the entrances of students who have taken drugs, and there must be people at the school as well. It may even be a place where the town government monitors them.
Thinking that this order was most likely to be issued, Nie Cai quickly took out a piece of paper, which was the "instruction" written by Mayor Du to cooperate with Nie Cai in the interview.
"Mayor Du?"
Principal Wu glanced at Nie Cai's note and said in surprise.
"Yes, we approached Mayor Du and he agreed to let us do the exclusive report."
Nie Cai gave a random reason and said.
Seeing this, Principal Wu's face moved slightly, and there seemed to be a glimmer of hope.
"We have subsidies for the construction of psychological counseling rooms, but unfortunately they have been blocked by the county. The county government can't even pay wages, so we have to find a way from this aspect."
Principal Wu gritted his teeth and said, "If this psychological counseling room can be built, maybe Xiaobai and Longlong will not have to die."
A large number of children in the school have parents who have gone out to work. They are considered left-behind children. Most of them are rebellious and withdrawn. Psychological counselors are actually very useful.
But he immediately shook his head and said: "Even if there is a psychological counseling room, there will be no psychological counselors coming to this poor place. In fact, the result is still the same. We, the supporting teachers, can teach Chinese, mathematics and ideological education well. , where do we get psychological counseling?”
Nie Cai was slightly silent. He knew the situation of teaching in X Province. It was so difficult that young people full of passion could not endure it.
The wages in elementary school were horribly low, and they were often in arrears. It was difficult to support himself under today's price levels. He just saw a vegetable patch behind the campus, which should have been cultivated by the school's teachers. This was the only way to maintain self-sufficiency.
If I didn't have the idea of being a candle and sacrificing myself to light up others, there would be no way I could stay here.
As he said that, Principal Wu stopped in front of a teacher's room. The plastic sign in the classroom said Class Six (1), which was the class where the mass suicide occurred.
Xiao Yi ran into the classroom in two steps and walked to a table in the middle of the classroom.
"Xiao Bai, why did you just leave... We agreed that we should share the blessings and share the hardships."
He touched the words 1.19 engraved on the table and burst into tears.
When Nie Cai and Shen Lan saw Xiao Yi's appearance, their expressions were slightly touched.
"That was the desk of Xiao Bai, who was the first to commit suicide by taking poison. She was the squad leader of Class 61, and she was pretty. Unfortunately, she was only eleven years old... Even if there was something unthinkable, she shouldn't have committed suicide."
Principal Wu introduced Nie Cai in a low voice. He regarded these children in the school as his own children and would know the general situation.
"Principal Wu, what would you do if you encountered something unresolved?"
Shen Lan shook his head and asked.
"I can only endure it."
"What if I can't help it?"
Shen Lan looked at his white hair and haggard appearance and said with emotion.
Can the word "tolerance" solve all problems? I endured it, endured other people’s misunderstandings, endured the infamy, and suffered so much pain that my hair grew old overnight...
"I don't know, I think I might go crazy."
Principal Wu lowered his head and murmured.
After the incident, almost all of his hair turned white in a short period of time. The grief for the child was one reason, and the bigger reason was that he could not face the accusations of others.
He was dismissed from office, and naturally, people on the Internet targeted him with accusations of irresponsibility, indirect murder, etc. He could hardly bear these accusations.
Principal Wu originally had the opportunity to return to teach in a primary school in the urban area, but he was not willing to leave. Instead, he chose to stay at Bancheng Town Hope Primary School for these children.
It's winter vacation now, and everyone is happily going home to celebrate the New Year, but he is the only one who dares not go back because he is afraid of others' criticism.
He obviously devoted everything he had to the education of children in mountainous areas, but in the end he ended up like this... Who can bear it
As a mentally sound adult, he has moments of mental breakdown, let alone young and ignorant teenagers.
After sighing, Nie Cai found that Xiao Yi's mood had stabilized a little, so he motioned to Shen Lan to go into the classroom and have a heart-to-heart talk with Xiao Yi.
Shen Lan nodded, walked to Xiao Yi's side, squatted down, and said, "Xiao Yi, you don't have to be too sad. People always have to look forward, right?"
"Sister, do you have any good friends?"
Xiao Yi asked with his eyes widened.
"Of course. I had a good friend when I was a child. We went to school together, ate together, and went home together... But suddenly one day, she transferred to another school. I was so sad that I couldn't even eat. Later, when I grew up, Understand, people always have to be separated, but some things are always there, just like the sentence in the book - the world is as close as the neighbor."
We share blessings and share hardships. Who doesn’t have a few close friends in school? But if we really want to die together... that would be too much.
Nie Cai held the camera and secretly stretched his fingers. The female reporter was very considerate. It was true that she, a rough guy, could play kof with him, but she couldn't do it when it came to talking.
After hearing Shen Lan's words, Xiao Yi hugged Shen Lan's knees and cried heartbreakingly.
He suddenly choked and took a few steps back, ran to the back of the classroom, dug up the loose soil in the green belt, and dug out an iron box.