A Touching Modern Fairy Tale That Moves the World -- Ma Yan's Diary: Ma Yan's Diary

Author: Ma Yan
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2003-10-01
Features: The diary tells the daily life of a female student from a western rural area, her longing for education, her worries about dropping out, her pain over her mother not allowing her to attend school, and her determination to change her fate through learning. Diary Excerpt: July 13, 2001, Friday (Clear)
Mother steamed some steamed buns, and she called her father inside to eat them. I followed her inside and ate a small bowl of the leftover black rice from the afternoon. After finishing, I wanted to get another bowl, but my little brother had already eaten it all. I asked Mother if I could have one bun. Mother said, "Eat it tomorrow, you can't have it today." I said, "I'll just have a small one," but Mother still refused. So I went outside to sleep and watched the stars in the sky, thinking, "Did I not get into the girls' middle school? Is Mother still angry?" I started blaming Mother for not even giving me a meal at night. I secretly cried.
July 30, 2001, Monday (Clear)
This afternoon, while writing my diary, I looked for my fountain pen, but it was gone. I asked my two younger brothers if they had seen it, but they said no. I searched in the spot where I had written my diary yesterday, but couldn't find it. I asked Mother if she had seen it, and she said, "I saw you put your pen and notebook on the kang [traditional bed], so I put them in the drawer to keep them safe." But I couldn't find it in the drawer either. My heart broke. You might laugh, but is a pen really worth being sad over? You don't know the story behind this pen—it was bought with the savings I had accumulated over two semesters, without spending it on anything else. I saw that other classmates each had two or three pens, but I didn't even have one, so I couldn't help but buy one. The hardship of this pen is actually my own hardship. The reason Mother gave me money was that I could only eat two meals of yellow rice a day, and she gave me money so I could buy some steamed buns to eat. I endured hunger and saved up money. For this pen, I endured so much hardship. It taught me what a hard life is and what a happy life is. Every time I saw it, I felt like I was seeing Mother. But I disappointed her. I'm truly useless, still living a life worse than a beast in school, and now I didn't even get into the girls' middle school. What's the point of living?