When rape flowers begin to blossom in the rugged fields of southwest China, people know it is time to depart. Young fathers and mothers leave home to find jobs, putting toddlers and teenagers into the hands of elderly grandparents.
For the past decades, spring always brought hope along with a sense of the inescapable sorrow of separation for people at Dazhai village, Bijie county, Guizhou Province. The village has over 2,200 people, mostly of the Miao ethnicity, and the most common way to escape poverty is to find jobs elsewhere.
Cai Qun, a 36-year-old mother, repeatedly experinced such departures before emerging as a creative embroidery artist and becoming a successful entrepreneur. She is also among the 2,800-strong deputies of the 12th National People's Congress, now gathering for the most important political meeting of the year in Beijing.[Special coverage]
Cai wants to bring more congressional and public attention to the fate of China's "left-behind children."
"A child needs a mother. Stop the mothers from leaving and bring them back," she said.
Cai's hometown, Bijie, a poor city in Guizhou of southwest China, has witnessed the brutal damage poverty and absence of parental care can do.
In 2012, five street children in Bijie died from carbon monoxide poisoning when burning charcoal for warmth, in a roadside dumpster. In 2015, four left-behind children aged 5 to 13, from one family, died after drinking pesticide at home.
There are about 260,000 left-behind children in Bijie. Nationwide, China has more than 60 million children in rural areas who are left with relatives, usually grandparents. These children are easy victims of tragedies such as murder, trafficking and suicide.
"I hope there will be more incentives, like loans to small business who can offer jobs to mothers in their hometowns," Cai said. "When mothers do not have to leave, there are fewer left-behind children."
FROM WASTE-PICKER TO LAWMAKER
Cai's childhood was mostly about fighting hunger, the reason she left hometown. Cai's mother, now 87, gave birth to 13 babies, of which six survived, with Cai Qun the youngest. She has four older sisters and a brother.
Her parents grew corn and sweet potatoes on a small piece of land. "We did not have a paddy field, so it was very difficult to feed us. My mother always had to borrow food from neighbors," she said.
At the age of 12, Cai followed her sisters to provincial capital Guiyang to make a living collecting garbage.
"We picked food, cakes and vegetables to eat. We picked plastic bottles to sell. I was most happy when I got an empty Maotai bottle -- it could sell for five yuan and got us a nice meal," she said.
Like most girls in her village, Cai married early. She gave birth to her daughter Yang Linfeng at the age of 16.
