Trapped in the House His Father Bought With Gold Bars, He Won't Even Discuss the Demolition: "Talking Would Just Cause More Trouble" | Housing and Our Lives #15

The third report in the series, following Why Does Changle Road Matter So Much?

In 69 years, Wu Chenhua seems never once to have had a new house. He has lived since birth in the house his father bought with gold bars — under 60 square meters, in Zhonghecun, Lane 272 on Changle Road.

The south side of Lane 272 is known as "Shanghai's Ura-Harajuku," home to some of China's earliest streetwear boutiques. Cut through the lane to the north side and you come out at Datongfang, a sunken bar street the Huangpu District government built in 2017.

A few steps apart: at night Datongfang sells cocktails at 70 yuan a glass, while Wu Chenhua gets two meals out of a jin of rice cakes that cost him 3 yuan.

The lane grew out of the Shanghai branch of the World Red Cross Society, put up in 1925. The residential blocks around it were built to surround the Red Cross building, and the house Wu Chenhua lives in was originally quarters for the organization's volunteers.

It has never been renovated. The ground floor is the kitchen; the second and third floors are each under 20 square meters. For years the household has kept three beds in place — Wu Chenhua's 69 years here amount to swapping one bed for another. The three beds once held his parents, his younger brother and himself. After his parents died, the spare bed went to his brother's daughter.

As we talked, his voice carried a helpless kind of resentment. It may be the mood of his whole life. A cramped existence has worn him down: too many conflicts, not one of them solvable.

Part of that cramping goes back to his father's label, "capitalist." Wu Chenhua's father once owned a machine factory in Shanghai. After the 1956 conversion to joint state-private ownership, the family's income fell off a cliff, and Wu Chenhua was shut out of every avenue for getting ahead: no promotion at work, and none of the work-unit housing others of his generation received.

The other part is a disagreement inside the family over the demolition, which made them miss the resettlement window. His household and his brother's were left stuck in the old house, the resettlement question is still unanswered, and he no longer has the means to buy a commercial apartment of his own.

On January 8, 2017, a notice went up at the mouth of the lane: 93% of residents agree to the demolition. Wu Chenhua doubts the number — he never voted. In our interview he kept returning to his distrust of the authorities, and used "the old society" out of habit to mean his own past. He does not seem to notice that although the "new society" arrived long ago, his world looks no different from the one he had 30 years ago at the factory. He still has not gone to talk to anyone about the resettlement, just as he learned growing up: talking would just cause more trouble.

We recorded our conversation with him as an oral account:

I was born in 1949. This house used to be my parents' — my father traded gold bars for it. It's a very old house, built by the French in 1925.

I've lived here since the day I was born, more than 60 years. Our lane came after the International Red Cross finished its building; the residential block next to it was built afterward. When I was born there were still two boxy ambulances parked at the Red Cross — custom-built ambulances — and a few foreigners around; you could still watch them save people. Two very thick flagpoles stood in front of the building.

The old Jinjiang Hotel used to be near us, and it often received important guests, so for reasons of political vetting and security — those were the years of "landlords, rich peasants, counterrevolutionaries, bad elements, rightists" — anyone with something in his political dossier, a landlord, a rich peasant, a counterrevolutionary, a rightist, wasn't allowed to live on Changle Road. They'd tell you to move into an empty place on Chongqing Road, because they considered you dangerous. That was called "internal control."

The Garden Hotel is nearby too, right at the corner of Maoming Road and Changle Road. Back then, when Chairman Mao came to Shanghai he swam there — it had a proper heated indoor pool. When the Soviet revisionists were going to attack the Chinese, a military air-raid shelter was dug underneath it; they worked on it every night.

This house once held my father, my mother, my younger brother and two younger sisters — six of us counting me. Later my sisters married and moved out. My parents slept in one bed, I had one, my brother had one: three beds. It's still three now — my brother's daughter in one, my wife and I in one, my brother and his wife in one. All these years it's just been a big bed for a small one, a small bed for a big one.

Now it's just two households here, mine and my brother's — five people. My brother is on the third floor, I'm on the second, 20 square meters each. My niece has a small room at the back, 9 square meters. She's at Shanghai University now, comes home a day or two every Friday, then goes straight back.

We used to wash at the public bathhouse. My brother used to do interior decorating, and he put in a shower himself, so we bathe at home now. Later he added a Japanese washlet, fitted onto the old-style toilet — when you're done there's a jet of water to rinse yourself.

"We were so poor we had nothing at all"

My father ran a machine factory, fifty or sixty workers. He was classified as a capitalist, and every day he was struggled against at the plant and made to write self-criticisms. Then came joint state-private ownership: he had to hand over the means of production, hand over the factory. He didn't want to. He'd put that factory together with his own hands — why should he give it to you? Being a boss doesn't drop out of the sky either; it's exhausting.

They cut his wages too, and he had no money. At first he earned a lot, over 300 yuan a month. After the conversion it fell sharply. Figuring a bit over 10 yuan of living costs per person, the six of us cost my father about 80 yuan a month. My mother had no income then either, so money was very tight. Just staying alive in those years wasn't easy.

In Chinese history class we used to be taught, "One good rice harvest in Sichuan feeds the whole country" — if Sichuan had a good year, there was grain enough nationwide. But by the Three Years of Natural Disasters we were kneading vegetable scraps together with a little flour and eating that. Compared with elsewhere, the state did protect Shanghai to a degree. How? Back then, if you had any relatives in Hong Kong, they'd send over a bit of Hong Kong money and some goods every year. Our neighbors had relatives in Hong Kong, and seeing how hard we had it they'd say, "Take a can of oil" — rendered lard in a tin.

We were so poor then we had nothing at all. One person got a few liang of sliced meat, and there weren't even coupons for cakes. That's why people of my generation rarely throw money around — we don't believe in it. You people today are lucky beyond belief: whether or not McDonald's is any good, if you have money you can buy anything.

Things at home were so hard that the moment I finished middle school and a work unit would take me, I went straight to work. I'd been at Shanghai Nanchang Middle School, on Fuxing Road. Because of the Cultural Revolution the schools shut and classes stopped. I should have gone on to high school, but who was studying during the Cultural Revolution? It began in 1966 and classes simply ended — the students split into factions, rebel factions, struggling against the teachers, struggling against the principal.

Once I was working, whatever else happened, I had a fixed income every month. However little it was — say 20 yuan, with 10 yuan a head for living costs — 20 yuan meant I could support two people. When my younger brother and sisters wore out their shoes, every two or three months I could buy them a pair.

In 1968 I was assigned to a textile mill at Jiaozhou Road and Changshou Road. Under the Japanese it had been Naigai Cotton Mill No. 13 and No. 14; later it was renamed State Cotton Mill No. 1. Most of the people there had fled to Shanghai from northern Jiangsu, arriving before Liberation. The mill ran very hot, and my job was to cool the workshops and hold the temperature steady.

Between 1970 and 1972, after the Zhenbao Island clash with the Soviet revisionists, the Soviets were going to attack us. The country was weak, and we were told that the moment war broke out we should go down to the basements, so every worker at our plant had to make bricks and dig air-raid shelters. After my shift I'd spend a few hours making bricks for them — volunteer work, no pay.

Not having enough to eat was one thing; the blow to your spirit was heavier. A capitalist's son — who at the work unit was going to like you? They'd never give me anything important to do. There were bicycle coupons then: you needed a coupon to buy a bicycle, money alone wasn't enough. Cakes needed cake coupons too, and when the unit had a few of those it handed them to whoever it pleased — never to me. Say 10 people, and 2 of them are cadres' children: the coupons go to them. Capitalists, landlords, rich peasants, counterrevolutionaries, bad elements, rightists — we never crossed their minds.

I worked at that mill for 24 years, from 1968 until around 1990. I stayed a worker the whole time and never became a cadre. In more than 20 years I should have had annual leave every year; I got not one day. That I survived at all is something. I also couldn't afford to argue much with the leadership, so I didn't go looking for trouble.

My family's situation improved a little in 1978, when the policy corrections came through. My father had earned 300 yuan a month; after he handed the machine factory over, it was cut to 80, with 200 yuan docked every month for no reason — they docked his wages for more than 10 years. When the corrections came through they gave the deducted money back: 200 yuan a month, 2,400 a year, 24,000 over 10 years. I didn't think it was much.

Later, sometime in the seventies, they were putting up four big plants in Minhang District — a medium-sized machinery plant, the People's Electric Machinery Factory and so on. Electric motors were my father's own trade; they should have had him advising. Instead they sent him to dig earth and lay foundations, doing manual labor.

After 1990 I changed jobs and went to the Galaxy Hotel, on Yan'an Road at Zhongshan Road West — it's been renamed Xinye Center now, right next to the Hongqiao Hotel. The newly built hotel needed a central air-conditioning operator, and I'd done heating and cooling at the mill, so it matched exactly. The mill had never allocated me housing, and that had always rankled.

Under the policy, only people with under 4.5 square meters per person qualified for an allocation. If you didn't meet that figure, there was no point raising it at all. And on top of that I was a capitalist's son. I knew perfectly well that talking would just cause more trouble, so I never raised it with them. All my colleagues got housing — good or bad, at least they got something.

In the early '90s wages were relatively high and bonuses were good, because after reform and opening up, old Kuomintang veterans could come back from Taiwan to visit relatives, so the hotel did well. Foreigners came to travel, and a lot more Hong Kong money was coming into the mainland.

I can say that in my three to five years at the Galaxy Hotel nobody held anything against me, and my work was certainly good, because what I ran was the central air conditioning for a building that size — 32 floors, more than 800 staff in the hotel. Heat in winter, cold air in summer, all of it operated by me, and the leadership thought well of me. There were plenty of perks then; showers and haircuts and washes were all free.

Because my father was a capitalist, my mother never had wages of her own. Counted as a worker's dependent, in the end she could only draw a 100-yuan living subsidy, which wasn't enough. My pay at the Galaxy was decent by then, so I made up the difference. At the hotel I definitely cleared 300 to 400 yuan a month, 500 to 800 in a good month. Earlier, when the textile mill went under, it handed the workers 20,000 or 30,000 yuan and washed its hands of them — all those people were laid off. I was slightly better off because I'd jumped ship early. But we'd borrowed a few hundred yuan from neighbors to get through the Cultural Revolution, and that had to be paid back too. It's hard to sum up in a few words.

"I've lived on the same piece of land for 60 years — of course I'm its rightful owner"

We're Lane 272 on Changle Road; next to us is Lane 236. The resettlement is mainly these two lanes. Almost all the houses in the lane are leased housing, not privately owned. Leased housing belongs to the state Housing Authority — we rent from the state. I pay the state a bit over 100 yuan a month in rent, and in all these years it hasn't gone up much.

Right now it's just my household and my brother's. The lease was originally in my parents' names, and there's only one lease card; we have no property deed. Under the resettlement, one lease card gets you only one apartment, which creates all sorts of problems. Give my brother an apartment, and where do I live? I can't sleep in the street.

Every time Shanghai carries out a resettlement, nobody can work out how the policy was decided. You want to tear the houses down, but you don't give the people living in them comparable housing — where are they supposed to live? Hangzhou is different. If Hangzhou tears something down, there's always comparable housing, or if you don't want housing, a suitable sum of money. Here there's no housing and the money is very little — who would want to be resettled? You'd think people wouldn't object to having their housing upgraded, right? But upgrading housing can't be turned into a way for district officials to profit. That's how a lot of things get ruined.

I do want to move, but the terms have to be somewhere close to what we have. At a minimum our two households need basic housing — I'm not asking for anything big, two bedrooms and a living room, or two separate apartments. And there has to be a limit on how far out they push us: far enough and you're in Taicang, which is Jiangsu Province. When Hefei Road was cleared, people were moved to Taicang. But Changle Road is dead center in Shanghai — do you think I'd accept your terms?

It hasn't even reached that point. Last August they knocked on the door and took our household registration booklet away to photocopy. They never came back to talk, and in fact I haven't talked to them either, and don't want to, because I already know what terms they'll offer and they're nowhere near what we're asking. Approaching my brother on his own is no use either — among people living together, if even one person disagrees, it doesn't go through.

My brother's view? We've never discussed it. We don't bring the subject up, because it would be awkward. Sooner or later my brother and I will have to talk, but he also thinks getting the housing we'd consider ideal is impossible, so we're in no hurry. We think this environment is fine to live in — why should we be moved around? A house is for living in.

If they drove us out and something excellent went up here fast, I could at least say it was in the national interest. But right now nobody can even say clearly what they intend to build here. Last year the notice said more than 93% of residents had agreed. Who supervises that 93%? Who says 93% is really 93%?

I have two younger sisters. One is doing quite well now, the other not so well. The one who did well made money in stocks and bought an apartment south of Ruijin Road, and another in Yichang, Jiangxi — both over 170 square meters. I don't envy her, and I don't wish for anything more for myself.

My other sister is in the Nanshi area. She's ill at the moment, staying in a nursing hospital in Qingpu, and her wages and her husband's both go to paying for it. Her resettlement apartment won't be finished for another two years.

She's mentioned wanting to move her household registration in with us, so that when the resettlement comes everyone could get a share of the housing. But we know it isn't possible. The state keeps records on everything now, and the policy doesn't allow it. If she had no housing, maybe; since she does, it's out of the question.

Moving her registration in would also cut into what we're allotted — who's going to agree to that? If they gave us 10 million yuan, it was originally my brother and me splitting it, 5 million each. Bring my sister in and it's a bit over 3 million each. It isn't that I want the money; what I want is a settled place to live. And they'll never give us 10 million anyway — if they did, the people who moved out earlier for 600,000 or 700,000 would revolt. I don't want a single yuan of it. Just give me suitable living conditions. But so far they've given me nothing at all. Beyond the value of this house there's the value of the land — doesn't my land in the center of this city count for anything? I've lived here 60 years, on the same piece of land for 60 years — of course I'm its rightful owner.

What does "it all belongs to the state" mean? I belong to the state too.

Plenty of people here want the demolition, especially the ones in the little pavilion rooms, because those were all allocated by the state. Back then the state gave these 13-to-14-square-meter rooms to people with no housing, so they moved in without paying a cent. Now they're waiting for the demolition, because it gets them money and better housing at once. But we moved in by trading gold bars with the sublandlord. In more than 60 years the state has never allocated us housing, not one square meter. Why should I agree to the demolition? I think it's unreasonable.

The houses facing north, toward Julu Road, were all state-allocated. Most of the people in them are from out of town; some retired as teachers on good pensions, took loans and bought good houses elsewhere, made their money and have already moved out. Hardly anyone lives on the north side now. The south-facing houses, on Changle Road, cost more because that's the main street, but the Shanghainese on the south side are counting every yuan each month. Even Shanghainese can't afford to buy housing.

"Shanghai people have the hardest housing situation in the world"

At first they said these two lanes would be torn down; then they said they'd be preserved, because a building of note like this Red Cross one can't be demolished — so the matter was simply left undecided. Ordinary soldiers moved in in 1949, and it's their descendants living there now. Whose house it actually is, no official knows.

They were already saying in 2007 that it would be demolished. Since 2007 our water and electricity bills have never been delivered. Last year they came around again, said the buildings would be preserved, and it was off again. I don't think about buying a house either — I don't trust their policy, because they say one thing today and another tomorrow. I genuinely can't tell how it will go.

In the first resettlement round in 2007, some people had already taken the money and gone out to buy or rent elsewhere. Everyone at No. 10, Lane 272 left; it's empty inside. They got a bit over 700,000 yuan altogether, not a lot. After they moved out they wanted to go back and ask the government for more, but by then nobody would give them anything.

I didn't move in 2007, because money wouldn't solve my family's problem — everyone in the household wanted something different, and 700,000-odd yuan wasn't enough.

Think about it: I've worked more than 40 years, and my wage is still under 5,000 yuan. Without those 40-some years it would only be 2,000 or 3,000. The people Shanghai sent to support the interior — to Chengdu, Guiyang, Lanzhou — still make only a bit over 2,000 a month; the ones sent to Anhui make only a bit over 1,000. Go and look at Jiangxi Road and Fuzhou Road any Wednesday at 10 in the morning: they're up there taking their grievances to the authorities. Outsiders all assume Shanghainese wages are very high, but a Shanghainese needs a particular work history to earn a high wage. A lot of it is misleading. I'd say Shanghai people have the hardest housing situation in the world.

In 2009 my mother fell and had to be hospitalized. She was Shanghainese, but she had no labor insurance and no medical insurance — that was right at the healthcare reform, and her own card had 500 yuan of social relief money on it. Even now not every Shanghainese has medical insurance; you have to pay in to be covered.

I make a bit over 4,000 yuan a month now. At midday I eat boiled rice cake with napa cabbage and a little shredded pork. Apart from medicine when I'm ill, I don't really spend on anything. I've been to Europe, to Germany, to England — last year, after Brexit, when the pound hit its lowest, I went to Britain and spent under 20,000 yuan.

This is the city center; my wife and I living in a bit over 20 square meters isn't bad, and we have no children. It's small but quite comfortable, and we're used to it. A bit cramped is a bit cramped. Send me somewhere far away and — we're getting on now, high blood pressure, this and that — right now when we see a doctor we go to Ruijin Hospital, a stop or so away. Move us far out and seeing a doctor becomes inconvenient too.

The best would be somewhere close by, like the CapitaLand Center on Dagu Road. Would they give us that? Certainly not. Or somewhere like the Maoming Apartments that Tung Chee-hwa's younger brother built, across from the New Jinjiang Hotel. But I know that even if they gave me a place like that I couldn't afford to live in it — the property management fees alone are fierce. They don't tell the truth and we don't tell the truth, and that makes it very hard to talk.

Illustration: Lin Yuyao

Cover image: Unsplash