Zhang Wei

Zhang Wei was born on October 21, 1995, in a village area of Gouchang in Zhijin County, Bijie, in the mountainous karst of western Guizhou. The county sat inside the People’s Republic, governed through township and county offices. The family lived in the everyday Han world of Southwestern Mandarin, state schools, and seasonal rites at graves and household altars rather than regular temple attendance.

His father, Zhang Guoshun, farmed small plots and kept a few animals when feed allowed. His mother, Luo Meilan, ran the household and worked the fields when planting and harvesting came. The house held a third adult too: his paternal grandmother, Zhang Shuhua. She slept close to the kitchen warmth in winter, kept the money in a cloth pouch, and watched the children when the parents were in the fields. Wei arrived after two girls. Zhang Li, born in 1989, already handled chores with a seriousness that made her seem older than she was. Zhang Fang, born in 1992, watched Wei with quick attention and laughed at him when he tried to keep up.

The family was poor enough that every purchase carried a small argument. Soap, cooking oil, a new pair of shoes for school—Meilan counted and recounted. Guoshun’s temper rose fastest when someone broke a tool or wasted grain. Still, the house had routines. Before Spring Festival, Shuhua supervised the cleaning, then taped fresh red paper couplets at the door. On Qingming, they carried paper money, incense, and a small bottle of baijiu to the graves. Wei learned to bow, set the incense upright, and wait while adults spoke quietly to ancestors by name.

He started primary school with a slate of cheap notebooks and a pencil cut short from use. His teachers drilled characters and basic arithmetic. He talked more than he studied. At home, he chased his sisters into laughter, then got scolded for making noise when Shuhua wanted quiet. In summer he liked cold noodles with vinegar from a roadside stall after school; in winter he hovered near the stove and peeled sweet potatoes, stealing bites before they cooled.

When he was twelve, winter weather came hard. In early 2008 freezing rain turned paths slick and coated branches and wires. The village spent days with unreliable power and slow travel to the town market. Guoshun worried aloud about food prices and the condition of the animals. Wei, home from school, carried water carefully and learned how quickly a small hardship could spread across the household.

The following year brought a change that cut deeper. In 2009 Shuhua’s health failed after months of coughing and weakness. She had been the one who told him stories at night, who slipped him extra rice when his father wasn’t watching, who let him sit beside her while she mended clothes. Now she insisted on sitting upright to supervise meals, then began to stay in bed. Wei hovered around her room, asking if she wanted tea, bringing cups she waved away untouched. She died that year. It was his first close death. Afterward Meilan’s days stretched longer, and Wei’s sisters stepped in without being asked. Wei snapped back when corrected and followed his mother around when the house turned quiet. At night he lay awake thinking about money, school, whether his father would get angry. The next morning he covered it by being louder.

By 2010 he had started middle school, taller than many classmates and quick to find friends. The area went through repeated dry stretches that year and the next, and water management became a regular topic at home. Wei carried buckets and watched his father argue with neighbors about whose turn it was at a shared source. School mattered less than cash. His marks stayed middling, and when teachers pushed him toward more study he joked his way out and promised he would try tomorrow.

He sat with boys who traded cheap cigarettes and stories about jobs in cities. In 2011 he joined older youths at night markets when they visited town, buying skewers and sweet drinks with coins they should have saved. He liked being the one who ordered, who called out to stall owners, who made others laugh by repeating their accents.

By sixteen he began talking about leaving. Roads improved, buses ran more reliably, and people returned from Guangdong and other provinces with smartphones and new jackets. His father complained about foolish spending, then asked those same returnees for contact numbers. Wei took short jobs near home—moving materials, helping a mason, loading sacks—and then followed introductions to city work. He learned how labor hiring worked: early mornings, men crowding around a foreman, bargaining fast, taking whatever came.

A labor broker everyone called Qian Laoban pulled him into a crew and taught him what mattered on site: keep your helmet on when supervisors appear, carry more than you talk when the concrete arrives, and don’t count on wages coming exactly on time. Wei listened when the talk was practical. When it came to saving money, he drifted. A good pay month meant he bought better meals for the room, treated coworkers to beer, and sent a remittance home late with a cheerful excuse.

He rented shared rooms near worksites and slept on narrow beds with his clothes folded at his feet. He made friends easily. One was He Ming, a fellow villager who became his closest companion in the city. They ate late-night bowls of noodles, played cards, and joked about foremen behind their backs. When Wei felt cornered by worry, he walked outside to a convenience store, bought sunflower seeds, and chewed them while watching traffic. He called his sister Fang more than anyone else back home. She had married and moved to a town in a neighboring county, and they talked at night when her husband was working late, trading complaints about money and gossip about people from the village. His older sister Li had also married by then, staying closer to home and visiting their parents more often.

In 2016 he met Li Jing through coworkers. She worked in the city and had her own small circle of friends. Wei talked too much on their first few meetings and still got her number. They dated fast, meeting after shifts for spicy hotpot or rice noodles, then sitting outside on plastic stools and watching people pass. They slept together that year, in rented rooms with thin walls and a shared bathroom down the hall. He told He Ming about it in a bragging tone, then stopped when he saw how quickly stories traveled.

The relationship started well but frayed. Wei changed sites. Li Jing wanted clearer plans. He forgot promises, arrived late, spent money on nights out instead of saving it. When she complained he apologized and then did it again. In 2018 she ended it. He took it badly for a week, calling too often, then pretending it didn’t matter. He sent more money home for a while as if that proved something.

In 2019 he began a serious long-distance relationship with Chen Xia, a woman from near his home county he connected with through hometown networks and WeChat. Her family asked about marriage early. His own parents asked too, especially with his sisters aging into their own households. Wei answered with jokes, then with irritation when pressed. He liked her voice on the phone at night and the idea that someone waited. But when her father brought up bride price, Wei said he was saving. When she asked when he would visit properly, he said after the next job.

COVID-19 changed his working life in 2020. Travel restrictions and testing rules cut routes, sites paused, and hiring became uneven. Qian Laoban called when work resumed, but the jobs were shorter and the pay slower. Wei spent long evenings in cramped rooms scrolling his phone, then going downstairs to smoke with other men who were also stuck. He called Chen Xia more often and argued more. She complained about his lack of direction. He complained about her demands.

In 2021, during that strained period, he slept with another woman, Liu Yan, whom he met through the social strip near a worksite—small restaurants, loud rooms, people drinking after shifts. She worked at one of the eateries and flirted easily. It happened twice over a few weeks, then stopped without argument. He kept it quiet. He watched his phone for messages afterward, feared gossip, and acted extra attentive to Chen Xia in calls. The secrecy made him jumpy. He lashed out at He Ming for a minor joke and later bought him a pack of cigarettes to smooth it over.

Chen Xia ended the relationship in 2022. Wei did not fight for it. He told his mother it “didn’t work out” and changed the topic. As restrictions eased, work steadied again. By 2023 he had a regular place in a crew, still doing general labor—carrying materials, clearing debris, helping skilled workers—without moving into a trade. He liked the days when tasks were simple and the crew joked through the heat.

In 2024 and 2025 he returned home for Spring Festival visits, bringing gifts and cash, sitting with his father at the table while his sisters, Zhang Li and Zhang Fang, talked about their children and household expenses. He listened, teased them, and then went quiet when his mother asked again about settling down. He left after the holiday each time with a bag of cured meat and pickled vegetables, and a list of small errands from home.

By late 2025 he is thirty, living most of the year away from Zhijin in a rented room near construction sites, working days that start before sunrise. He eats breakfast from street stalls, jokes loudly with his crew, and calls home at night when the room feels too still. He keeps a few hundred yuan set aside in his phone wallet, enough to feel secure for a week or two, and sends the rest when his mother asks. He is unmarried, childless, and busy. Tomorrow’s shift starts at six.