BROKEN BONES —
(The February 7 issue of the Hong Kong edition of the Hsinhua News Agency! s daily
bulletin carried the following inspiring report’ under the title, "Mao Tse-tung's Thought Gives Him Strength. j ,
* *k *
LANCHOW,. February 6 (Hsinhua) -- In the Yumen oil field Lin Jui-liang was repair-— ing a floodlight mounted on a scaffolding tower when some rotten lengths of scaffolding collapsed and he lost his foothold. The teén-meter fall fractured his left arm and left leg and some of his ribs. Although he was semiconscious he was heard murmuring a quotation from Chairman Mao: "Be resolute, fear no sacrifice and surmount every difficulty to win victory."
During his stay in hospital Mao Tse-tung's thought gave him amazing powers of endurance and tenacity. His nine serious fractures healed. in a comparatively short time and he returned to his post soon afterwards.
Due to some special medical consideration, the surgeon set Lin Jui-liang's fractured bones almost entirely without anaesthesia. The operation lasted for three hours.
Though the acute pain made him pour with sweat, he did not utter a single groan but even encouraged the surgeon to go on with his operation when the latter solicitously inquired how he felt.
When he was carried out of the operating theater, some of his comrades. waiting outside were so moved by his fortitude that they could not hold back their tears. It was he who had to soothe them with e calm: "I'm all right, don't worry."
Each of his injuries was excruciatingly painful. He thought: "Mao Tse-tung's thought is the red sun in my heart; it will give me the strength to see me through any difficulty." Laboriously he used his uninjured right arm to take out some copies of Chairman Mao's writings from under: his pillow and began to read.
Lin Jui-liang read the article "Serve the People" word by word, drawing strength from every sentence. He said: "As oxygen is indispensable to life, so Chairman Mao's teachings are to revolutionary man. tf you try to. live without them you are only a living corpse. ;
At night sometimes, when the pain woke him up, he turned again to Chairman Mao's works, He seemed to hear Chairman Mao saying: "In times of difficulty we must not lose’ sight of our achievements, must see the bright. future and must pluck up courage." He. thought: "Every day I persist in the struggle, brings me one day nearer to victory. Even if I should end .up disabled, my heart must be ‘devoted to serving the people without reserve.
Lin Jui-liang felt better every day. But his left arm was still stiff and his knee had a: pin. through it on which hung a sandbag weighing several kilograms. He could not even turn in bed and the doctor’ said: he must lie in this position for several months. How he wished he [could] get back: to his vigorous, active life right away.
a: asked the nurse to give him a notebook and persisted in writing a diary every day, though it taxed his strength to do so. In one of his entries, he wrote: "I must turn this period of treatment into a period of study and turn the wardinto a school for the living study and application of Chairman Mao's works."
“After some time he realized the need ‘to coordinate the medical treatment he was receiving with exercises on his own, otherwise, his leg. and arm, kept immobile for some months would become stiff and useless. With the help of a crutch, hhe began a painful course of training, hobbling up and down the corridor. After each journey to and fro, his shirt was drenched with sweat, but he only commented: "How can you make a revolution if you are afraid of pain?"’He made thirty of these journeys each morning and, sitting on his»bed, he would continue flexing his injured tes a | couple of hundred times. He did this exercise four or five times a day.
Apart ‘from that, inspired by Chairman Mao! s words: "Complete devotion to others without any thought of self," he helped to give massage to other patients in his ward and helped the -nurses- ‘to perform some of their other duties.
- When he was discharged from the hospital after four months, the doctor Signed .a certificate authorizing him to take 35 days sick leave. But on his return to Yumen, ‘he -did not show the certificate to the leadership at his plant. When they offered to send him to a sanatorium -for a period .of convalescence, he said: "I won't go anywhere. This is the place for me to make revolution." The next day he was geen, leaning on a stick, sorting out scrap material. It was not long before he discarded the stick and resumed his normal work. End item.
x * *
.. [LIs a question permitted? "With all that thought | of Chairman Mao, ‘how come no one noticed those rotten lengths of scaffolding?"]
‘