““We usually got up at five o’clock. For breakfast, we ate Chinese cabbage that we grew in our garden. It was boiled in water and thickened with cornstarch. Sounds pretty ghastly, right? It was. But if we could get down a bowlful of the stuff, it made our stomachs feel full. My father used to leave the house first. Then I’d carry my son off to try to find someone who could breast-feed him. I’d go from house to house, asking for help. I couldn’t pay anything, so all I could do was hope to find some kindhearted soul.””
