Chapter 22: If you can build, you can destroy it

"Think about the days we've lived."

"What are we all doing in the United States? We come with dreams, dreams, beautiful dreams. Those white people tell us that we can make a lot of money by eating and drinking!"

"But from the beginning, this dream has never come true."

"When we came, we were on the unventilated cargo hold on the boat. We ate, drank, scattered, and slept in for dozens of days, and were transported by people like piglets. After we arrived, there was still a bullshit foreign miner license law in California. Each person had to charge $20 a month... But how much did we charge in a month? That's not all. In addition to the license fee, those white people also had to take commissions and even write fake receipts. Those tax collectors could easily pursue and arrest us. Let's not say that we went to hunt gold, but we didn't even dare to hide in a place where there was no one in the canyon for a few days."

"We have so many people, and the longest one has lived in the United States for almost twenty years. We have been living here for twenty years. We are not doing well here and are bullied every day. But why don't we go back? Don't you want to go back? No, no!... Actually, I don't dare! I dare not go back! We have no shame to go back, we have no personal appearance, and we have no face to meet the elders of Jiangdong!!"

"Think about the construction of those white people when they built the Pacific Railway, the construction was difficult and they were in danger. The white people were unwilling to work, and they didn't work at high wages. In the end, the Central Pacific Railway Company almost went bankrupt, just a little bit! How could it not be finished after only a few years of construction of dozens of miles of railways?"

"But at this time they thought of us. They recruited us from China and only gave half of the wages of those white people every month. White people were responsible for food and accommodation. We were still not concerned about food and accommodation, and all dangerous work were put on us. In the middle of winter, the weather that could freeze people to death is forcing us to work in the snow."

"Dona Pass, Uncle Hou, you should still remember it?"

In the hut, Guo Jinzhang held up a torch and looked at Hou Nan and asked lightly.

"Duo, Duo..." Originally, listening to Guo Jinzhang mentioning the past, Hou Nan's face was not good-looking, but he could still remain calm. However, when he mentioned "Dona Pass", his voice seemed to be blocked by something, and his face turned pale in an instant, and then tears rolled down:

"Dona Pass, Dona Pass... I cum and their ancestors!"

The cottage became quiet. Everyone was silent.

Dona Pass, which is a hell-like existence in the memory of the ancestors of Chinese workers.

There are many place names in the United States, either named after the discoverer, or the first group of settlers, or the name of the land buyer, or transliterated by local Indian names. However, the name "Dona" does not come from these methods.

When it comes to Dona Pass, we must first mention Lake Dona. In eastern California, close to Reno, Nevada, there is a snow-capped mountain in Serrari, which is extremely high at an altitude and lasts 5-6 months every year. One lake in the mountains is Lake Dona. Lake Dona is 3 miles long, half a mile wide, and the lake water is very deep. This lake is quite famous in the United States because there has been a very creepy legend here... a rare legend of people who cannibalize in American history.

This legend is not very complicated. Decades ago, it was when the American Westward Movement was in full swing. A man named Dona led a pioneering team through an unknown mountain pass in the peak of the Sierra Nevada. Their purpose was to reach the legendary beautiful and fertile California. As a result, this 87-man team encountered a blizzard at the pass and was trapped next to a mountain lake. It was not until the spring of the following year that the rescue team found them. When they found them, 39 people had died, and the others survived by eating dead bodies.

This tragedy later became the most terrifying story in the history of western United States development. This pass was later called the Dona Pass, and the plateau lake was called the Dona Lake.

The legend of cannibalism has been circulated in the United States since then.

However, 20 years after this tragedy, the Central Pacific Railway Company also built the railway to the same place. At this time, they hired about 9,000 Chinese workers. In this year, the weather here was more cruel than the Dona pioneer team back then, and the snow in some places reached 14 meters deep and could not be constructed at all. However, the one-day shutdown meant that the company's boss lost tens of thousands of dollars and dozens of square kilometers of land. Therefore, several giants at the time of Central Pacific Railway Company were anxious. In order to reduce losses, they ordered Chinese workers to continue construction despite the weather conditions.

The Chinese workers have opposed it, but it is useless at all. Therefore, they have to continue to start construction with their amazing patience and sacrifice. They dug tunnels in the deep snow, digging roadbeds and laying railway tracks every day under the snow. Two horse-drawn sleds can be walked side by side in the widest place of the snow cave. Snow is still raging in the valley, and there is no sign of life. Who would have thought that under the snow, there is a busy construction site?

However, what did the construction in this situation bring to the Chinese workers? The Chinese workers in labor often lose their lives in avalanches, and even the entire camp where the Chinese workers live was buried by heavy snow, and dozens of Chinese workers living in tents were buried together by heavy snow. Many people's bodies were not discovered until a few months later after the ice and snow melted, and some people still held the iron pickaxe tightly in their stiff hands.

The construction conditions were so harsh that dangers always appeared on the Chinese foreman, so that at that time someone used "Chinese opportunities" to describe a person's luck that was extremely poor. However, as Lelan Stanford, founder of Stanford University and one of the four giants of the Central Pacific Railway, described in his diary, the Chinese workers were very quiet, few complained, and few retreated.

But, do you really don’t want to complain or back down?

Under the oppression of those from Central Pacific Railway Company, what can everyone’s complaints be used? Where can they retreat? If you don’t work, you may not even get food. It’s a big deal to walk back alive.

As a result, the Dona Pass and the Sierra Nevada became an eternal nightmare for Chinese workers participating in the construction of the Pacific Railway.

All of this is just a microcosm of what Chinese workers encountered while building the Pacific Railway.

Later, on May 10, 1869, it was an epoch-making moment in American history. The first Pacific Railway across the North American continent was completed ahead of schedule. After seven consecutive years of coordinated efforts and hard work, two road construction troops, namely the Central Pacific Railway Army built east from Sacramento, California, and the United Pacific Railway Army extending west from Omaha, Nebraska, were connected in the Promontery hills in the Ogden area of ​​Utah. The main force in the western section that undertakes the most difficult tasks was the Chinese workers who were particularly hard-working and intelligent. This feat declared that the American mainland began to be connected in economic operation, marking the period of rapid development of the US economy, and promoting the United States to become an economic power connecting the Pacific and the Atlantic Ocean.

At 12:30 noon that day, Leland Stanford, president of Central Pacific Railway and former California Governor, placed a pure gold nail in the nail hole, then raised a silver hammer and smashed it hard, but hit the sleeper next to it, and laughed out loud from the crowd.

However, the news of the closing of the Pacific Railway spread throughout the United States with a hammer from Stanford. The entire United States turned into a boiling ocean at that moment, and the scene of national celebrations could only be compared with when the American War of Independence ended.

The golden path nail smashed by Stanford had a sentence engraved on it: "May God connect two oceans like this railway and bless our country's unity." On May 10, this day was forever recorded in the history of American history. On this day, Americans called it "Golden Path Nail Day"

The golden nail is engraved: "May God connect two oceans like this railway, and bless our nation's unity."

The Central Pacific Railway is thousands of miles long. During this long journey, railway workers waved hammers in total and nailed 2.76 million nails to complete this world-renowned project, and more than four-fifths of the work were completed by Chinese workers.

But it is a pity that no Chinese was invited to attend the celebration ceremony for the railway opening.

The angry Chinese workers secretly hid the last sleeper until the white men searched everywhere but couldn't get it out... But what's the use?

No white people still remember the contributions of Chinese workers to the United States.

The Pacific Railway was completed and tens of thousands of Chinese workers were immediately fired. Immediately afterwards, it became the object of Americans' exclusion!

"My uncle told me when he was alive that nine years ago, in October, hundreds of white people in Los Angeles rushed into Negro Lane and killed 19 of our compatriots, but no one cared about it. A few years later, all the Chinese houses in that place were set fire to the whites, and no one cared about it!"

"Now, they gathered thousands of people to cause trouble for us. This time they took care of it, but as a result, I have to bear all the sins. You said, will those white people just forget that with such encouragement?"

Guo Jinzhang looked at everyone in front of him, with no expression on his face.

"People are addicted to bullying others!" Qian Shide snorted coldly.

"If you can build it for him, you can naturally destroy it. If we don't let us live, we don't have to let them live." Hou Nan sighed and stretched out his hand to Liang Zuying: "Azu, give me a torch too!"

"Burn the fuck!"

"Even if it is burned to ashes, it will not leave a trace of them!"
Chapter completed!