China / Society

Feature: An unmade trip out of Spring City

(Xinhua) Updated: 2014-03-02 05:37

KUNMING - Chen Guizhen stared blankly at a blood-soaked bag, searching for two Sunday train tickets to East China's Zhejiang, though she knew well the trip would not be made.

The 50-year-old woman was discussing the trip of leaving home for hope with her husband Xiong Wenguang at the waiting room of a train station in Kunming, southwestern provine of Yunnan, at around 9 pm on Saturday, when a group of knife-wielding people broke in and staged a slaughter.

People screamed and scattered. Chen saw a men ran to them and waved a long knife. Xiong pushed her away, but failed to escape.

Chen ran out of the station, but not far away. She was not sure if her husband was alive. After police took control of the situation, she got the permission to run back into the station.

However, she only found Xiong lying in blood.

An Ambulance brought the couple to the Kunming No1 People's Hospital, where another more than 60 victims were being treated.

News circulated in the hospital that at least 28 civilians were confirmed dead and 113 others injured in the violence, which authorities called it an organized, premeditated violent terrorist attack.

Desperation finally gripped her heart, when doctors told Chen that Xiong had gone.

"We are simply farmers. Why are the terrorists so cruel? " moaned Chen, with the blood-stained ID card of her husband in her shaking hands.

"We are migrant workers from Chuxiong (an autonomous prefecture of Yi ethnic group in in Yunnan, some 120 km from Kunming) to take the early morning train to Zhejiang to work," she said.

"We planned to stay overnight at the waiting room. But how could this happen to us?" she said.

"I found his ID card from his body. I can't believe he's left me," she said,

To prove her words to the people around, she took her husband's bag and began to take things out: some cash, a small bag of tissues and a wallet, all soaked in blood, but no tickets.

"My husband may have carried them on himself," said she, falling into silence.

Kunming is known as Spring City in China for its mild climate and green environment. But for Chen, the city will no longer be remmenbered as what it was like before.

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