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Born during Three Bitter Years
Chen Zhonghua was born in the winter of the third year of the “Three Bitter Years” (1961), a period of famine, drought and floods that left millions of people in China dead. While his mother was pregnant with him, she and the rest of his family suffered from starvation. The situation was so bad that the landscape of China was completely devoid of life. Anything that moved or grew was eaten. Out of necessity people had taken to eating leather and the bark from trees. As a result of these conditions Chen Zhonghua was born small and weak with severe health problems including damaged lungs. He was not expected to live into adulthood.