Chapter 11

十一

It was hard to find anything in English. But using translation software, I found much more on Chinese websites and I stumbled across a brief article about a young woman, only 24, and stunningly beautiful, who was executed, here, by firing squad.

The gorgeous youth had been convicted of setting fire to her workplace, killing several people inside.

The article had a picture of the field where she’d been shot. Recognizing the landscape, I looked up the area on Baidu maps, and sure enough, the prison, the jailhouse, the execution grounds, were indeed right here, where the campus now sits.

And sifting through the search results on Baidu, I located a few old pictures of the prison, too.

The jailhouse was right where I was sitting, where the teachers’ living quarters were now located. This was the spot of the prison.

It hit me like a sledgehammer to the head, seeing it on the map, seeing its picture, and recognizing the hills in the distance that I could see on a rare day that wasn’t too smoggy.

I wanted to learn more of the prisoners here, at this prison, and through the further reaches of my deep dive, I’d found that this had been a prison for the worst of offenders, many of whom were sentenced to die. I found case stories, articles about several violent offenders here who’d murdered their families or coworkers in fits of rage, and one infamous soldier who’d stolen a gun and gone on a shooting spree in a village nearby, as well as several arsonists, most of whom had attacked and set alight public buses and packed restaurants.