In my 19-year friendship with Helen, I saw in her not only a dedicated American friend, but more like an elder in my neighborhood and a devoted China scholar. During my stay in Connecticut in 1985-1986, I was always present whenever any Chinese guests came to visit her. She would always ask the Chinese visitors where they came from. Then she would introduce herself by saying “I am from Haidian, Beijing” in Chinese. She always described Xi’an, Yan’an, Bao’an as ‘Snow Country’ and regarded Shaanxi as her second home.
Since her return home in 1940 until her death in 1997, Helen never stopped observing, studying and writing about China. She held the long history of the Chinese people in her heart. She remembered the Chinese suffering from starvation and oppression; the Chinese struggling for freedom and independence; and the Chinese working hard for a better life. Helen was always interested in the improvement made by the Chinese people. In the 1980’s she often wrote me with useful advice. For instance, she suggested that Gung Ho organizations in Qingdao grow seaweed for iodized salt to help those with iodine deficiency in China’s Northwest. She suggested that the old caves be preserved in Yan’an and Bao’an with no changes on the outside surfaces. But that the inside should be as well furnished as good hotel rooms. The cave houses were warm in winter and cool in summer and the tourism industry could be well developed with limited costs in northern Shaanxi. She also suggested that solar energy and wind power be developed in the Northwest, etc.
What impressed me most was her love for China in her last days. One summer day in 1986 Helen showed me her grave lot in North Madison Cemetery. Pointing at the lot she said: “here is my resting place”. “What do you expect me to bring you when I come to visit you here?” I asked her with a smile. Helen replied without any hesitation “I love yellow roses and also good news from China”.
In the summer of 1995 Helen’s health was declining. When I made a special trip to see her, she had a very poor sight and could not see anything clearly. She grasped my hand and began talking to me, asking me more than once if I had my recorder on. She talked with difficulty for over an hour. She said to me emotionally: “I love China and the Chinese people. I hope China is getting better”.
It was not only in her old age that she carried the plight of the Chinese people in her heart. As soon as she stepped on the soil of China in 1931, Helen had devastating exposure to the famine, desolation and hardship of the Chinese people. She saw with her own eyes a devastating flood on the Yangtze River which killed 600,000 people and sent 120,000 refugees pouring into Shanghai. She ventured inland and witnessed the crushing poverty and disease of Chinese peasants. A few months later, when the Japanese invaded the Chinese section of Shanghai and with war at her doorstep, Helen’s political and social awareness was awakened. Her sense of commitment to the Chinese people grew. Her purpose in China was not to write alone, she believed; but also, to act on behalf of a people who had captured her heart. That great man of China, Lu Xun, wrote: “there are two foreign friends who love China more than some of our own compatriots”. The two foreign friends Mr. Lu Xun referred to were Edgar and Helen Foster Snow.
(Wuhan, China, 23 July 2011)