Sea sentries

Married to the job: A dedicated couple have kept a proud watch from a remote island for three decades

Covering an area of only 0.013 square kilometer, Kaishan Island sits in the Yellow Sea, near the junction of Japanese and South Korean and international waters. It is about 12 nautical miles from Yanwei Port, Jiangsu province.

The island is virtually inaccessible, with extremely difficult living conditions.

Wang Jicai and his wife have been living there for 30 years. They are known as the island's "border guard". In 1986, the Kaishan Island militia sentry was set up and the People's Armed Forces Department asked militia member Wang to guard it. He accepted the task without letting his family know. Later, his wife Wang Shixia quit her job as a primary school teacher and joined her husband.

The couple raise the Chinese national flag every day, monitor sea and air conditions, rescue distressed people from the sea and maintain a coastal defense log. Driven by a sense of responsibility, the couple have only reunited with their family during five Spring Festivals in the past 30 years.

In September 2014, they received a "Models of the Times" award from the government.

Kaishan Island now serves as a patriotic education base and has so far received more than 5,000 visits.

"We will overcome difficulties as long as we are still here. We will keep letting our national flag rise and fly high on the island," Wang Jicai says.

Photos and text by Han Yuqing and Li Xiang, Xinhua

(China Daily Africa Weekly 03/10/2017 page4)