Wuxi Disasters

I did a salon class yesterday about disasters.

The students told me about a couple of Wuxi disasters.  In 1991, there was a flood in Wuxi.  This is not surprising given the amount of canals and rivers in the Wuxi area.  The '91 flood did not result in many deaths though I was told some diseases spread in the population.  The water was a foot deep in some low lying streets of Wuxi.  Students told me of their grandparents telling them tales of the famine in 1958 in Wuxi.  Famine in Wuxi? I asked.  I told them Wuxi seemed to be an area that would be famine-proof since so much is growing here.  But even Wuxi experienced the 1958 famine  caused by stupid Maoist industrial policies.

Another disaster was SARS.  In Wuxi, many students were quarantined in their campus.

During WWII, Wuxi was occupied by the Japanese and massacres occurred here.