Great Wall watchmen undertake labor of love

He Liping, 52, has been working as a Great Wall watchman for five years in Yumen in Northwest China’s Gansu province. Every two weeks, he rides his motorcycle around the Great Wall ruins, more than 20 kilometers from his home in Huahai town.

His job is to take pictures to record damage caused by nature and people and report it to the local cultural relics preservation department.

“The road from my home to the wall is bumpy, and it often takes hours to go and come back. It is quite a hard job,” He said.

“But I am proud that I can do a little to protect our Great Wall.”

The Great Wall in Yumen, stretching 110 kilometers, is a section from the Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 220) that was built to prevent raids and invasions by nomadic groups.

Yumen is at the west of the Hexi Corridor, a major part of the ancient Silk Road. The Great Wall in the city also helped protect trade caravans and goods transported along the ancient route.

The wall is made of stone, brick, packed earth, wood and other materials, and is vulnerable to damage.

“The wall had no fences a few years ago. Many local people and visitors did not know it was a historical site and caused a lot of damage,” said Wang Pu, curator of the Yumen Museum.

After the wall was placed under State protection, Yumen launched an investigation to get information about damage and allocated about 1.3 million yuan ($195,000) to repair it.

In 2012, Yumen’s cultural relics preservation department hired 68 villagers to help with preservation of the fortification.

“The Great Wall relics are scattered in remote towns and deserts in Yumen. It is necessary to mobilize villagers to join in the protection,” said Zhang Jianjun, director of the Yumen Bureau of Cultural Heritage.

Yumen only pays the villagers 500 yuan each year due to a lack of government funds.

“The salary cannot even cover their transportation fees. The villagers do this job just because of their love and responsibility for preservation,” Zhang said.

“Most of them, who are in their 40s, will quit if their children who work in big cities ask them to leave their hometowns to help take care of grandchildren,” Zhang added.

“They might stay to do this job if we give them a higher salary.”

Because of the lack of government financial support, Yumen has built some fences to protect the historical site, but most of it remains exposed.

In China, protection of the Great Wall still has a long way to go.

The Great Wall, which is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, measures more than 21,000 kilometers in its entirety.

“There are still many factors and difficulties restricting protection, and protection efforts remain unsatisfactory,” said a report on the protection of the Great Wall released by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage last year.