In 1953, traveling from the city to Yiyuan Mountain, the quality of life differed greatly between Nanjing and Yiyuan. During his studies, Li Zhenhua often heard the teachers talk about the revolutionary stories of Yimeng Sister-in-law and Yimeng Six Sisters. Back then, he secretly made up his mind to make contributions to the people and the nation.

At that time, the country called on young people to "go to the most challenging revolutionary places, to the greatest parts of the motherland". Influenced by the spirit of the Yimeng Old Area, the 17-year-old Li Zhenhua responded to the call. He walked out of the Nanjing Normal School and headed to the remote and impoverished Yimeng Old Area for support.

Before entering Yiyuan, there was a twist. Because he was from the city and young, the authorities were worried that Li Zhenhua wouldn't adapt to local hardships, so they assigned him to Weifang. However, being young, Li Zhenhua pointed at the map, mentioning the most mountainous and challenging area, choosing to work at Hanwang Primary School in Yiyuan Mountain. Li Zhenhua told reporters:

"When I finally arrived at Hanwang Village, I discovered how poor the place was. Finding a tile was difficult, and there wasn't even a square meter of earthen ground."

After spending a few days in the county town, Li Zhenhua set off the next day with his luggage, heading 110 miles to Hanwang Village. At that time, there were no roads for cars, and he hiked over mountains, taking a whole day until he couldn't walk any further. On the sixteenth day of the first lunar month, when Li Zhenhua finally reached Hanwang, the village's old secretary led the whole village to greet him at the village entrance.

Walking into a classroom converted from a broken temple, Li Zhenhua was stunned. The windows had no glass, the door was half-absent, winds blew from all sides, and small stones littered the ground. "The village is so poor, stones are the desks, small stones are the benches." The old secretary sighed and said, explaining how the students had been without a teacher for six months. Since there hadn't been a teacher for half a year, when classes resumed the next day, the students were eager to attend. As soon as the sun climbed, 38 students sat in the classroom. The oldest already had three children, and the youngest was only seven, with villagers gathered around the classroom windows.

Before heading out, Li Zhenhua's family specially made him a Zhongshan suit. Villagers had never seen machine-woven fabric, and as soon as Li Zhenhua spoke, he was labeled an outsider. Amid anxiety and reassurance, he mustered the courage to teach, but his Southern accent drew waves of laughter and discussion. After a failed attempt at teaching, Li Zhenhua felt deeply troubled. At night, staying in a room where the doors didn't close tightly, listening to the howling wolves, he was scared and homesick, tears streaming down his face. Being away from home for the first time, sometimes even a nap would have vivid dreams of his hometown, only to wake up and find himself alone.

"Thinking back now, I honestly don't know how I survived that time."

Immersed in melancholy, Li Zhenhua was woken by villagers bringing food. It was pancakes made from a mix of tree leaves and bran, the outer layer resembling cowhide. While puzzled by the villagers' "delicacy," he unwrapped it to find the pancake empty and lukewarm, realizing then that this was the meal.

Li Zhenhua took bites, swallowing with difficulty, eventually dipping it into the bitter soybean soup to finish one. "I claimed to be full, but in truth, I was still thinking how much I'd like to have it." At that moment, Li Zhenhua's heart felt as if it were pierced by needles, not knowing how to cope with coming lessons, and clueless about how to swallow the never-before-seen black yam pancakes and bran buns.

Li Zhenhua and the children stayed together. (Provided by interviewee)

The road back to the city was never taken.

Ideals and reality are like twin sisters; realizing an ideal requires undergoing countless tests. Without finding spiritual support, no matter how splendid the ideal, it is unlikely to be fulfilled.

Facing difficulties with language and lifestyle, relying on an ardent passion for the poor mountains, Li Zhenhua was unwavering in heart: "I could stay in this place and could endure for days."

Upon first arriving in the Yimeng Mountain Area, Li Zhenhua didn't plan on staying for life. He intended to return after three or five years. But should he return, he wondered what to say when others asked, which troubled Li Zhenhua. "I just thought of a compromise, thinking I could stay for three days if I could stand five, enduring a few more days to avoid embarrassment upon returning."

During the following six months, of the over 40 students who went to support Yiyuan from the same school, 37 gradually returned, yet Li Zhenhua was unable to leave the Yimeng Mountain Area. Leaving the village amidst a joyous crowd, he noticed a thin figure, particularly touching to the eye and mind. Returning, taking old lenses, spinning cotton into threads using a spinning wheel, weaving them into cloth with a loom, sewing cotton coats, cotton shoes, and wrapping straw and reeds in the shoes to keep warm.

"When I brought these, tears rolled down. It felt like meeting old family again."

Li Zhenhua recalled that upon learning about his meals, villagers themselves eating bran and greens, gave him the better food. Eggs laid by someone's old hen, which could be exchanged for firewood and salt, were quietly placed in his pocket by the villagers.

"Every time receiving an egg with warmth, words cannot express my feelings."

"I am here to impart culture, and cannot leave."

Li Zhenhua remembered the Battle of Menglianggu, where the whole village dispatched 72 young people to carry the wounded, even sending homemade pancakes and sewn cloth shoes to the front lines, fully supporting the revolution. "The family made the ultimate sacrifice for the revolution; would they fear these small hardships?" The Yimeng God and the simplicity of the locals deeply moved Li Zhenhua, making it impossible for him to take the steps returning home, knowing he would not leave anymore.

Spill all the sunshine onto the students

Li Zhenhua was determined to use knowledge to transform the face of the impoverished mountainous area. Thus, he steadfastly committed to one thing for 68 years: study diligently. From then on, giving classes during the daytime, and walking five or six miles at night to provide extra classes for students. To improve the conditions for teaching, he crafted globes out of basket guts and old newspapers, explaining the longitudes and latitudes while teaching geography, showing students where the Atlantic, Pacific, Europe, and Asia were; constructing models using balls, sticks, and ping-pong balls, explaining eclipses and lunar eclipses.

The Hanwang Primary School situated in the mountains sometimes saw students suddenly fall ill, leading Li Zhenhua to carry students down for treatment; when the river rose, he would wait early by the river, carrying each student across, then carrying them back across after class.

Through wholehearted investment, the students' grades skyrocketed. In 1955, other schools in Yiyuan County had a graduation rate of 10:1, but all eight graduating students from his class were admitted into middle school, creating an uproar in the county.

In 1982, Li Zhenhua was transferred to work in Yiyuan County. It was a newly established special school, where all admitted students had failed their county junior high school entrance exams. In this context, Li Zhenhua proposed a slogan — "Spill all the sunshine onto the students", so teachers were dedicated to the students with great enthusiasm. Among the first batch of students, Liu Yang (a pseudonym) was notoriously troublesome, used to causing trouble, known to the local police. Seeing Liu Yang suffering from a severe cold during a lesson, Li Zhenhua immediately went home to cook a bowl of egg noodles, causing the student to shed tears, promising to never cause trouble again, ultimately getting admitted into college.

Who would have thought that among the 108 students with an average score of 28.6, 78 would be admitted to key schools after three years, 26 making it to advanced grade levels, creating a social sensation. The county immediately renamed Chengguan Second Middle School to Yiyuan County Experimental Middle School. Since then, the Experimental Middle School has been the best in Yiyuan.

Back then, students could only choose three university preferences, and under Li Zhenhua's influence, 60%-70% of students chose normal universities, eventually becoming esteemed educators.

After 10,000 years of extinction, scientists are "resurrecting" the mammoth.

It is explained that this "resurrection" plan is not intended to recreate real mammoths but to create embryos carrying mammoth DNA to develop a hybrid offspring of elephants and mammoths. Church explained in an interview: "Our goal is to engineer a cold-resistant elephant that looks and behaves like a mammoth. Not to deceive anyone, but to recreate an animal functionally like a mammoth—one that can enjoy life in minus 40°C environments and perform all tasks elephants and mammoths do, especially knocking down trees."

By comparing genomes extracted from frozen mammoths and Asian elephants, researchers have identified specific genes responsible for cold climate adaptations like mammoth hair and fat layers. Subsequently, they extracted skin cells from Asian elephants and began editing them into multifunctional stem cells carrying mammoth DNA.

Finally, these embryos will be birthed through surrogate mothers or artificial wombs. Colossal hopes to develop artificial wombs to rapidly breed a large herd of mammoths. If everything goes well, the researchers anticipate the birth of the first batch of calves within six years.

"Resurrecting" mammoths step-by-step infographic

Reportedly, the project aims to help protect Asian elephants by bestowing upon them traits allowing them to thrive in the "Pleistocene Park".

[It's said that ever since Uncle Wang next door subscribed to the legitimate version, his aches have disappeared, his arms have become stronger, and he can jump five flights of stairs with ease; the next day, he even found an 18-year-old girlfriend]