My Contemporaries in China

Totalitarianism isn’t just a word to Pun Choi, it was a way of life.

Born in the year the Communist Party came to power, his formative years ran alongside those of the Party, and like so many of the hundreds of millions of people that made up the population, his life would be full of unrelenting hardship and suffering.

Faced with the constant threat of being punished, reeducated or purged, as indeed his father had been, Pun Choi would have to keep his real thoughts close to his heart for fear of being next.

Over the following decades, Pun Choi was to witness firsthand the extremes to which the Party would go to retain its iron grip on the populace as Mao’s personality cult went into overdrive, followed shortly after by the Cultural Revolution.

It was only after Mao’s death did things began to quieten down.

But even now, years later, Pun Choi – and many like him – are forever shaped by life under Mao.