By K.C. Ung
(For photos of the field trip. click here)

China is such a vast country; no report ever written can be “typical” of the whole country – the more so, this report of a minuscule part of China. China is vast in geographical space, varied in cultural experiences, vociferous in its technological and structural achievements (perhaps less so in its under-achievements), sometimes regarded as a variant in its refusal to compromise with world’s standards. Whatever opinion one may form, whatever statistics one may project they may not be true of the whole country.

It is in this light, that my humble experience of my first visit to Shanghai and its neighbouring cities must be seen. It is a report perhaps of a frog just out of the coconut shell (in contrast to the Malay saying, "katak dibawah tempurong") but still is an eye-opener (a peep?) to me in the background of many negative reports I have received.

On September 19 to 26, my wife and I joined a group tour organised by some Christians in the Perak assemblies. We visited Wuxi, Suzhou, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Tongli and Shanghai. On the Lord’s day, before the tour ended (Sept. 25), the tour group, at our request, arranged for us (the first in their history) to visit the Three-Self Community Church of Shanghai. By the time we reached the place at 7.30a.m. the main hall was full to capacity. We were directed to the third level of an adjacent three-storey building, as places in the lower levels had all been taken up. We were separated at the top level as there were only a few vacant seats here and there in the packed room of over two hundred people.

We followed the one-hour Methodist-format service in Chinese in the main hall from a TV screen in front. There were others on the ground level in prayer as they sat on the corridor seats and still others in the open grounds following the same service. When the service ended, the vast crowd of easily over a thousand worshippers streamed out; the doors were closed for the places to be cleared up. Five minutes later, another crowd had formed outside the gates to get in for the next service. There were three services arranged for that day with an English-speaking meeting in the afternoon.

While the rest of the tour group returned to Malaysia the next day, my wife and I with Mr. & Mrs. Wong from Bukit Mertajam Gospel Centre stayed back in Suzhou with our hosts Mr. & Mrs. David Foo from Sung ai Nibong Gospel Hall for another week.

On Friday (30 September), we travelled by train from Suzhou to Nanjing for a visit to the Amity Printing Co. Ltd. which had been prearranged for us by Mr. Lee Min Choon and Mr. Joel Ng of the Bible Society in Malaysia, Mr. Kua Wee Seng, Coordinator, China Partnership, United Bible Societies (UBS), and Mr. Jiang Yuchun of UBS in Nanjing with Mr. Peter Dean, Special Assistant to the General Manager, & Resident UBS Production Advisor, Amity Printing Co, Nanjing, China.

The Nanjing Amity Printing Co., Ltd. (APC) - Click here for photos

The Company is a joint-venture between Amity Foundation and the UBS. Amity Foundation was set up on the initiative of Chinese Christians for the purpose of promoting health, education, social service and rural development projects in the People’s Republic of China. The UBS is a worldwide fellowship of national Bible Societies committed to the translation, publication and distribution of the Scriptures.

APC was established to give priority to the printing of Bibles and other publications entrusted by the church organisations. In addition, the Company also prints other materials in conformity with the goals of Amity Foundation to serve the community in general.

Some US$4.9 million worth of modern printing equipment and US$0.9 million of start-up capital (with an additional UBS contribution of US$1.7 million to the share capital) were donated by Christian churches and individuals round the world through their respective national Bible Societies and the UBS helped set up the Printing Press constructed on a 6,000 square-meter air-conditional building on about 10 acres of former farmland 15 kilometers south-east of the city in late 1986. The first batch of 10,000 Bibles were completed by the Press on November 12, 1987. In 1988, 500,000 copies were printed and since then, over 31 million copies of the Bible have been distributed.

On arrival at the Nanjing Train Station, after one-and-a-half hours of smooth and comfortable travel in a double-decked train from Su zhou, we were met by Mr. Jiang who took us in a van to APC about an hour’s ride away. Mr. Peter Dean of APC then briefed us in the conference room of the roles and responsibilities of APC, showing us the very impressive and beautiful Bibles and publications available at affordable prices to the Christians in China, before taking us to a 12-course lunch. After that, he took us on a tour of APC from the first stage of the printing process of a Bible to its last stage when it would be packed and loaded for distribution. Standard Bibles are freely available for sale at 12RMB (about RM6.00) in all churches to the public.

After the two-hour learning visit, we were ready to return home – by bus, this time as all train tickets back to Suzhou had been sold out three days before. The people were preparing for their National Day Holiday on Oct. 1 st. The two-hour return trip would be a memorable experience for us for a long, long time.

At this juncture, I would like to place on record our grateful thanks to Mr. Lee Min Choon, Mr. Joel Ng, Mr. Kua, Mr. Jiang and Mr. Peter Dean and the UBS of Nanjing who paid for our trips by van to and from APC and the train/bus stations and the luscious lunch. Thank you.

The return trip to the bus station coincided with office workers and students returning home. The roads were jammed pack with vehicles of all sorts. Traffic rules were made to be broken at this point. Our van driver had to go onto the cycle lanes, onto pedestrian pavements, etc. to avoid the main stream of traffic to reach the bus station, as we did not expect the traffic congestion. And we were very late for our bus!

When we finally reached the bus terminus (about five minutes to spare), we were wondering how we could ever get to our platform to board our bus as there was a river of humanity between us and the platform. We are grateful to Mr. Jiang who managed to squeeze past the human block, contact the officials, and pulled us through by bye-ways, official channels, etc. with the magic password, "They are Malaysians and they are late!" and landed us at the door of our bus just as it was about to move.  Thank you, Mr. Jiang. We are very grateful to you for the miraculous feat you achieved for us. We were praying for you and for us all the time and God answered our prayers. If not for the Lord and you, we just would not know how we could cope with the situation. We might have to spend the night in Nanjing.

In Suzhou, again there was heavy traffic. We had to walk some distance, before we could get any taxi willing to take us to a restaurant for our dinner/supper (10.00p.m.) Well, that was quite an experience for all of us.

On Saturday night, I attended another Government-registered church in Suzhou and spoke at the morning service of the Suzhou International Fellowship for expatriates where Mr. & Mrs. David Foo worship.

Now what are the practical implications for the prayer-partners who read this? If you would like to help spread the distribution of Bibles in China, contact your national Bible Society. The UBS has committed to provide a steady reliable supply of Bible Paper for Bible production in China.

If you would like to help place a Bible in China, you can contribute:

US$1.00 per copy for the paper for 1 standard size Bible;
US$2.50 per copy for the total cost of 1 standard size Bible.
Or you can designate a love-gift as “For Bible Paper for China” of any amount and send it to the Bible Society.

Finally, let me give the final say to Mr. Lee Min Choon of the Malaysia Bible Society: