Du Meiru smiled and denied the speculation that she would become rich because of the inheritance, and she said that she only inherited a family with the surname "Du". Regarding her father Du Yuesheng's evaluation, she insisted that he was a person who always loved the country and did not betray the country.
Du Meiru has her own views and stories about the events of those years, as well as Du Yuesheng's subsequent whereabouts, and why she lived in Jordan for nearly 30 years.
Du Meiru: Shanghai gang leader Du Yuesheng, a name inseparable from "hooligans". He was born in 1888, and due to the poor family environment and the early death of his parents, Du Yuesheng was regarded as an unsupervised child from an early age.
Although he still has a maternal grandfather and an uncle, Du Yuesheng's education is almost completely free-range. With little education and a lot of activity, Du Yuesheng began to look for all kinds of new things to pass the time, and his uncle was also very anxious about this, trying to get him to sell fritters on the street to make money.
Du Yuesheng developed a habit of stealing when he was young, and although he only stole a small amount of property at first, he gradually became bold. His uncle had no choice but to send him to the fruit shop as an apprentice, but he still did not learn about his thieving habits and was soon expelled from the door for stealing.
After that, he moved to a butcher's shop and was also fired for stealing. During this time, he became acquainted with many street gangsters and joined a gangster.
His ingenuity was appreciated by the gang leader, Chen Shichang, who also recognized him as his godson, and his fame gradually rose to prominence in Shanghai.
Du Yuesheng is not rich because of blackmail, but has a poor life. The opium business catapulted him to fame. During the reign of the Beiyang warlords, the huge profits of the opium trade attracted many merchants to participate.
The gang was fiercely competitive, but Du Yuesheng was able to stand out in the opium business thanks to his brotherly relationship with the warlord Zhang Xiaolin.
In the process of transporting opium, Zhang Xiaolin and Du Yuesheng and other bigwigs would avoid gang fights, so Du Yuesheng became the largest businessman in the opium transportation industry under Zhang Xiaolin's umbrella.
The huge opium profits allowed Du Yuesheng to accumulate a lot of wealth, and at the same time, with the protection of the Qing Gang and Zhang Xiaolin, Du Yuesheng's reputation spread in downtown Shanghai. In 1925, Du Yuesheng was founded in the French Concession"Sanxin Company", promising to charge a secret fee of thousands of dollars a month to ensure the safe transportation of opium goods, and promising to bear any problems themselves.
Therefore, Du Yuesheng has many subordinates who are willing to work for him, and his reputation is expanding day by day. In order to gain a firm foothold in Shanghai, the Kuomintang took the initiative to extend an olive branch to him.
Chiang Kai-shek's motives were not complicated, they were nothing more than money and fame. With his relationship with Zhang Xiaolin, his relationship with Du Yuesheng became very easy. At that time, the Kuomintang's power in Shanghai was not stable, and Du Yuesheng, who started as a business and was quite influential in Shanghai, naturally became the first choice for the Kuomintang to carry out covert operations.
This also made Du Yuesheng's status in Shanghai change, and he began to get involved in the political arena from the business field. In 1931, Du Yuesheng used his wealth to establish the Du Ancestral Hall, and its grand ceremony made the entire Shanghai Tang people give up three points to Du Yuesheng.
Du Yuesheng's large party guests, including Zhang Xueliang, Xu Shichang and Chiang Kai-shek, revealed that his social status was unmatched. In order to expand the larger economic industry, Du Yuesheng adopted a two-step strategy: first send hooligans to the docks to create chaos, and then force the social authorities to reorganize the enterprises.
Driven by such a policy, Du Yuesheng has successfully owned dozens of enterprises and is even known as a modern entrepreneur. After becoming an entrepreneur, Du Yuesheng's image has become more complex.
Although he knew that associating with the Kuomintang would help him gain greater financial support, he also knew that he had already stepped into the political circle and that he had to be involved in some things.
Although Du Yuesheng had great influence in Shanghai, the Kuomintang did not dare to take action against him lightly. After the September 18 Incident, the people of Shanghai broke out into a strong anti-Japanese sentiment, and all walks of life, whether it was trade unions or chambers of commerce, actively participated.
Du Yuesheng also participated in the Anti-Japanese Salvation Congress in Shanghai, and although the Kuomintang authorities were dissatisfied with this, they were helpless against Du Yuesheng. In November 1937, after the defeat of the Songhu Anti-Japanese War, Du Yuesheng was forced to leave Shanghai, and since then it has been going downhill.
After the outbreak of the Pacific War, Shanghai became an isolated island, and Hong Kong was also occupied.
After Du Yuesheng in October 1948, the defeat of the Kuomintang was assured, and he lost the strength to rely on. Although he had expressed patriotism, he was forced to move his family to Hong Kong because of his close association with the Kuomintang.
Among them, Du Meiru is his eldest daughter, born to his Sifang wife Yao Yulan. Yao Yulan, along with her sister and mother, are all famous opera actors in Shanghai. Du Yuesheng provided a lot of help in order to get close to them.
Although the mother and daughter knew Du Yuesheng's motives, they didn't say much because of his strong power. As a result, the youngest daughter Yao Yulan married Du Yuesheng and became his fourth wife, and gave birth to the eldest daughter Du Meiru.
Du Meiru grew up in the Du Mansion until she left Shanghai for Hong Kong, and her life changed dramatically, and she felt uncomfortable from a rich lady to an ordinary person.
In addition, Du Yuesheng made many enemies in Shanghai, which made the Du family's life in Hong Kong full of unease and challenges. Du Meiru recalled that Du Yuesheng once wanted to move his family to France, but he was unwilling to abandon those who were loyal, so he began to calculate the cost of going to France.
However, the Kuomintang ** suddenly asked Du Yuesheng for the so-called "passport fee" of "150,000 US dollars", which put Du Yuesheng in a difficult situation, because all his savings added up to only 100,000 US dollars, and he could not pay the "passport fee" of 150,000 US dollars at all.
Du Yuesheng once sold his property for assisting Chiang Kai-shek in resisting Japan, but was blackmailed by Chiang Kai-shek. Coupled with the fact that the Youth Gang had arrested Communist figures, Du Yuesheng was unable to seek help from the Communist Party or flee to France.
These experiences made Du Yuesheng weak, and before his death, he was invited to return to the mainland, but Du Yuesheng thought that he had no face and finally died in Hong Kong. His last words were: "I have no hope, but you still have hope, and there is hope for China." ”
Du Yuesheng's death was a heavy blow to the Du family, making their lives difficult. In desperation, the Du family finally followed Chiang Kai-shek's advice and transported Du Yuesheng's coffin to Taiwan.
Chiang Kai-shek's move was not out of gratitude to Du Yuesheng, but to avoid accusations that he had turned his back on Du Yuesheng. Du Meiru met her husband, pilot Kuai Songmao, in Taiwan, and the two fell in love at first sight and quickly entered the palace of marriage.
However, they all understand that Taiwan is not their ultimate destination. So, when the opportunity arose to serve as a military counselor at the Jordanian embassy, they decided to go to Jordan and open a Chinese restaurant.
Kuai Songmao and Du Meiru are a Taiwanese couple whose husband served as a military counselor in Jordan for nearly three decades. The greatest wish of the two of them is to return to their roots and hope that the two sides of the strait will be reunified at an early date.
Kuai Songmao's ancestral home in Anhui Province was displaced from his family during the Anti-Japanese War, and later fled to Sichuan, where he entered the Air Force Infant School run by the National ** at the age of thirteen. He withdrew to Taiwan with the Kuomintang and participated in the Kinmen Artillery Battle.
According to him, at that time the superiors instructed that it was okay to **, but not to really hit. He recalled that when he flew a plane to patrol the coast, he often greeted the pilots from the mainland and knew each other tacitly.
Du Meiru and Du Meiru have lived in Jordan for nearly 30 years, and their greatest wish is to return to their homeland. In 2000, when the two were over 100 years old, they decided to leave the restaurant in the hands of their children and set out to fulfill their wishes.
In 2001, Du Meiru returned to Shanghai at the age of 87, and the Pudong in front of her was completely beyond her childhood memory, and the rapid development made her feel a lot of emotion.
Looking at the Du Mansion, Du Meiru was full of emotion: "Although I am back, they are all gone." ”
After Du Meiru and Kuai Songmao left Shanghai, they returned to Kuai Songmao's hometown of Anhui. This pair of old men, who are more than half a hundred years old, were full of tears when they stepped on the land of their hometown.
They said that they have never regretted being Chinese, and being Chinese makes them feel extremely happy. And what they are most looking forward to is planning to visit various parts of the motherland.
They longed for thirty years to return to their roots, and finally found their final home in the era of peace.