Sun Yat-sen University in Moscow and the Chinese Revolution - KU ...

thing at all, or even to read, one generally became adept at making
speeches, which was an important quality for a revolutionary agitator
to have. Hsiang Chung-fa, for example, who had been a semiliterate
boatman and who for several years was secretary general of the CCP,
could not write effectively; he was nevertheless an orator of some
ability. This pattern was the case more often than not.
Turning from classroom methods of teaching, I will now discuss
the more practical aspects of our educational experience. These practical
aspects of our education consisted primarily of excursions, tours,
and practical training at industrial units. In the summer of 1927, after
my arrival in Russia, the university organized two touring parties—one
to the Crimean Peninsula and one to the Caucasus. The object of these
tours was to study the history and social structure of the various
minority groups in these regions.
I was with the group that went to the Caucasus. It was composed of
six or seven students and was headed by the dean of the university,
Ignatov. The professor of Western History, Wax, and a professor of
the History of the Evolution of Social Formations also accompanied
our group. We left Moscow in July, going south to Vladikavkaz by
train, and from there continuing our trip by bus along the famed
Voenno-Gruzinskaya Daroga (Military Gruzinskaya Highway). Midway
we stopped at Kasbek for two nights and a day, and saw the
perennially frozen glacier and a volcano. We also visited a nearby
tribal village. After leaving Kasbek, our bus climbed higher and higher
into the mountains.
Finally, we arrived at a place called Basanaur. On our second day
there we scaled a mountain in order to visit the Hefsur tribe. This
tribe numbered approximately five hundred. And, although these
people lived in the mountains, they were not considered backward. We
met the tribe's hoary sage, a man of one hundred and twenty-five years.
Through the services of a young policeman of the tribe, we were able
to conduct a very interesting interview with the old sage. The Hefsur
people were very proud, brave, warlike, and exceptionally long-lived.
They had resisted Tsarist Russian oppression, and they also fought
against the Soviet regime. The Soviet government had tried to subdue
the tribe by armed force, but the Hefsurs used the mountainous terrain
to their advantage and fought off the Russians valiantly. The conflict
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