Chinese Father Documents Life With Son Every Year of His Life for 3 Decades

1997

By age 11, Li is visibly not the little boy we have seen in previous pictures. This would be the last photo in which he is being held by his father, who at this point was 38. This is the same year that Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule, after being under the United Kingdom. This transfer is often noted as the end of the British Empire.

The same year in Ghulja, protests erupted after 30 Uyghur independence activists were executed. After two days of protests where the protesters shouted “independence for Xinjiang,” the demonstrators were attacked with gunfire. While official reports say the death toll was nine, dissident reports estimate the death toll at 100.