At a little past five in the morning, faint light began seeping through the window. Wang Fang dressed quietly and rose from bed. Her husband, still groggy, mumbled, ‘Leaving so soon?’
The two rustled through their morning routine. Wang Fang double-checked the clothes, crackers, bottled water, and ID cards she had packed the night before. Satisfied nothing was missing, she headed to the kitchen.
Her husband had already boiled a pot of eggs—over a dozen, nearly covering the bottom. Another pot bubbled with water for noodle soup.
It was late March 2025. Wang Fang and four other women from her village were set to board a bus to Anji County, Zhejiang Province, to harvest tea. The group leader and one worker were relatives; the others were close neighbors. The leader had mentioned that besides their village, 31 additional workers would join along the way—picked up at towns or highway rest stops.
This was Wang Fang’s second journey as a migrant tea picker. Her luggage was lighter this time, and she felt surer of earning better wages.
1. The Familiar Land
Premature aging was a shared fate among the women in Wang Fang’s village. At 56, her skin bore a sallow, weathered hue, her once-bright eyes now clouded.
Time and relentless labor had etched these marks. In her village of a thousand residents, women like her stayed home after marriage—raising children, tending crops, and taking odd jobs nearby: shucking corn in late summer, bagging grape clusters, or harvesting cabbages.
Under scorching sun, they worked bare-skinned in fields that remained their most familiar livelihood. A day’s labor—whether standing or bent over—paid the same: 60 yuan. Farming was one of the few options left for women and elderly men.
Young Wang Fang had resisted being tethered to the land. She once ventured to the county town with friends, seeking work at a shoe factory and later a restaurant. But they were called ‘clumsy’ at the factory and berated by impatient diners. Defeated, they returned to the village.
Farming, at least, spared them humiliation. For decades, Wang Fang grew corn, wheat, and peanuts, sometimes trekking mountains to dig medicinal herbs, sold dried for 10 to 30 yuan per pound. Years of sun and wind left her lean and tough, though her vision now blurred with age.
Among her fellow tea pickers, only Wang Fang’s sister-in-law had long-term migrant experience. At 58, she’d been laid off from a Zhengzhou restaurant dishwashing job—3,000 yuan monthly for 14-hour days. Her fairer skin, a relic of indoor work, made her seem younger than Wang Fang.
After returning home, the sister-in-law avoided farmwork, seeking factory jobs but facing age discrimination. Reluctantly, she took up grueling 12-hour farm gigs for 60 yuan a day. When Wang Fang mentioned tea picking paid 30 yuan per pound—6 to 8 pounds daily—her sister-in-law signed up. Last year, Wang Fang had earned nearly 3,000 yuan in under 20 days.
For the sister-in-law, desperate to repay debts from renovating her son’s wedding home, tea picking was a rare shot at ‘good money.’
2. ‘Like Smoking Out a Badger’
Anji County, famed for white and yellow tea, sprawled across 243,200 acres of plantations in 2025. That spring, Zhejiang planned to recruit over 200,000 migrant pickers from Henan, Anhui, and beyond.
As one of them, Wang Fang felt confident—she was the group’s second-youngest and only seasoned picker. The bus ride lulled her in and out of sleep; she barely touched the eggs her husband packed.
After countless stops and miles, they arrived at the tea mountains at 9 p.m. Under dim lights, weary but curious faces filed into a hillside shack. The sparse dorm held plank beds and a corner toilet. Meals, the leader said, would be cooked outdoors, with work starting at 6 a.m.
But rain the next afternoon forced the stove indoors. Damp firewood choked the room with smoke, permeating clothes and bedding. ‘It felt like smoking out a badger,’ Wang Fang remarked.
The cold snap left many sniffling, some layering autumn clothes or winter coats. Others shivered in thin layers. China Tea Marketing Association’s 2025 Early Spring Tea Report noted three cold waves that March, with rare snow in Zhejiang and Hubei, slashing pre-Qingming tea yields.
When skies cleared, the women returned to the slopes. Raindrops clung to tea leaves; pants soaked through within minutes. Many preferred picking at mountaintops—away from the boss’s gaze, where leaves grew tender and large.
Once, Wang Fang and a neighbor were caught on a hilltop. The plantation owner stormed up, yanked their baskets, and barked, ‘Ever picked tea before? These stems are too long!’ Learning the neighbor was a novice, he snapped, ‘I said no newbies! You’re just freeloaders!’
The clash escalated until the neighbor threatened to quit. "Go then!" the boss retorted. On their way down, the pair asked a local for water but were refused: "You outsiders come to earn money. We’ve got none to spare."
Back at camp, they vented to the leader about leaving. But faced with footing their own 1,000-yuan return fare, they stayed.
3. Hard Work, But They’d Return
In films, tea pickers are elegant, steeped in tea lore. Reality for migrants like Wang Fang was stark: meager meals of cabbage, potatoes, and onions, with rare meat. Complaints about food were dismissed. Some plotted early departures but stayed, unwilling to pay their way home.
One evening, Wang Fang skipped dinner—leftover potatoes turned her stomach. Nearby, 59-year-old Liu Li from Zhoukou, Henan, fared better: her team promised 150 yuan daily, but only if they picked six pounds. Otherwise, pay dropped to 20 yuan per pound. Feeling cheated, Liu Li stayed—it still beat her hometown’s 80-yuan farm wages.
To boost yields, some workers left long stems or mixed in dirt. Bosses retaliated by docking pay for ‘imperfect’ picks. Wang Fang, meticulous in her methods, still faced public scolding: "Your stems are too long—redo them!" The leader claimed it was to deter others, but Wang Fang resented being made an example.
Her sister-in-law, reassigned as a tea roaster for 180 yuan daily, envied no one. She worked past midnight, scrubbing floors while bosses griped about her "laziness." Asked if she’d return next year, she shrugged: ‘If they’ll have me.’
When Wang Fang called home, she grumbled about bad weather and food but concluded: ‘It’s still better than odd jobs back home. I’ll come again.’
She just hoped for better meals, fairer treatment, and a raise.