A brief account of one interesting anecdote related to "Five Day Emergency", commonly abbreviated to "Five Day Exc".

So the May Day holiday was just a holiday? What was the actual emergency situation during this time?

There was only one elderly woman among us. Everyone else had young children to care for, or heavy work to finish. How did she manage to come all the way from Guangxi?

When we were leaving, she held our hands and gave each of us a little packet of "five-day emergency medicine" to take home.

I didn't think much of it at the time, but years later, when my family members were on their own in Guangxi, I learned that those packets of medicine were invaluable.

In Guangxi, the food is slightly different from the food we're used to in the south. I couldn't eat much, and after only two days, my family had already lost weight.

It wasn't until a few years later that I learned that those packets of medicine were actually anti-inflammatory drugs. The elderly woman had given me a small amount to help me through the difficult period.

Looking back, I realize that those little packets of medicine saved my family's life. Without them, we might not have been able to come back from Guangxi at all.