关于朱玲案，贝志城同屋的一些回忆和感慨

I was the roommate of Bei Zhicheng and Cai Quanqing in Beida. Iwitnessed the whole thing and was among the numerous people whoprovided help. I remembered the names of Xin Li and Dr. Aldis. Li’swebsite in UCLA is extremely organized and contains most of theinformation. All the facts in Yuan’s long article were pretty muchaccurate except his/her imagination about the relationship between thetwo daughters’ tragedy of Zhu’s family was never confirmed.
　　　　　　
　　　　　　There are quite a few things that are significant in this event:Internet, telemedicine, medical accident due to the ego of doctor(s) inPUMC, murder, struggle of a devastated family, etc. In fact, thepublicity of this event made Internet a household name in the early1995. I know many people in China who first heard of Internet from thisstory. People from all over the country sent letters to Bei and Caiasking for medical help year after this event. However here I’d like tomake some comments from a different point of view.
　　　　　　
　　　　　　The courage and perseverance of Bei when facing challenges andconfronting authorities. In China, no too many people have the guts toconsistently question the opinion of authorities like PUMC with littlemedical knowledge. Getting help from Internet was easy comparing to thebattles later on fought with PUMC. Bei showed sound judgment and spiritof independence. Although he didn’t finish school due to his ownchoice, I admire him as a true Beidaer in this regard.
　　　　　　
　　　　　　The help from numerous people. Bei was Zhu’s classmate in high schooland they hadn’t been in contact for years by them. Cai at that time wasplaying around in Prof Chen Yaosong’s lab as a Sophomore student. Heprovided the idea of Internet news groups and all that. 10 people livedin our room at that time. We were all astonished by Bei’s descriptionof Zhu’s symptom after his visit to PUMC. Almost all of us were helpingin this case. We sat in front of the dummy terminals in the labdownloading the responses from the Internet with a connection of100bytes per second even in the midnight (that was early 1995) andanalyzed those letters in the dorm. With several thousand responses,the analysis itself was quite a job. I was really moved by the kind ofhelping spirit in my room, in the lab and, needlessly to say, on theInternet. Prof Chen even gave us several hundred RMB to have a decentmeal. What a nice guy! However, Zhu Ling’s friends and classmates inTsinghua never contacted us to provide help. I remember I went toTsinghua asking for help from her fellow classmates in one weekend whenwe were really short of hands. Nobody showed even a slice of interest.On the contrary, they showed clear distance from this. That kind ofcoldness hurt us so much. We never contacted them again. Thallium wasall over Zhu Ling’s drinking glass (as I remembered) in her room. Shewas clearly poisoned by people close to her. The prime suspect was herclassmate although never convicted. I still wonder how her roommatesand classmates could live with that! This kind of feeling grew strongerover time as I understand more and more about humans. I am not reallyinto the debate over the superiority between Tsinghua and Beida. But Ihave no doubt that Bedaers, not Peking University, in a sense, willalways be the conscience of China.
　　　　　　
　　　　　　Seven years haspassed. Now I am sitting in front of my computer in an office in theSilicon Valley. I have changed a lot. However, I wonder whether theresult would be different should this case happen again in China today.If some day somebody wants to make a movie or write a book about this,I would like the book or movie to be about the nature of human beings,not just about Internet, a murder case, or a medical accident.