The woman in one of China's most touching real-life love stories, "Stairway Of Love", has died at age 87. Xu Chaoqing passed away peacefully on 30th October, five years after her husband Liu Guojiang breathed his last at age 72. She was buried next to him.
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Liu and Xu's love affair was so moving that it inspired director Zhang Xianglin's movie Noble Love, while TVB Hong Kong filmed a 25-episode series called The Last Steep Ascent, starring Moses Chan, Maggie Cheung and Kenny Wong, which started broadcasting in September to high ratings.
They were also the inspiration for the song Stairway Of Love, written and performed by Hong Kong group C Allstar, winning them the 2011 Jade Solid Gold Top 10 award. Julian Cheung also recorded the tune.
More than 1,000 fans paid their last respect to Xu by visiting her home in the jungles of Chongqing, where she lived with Liu for over 50 years, and hiking up the 1.5km Banpotou Mountain, climbing over 6,000 steps on the actual "Stairway Of Love". One mourner scattered 10,000 white roses along the way.
Liu spent his whole life building the "Stairway Of Love", using tools made from stone and wood, so that Xu could climb up and down the mountain, although she rarely left home in the end. One of their kids, Ming Sheng, said, "My parents loved each other so much. They were never apart for a single day."
Liu and Xu's story began in the '40s when Xu arrived in Liu's village as the intended wife of another man. Liu, then only six, followed Xu's wedding entourage to her husband's home where he approached the 16-year-old bride for a blessing.
He wanted her to touch the space when he had knocked his tooth out because the locals believed that a new tooth would grow after that. But he was so nervous that he bit her finger—and when their eyes met for the first time, he fell in love.
Liu and Xu in one of their last photographs together.
He kept his secret until Xu's husband died 10 years later and her in-laws cast her and her four kids out, saying that they brought bad luck. Seeing her forced to weave and sell grass shoes and survive on wild mushrooms, Liu supported her by taking over her heavy chores and looking after her kids.
She eventually fell in love with him, but his family and friends frowned upon their relationship because she was an older woman and a widow with kids.
Then in August 1956, the lovers and her children disappeared from the village. They remained hidden from the world until 2001 when an expedition group chanced upon the family.
"We eloped to escape the gossip and the scorn," Liu told reporters then.
He said that life in seclusion was harsh at first as they had no electricity or food. They lived in a cave and fed on grass and roots from the mountain, but the couple stayed together and eventually had four more children. Then a year after moving to the mountain, Liu began craving out the stairs.
After Liu's death, Xu's son brought her down from the mountain to live with him, but she soon returned up to her own home as she didn't want to leave Liu alone where he was buried.
Liu and Xu's tale became one of China's Top 10 Love Stories after Chinese Women Weekly ran their tale in 2006. Meanwhile, the local government has begun drafting plans to preserve the stairs and turn their home into a museum.
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