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My family is an Elite land-owning family of Hui descent living in the Yunnan region. They value education and are willing to help their children become as knowledgeable as they like. Ma Lan is 20 years old and was born 1825 he is on the path to being married and has not completely decided what he wants to do with his life. He has studied for much of his life and is a devote practicer of Islam. He will likely take over the family land when his parents retire. His family has noticed the tension rising from the Qing and from the rebel groups. They are willing to leave if the region becomes too dangerous.

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This character is a banner soldier from the Taiping Rebellion. He along with the rest of the banner army, suffers incredible losses. He losses many of his loved ones to the war as well as his wealth. He goes on to become a part of a smaller army as it is all he has left.

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My character is a 27 year old merchant from the Northwestern part of China in the Shaanxi province. He inherited his father's business and trades spices along the Silk Road. While maintaining his business my character is also hoping to start a family to continue his business in the long term.

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Jin Huang (金煌)

Father and Grandfather who has worked his whole life to provide for his family.  Trades silk and tea with domestic companies and British companies who end up in Shanghai. Lives in the old Nanshi District with his wife and works at the docks. His children are adults who live in other districts of Shanghai.

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This is Wang Han. A peasant who work as a tenant farmer for his landlord in Anhui Province China.The charater got married 5 years ago. His wife is appointed by his parents. Have three Children, but one died while his wife is giving birth. He works hard as a tenant peasant (some one who work for the landlord to earn food to support his family's living.

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This is the farm where my character's, Hiowan, family lives. He was born here to a father who was a bannerman soldier, a role which he was then raised into. His family took great pride in their status as bannerman soldiers, which had been passed down through men in their family for close to a century. In peacetime they run their farm and do drills at the local bannerman garrison, and in war they are called upon to fight.

-Alex Western

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women working in an organic farm in Shanghai

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Yifei Chen
This is Desheng Zhang, a Han Chinese man from an industrious peasant family from the Qingshan county of the Sichuan province which consists of 28 peaks fully covered with bamboo. In 1840, he was 36 and had two children (a son and a daughter). Since he was born in a family that both his father and grandfather were craftsmen who made articles from bamboo strips, Zhang was influenced by the surrounding environment and was an artisan. Making the strips became the family’s main source of income, they spent most of the money on the education aspect since they were undereducated due to lack of the peasant’s assets. He and his wife had high expectations of their children and enforced them to read many books at an early age. His wife was also engaged in agriculture, helped the family to take care of the children, and supported his work. Zhang worked conscientiously and went to the county fair twice a week as a self-employed businessman to sell his bamboo strip products.

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This is Tóngqíng Ikderi, a Manchu man from an elite bannerman family. In 1850 he became a bannerman himself and was granted land and income. However, Tóngqíng and the more recent generations of bannerman are nothing like their predecessors. While those long before were masters in warfare, the more recent are masters of idleness. In the Taiping rebellion, Tóngqíng proved himself to be an incompetent warrior due to his training, or lack thereof. After seeing the devastation that the rebellion has caused, he felt a strong sense of shame. He has resolved to train hard to become what a bannerman ought to be, so he can protect the good people of the Qing Dynasty.

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Yellow River, Changqing District, Jinan, China

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Yellow River, Changqing District, Jinan, China

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Yellow River, Changqing District, Jinan, China

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This is Xu Kong (许 孔)
He is a third generation farmer living in the Shandong Province. Being raised by a family of farmers, he was taught at an early age the importance of working for what he wanted.  Despite not having an abundance of money Xu enjoyed a good childhood, spending most of his time near the Yellow River, playing with friends or his families small livestock.    Although not in a relationship currently, as he is getting older, his family is being more persuasive and vocal about finding someone soon.

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This is Chong Zhou, a trader in Ningbo. Born into a middle class family in 1812, he is working to build up his own business. After the end of the Canton Cohang and restrictions on trade in 1842, he began trading textiles mainly with the British out of his his hometown in Ningbo. He has a wife and a young son who hope to carry on the family trade. They are Buddhist, yet are very curious and open about the Presbyterian Church that has been built in their city. Chong Zhou and his family fled the city in 1842 when the British invaded, but have since returned and begun trading with them. He is a ruthless businessman determined to succeed.

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Qingyi Wei, born in a trader family who lived in Anxi, his grandfather traded different kinds of tea like tieguanyin, but because of some policies of Qing, closed the communications with other countries by port and ban any tradings, his father could not trade with people from other countries, so their family just focused on planting tea trees and support tea to people who had enough power and money to afford it at that time. Qingyi Wei developed oolong tea and started to trade it and more kinds of tea with people who lived in other provinces or even people around the world.

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On the right is Ju-long Bai. He is a 35 year old widower with three children. He is from the Fujian province and practices Buddhism. He is a Gentry who passed the civil service exam and now spends most of his time serving in his local government. He loves serving his community as it is his way to cope with the grief of losing his wife to cholera. He also owns a few acres of land which he rents out to make extra money to support his children.

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This is Shi Liwei, a young merchant of Bukharian Jewish descent living in Kaifeng. Due to the decreasing size of the Kaifeng Jewish community as a result of assimilation, he put significant emphasis on marrying a Jewish woman and raising his two young children (one boy and one girl) Jewish. However, the recent destruction of the last synagogue due to a flood in 1860 and the subsequent death of the last rabbi will make it difficult for the boy to learn to read Hebrew and study Torah as Liwei did when he came of age. His business is successful as he is one of the last craftsman making and selling Judaica in China, as his father and grandfather had before him. As such, he is able to provide sufficiently for his family.

-- Jenna Lucash

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This is Zhiqing Yang, and he is the first son of a rich farmer family. The family status is fine and better than many other farmers. Indeed, they have tenant farmers to help them farm the excessive land. However, they are not as rich as those landlords. With such family condition, his father and mother decided to let him go to school and learn to read and write; in fact, they can only support one child, and he is the oldest, he starts going to school at 7, and passed the Fu exam at the age of 24 to become a Xiucai. However, his next four attempts of the Xiang exam ends in failure, and his family is no longer have the ability to support this. By the age of 33, upon the last failure of the Keju exam, he decide to start a business as a bookseller and then started his own little publishing house by the age of 35. He believes in Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism and also the local goddess Mazu. Now he is trying to write his own novel too,  a fictional satire of government to express the resentment of never passing the exam.

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Born into a very poor peasant family on a family farm, Xi Zhengying works with her husband in order to provide for themselves and their son. They currently own their farm under a mutual agreement with the farm/land owner that up to half the yield goes to them, some is collected for agricultural tax, and the family is able to live off the rest. They mainly farm rice in paddies and live a very strenuous day to day life, working in hot and damp conditions for much of the summer.

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Hubei is known for some of its spectacular natural phenomenon like the Enshi Grand canyon. The area is know for its agriculture and industry. Ancient agricultural practices evolved into booming modern industry.

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Jiao Zhai Cun, Changqing District, Jinan, Shandong, China

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Jiao Zhai Cun, Changqing District, Jinan, Shandong, China

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Jiao Zhai Cun, Changqing District, Jinan, Shandong, China

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This is Ming Shi and her husband Zihan Shi from the Shi family. They are peasants from the Han origin originating and living in the Jiao Zhai Village, East of the Yellow River and Northwest of the Shandong province. Ming Shi was born in the year 1822, whereas Zihan Shi in 1821. They are newly wed couple with no kids and are from a very poor family with distant relatives working as merchants and farmers. The couple work for the Kong family, the richest farmer in their village. They both are very religious and obedient to the rules of their religion and their master. Both Ming Shi's parents are dead, whereas Zihan Shi's mother is still alive, currently living with them.

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Bstandzin was born in a elite Tibetan family in 1848. His father was a serf owner and a land lord in the suburb area of Lhasa. His family got him into a Sishu(school with small scale) run by Manchurian and Han educators to learn Chinese and Manchu language. Because of his education background and the influence of his family in Tibet, The Tibet Amban(Qing's admin institutes of Tibet affairs) found him and asked him to work for them. By accepting this job offer, he and his family become a real aristocrat(wealth and power) in the local area and started to climb up to the center of power in the east part of China through the stairs of politic career.

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Jun Yixiu was born in 1856 in Chángdé County of the Hunan Province of China. Jun’s father fought in the Hunan army during the Taiping Rebellion and used his military reward to purchase land which gave him gentry status. He expects Jun to preserve the family's wealth by passing the imperial examination which would enable him to pursue civil service.

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Born in 1810, Damin Zau built himself up as a trader. Mostly trading with foreigners, he imported and exported products to and from the West in order to turn a profit. He takes his business and the quality of his products seriously, as that is what has gotten him through difficult times.

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Rice Cultivator. Family of peasants lives on the land we work. Worried of growing tensions and hostility towards Hakka people

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This is Li Jiyu (이지유, roughly translated in Chinese to 李支柳). She is ethnically Korean, but her and her husband and two sons migrated across the Tumen River in 1879 and settled in the Jilin Province. Her and her family begain to harvest and farm ginseng, which the region is famous for. Their migration was initially illegal, however, in 1881, the government made it legal for Koreans become residence. The family began to sell ginseng to Chinese traders. With this new income and legal residency, the family was soon able to build a traditional Korean house that also had elements of a Chinese traditional house.

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Isma’il Burgah was born on July 5th, 1818 in Ürümqi, Xinjiang. His father operated a successful caravansary, trading ceramics, fabrics, precious stones, and “human merchandise” across the Tarim Basin and into the emirates of Central Asia. Isma’il grew up in relative wealth thanks to his family’s collaboration with Qing officials. Now a father of four, Isma’il operates his inherited business with great acumen. The buying and selling of slaves, however, bothers him deeply. Isma’il refuses to enslave his fellow Muslims, which frequently brings him into conflict with Qing officials. On the other hand, his privileged position as a collaborator and landowner alienates him from those who are resentful of imperial domination.

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This is Guiqin Li, a Han Chinese woman from a petty merchant family from the Qufu county of the Shandong province, the home of Confucius. In 1840 she turned 30 and had begun to manage the family's finance. Her husband held a secretarial position to the county magistrate and brought home a modest but steady income. They had three children (a son and two daughters) and two aging parents to support.  Although her own family engaged in small business, she and her husband were determined to improve the economic condition of the family, by investing first on land, then opening a shop in town. With this income, they were able to hire tutors for their son and daughters.

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Married to a farmer while we work in the fields of a farm in the yellow river basin, working for a wealthy landlord no one in the family has an education and money is at a minimum.