A few strands of straw are twisted, woven, and bound together. Little by little, they take the shape of a pair of sandals. Simple as they are, these straw sandals carry a history that stretches back more than 90 years.
These sandals are closely associated with the Red Army soldiers who gathered there before embarking on the Long March.
Yudu County in Southeastern China's Jiangxi Province was one of the important gathering and departure points of the Central Red Army. In 1934, tens of thousands of people from the county joined the Red Army.
Almost every family in Yudu has one that joined the Red Army.
For those who made and offered them, the sandals were more than just footwear. They were a simple but practical way of supporting soldiers embarking on a journey with an uncertain destination.
"These are the straw sandals the Red Army wore," said Xiao Nandou, an 82-year-old local straw-sandal weaver who still knows how to make them. "At that time, many of them didn't even have shoes. They had to walk barefoot. It was really tough."
For generations, straw sandals were handmade in rural communities across southern China. But in Yudu, they came to embody a particular chapter in the region's history.