Kou Aizhe, who runs the podcast. (Credit: Gushi FM)Kou Aizhe, 36, says his favourite podcast is the one he released after accompanying a blind woman to work one day in 2017. It bothered him that he had never seen blind people use the yellow pathways that run along Beijing sidewalks, or any big city in China, for that matter. This became episode 100 of Gushi FM (Story FM), a series of Chinese podcasts which Kou runs.
The podcast series, which has now completed over 200 episodes, offers intimate, personal audio stories on everyday lives in China. “It turned out these pavements were for cities to show they were disabled-friendly. Every few years they would get funds and they would build these pathways but not care if it works, or if it is helpful,” he says. “What I found was not a superficial problem of unused pathways, but a deeper issue of segregation in people’s minds on how they view the disabled.”
Then there were three episodes out of Shenzhen in southeastern China, which Kou says was “talked about a lot by our listeners”. He interviewed a journalist who went undercover to spend time with young people who call themselves Sanhe dashen, or “gods”. This was a self-mocking name given to debt-ridden and internet-addicted young people who, tired of monotonous work in factories, chose to work as daily-wagers. “In China, people from different classes don’t understand each other and don’t try to understand each other,” says Kou. “This journalist was from a rural area and he realised if he hadn’t studied and gone to college, he would have ended up like them.”
Kou grew up in a coal mining town in Jilin province. He is a librarian-turned-journalist who has worked with several foreign media including Swedish Radio, where he picked up crucial lessons for what he does now. “It was a town built around a coal mine, but by the early 90s, my family started a business and so our economic situation got better,” he says.
In 2016, he launched his own podcast, ‘Aizhe Radio’, with seven episodes. The first was about a collective of women detectives formed for the purpose of investigating husbands who betrayed them. Three years later, he never uses the word ‘Bo Ke’ or podcast when he approaches people for an interview. “I ask if they will agree to be part of a sound programme. Why scare them with an alien name?”
Kou has been a “podcast fan” since 2007. “I had a very small Apple Shuffle back then,” he laughs. Today, his 20-30 minute episodes air three times a week, with each one garnering four lakh listeners. “Of course, This American Life is amongst my biggest inspirations but I also listen to Radio Lab and WNYC’s Death, Sex and Money and Snap Judgement,” he says. Planet Money is another favourite.
Gushi FM’s listeners — largely 18-37 year olds — are drawn from China’s big cities: Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangzhou. The seven-member staff has produced stories such as ‘In 1993, I opened the first sex shop in China’ or ‘I went to college in North Korea’.
The episodes receive thousands of comments on various Chinese social media platforms. “People judge because we tell true stories. They judge the person interviewed and often they use swear words,” says Kou. Fake names are mostly used in the episodes to protect identities. “Listeners’ comments are a good way to get feedback but I never engage. We are here to maintain a neutral position, not to comment or judge anyone.”
Seven years ago, Kou left China to go overseas for the first time. He went to India. “I chose India because it was most unfamiliar to me. I stayed in Delhi and every day I would walk over to Connaught Place to hang out with college students. I wanted to know what they think about China, what their life is like and what they really care about,” he says.
“I don’t always talk about the meaning derived from the work I do. But these stories are meaningful for China today,” Kou says. “We normally choose not to understand each other, but through these stories, if we can understand that our feelings about issues are more or less the same, that could bring us closer. That is why I feel personal stories matter.”
