Mountain Far Away

This is a documentary about coal miners In the Qilian mountains of Qinghai Province where the altitude is over 3600 meters and the air thin there are numerous small coal mines in which work around 200 miners aged 17 to 50 Every day they must crawl through pits 60 to 70 metres deep just to carry out 30 loads of coal Each load weighs 50 kilograms The miners earn 500 yuan a month without insurance Miners normally suffer from pneumoconiosis after working four or five years in the mine and cannot work thereafter They usually spend their wages on building houses marriage and tuition fees for their children If they die in an accident their family receives a 5000 yuan pension This film is a record of these working conditions and of human labour Shot June 1995