Chen Si () (born 1968) is a Chinese man who has stopped at least 412 people from committing suicide off the

Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge The Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge (), previously called the First Nanjing Yangtze Bridge, is a Bridge#Double-decked bridges, double-decked List of road-rail bridges, road-rail truss bridge across the Yangtze River in Nanjing, Jiangsu, China conne ...

Nanjing Nanjing or Nanking is the capital of Jiangsu, a province in East China. The city, which is located in the southwestern corner of the province, has 11 districts, an administrative area of , and a population of 9,423,400. Situated in the Yang ...

, China.

Early life

Chen Si was born in

Suqian Suqian ( zh, s=, t=, p=Sùqiān, IPA: ) is a prefecture-level city in northern Jiangsu Province, China. It borders Xuzhou to the northwest, Lianyungang to the northeast, Huai'an to the south, and the province of Anhui to the west. History Suqi ...

in the province of

Jiangsu Jiangsu is a coastal Provinces of the People's Republic of China, province in East China. It is one of the leading provinces in finance, education, technology, and tourism, with its capital in Nanjing. Jiangsu is the List of Chinese administra ...

. After dealing with poverty as a child, he dropped out of high school and left for

. After opening an independent fruit stand in the 1990s, he saw his fortunes improve.

Interventions

He first intervened in someone's suicide attempt in 2000, and saved the woman's life. Since 19 December 2003, Chen Si has spent every weekend on the

, a notorious spot from which to commit suicide. Chen patrols the bridge on foot and on his motorbike, looking for people who might be contemplating suicide. To Chen, these are people "who look depressed, those whose psychological pressure is great" and whose "way of walking is very passive with no spirit, or no direction." He then approaches them and tries to talk to them; sometimes they are already over the railing, and he has to grab them and pull them back over. In his talks with these people, Chen seeks to learn about their troubles and then find a solution. For example, Chen helped Shi Xiqing, a man who tried to commit suicide because of the $15,000 bill for his daughter's leukemia treatment, by phoning him every week and talking to his creditors.

Media response

Chen and his activities have received ongoing attention from the media, both in China and abroad. Louisa Lim of

NPR National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...

called him an "unlikely guardian angel." A German TV program also reported about Chen Si preventing suicides. episode aired on March 17, 2018

Feature documentary

Filmmakers Jordan Horowitz and Frank Ferendo released a documentary film about Chen in 2015 called ''Angel of Nanjing''. The documentary won over 13 awards at prestigious festivals, including seven for Best Documentary.

References

External links