Dong Xiaoxue also emphasized that when she transferred, her mother had already retired, and she was able to be assigned to work in the organization department, with her mother not helping at all, but rather relying on her own performance to earn awards while on the front line at Laoshan.

Pan Jun interjected at this moment: I couldn't get in touch with you, I heard from some comrades that you went to your husband's hometown in Guangdong.

Xiaoxue: It's both true and not true.

My husband is from the Hakka people in Meizhou, Guangdong. His grandfather and family went to Southeast Asia early on, and later settled there to develop and became wealthy merchants and leaders of the overseas Chinese community. In the early 1980s, after his grandfather passed away, his father went back to inherit a large fortune and started working in real estate in Hong Kong, making a lot of money.

Xiaoxue continued: After I transferred, my husband's father asked us to go to Shenzhen to develop and wanted us to work in his domestic real estate company to make big money.

The two of us took our daughter, who had just learned to walk, and used our family visit leave to go several times. My husband particularly loves his hometown in Guangdong and wanted to stay and work there, while I couldn't bear to leave my mother and the stable job in the provincial organization department. My husband resigned and went to Shenzhen, while I stayed in the mainland, and a few years later we divorced because he became fond of making money and living a lavish lifestyle. Later, I lived in Chengdu with my mother and daughter, and eight years ago my mother also passed away, and I retired, now living with my daughter and her family.

Her topic about herself ended sadly, and Pan Jun just listened, understanding that he couldn't say anything more.

Dong Xiaoxue's competitive personality was evident from the moment she put on her military uniform and joined the army.

When Dong Xiaoxue was in the political department's propaganda team, she was not only a top dancer but also very strict with herself, practicing hard, and her figure could be seen during drills, in the kitchen, and helping her comrades.

Her comrades recognized Dong Xiaoxue very much, unlike some city female soldiers who were very arrogant.

When performing in the army, she never shied away from dirty or tiring tasks like unloading the stage, running errands, feeding pigs, or working in the vegetable field, and she actively went to the kitchen to help cook, wash vegetables, and chop vegetables. She did not show any signs of being a cadre's child; her parents' military genes made her perform excellently.

Pan Jun heard about these performances in the propaganda team from the team leader and several comrades transferred from the military art troupe, thinking that her brother Dong Xiaoyong's request to take care of Xiaoxue was just a friendly gesture; otherwise, it would be very inappropriate for Pan Jun to find out later that his sister had arrived at the unit without any notification.

In fact, Dong Xiaoxue's most outstanding performance in the army was during the year she was rotated to the Laoshan front line.

After the Sino-Vietnamese border self-defense counterattack in 1979, starting in 1984, the Central Military Commission decided to rotate troops from various field armies to the Laoshan front line.

Pan Jun, Dong Xiaoxue, and their division were instructed to proceed to Yunnan on schedule. Before reaching Yunnan to take over the positions of neighboring units, the political department's propaganda team also reorganized according to wartime requirements, with male cadres and soldiers either going to the company or returning to their original units, while female comrades were temporarily assigned to work in the division's direct units.

Dong Xiaoxue was assigned to the division headquarters' secretarial section, but she reported to her leaders and applied to go to the company because that was where she could hear the sound of gunfire and experience the smell of gunpowder. Later, she was transferred to the division's communication battalion, serving as the deputy instructor in the communication company, managing more than twenty female telephone operators.

At this time, Dong Xiaoxue's determination to fight was also reflected in her personal marriage; before the troops headed to the front line, she resolutely notified her fiancé, whom she had been dating for eight years, to end their relationship. Unexpectedly, her fiancé immediately rushed to the army, and they held a very simple yet touching wedding.

After the troops arrived at the front line, the division leaders gathered forty female soldiers from the division, excluding those from the division hospital and health teams, to form a temporary female soldier company directly under the division, with three small teams: a frontline rescue team, a frontline service team, and a frontline propaganda team.

Because Dong Xiaoxue was older than these female soldiers and held a cadre position, the division leaders decided after careful consideration to appoint her as the company commander of the female soldier company.

That year at the Laoshan front line, Dong Xiaoxue led the three female soldier teams to perform excellently. She was originally thin, and after returning from the rotation due to long hours of labor and lack of sleep, she lost more than ten pounds.

At that time, Pan Jun was running around the grassroots, writing battlefield reports, and often saw Xiaoxue and the female soldiers.

Xiaoxue led by example, whether it was washing clothes for the wounded in the service team or assisting military doctors and nurses to comfort and care for the wounded soldiers. Sometimes she would take a few female soldiers from the propaganda team to visit the frontline soldiers with the leaders of the political department, and Pan Jun had even seen Xiaoxue singing over the phone to cheer up the frontline soldiers...

Once, while accompanying the division leaders to the front line, Pan Jun encountered Xiaoxue and several female soldiers coming down from the mountain with ammunition.

He called out to Xiaoxue: Be careful and take care of yourself!

Dong Xiaoxue smiled at him: Don't worry, Pan officer!

The division leaders and comrades in the headquarters gave Dong Xiaoxue very high praise for her performance on the front line.

Each female soldier in the three female soldier teams performed excellently during the Laoshan rotation, not only not becoming a burden to the frontline troops but also completing their tasks outstandingly. This was directly related to the female soldier company commander Dong Xiaoxue.

After returning to the military camp from the front line, Pan Jun once went on a business trip to the political department of the military region. After finishing his official business, he specifically arranged to meet Dong Xiaowei for dinner.

The two old comrades mainly talked about Xiaoxue's performance on the front line.

Pan Jun: At that time, when the division leaders decided to establish the female soldier company, it was to ensure the safety of female soldiers when going to the front line. They repeatedly studied the selection of the company commander and originally wanted to send a male comrade to be in charge, fearing that he couldn't manage these girls and that the girls might have menstrual inconveniences. In the end, they decided to pull Dong Xiaoxue from the communication battalion to take on this position. After the announcement of her appointment, the division commander still had some concerns, fearing that Xiaoxue, who came from an acting background, couldn't bear this burden. The political commissar of the division encouraged Xiaoxue by saying that the front line is where a qualified soldier's offspring is tested.

But later, Xiaoxue's performance truly lived up to expectations.

Pan Xiaowei listened intently and finally said: My sister has always had a spirit of not admitting defeat since she was young.

After the rotation ended and during the evaluation of merits and awards, Dong Xiaoxue was awarded a second-class merit for her outstanding performance and was also reported and recommended for the title of "National March 8th Red Banner Holder."

She went to Beijing twice, once for the division's "Cat Ear Cave Band" to report performances to the military commission leaders and local units, where Xiaoxue served as the program host.

The other time was to attend the national March 8th Red Banner Holder commendation conference, during which she was warmly received by the leaders of the party and the country.

Unfortunately, at that time, Pan Jun was still serving as the political commissar in a certain field hospital of the military region and was not in Beijing.