This farmer grows robots
By Jia Hepeng (China Daily)
Updated: 2006-07-07 09:05
Neighbours, and even strangers, gave him money to rebuild his house, with no
mention of repayment. Three months later, Wu was in a new home, costing 90,000
yuan (US$11,250).
Wu was determined to repay them but his pursuit of
building robots did not leave much savings.
 His son Wu Hongfeng said: "With his skills, my father could have become
rich by making more profitable tools, but after the fire, the whole family was
preoccupied with repaying our debt."
Wu Yulu eventually decided to sell
some of the robots that had been stored elsewhere.
"I felt terrible, but had
no choice," he said.
An institute affiliated to the Chinese Academy of
Sciences bought one of the robots for "several thousand," Wu said, and a
collector bought another.
Wu's perseverance finally began to pay
off.
Feature stories on the "farmer inventor" began appearing in various
media.
After one report on China Central Television (CCTV), its science
channel hired Wu as a prop-maker, paying more than 3,000 yuan (US$375) a month.
Each week he goes to CCTV for orders and makes them at
home.
Selling robot Wu Laowu helped speed the repayment of his loan. "The
neighbours would not mention money, but I had to show them some consideration,"
he said.
Last month, Wu made the headlines again for a new invention, a
robot able to pull a rickshaw one step every three or four
seconds.
Sitting in the rickshaw, Wu said he has no plans to start a
robot business.
"I can invent robots able to carry a sedan chair, and
next I will make robots of the 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac.
"There
are so many good things in life, and they become the basis for my
robots."
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