Gabaxongduo Town in Tongde County, Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, is located on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau at an altitude of about 3,200 meters.

In this small town, there is often a figure moving through pastures and forests, mediating conflicts and resolving disputes for the people. He is Yula Cairang, a specially invited mediator of the People's Mediation Committee of Gabaxongduo Town, Tongde County, and a recipient of the titles "National Model People's Mediator," "Qinghai Provincial People's Mediation Expert," and "Provincial Most Beautiful People's Mediator."

Yula Cairang began working in people's mediation in 1984. Now in his sixties, he still keeps going, wholeheartedly resolving difficulties and disputes for the people.

Photo shows Yula Cairang. Photo courtesy of Duojie Cairang

　　No matter how his work changed, his identity as a mediator remained unchanged

In 1984, 21-year-old Tibetan young man Yula Cairang went to Gümang Township, Tongde County, to serve as a judicial assistant.

When he first took up mediation work, faced with some emotionally agitated parties, Yula Cairang could not well control the situation and make the best response. To get up to speed as soon as possible, Yula Cairang visited all eight administrative villages in the township, became familiar with and grasped the situation of conflicts and disputes in each village, and took the initiative to consult his seniors, learning from their mediation experience while also focusing on studying theoretical knowledge.

Gradually, no matter what kind of dispute he faced, Yula Cairang could always adapt to circumstances, effectively soothe the parties' emotions, and properly conduct mediation.

When Yula Cairang successfully mediated a marriage and family dispute and heard the parties' words of thanks for the first time, he was deeply moved.

In the days that followed, Yula Cairang moved from Gümang Township to Tanggan Township and then to Gabaxongduo Town, serving as a mediator in several townships after job transfers. No matter how the township where he worked changed, what remained unchanged was his identity as a mediator.

To date, Yula Cairang has mediated more than 3,500 various conflicts and disputes.

In February 2020, Yula Cairang learned that two herders in Sairuo Village, Hebei Township, had a conflict over issues such as grassland use rights. He and his colleagues immediately drove 70 kilometers and hiked over two mountains, arriving at the herders' home at noon.

Well aware that grassland is the lifeblood of herders, Yula Cairang, despite the long journey, began mediation work. In the end, a long-delayed grassland dispute was successfully resolved. Yula Cairang said with emotion: "Seeing them turn hostility into friendship makes all the hardship along the way worthwhile."

In 2020, the Tongde County One-Stop Conflict and Dispute Mediation Center hired him as a full-time mediator.

　　Every khata is an "unwritten banner of honor"

In March 2022, a conflict and dispute arose in Gabaxongduo Town of the county over grassland and mountain boundary issues.

Upon learning of it while hospitalized for illness, Yula Cairang immediately returned to his post. He and his colleagues visited and investigated, conducting more than 30 on-site surveys along the grassland and mountain boundaries full of cliffs and precipices, and clarified a mediation plan.

At the mediation site, the two sides were about to come to blows after a disagreement. Yula Cairang stepped forward, standing in the middle to block both sides while shouting: "Fighting won't solve the problem; it will only create new disputes, and boundary disputes will become even harder to resolve!" After some persuasion, both sides temporarily calmed down.

After six months of intensive mediation, the two sides finally reached a mediation agreement, presented khatas to each other as a sign of reconciliation, and presented a khata to Yula Cairang to express gratitude, praising him as an "iron-willed man." At that time, however, Yula Cairang collapsed from overwork and his illness, which had not yet been cured.

Gabaxongduo Town is at a high altitude and surrounded by mountains on two sides. Mediation trips often require crossing mountains and rivers, and there are frequent encounters with sudden storms and landslides. Yet Yula Cairang is not daunted by the harsh environment and insists on mediating on site. The steep mountains, rugged rocks, and green fields and forests along the way bear witness to his hard work.

Yula Cairang also responds to parties' mediation needs "around the clock," mediating at any time.

Over the past 40 years, Yula Cairang has received more than 100 banners of honor from the public, and even more khatas. Each of these khatas is like an "unwritten banner of honor."

Photo shows Yula Cairang (front row, third from left) and members of the public conducting an on-site survey of grassland boundaries. Photo courtesy of Duojie Cairang

In long-term mediation practice, Yula Cairang has summarized the "Five Hearts" mediation method: love, heart-to-heart communication, patience, sincerity, and fairness.

To facilitate mediation work, Yula Cairang mediates in both Tibetan and Chinese. After serving as a mediator at the county mediation center, Yula Cairang, with the guidance and support of the county justice bureau and other departments, formed a Tibetan-Chinese "bilingual" mediation team.

These stories are merely a few fragments of Yula Cairang's forty-year mediation career. Today, Yula Cairang is still working diligently on the path of people's mediation...