It is important to emphasise at this juncture that the differences in the various waves of returnees should also be taken into consideration. During my fieldwork I gradually developed the impression that the most recent group of returnees from Vietnam, who mainly came over in the late 1970s, are still seen as the ‘newcomers’ by many residents of the farms. Furthermore, Vietnamese appeared to be the lingua franca on the farms I visited in which returnees from Vietnam were the majority. Also, these locations are perhaps the most rustic and least-developed nongchang in the state farm system. On one such farm, I approached an elderly couple who were weaving baskets in front of their one-room homes. I introduced myself and explained that I was there to learn about the history of the huaqiao nongchang. The man welcomed me, and then with a cheeky grin exclaimed in a barely comprehensible form of Mandarin, “Researching huaqiao nongchang, eh? Well, you have found the shittiest one” (勘查华侨农场啊?你找到最鸟不拉屎的农场)! It is apparent that there are significant disparities in the experiences of residents of the different farms, and the striations among the various groups of returnees comprise an area of inquiry worthy of further research.