For our first day in Beijing it was sunny, and the combination of body heat from the crowd, the sunshine and the smog made the Square warm. Our bus wasn't allowed to drive too close to the centre, so we got out and our political heads and teachers herded us towards the Gate of Heavenly Peace. People swarmed everywhere, many stopping to take pictures, so it took some time before we could get close. Then one of our political heads told a security guard that we were from Madame Mao's school. That mention alone was enough, and he happily let us into the security area surrounding the Gate of Heavenly Peace, so we could pose for several group photos.

It was only once I settled back onto our bus that a sense of insecurity began to overwhelm me. I sank down into my seat and looked out the window. The buildings around the Square seemed to stare at me. Why are you, peasant boy, here in this magnificent city? Throughout my childhood I had always dreamt of coming here. I had always believed I never would. Yet now I was here, among fifteen million people. I felt like a feather swept up in a whirlwind. I was only eleven years old. Nothing could have prepared me for this.

Our bus travelled through the city streets and gradually the tall buildings of Beijing were left far behind. We drove on and on, heading, we were told, towards a village called Zhuxingzhuang, about one hundred and twenty miles away. The name meant Zhu's New Village and it was to be our new home.

The wide, open fields of the countryside seemed to invigorate me. The fields here were flat compared to the layered fields surrounding my home town, but there were enough similarities in the countryside to relieve my anxiety just a little. It was a long drive, and one of the teachers suggested we sing propaganda songs as we went along and this too temporarily kept my attention.

Eventually, just as our bus turned into a drive, the political head proudly announced, "We are here! Our school is on the left."

I could see tall, bare trees on each side of a driveway (it was February and still bitterly cold) and within a couple of minutes our bus turned towards a metal-barred gate which had bright red letters over the top of it: Central 5-7 Performing and Arts University. The numbers, our political heads explained, referred to 7 May 1970, when Madame Mao delivered a famous speech to the arts and education communities, using Chairman Mao's philosophies to encourage all intellectuals to engage, both physically and mentally, with the three classes: peasants, workers and soldiers. They were golden words to the Ministry of Culture, so they proposed that Madame Mao should be the artistic director of this new university, and that it should be located in the heart of the communes, where future artists could learn and work among the peasants every day. In such an isolated site, surrounded by communes and fields, students would be protected from any negative influences from the city. Madame Mao supported this idea and the project quickly received the central government's backing.

Our bus came to a stop inside a compound and we all filed out. A small group of officials and teachers helped the girls with their luggage before we were all taken inside a new three-storey building. I smelt fresh paint as we entered, an overpowering, unfamiliar smell, but the teachers didn't seem to notice. Before we climbed upstairs to the second floor, one teacher read out our names and divided us into groups according to our age and gender. I was put in the younger boys' class.

There were three stairways: we went up the centre one and I noticed next to the other stairs there were two bathrooms, one for each sex. The teachers explained things as we went. The boys' bathroom was divided into two sections: the outer section was for washing and there was only cold water there. We were told that we had to collect our hot water from the boiler-room near our canteen. Water coming through pipes, instead of having to carry buckets from the well! I thought it was amazing!

Next we were shown our bedrooms. There were four rooms, two for boys and two for girls, and about ten or eleven of us to a room. The beds were crammed in so close together. It would be a luxury to have a bed all to myself, but I knew I'd still miss my brother's smelly feet and long for the security of my parents.

We were allowed a few moments to put our personal belongings away, so I put my snakeskin and the smelly dried shrimp and my other items in a little bedside chest of drawers next to the bed I was allocated. Then I got out my niang's precious handmade quilt and carefully folded it on top of the bed. Then all of us, all forty-four students, were taken to the sports-ground near the canteen by our three political heads. They organised us into four straight lines according to height, the smaller ones at the front and the tallest at the back. I was the second smallest boy in my line.

Once everyone was standing quietly, the head of our academy, a broad, strong man in a green army uniform, started his lecture. "Students, I am your director and you can call me Director Wang," he said in a rusty, deep voice with a distinct southern accent. He looked around. I could see his scary little eyes. There was complete silence. "On behalf of our beloved Madame Mao, I welcome you to the Central 5-7 Performing and Arts University. You are privileged to be chosen to be part of Madame Mao's new school. Do you know what your chances of being chosen were?" He paused. "One in a billion! That's right, one in a billion! You are the lucky and proud children of the workers, peasants and soldiers of China! You will carry Chairman Mao's artistic flag into the bright future. Not only will you receive six years of ballet training, but you will also study Chinese folk dance, Beijing Opera Movement, martial arts, acrobatics, politics, Chinese and international history, Chinese and international geography, poetry, mathematics and Madame Mao's Art Philosophy. What's Art Philosophy you may ask?" He paused again and looked around once more with his scary little eyes. "Art Philosophy is the relationship between politics and the arts. It is Madame Mao's wish that you don't just grow up being a dancer, but a revolutionary guard, a dedicated and faithful servant of Chairman Mao's great crusade! Your weapon is your art. Madame Mao and over a billion pairs of eyes will be watching your progress. The expectation is enormous. The hurdle is high. The task is difficult.

But what you are assigned to do is glorious! "Your parents helped Chairman Mao win his first war. You can help him win his future battles. You will need skills and mental strength. They don't come easily. You will need to work hard every day of the year. Your daily schedules will be posted on the noticeboard on your floor and they will be strictly followed and reinforced." Another pause. "Any who are not up to this important task, raise your hand now!" His head did not move but those scary little eyes moved from left to right, and right to left. Nobody raised a hand. He smiled, which made his already tiny eyes look even smaller. "Good!" he continued. "There are five people working full time to support each of you here. I hope you don't let them, and over a billion other people, down. Now, you can go to your supper."

Director Wang's lecture left me confused and lost. I vaguely understood that we had been assigned an important job, that I was to devote my life to Chairman Mao's revolutionary causes. But this was nothing new. From the first day of school we were told to love, follow and even die for our great leader Chairman Mao. Director Wang's words were clear and authoritative about that, but I couldn't grasp the rest of what he said about art and politics. I wondered whether Chairman Mao's artistic flag was going to be a different colour from the flag of China. I didn't know what to think. All I could think of was standing on my toes in a pair of pointe shoes all day.