Two plates from an animated story book.
The Chinese name 蒸蒸日上 is an expression that literally means, “steaming days better”. It is an expression that carries the idea that things get better through steaming, such as steamed foods. The character 蒸，means to cook by steam.
Norman Bethune was a Canadian surgeon who volunteered to help the People’s Liberation Army in the 1930s. Mao held him up as a model for emulation. See an animated storybook of Norman Bethune here and another collection of storybook pages here.
The slogan on the boat is, 为人民服务 “Service to the People.” There is an ethnic Korean woman with a bundle on her head in the lower right corner in traditional Korean clothing. Songhua Lake is located in Jilin province, which neighbors North Korea.