The issue of abduction crops up a number of times in the mainland Chinese drama series (set 1977–92) that I've been watching.
The young nephew (aged 11?) returning home to Guizhou (S.W. China) after staying with maternal uncle and his family in Suzhou (near Shanghai) is reminded not to speak to strangers on the journey back. This is 1979, but don't forget China had just emerged from a decade-long shutdown during the Cultural Revolution (1966–76), so there might be some time warp here with practices going back to more "primitive" times.
A few years later, this young nephew from Guizhou decides to go to Shanghai with the boy next door to look up his older cousin who's got into university. In case the grown-ups won't let them go, they sneak off, leaving a note for the parents of the boy next door. This sparks off a huge panic, with the adults worrying about them being abducted. This is 1982.
The teacher chap's son, who's at university in Shanghai doing architecture, is going on a town-preservation project trip to somewhere in the northwest of China (portrayed in this series as being an outback with primitive people and practices -- this is 1984).
The younger boy next door who makes a special trip to Shanghai from Suzhou to deliver the university boy's bicycle for using on that preservation trip also delivers warnings from Uncle Qian (a long-distance bus driver they'd come to know): not to go anywhere alone, whether it's for a meal or to the loo, especially to the loo, as he might get coshed from behind and robbed.
(China, 1979/1982/1984)
