by Tuttle, Dan;
159.
“Yes, I’m an African,” she switched, “Nà nǐ
de lǎojiā zài nǎr?” Stella slowly read
from workbook on her lap, asking where he
was from ancestrally. Qin looked ahead
and failed to register she’d asked a thing.
Repeating it, she pointed at her text.
Her tones, she feared, were quite embarrassing,
and in this case left native speaker vexed.
“Zài Sìchuān, zhèlǐ. Wǒ de jiārén dōu
shuō Sìchuānhuà, a ‘dialect’. You, read
this sentence,” touching text. She did. “No, slow.”
She did again. He spoke and remedied
pronunciation errors: “Mouth more wide.”
That helped, she thought. Could friend be better guide
160.
than teacher? Being understood enthused
her. “Wǒ zài túshūguǎn xǐhuān dúshū.”
At hearing this, Qin suddenly effused,
spoke words she didn’t get, although she knew
from body language it was praise. Progress
felt good. The lesson carried on, a mix
of English and Chinese. They both obsessed
on other’s grammar, pausing oft to fix
it. Thoughts of speaking error-free relieved
the worries keeping them from all attempt.
A half-hour’s back-and-forth for both achieved
some cleaning of what started as unkempt
enunciation. “Wǒmen míngtiān zài
zhèyàng liànxí shuō mā?” Stel tried. “Yes! Bye!”
161.
She hadn’t thought before they met that she’d
want to repeat the conversation with
this boy. Yet, speech when topic’s refereed
felt comfortable, and closer to the pith
behind adventuring she’d known back home:
the thrills she’d found in nature were about
the serendipitous surprise biome
provides. In words, fortuity reroutes.
The barriers of understanding shroud
each person in a shifting set of veils,
attempted meanings in words said aloud
not meeting expectations of details.
It felt intrepid, using mind and lung
to make herself known in another tongue.
162.
BEEP BEEP!, BEEP BEEP!, BEEP BEEP! alarm clock screamed
one Thursday morning, after having snoozed
three times. It unstitched dreamed world seam by seam,
left real one. Cortisol in Abu oozed.
He’d nearly broken morning’s long routine
of rising early, walking route to school,
and camping with his books in kids’ canteen.
This daily practice had become his fuel
for memorizing characters, required
for every day of class. In fact, he’d made
such rapid progress Teacher Shi desired
he switch into a higher class. Upgrade
augmented pressure to perform, so BEEP!
lit up adrenal glands, dispelling sleep.
163.
Once clothed, he rendezvoused right at the front
door where their shoes were all deposited.
With us today? thought Stel. The stress’ brunt
was worn upon his face, not closeted.
Outside, the warmth of summer’d fallen. Steam
still poured from tiny shops, backlit by sun.
It blew toward them, as if they were downstream
of aromatic brook of breakfast buns.
A man in padded comrade jacket stood
beside repurposed oil drum that, near-capped,
pumped fumes like only makeshift smokestack could.
His puffy hands crushed dough, balled up, and slapped
it down in crescents into crucible,
bare-handed as if skin weren’t fusible.
164.
“Oh! Lao Li hǎo,” Stel said, familiar with
the aproned man with concrete hands, his pastes
arranged in glass jars on the shelf. “The fifth
looks good today, I need a sweeter taste.
Dì wǔ gè. Wǒ yào chī tián,” she explained.
“Tián de, Xiǎo Xīng, qǐng nǐ bié wàngjì!”
corrected he (when adjectives remained
without possessive “de” aberrantly
they oft weren’t understood). Her daily bite
of pastry came with tutelage. “How did
you get so comfortable nigh overnight
with speaking?” “Wasn’t overnight. That kid
that I’ve been chatting with has helped me drill
some real-life phrases. Turns out that until
165.
I found some mystery in trying to learn
I didn’t want to spend the time. When all
I had was a dull textbook and a stern
instructor, I’d just focus on the small
details in grammar that she pushed us to.
I missed the fact this class is meant to be
the stuff we need to know to go pursue
our Pioneer adventures here.” The fee
for egg-filled salty, spicy, sweet, or plain
jiānbing was ’round a couple yuan. Abu
then realized that since he’d been enchained
to classroom text, excelling through and through,
he hadn’t found the way to move from writ
to spoken word, omitting half the kit
166.
of language in the first place. Stella’d been
at work at conversation for some weeks:
“I think I’m finding ways now to begin
enjoying these attempts to take a peek
into the lives of people.” “When we met
we mostly found our classmates boring,” he
recalled, “what’s different here?” “They can offset
the loneliness of being here. I’m me
when I can share some of myself.” “I don’t
have any need for sharing. Will it boost
my study speed?” “Dunno. You’re stressed. It won’t
hurt,” Stel shared, hoped idea had seduced
her brainy friend. Ab pondered friends as tools
for lexical expansion past books schooled.
167.
When history concluded, ten past twelve,
he lettered little sign in block-script, which
invited other kids who sought to delve
into the ways exchange could both enrich
their grades. He borrowed name from Pioneers,
‘The Afroasiatic Cultural
Exchange’ it read, with characters that neared
that meaning. Though kids swirled like vultures, pull
of sign and Abu weren’t enough to bring
a population to the table. So
he sat alone, passed up. He tried to ping
their housemate Ai, who’d come to say hello.
Conceivably with friends, too! No reply
arrived to SMS. What went awry?
168.
Stel said demand was high for English chat,
so why were folks avoiding offer? This
was wasted textbook time if it fell flat.
He wished again for help from homestay sis.
He spotted her and Stel step into hall,
and beckoned them to join to seed the group.
Ai did, looked smug, and said, “I hear you call
for help first time now,” then sat down and scooped
the sign up, got a pen, and edited
the words so it read ‘English Corner Here’.
Known phrase like that was more accredited,
and standard in this case would friends endear.
A partner’s presence others would attract
169.
But, not so quickly. Ab still had his books
arrayed out on the table, looked as if
he’d built his own library study nook
of Babel tower spires, from bricks of glyph.
Kids walked right past with cafeteria
trays loaded with foods—words he’d memorized.
Could food talk test his budding theory the
meal time in China’s sacred? Passed corps sized
his study fortress up and steered selves clear.
Ai pitied, took the hardbacks, pads, and sheets
down carefully and stored them with his gear.
Stel sat down, eased in, surveyed Ab’s defeats,
breathed deep and put a warm smile on, looked ’round.
Thereafter came success: a first friend found.
170.
It was the boy that teased her some weeks back,
now friendly from their one-on-one exchange.
Behavior’s change turned Ab amnesiac,
forgetting past transgressions had estranged
them. Now a peer connected to lots more
found value in his interactions with
young Ab and Stel. Become what they adore,
by being foreign coveted wordsmith,
Ab thought, bemused by popularity
arisen from such mundane daily skill:
he had but expat titularity,
knew English by default and not by will.
I’ll have to find, he thought, more gifts unsung
I didn’t know would help climb power’s rungs.
CHAPTER 11
171.
The view through dusted window of the car
transitioned from gray urban bleak to green,
alive with farms. “They’re fed by reservoir
some hundred miles away.” Aquamarine
canals branched out like tentacles from run
of river, feeding pipes pumped up the hills
to plots. Jiang Long, the father, had begun
narrating nature’s features. Overfilled,
they’d crammed into the family vehicle,
two parents front, kids in the middle, BLING
and Huhu sharing back. Through scenes fickle,
his color commentary’s constant ring
was all that Stel could pay attention to.
It let him show a new dimension through
172.
which he was better understood: a guide
and champion of Sichuan Province who
was born there, felt that heritage as pride
and therefore strived to give an overview
to all guests, filled with admirations. “This
is China’s breadbasket. We’re at the crux
of where one billion eat.” The cloudiness
that kept the sky mid-tone, reducing lux,
meant plants must thrive without the blaze of sun
that Stel enjoyed from Tanzania. Plants
popped out from mountain terraces, each one
jonesed jolt genetically that photon grants:
the ATP to broaden networked root
while stretching ever up toward solar food.
173.
They’d left their home vacationing, like rest
of China for Mid-Autumn Festival.
“Our duty is to help those who’ve senesced,
like Shushu, mother’s uncle. Restive, he’ll
be pleased to see us, no one else will come.
I used to write to him when I was small,”
the mother had explained. Now Stel succumbed
to mesmerizing visual, enthralled
with all the landscapes passing past her eyes.
They’d gone from sprawl to plains to foothills, wound
up mountain range tops, looming oversized
compared to skein of road upon the ground.
Stel hadn’t seen sierras crossed by lanes,
kinks serpentine that level uphill gains.
174.
With traffic jams from holidays, it stretched
into the longest car ride of her life.
Geography this drastic felt far-fetched,
like heaven gouged out gorges with buck knife,
then set down snowmelt rivulets at base,
excusing hasty handiwork with gleam
of river rush distraction. Air encased
with icy vapor ambient sunbeams,
diluting color of hills furthest off
when spied at apex of a corner’s curve.
A cobalt colored sky, peak down to trough
of gully’s brook. This place had been preserved,
a jewel geology itself had wrought
compared to smog-skied urban mega-knot.
175.
The undulations mountain road carved kissed
recesses’ recollections in Stel’s mind.
She’d somehow seen the ways that these rocks twist
before, the angled schist, the ridge decline.
When eyes fell closed, impressions on her lids
felt navy blue and monochrome, as if
Poseidon’s dolphin chariot left skids,
a watermark embedded hieroglyph.
These placid pools of thought inside her brain
were punctuated by a memory
that burbled up toward more conscious domains.
What is it? Stella thought, this gem, or me?
She hadn’t pieced together if she’d seen
this canyon flood in once-dreamed scene marine.
176.
The reverie of countryside made way
for one of Ai’s mom’s seventies vignettes:
once moving back she’d become protégé
to Shushu. She’d become a suffragette
on seeing how the revolution changed
suspicions he’d held into faith in state.
She saw hypocrisy: state’s work estranged
from goal that women’s rights gain equal weight
as man’s. Strict household that she grew up in
maintained that antiquated sense of role
she’d hoped the revolution would begin
to overturn instead of to ensoul.
Though none could vote, she’d tacitly explored
more ways to women’s voices bring to fore.
177.
While details of inspiring past were shared,
Abu’s head bowed in ignorance of tale,
clear focus on his textbook unimpaired
by mother’s turn toward radical female
by witnessing the secular belief
of uncle she’d been shipped to live with. Stel
had no idea a wee farming fief
had shaped the mother too. To say farewell
to countryside of well-known plants and leave
for city took a boldness that she found
attractive. Woman had not been deceived
by strictures expectation used to bound.
I ought to figure out what father does,
Stel thought, to better know how mother was
178.
led off, away from radicalities.
Perhaps in lengthy hours the kids were schooled
she used her husband’s rank royale, city’s
slow bending to her will as woman who’ll
discreetly advocate for women’s rights
within society that kept them down
with rigid gender roles? Did she requite
the centuries of being but pronoun
and not protagonist, through quiet schemes
to shape society more squarely with
the voice of women? Stel liked these daydreams
that overlaid on factual the myths
of grander consequence that hist’ry books
pull out and weave in retrospective looks.
179.
Imagining the pu
ppeteer behind
the puppeteers of that society
caused Stel to close her heavy lids. Reclined,
the ride passed fast in sleep. Anxiety
swept into dreams again, the same sad flood.
At last she woke when car pulled up to farm,
down lengthy rain-worn path half dirt, half mud.
Outside Ayi and Shushu kept alarm
off faces, saving face. Stel felt their eyes,
recalled conflict with Ab that sprung from when
at school same happened. She’d too been surprised
when she’d first seen Chinese, the workers in
her province came to build a road to mines.
And then, like now, the newness soon declined.
180.
The farmhouse organized itself around
a central doorway, richly oiled old wood
maintained to best degree. Its top was crowned
with lucky crimson paper wishing would
gold fortunes fall on those who pass beneath,
a message reinforced with diamonds of
red cardboard, nailed on like two welcome wreaths,
both faded pink beneath the sky’s sunned love.
The characters upon them upside-down
in way that Stella’d seen in city meant
a higher chance prosperity’d come ’round
according to its homophone. Words bent
themselves to double meanings in Chinese,
tradition rich in wordplay hard to seize.
181.
Beyond the door the differences began
to individuate this rural house.
Its single floor reminded of floorplans
of homes in Tanzania. They would douse
the dust out front in summers to make sure
their discharged topsoil didn’t fill the lung.
The hardpack clay in walls had too endured
what weathering had decades’ seasons brung.
Where washed away from heavy storm and time
new rocks of colors mimicked in the hills
were stacked to fill the holes. A layer of grime
caked terracotta shingles, windowsills,
and cracks in grout, yet couldn’t nearly blight
the cheer that Stella felt for rural site.
182.
The motorcycle here seemed so much more
at place than scooters zipping ’round Chengdu:
the less ground ground up as a basis for
paved roads, the more for plants to have sprung through.
Small farms, she knew, were never flush with cash
so every green square foot made likelier
by end of year you’d have built up a cache
of calories’ insurance. Sightly were
the woods behind the home, set at hill’s edge.
The land too steep to cultivate, it stayed
as nature had intended. Yard’s short hedge