“I’m still back on the meat.”
“Right, well, this is the meat area of the market so you’ll see lots of flies and probably a rat or two.”
“You’ve got to be—”
“But today’s larger lesson is bùyào. In this context, it’s how you say ‘no.’”
I cocked my head. “I get that they use a different word here, but isn’t ‘no’ universal? Don’t most people on this planet understand what ‘no’ means?”
Kristy’s eyes widened. “This is China, not Europe. Or the Americas. So no, ‘no’ is not ‘no’. Bùyào is ‘no.’”
I closed my eyes, put my hands in front of my face, and then spoke through my fingers. “Why does everything have to be so complicated?”
“Come on, Tina! Don’t get stuck—we’re almost out of this quadrant! It’s much more pleasant by the purses and toys. Plus, you can’t live in Shanghai without experiencing this market. Many Americans come to Shanghai solely for shopping right here.”
“I can’t imagine that’s true, but I’m still following you,” I said, slowly pushing forward again and then stopping to raise my hand. “But if the kids wake up and start melting down, point me in the direction of the fake Barbies, or the My Little Phonies, or whatever knock-off they will sell me to provide amusement.”
“Here we are,” Kristy grinned seven minutes later, “at the best handbag shop in all of Shanghai, possibly all of China.”
We stood in front of a low-ceilinged, dusty shack festooned with a gazillion heinous-looking handbags. Every color, size, and configuration of satchel hung from every available cranny. But I didn’t see one I would hang off my arm.
“This is the best handbag shop in all of China?”
“No, dummy, this is the facade. Follow me,” she said, pushing past a table piled high with every color of plastic coin-purse.
“But my stroller can’t fit,” I said. Right then a chunky woman wearing a yellow sweater dress, pink sunglasses, and maroon high heels hustled out clapping. She rushed to the stroller and crouched down.
“Don’t wake her, please!” I said as she went straight for Lila’s feet. I’d already forgotten the word for ‘no.’ Too late. Lila blinked and rubbed her eyes. She stretched and looked at me, then looked at the lady tickling her toes. The woman smiled and reached out to her. Lila looked at me again and then back at the lady and put her arms up. Piper continued sleeping.
Kristy spoke Mandarin to the lady holding Lila. The woman nodded emphatically and hollered something back at her.
“This gal will watch your kids. If there’s an issue, she’ll bring them inside to you,” Kristy said.
“Excuse me?” I said.
“This is what she does, Tina—watches kids so expat women can shop. Trust me, the girls will be fine. She wants to increase her odds of making a sale, not destroy her livelihood.”
“But I’m not buying anything!”
Kristy shrugged.
“How do I know she won’t take off with my kids?”
Kristy chuckled at my folly. “Come on, Tina! There’s not a chance in hell that one of the 1.2 billion citizens of the People’s Republic of China would steal or harm a foreign child. It would never be worth the punishment! Any person who harms a foreigner, or even gets accused of harming a foreigner, would get shot before you could utter the words Amber Alert. Plus, they don’t want girls here, not even to marry all their single boys. You’re nothing but a photo opportunity to them, you know that, right? Trust me, no one wants your little white girls but you.”
I looked at her for a long moment. “They shoot people?”
Kristy shook her head. “I keep forgetting you’re new.”
“Like, in the streets?”
“Of course not! They’d take her out back. Look, don’t worry about it; I think they’ve slowed that whole program down. Maybe she’d end up in prison for life instead, moving rocks from one pile to another and back again. Either way, your kids aren’t going anywhere.”
I looked up, took a deep breath, then exhaled loudly for effect. “If you promise to never bring me here again, I’ll run in for a quick look. Tell the woman not to take her eyes off my kids; remind her of the punishment.” I slid my finger across my throat.
Kristy barked at the woman before pushing through the rainbow landfill of bags.
We stopped at the back wall of the booth. I leaned forward with my knees bent so the purses hanging from the sloped ceiling wouldn’t nuzzle my head.
“Xiàng sheng! Wǒmen yào jìnqù hǎo ma?” Kristy bellowed.
A man hustled toward us clutching a key on a dirty string. He kicked a pink plastic footstool against the wall, stood on it, and reached up, grabbing an unattractive white pleather purse from the highest hook. Behind it was a tiny keyhole. He pushed the key into the hole, then pulled with both hands to the right. The entire wall slid open.
“Wow,” I said and stepped in.
The interior of the illicit space consisted of three small whitewashed rooms connected by a cramped, dark corridor. The rooms were filled with metal racks separated by skinny aisles. On the racks sat neatly-arranged luxury brand bags, smallest in front, largest in back: Gucci, Prada, Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Chanel, Fendi, Balenciaga, plus a few I didn’t recognize. The wall slammed shut behind us.
“These are all this year’s styles and colors. I think the next room has the older models. And luggage. And shoes—”
“Wait, these are all fake?” I whispered.
“You don’t have to whisper, we all know what’s going on here, right?” she remarked to a middle-aged blonde woman walking by clutching a fake Gucci wallet. The woman glanced at her and then looked away.
“How much do they cost?”
“Oh, I don’t know, twenty bucks for a wallet, more for a purse? It depends on the size and how well you bargain,” Kristy said.
“Sheesh.” I walked around as Kristy ducked over to the “Prada” area on the next rack. I picked up a fake Louis Vuitton Speedy bag and smelled it.
“It even smells like real leather,” I called to Kristy in amazement.
“That’s because it is real leather. The good fakes are almost exact replicas of the real thing, down to the paper they’re stuffed with, the lock if they have one, even the care instructions. But check the zipper on anything you like, because if it’s a bad fake, that’ll be the first thing to bust apart.”
“Oh, I’m still not going to buy anything, I need to get back to the kids. I didn’t even bring my wallet in.”
Kristy dropped the bag in her hand and strode straight up to stand in front of me. “You’re kidding, right?”
“What?”
“You left your wallet out there?”
“You told me my kids were safe out there, Kristy, so why wouldn’t my wallet be? Besides, it’s under my kids—in the bottom of the diaper bag which is crammed in the basket under the stroller where Piper’s sleeping.”
She shook her head in confusion. “Tina. You can never leave your wallet anywhere.”
“Then what was the whole song and dance about how safe it is here! ‘People get shot,’ you said!”
“Yes, you are safe, and your children are safe, but your wallet is not anywhere near safe. Fu wu ren!” she yelled, knocking on the exit door. “Kuai yi dian!”
A woman hustled over to unlock and slide the door open.
Piper was awake and out of the stroller, watching a Chinese cartoon on a TV wedged under a body length mirror in the back corner of the hut. Next to Piper, the lady in the yellow dress bounced Lila on her hip while Lila chewed on the arm of her sunglasses. The stroller was parked toward the front of the hut, the front half of it wedged under a folding table showcasing every configuration of fanny pack. The diaper bag was nowhere to be seen.
26.
“There’s something wrong with this place!” I hollered into my cell phone as I steamrolled over toes and elbowed the butts of innocents on the sidewalk outside of the market. I held my phone to my ear
by my cocked left shoulder. People scattered around me, expressing their dissent with high-pitched percussive commentary, clucking, and fluffing, then rejoining their traffic patterns behind me.
“What happened?” Daniel asked.
“My diaper bag is poof! Gone. Vanished. No trace. My wallet was in it. I have nothing.” I jumped the stroller off the sidewalk and into the gutter to get around an army of men sweeping the street corner with brooms formed from a collection of tree branches banded together with string. The girls squealed in joy.
“Is that the girls I hear?”
“Uh, yes.”
“Then you don’t exactly have nothing,” he said.
I thought about hanging up but couldn’t figure out how to do it with my chin, so I stayed on the line and fumed silently.
“Was there a lot of money in it?”
“Not really. About fifty bucks.”
“Your passport?”
“No.”
“Apartment key?”
“No.”
“Any credit cards?”
“Just a debit card with my picture on it. I already cancelled it.”
“What else?”
“Other cards. Health insurance. Driver’s license. Triple A—”
“Those cards are worthless here.”
A horn honked behind me. I shook my fist at the driver of the Jetta taxi riding my tail with two of his wheels on the sidewalk. “Shut up!” I hollered.
“Uh, was that directed at me?” Daniel asked.
“No. I mean, sort of! I know the cards are worthless here, okay?”
“Then why were they in your wallet?”
“Are you serious right now? I’m telling you my personal property—”
“And I’m telling you it could be worse.”
I looked at my watch. “This isn’t helpful. I just got to our building, and I need to identify an English speaker who can help me replace my pool pass.”
Ten minutes later, I hit redial. “Our apartment is flooded.”
“What?”
“I started the washing machine before we left, and I don’t know, maybe I crammed too much stuff in it, but it has literally split open at the bottom—not even at a seam. It looks like the metal ripped, or like someone took a dull cleaver to it—one of those cleavers I just saw people using to chop chickens into bits at the wet market,” I whimpered.
“Where’s the water?”
“Everywhere. The kids are standing on the couch.”
“I’ll call Richard.”
Five minutes later, I picked up before it rang.
“Richard called our building manager. He says it’s our responsibility. We need to replace the washer,” Daniel said.
“What? That’s ridiculous. Give me his number.” I sloshed down the hall.
“It was apparently part of the rental contract. We fix, maintain, and, if need be, replace appliances. That’s what the contract says; I have it right in front of me. It’s non-negotiable.”
I smacked the bathroom door jamb with my hand, feeling the sting, and then blaming the entire city for it. “There’s something wrong with this place!”
He let me vent and then spoke again. “He said to go to Carrefour. They have the best prices for appliances.”
“What’s Carrefour?”
“It’s a French grocery store, the second largest chain store in the world after Walmart. There’s one about 45 minutes outside of Puxi.”
“They sell appliances at a grocery store?”
“Yes, and they’re cheap! Richard says they’ll pick up the broken one when they deliver the new one. I’ll send you the address now. Grab money from the top drawer in my nightstand.”
“Daniel, my consumer experiences in Shanghai have been pretty terrible up to this point, and that’s being generous.” I laughed with acidity. “I don’t have the patience for shopping here. It’s been a long day. I think it would be better if you go to Carrefour when you get back.”
“Tina, I have a job. And I’m in back to back meetings next week about a new factory—”
“Wait—what new factory? I thought you were already working with a factory?”
“We were until our accountant paid them a surprise visit last week and discovered it was a shell factory. A phony.”
“Last week? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I was going to, but it seems like there’s always a fire to put out.”
I stomped my foot, splashing water on the walls in the hallway. “They even knock off factories?”
“Yep,” Daniel said. “I think it’s safe to assume that everything here is fake.”
I clenched my fists. “This is ridiculous. I’m going to Carrefour right now, and I’ll leave there with a new washing machine, today!”
Several hours later I called Daniel again. “I did it! We have a new washing machine!” I sang into the phone. “It was painful, it took far too long, it might not even be a washing machine because I can’t read anything on the dial or in the instruction book, but guess how much it cost?”
“I’ve got a conference call in two minutes, can I—” Daniel said.
“Ninety bucks, brand new. NINE ZERO!” I ended the word “Zero” with an off-tune vibrato.
“That’s great, honey, uh—”
“Daniel, are you hearing me? Until today I haven’t had the patience to buy a banana off a guy at a food stall, and I just bought an appliance. Can you smell that? It’s called progress! Please acknowledge me! This is tremendous!”
He paused. “Uh—”
“Oh never mind, I’ll call Kristy.”
I hung up and dialed her. “I bought a new washing machine today, and I only paid ninety bucks, I ROCK!”
“Ninety bucks, geez, you didn’t get one of those top-loading pieces of crap, did you?” she said.
I felt like a bird, experiencing the joys of its maiden voyage, waving to all my feathered friends, chirping, “Look at me, I can do this!” and then BAM. A window.
“Please don’t pop my balloon, Kristy. Yes, it’s a top loader, but it’s the latest model with the newest technology. I think they said it’s a great choice.”
“Did I not tell you explicitly when you called me in a snit on the way to Carrefour that under no circumstances should you buy a top loader?” she demanded.
She might have told me that, and I might have ignored her.
“I feel good about it, and I think it’s gonna work. It’s being delivered today at 4 p.m.”
She exhaled her disgust into the phone. “I can see that you’re the type of person who insists on learning lessons on your own and resists any form of help or input, even when you ask for it. And that’s fine. My brother’s the same way and he’s limping by, so it can work. It’s just more difficult your way, which makes it often frustrating to watch. But, because you’re my friend, I’ll try not to say I told you so. Except I did.”
I ran the new washer umpteen times that night. I coaxed it lovingly, then firmly, then with profanity. I even tried a load of only four socks and two pairs of underwear. But every time I lifted the lid, clumps of powdered soap were still there, undissolved. Hems were still muddy, pits still offensive. I tried every setting on the dial. Nothing got clean.
I couldn’t call Kristy.
“What do I do?” I wailed to Daniel. “I can’t return an appliance in a taxi!”
“Didn’t you say it cost ninety bucks?” he asked. “It’s not worth the aggravation. Just roll it to the curb, someone will take it.”
“I will NOT roll it to the curb. They sold me a bum washer! I’m returning it first thing on Saturday and leaving the kids with you.”
27.
As soon as the doors to Carrefour were unlocked on Saturday, I hopped on the escalator up to the appliance floor. “Hello, can you direct me to an English-speaking manager?” I asked an employee in a blue jersey who idled at the front of a vast display of rice cookers on level three—the appliance level. She ambled off and whispered to a group of co
-workers who had huddled close by to stare at me.
A man in a yellow jersey approached. “Hello,” he said while feverishly scratching the inside of his left ear.
“Hello, are you a manager?” I asked.
“Yes,” he worked his mouth like there was food stuck in his molars.
I squinted at him and his internal itch. “Okay, uh, good. I bought a washing machine the other day, and it does not work very well. I would like to exchange it for this one.” I tapped the lid of the $350 front-loader, the most expensive option. “I’ll pay the difference. Is that possible?”
“One moment.”
He hollered into his walkie-talkie. An extra tall, acne-riddled youth, also in a yellow jersey, strode up. I re-explained my situation to him. He smiled and nodded.
“I bought this one yesterday,” I told the third yellow jersey, tapping the lid of the $90 display model and making an exaggerated frown. “It does not work at all.” I spoke slowly and shook my head. “It is at my home now. I want to exchange it for—” He walked away mid-explanation as a woman in green Carrefour coveralls strolled up. She looked me up and down and muttered something. About a dozen nearby employees burst into fits of laughter.
I was about to storm home and kick the washer out the window when the first yellow jerseyed man trotted up.
“Yes, okay, we will exchange,” he said.
“Oh thank God,” I said, feeling the tiniest bubble of hope.
I followed him to the nearest cash register, trailed closely by a gaggle of jerseys and coveralls. Once there, we all huddled around the cashier to watch her enter the information. The group alternated between watching her and watching me watch her as she slowly tapped on her keyboard. Tap, pause, tap, pause, tap, tap, extra-long pause. Why was she typing so slowly? Isn’t typing a basic skill set for a cashier? I wondered these things as I tried not to think about how badly I had to go to the bathroom. I couldn’t bear the thought of walking away to find a place which could only hit ten out of ten on the stink scale, and risk needing to start the transaction over from the beginning. I couldn’t hack starting over; I could already feel myself crowning into Crazyland.
Fish Heads and Duck Skin Page 14