Love In No Man's Land

by Duo Ji Zhuo Ga

  Lunzhu glanced at the wild asses grazing below. ‘How many hunters came out today?’

  ‘Twenty-five. Apart from two tents whose men aren’t here, everyone else came.’

  ‘Keep to the old rules: one head per person, and no shooting animals with young.’

  ‘Alright!’ the young man replied, then passed on the instruction.

  ‘Aba, why don’t we shoot animals with young?’ Gongzha gazed up at his father, his eyes wide.

  ‘We need meat now, but we’ll also need meat again next year. If we kill the animals with young, what will we do next year? Nature has given us the wild asses to use in times of need: they don’t compete with our yaks and sheep for pasture, and we don’t even have to look after them. If we run out of food, all we have to do is go out onto the grassland and bring one back. Remember, son, you should never do anything to the point of exhaustion, and that includes hunting. If you do that, you have no room for manoeuvre. Understand?’

  Gongzha nodded as if he understood, then scrambled up to sit alongside one of the young men who’d already loaded his gun and was searching for a target.

  Production-Team Leader Danzeng came over. He didn’t look at Lunzhu, but his words were meant for him. ‘We’ll go by the old rules and kill two extras for the vultures and wolves.’

  Lunzhu nodded.

  Danzeng and Lunzhu respected each other, but there was a distance between them. Lunzhu’s woman, Dawa, had been Danzeng’s first love. However, circumstances had conspired against him, and the woman he loved had married another man, the man they called the Sniper – Lunzhu. Danzeng would never forget her.

  After a big hunt, it was the custom to leave some of the kill for the vultures and wolves. Vultures subsisted primarily on corpses, but in recent years the rains had been regular, few animals or humans had died, and the vultures had gone hungry. The wolves were also hungry: in winter, most animals hid in their dens and it got harder and harder for the wolves to find food; famished, they would attack the herders’ livestock. Hunts left behind a strong smell of blood, which drew these carnivores in. Experienced hunters would leave them something to eat at the site of the kill. If the scavengers were full, the men and their livestock would all be a little safer.

  ‘Bala, look! There’s a bear over there!’ Gongzha was staring at the summit of a distant mountain, from where a brown bear was watching them. ‘There’s a white ring on its forehead.’

  ‘That’s Kaguo, born last year,’ his father said. ‘The bear cub Dunzhu and his men caught last year was her brother.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Her parents live on that mountain. I see them every time I go there to catch foxes. When the mother came out for the first time last spring, she had two cubs with her. Kaguo was one of them.’

  ‘How do you know that cub was this one’s brother?’

  ‘They both have circles on their foreheads. This one I call Kaguo and the one Dunzhu caught I call Naguo, because its circle wasn’t as white as this one’s – it had some black in it. You shouldn’t assume that all bears look the same – each one is unique and if you observe them carefully, you’ll see the differences.’

  ‘Should we kill it, Bala? You can get a lot of money for bear claws!’ Gongzha stared at Kaguo, bursting with enthusiasm.

  ‘Certainly not.’ Lunzhu gave his son a stern look. ‘We’re herders, we rely on the grassland to live. Today the grassland gave us all these wild asses, so we have meat to eat. What would we do with all that money? Never forget, Gongzha, that a hunter should not be greedy.’

  Gongzha frowned and fell silent. Even though his father was the grassland’s top marksman, he had strong principles. He wouldn’t kill two animals in the same day. That’s to say, if he’d already killed one piece of game that day, no matter what sort of animal he came across next, he wouldn’t fire another shot unless he was in danger. As he repeatedly said, if hunters practised self-restraint, there would always be food for them.

  Just then, Team Leader Danzeng, who was standing on the highest point, waved his hand and pulled his trigger. A crackle of bullets followed from where the other hunters were hidden. After a moment of shocked hesitation, the wild asses began to bray and flee in all directions. But they were too late to save themselves: any ass that escaped did so only because the hunters had allowed it to.

  Gongzha wasn’t interested in the wild asses; he was still watching the bear, Kaguo. When he saw how she scampered off at the sound of the gunfire, for some reason he felt a bit sorry for her. The shots weren’t loud – they sounded like beans frying – but they scared away all the animals, who instinctively knew their lives were in danger. It was as if the fear of gunfire was lodged deep in their bones. Generation after generation must have instilled in their offspring that the animals on two legs posed the greatest threat; they needed to get as far away from them as possible, because they had guns.

  The scent of blood and the sight of their prey crashing to the ground always got the men excited. Perhaps this was also something that had its origins in ancient times and was lodged deep in the bones of humans. When people were in competition with animals for food, a kill was something to be proud of; this had been passed down the generations, so that even when they were not hungry and had no need to hunt, the thirst for blood was still in them. It required only the right conditions for it to burst out. And so, as the men looked at the wild asses on the ground and saw the blood spurting, their pupils dilated with the thrill of it.

  Danzeng sent a few people down to do the count. There were exactly twenty-seven: neither too many nor too few.

  ‘These two are really skinny, and this one has a broken leg,’ one of the young men yelled back up. ‘Who killed them? He’s a good shot – got them with single bullets!’

  Gongzha knew that the two weakest asses had been killed by his father: two shots, two animals. This was what his father meant by ‘survival of the fittest’. Men hunted only out of necessity, and given that they used the lives of animals to sustain their own lives, they were duty bound to treat them with compassion. In the fierce struggle for life, the weakest animals would always be the most vulnerable. Being torn apart by wolves was far worse than being killed with a single clean shot.

  Lunzhu slung his gun across his back, took out a pinch of snuff, sneezed, and then said lightly, ‘Let’s give those two to the vultures and wolves.’

  ‘Yes.’ Danzeng nodded and called down to the men. ‘Don’t take the two skinny ones – leave them for the vultures and wolves.’

  The young men began hauling the rest of the kill onto the flatbed carts.

  The older hunters lit a pile of incense to thank the Buddha for providing the animals and honour their deaths so they could reincarnate earlier. This was the way of the grassland. Even though they hunted one another, they also depended on one another for survival. If one died out, the others would be lost. Give thanks to the Buddha, give thanks to the grassland, give thanks to every living thing: this was the first lesson Gongzha learnt.

  In just a short time, the grassland had been cleared. A light breeze blew and the grass rippled. Save for the stench of blood, it was as if nothing had happened there. As the horses dragged the carts away at a brisk trot, vultures started circling in the blue sky overhead and wolf howls echoed in the distance. The second shift of cleaners began to arrive one by one. After their work was done, the grassland would be pure once more.

  2

  ‘Leave your tent at sunrise with the livestock; leave your tent at sunset with a woman.’ This line from an old herders’ song was an accurate description of men’s lives on the grasslands. For herders, the only things of value in their tents were a few pots and pans: the yaks and sheep that gave them their meat roamed out on the grassland and all the clothes they owned hung off their backs. Theft on the grassland was rare; no one would ride a day or two to another tent just to steal some old household goods. Blood was spilt frequently, however, usually when an argument became heated and knives were draw
n. If it was just a minor incident, it was soon forgotten. More serious altercations were adjudicated by the elders, and often a sheep or yak would be given in compensation, to stop further revenge being taken.

  Most events in the wider world had no effect on life on the plateau, where the Changtang herders carried on as they always had. But the Cultural Revolution was different. In 1966 it roared across the grassland like wildfire. People’s respect for religion seemed to disappear overnight. Buddhism lost its air of mystery and herders no longer prostrated themselves fervently before the golden statues of the bodhisattvas or gazed up at them in awe. Temples large and small fell into disrepair. Buddhist monks were stripped of their expensive robes and walked out of their temple halls in everyday clothes, forced to re-adjust to the secular life they had left behind. For those who’d joined the temple when they were young and knew only how to read the scriptures and serve the Buddha, this was a long and excruciating process. Relearning how to herd and milk and gather yak pats was easy enough, but having to put aside the Buddhist prohibition against killing and take up hunting in order to keep themselves from starving was torturous.

  On the day that a group of communists brandishing copies of the Little Red Book and wearing shabby fur-lined robes stormed into Cuoe Temple, Gongzha was sheltering in a crevice higher up the mountain, counting the wild yaks in the river valley. The yak herd had arrived two days earlier and Aba had told him to keep a close eye on them and see that they didn’t run off. If he did as he was asked, Lunzhu promised he would take Gongzha with him to kill one of the yaks. The family had nearly run out of meat and would soon be going hungry.

  Whenever Lunzhu took his old rifle with the forked stand out on a hunt, he always came back a day or two later with enough meat to last the family for several days. And even though Gongzha was not yet as tall as the gun, he’d been well taught by his father; he never wasted his bullets and could already take down antelopes and foxes.

  Each time Aba came home from a hunt, he paid a visit to the temple, prostrated himself three times and presented the monks with some meat. Tibetan monks ate meat. Han Chinese Buddhists and Theravada Buddhists might have disapproved of this practice, but Tibetan Buddhism was rooted in the mysterious land of Tibet itself. On the cold, high plateau, yaks and sheep were essential for survival and anyone who did not eat meat would find it hard to scrape by. According to the theory of reincarnation, everything on earth had life, and that meant respecting not only animals that walked but also plants and other lifeforms. Everything had the potential to be the present incarnation of a person’s brother, sister or parents from a past life. Entering a temple and putting on the crimson robes of a monk might change a person’s status, but it did not take away his human needs. As Buddha’s representative among men, a monk’s first duty was to stay alive.

  Hunting had to be done mindfully and with restraint. If an entire herd was wiped out, there would be nothing but grass for people to eat. If humans were to continue living on the plateau, then animals had also to be allowed to continue living there. Cuoe Temple’s Living Buddha Zhaduo would say this each time Lunzhu visited, and each time Lunzhu would bring his palms together in acknowledgement, nod, and exit the temple hall.

  Gongzha had always wanted to go on a yak hunt with his father. Killing a wild yak was a serious challenge – they were massive, almost three times the size of domesticated yaks, and if you didn’t kill them with a single shot, they would fight for their lives and quite likely cause you an injury. For the last two nights, Lunzhu had been called to political study sessions with the rest of the production team and hadn’t been able to go hunting, which was why he’d told Gongzha to climb the mountain each day and check that the wild yaks were still there.

  The herd in the valley were females. There were at least twenty of them, as well as four calves born at the beginning of the year. Male yaks were solitary creatures and only joined the herd for the mating season, during which time they burnt off all the fat they’d accumulated over the winter. Then they left the females again and began rebuilding their strength.

  Gongzha suddenly heard shouts coming from the temple. Was it another group of communists looking to smash up the old way of doing things – the Four Olds, as they called them (old habits, old customs, old ideas and old culture)? Gongzha slipped excitedly out of the crevice and climbed round to a grassy viewpoint overlooking the temple. He wanted to see what was happening, but he was too young to join in.

  The temple was halfway up the mountainside and from his vantage point Gongzha could see everything clearly. A group of monks were sitting in the dirt yard in front of the temple while a revolutionary held up a copy of the Little Red Book and lectured them through a megaphone. Gongzha recognised the young revolutionary: it was Luobudunzhu, from another production team. He’d gone to middle school in the same commune and had then joined the Red Guards. When he returned to the commune, he set up a Revolutionary Command Centre and was now its commander. He usually wore a soldier’s belt around his sheepskin chuba and liked to strut around self-importantly.

  When Luobudunzhu finished speaking, he ordered the monks to leave the mountainside and return to their homes. From now on, he said, the temple would be the Red Guards’ headquarters. The Red Guards began yelling revolutionary slogans, hurling the bodhisattva statues to the ground and smashing them to pieces with hammers. The valley echoed with the clang of destruction and the despairing cries of the monks. In the blink of an eye, the revered Buddhas and bodhisattvas that had presided over the temple hall became nothing more than scrap metal.

  The back door of the temple opened quietly and an old monk emerged carrying a yellow cloth bag. He looked as if he was in a hurry; he didn’t take the path but scrambled on his hands and knees straight up the side of the mountain. Gongzha recognised him. He was the temple’s Living Buddha Zhaduo, the most learned man of his generation. He often chatted with the hunters and was a very self-disciplined old monk.

  A young man in a soldier’s cap poked his head out the door. When he saw the old monk halfway up the side of the mountain, he started to yell, ‘The cow-ghost snake-spirit is getting away. Hurry and bring him back!’

  A gang of young revolutionaries brandishing the Little Red Book swarmed out of the temple and began to chase after him, shouting and yelling. The old monk kept glancing back nervously. Tucking the bag into his robes, he climbed faster towards the top.

  Gongzha was worried for him; he feared Zhaduo would get caught and beaten up. The revolutionaries had subjected him to a lot of criticism at the production team’s recent political meetings, tying a wooden board around his neck announcing in Tibetan that he was a cow-ghost snake-spirit. The old man was getting frailer, and after each such struggle session, as the revolutionaries called these meetings, he was bedridden for several days. Lunzhu often sneaked over with Gongzha to see him, bringing him food and comforting him.

  Zhaduo’s pursuers were closing in. The living Buddha was clearly exhausted and his leg was injured. His route up the mountain was blocked by a large boulder. He would soon be caught.

  ‘Quick, quick!’ Gongzha urged quietly. ‘There’s a way up to the right of that boulder.’ He didn’t dare speak loudly: if the Red Guards found out that he’d helped the cow-ghost snake-spirit, Aba and Ama would suffer for it.

  In these troubled times, it was hard to distinguish between men and demons.

  Zhaduo looked up and was startled to see Gongzha, but he took his advice and edged his way round the side of the boulder. With no time to lose, he stuffed the yellow cloth bag he’d been clutching into Gongzha’s leather chuba, put his palms together and said, ‘Please help the Buddha, child.’ Then he turned and went back down. He cut a noble figure against the rocky mountainside.

  The revolutionaries soon caught him. They pinned his arms behind his back and walked him back down the mountain, jostling him as they went. Zhaduo staggered, and just before he re-entered the temple, he turned his head and glanced up the mountain.

&nbs
p; Gongzha touched the bag and suddenly felt that he’d been brave in the face of danger. He waited until the revolutionaries had disappeared inside the temple, then stood up and made his way back to the other side of the mountain. He slid down the slope, returned to his hideout and squeezed into the crevice. If he bent his knees to his chest, he could just about sit down.

  He pulled the cloth bag out of his robe and opened it. Inside was the statue of a Buddha as tall as his arm and so black it gleamed. When he held it in his hand it felt cool and heavy. There were also some pages from a book. Gongzha glanced through them. On the top page was written in gold ink: The Epic of King Gesar. There was another piece of paper with a snow mountain drawn on it. In the centre was a triangle, and in the centre of the triangle was the image of a bear; on the bear’s forehead was a tiny ¤ symbol.

  Kaguo? Gongzha opened his eyes wide to look at the bear on the paper. How could it be Kaguo? What was the old living Buddha doing drawing Kaguo? And in a triangle? Gongzha looked at it upside down and right side up. He’d seen Kaguo enough times – in the distance when he was picking up yak pats, hunting foxes or herding. Sometimes Kaguo was hunting mice or catching rabbits, sometimes she was sunning herself or just lumbering about. They’d never actually had an encounter, but she felt as familiar as an old friend.

  As he stared at the sketch on the rough paper, Gongzha felt as if a sheaf of grass had been stuffed in his brain. He thought and thought until he worried his brain would burst, but still he couldn’t imagine why Living Buddha Zhaduo would draw Kaguo. He put the piece of paper and the other things away again. He couldn’t take them home. The Red Guards came and searched the families’ tents every couple of days for the Four Olds. If he took Zhaduo’s things home and they were found, the family would be in big trouble. He would have to hide them while he worked out what to do with them. He looked around him, but there was nowhere in the rockface to hide things. So he got up, took out his meat knife and began digging in the crevice where he’d been sitting. After a while he’d excavated a hole just large enough for the cloth bag and the Buddha; he tucked them into it, covered them well and patted down the earth with his hands. Only then did he leave his hideout and descend the mountain, singing mountain songs.