by Zoë S. Roy
At the end of the ceremony, the new couple stood and held hands. The bridegroom had a wide smile on his face that smoothed away his wrinkles. The bride wore a pink silk flower clipped to her short hair, and her eyes beamed. Together, they sang a song from 1950s, which Nina remembered hearing as a child:
The revolutionary man is forever young
Like a pine tree green all year around
No fear for the thunder that shakes the ground
He stands straight even if rocks rebound…
The couple smiled at their audience. The song had spoken of the fullness in their hearts, which had survived ten years of hardship and depression, and were now filled with joy. Nina thought the ceremony had been simple and beautiful, almost revolutionary-style. Was it also hippie-style like Roger suggested? Nina wondered.
After the gathering, Nina went to stay at Rei’s grandmother’s home. The newlyweds had only three days for their honeymoon, and Nina did not want to disturb them.
The next evening, she visited Liya, but she was not home. Liya’s parents told Nina that their daughter had become a student in the Department of Chinese Literature at Pearl River University and was currently living in a dorm room on the campus.
The two friends met on the university campus and held each other’s hands as they swirled about on the lawn. Liya showed Nina around her university and explained everything that had happened since they had last seen each other. In the reading room of the university library, Liya turned to a page of the Sheep City Evening News. “This article may interest you,” Liya said, looking at her watch. “Hang around here and read this over. I must go to a student meeting now. I’ll be back in an hour.”
The headline was “Student Suspended.” The author started the story with questions: “How was Fangren Li (pseudonym) caught red-handed? Why did she steal the forbidden fruit?
“Li was a student from the Department of Chinese Language at a local university. According to her classmates, the quiet Li has always kept her distance from others. She had no close friends. Often, her bed was unoccupied. Her roommates merely assumed that she frequently went back to her parents’ home in town.
“One afternoon, a woman in her late twenties trudged into the main office in the university’s administration building. In a dark blue, floral-print blouse and baggy pants, she carried a piece of baggage and a wicker basket in each hand. When the woman visitor inquired about Lutou Chu’s address at the front desk, the office worker asked her, ‘Who are you?’
“‘I’m his wife,’ answered the visitor.
“‘What are you talking about?’ Flabbergasted, the clerk said, ‘He is single.’
“‘He’s married. I’m his wife.’ Gasping, the young woman’s round face was long and red. She raised her voice, ‘I have a child with him, too.’
“‘Okay.’ The worker gave her a pen and a sheet of paper. ‘Please write down his name. In case I mistook your words.’
“The unknown wife jotted down her husband’s name and said her husband worked in the admissions office.
“The clerk examined the name written down by the visitor, then she copied down his address on a slip of paper. A contented look on her face, the woman loaded the heavy canvas pack on her shoulder and grasped the woven basket with her hand. She trekked across the campus looking for the address the clerk had given her. An hour later, she located the three-storey building. Despite the tiring journey, the wife became excited when she reached her husband’s apartment — also her home. Two steps at a time, she mounted the stairs to the top floor without stopping though her shoulder ached from the pressure of the fully loaded pack, and her legs were sore from the long walk.
“She knocked on the door, knowing how surprised her husband would be to see her there. Just thinking about being in his arms thrilled her from head to toe. But no one answered the door. After she laid her pack and basket on the floor, she sat down to wait. Light radio music wafted through the air; as she listened, she became convinced that the music was coming from inside her husband’s apartment. Is he sick and can’t get up? she thought and got worried. She stood and pressed the side of her head against the door. What did she hear? The giggling of a woman and the voice of a man — it was her husband talking from the inside.
“She immediately thought something was wrong and so she banged on the door with her fists. ‘Open the door! Lutou Chu!’ she hollered.
“The door of the next apartment opened. A woman’s head came out. She asked, ‘What’re you doing?’
“The mad wife ignored the question. She started to kick the door. Then the door opened a crack. Chu stretched his head out. ‘Who is it?’
“The woman picked up her pack and basket and pushed her way in. ‘It’s me, your wife,’ she said loudly.
“Chu collapsed on the floor.
“The wife saw a younger woman sitting on the edge of the bed trying to fasten the top button on her blouse. Rage turned the wife’s face a livid purple. She threw the bag at her husband and grabbed an egg from the wicker bin she’d just placed on the floor. She hurled the egg at her rival and the younger woman ducked. It cracked against the bed’s headboard and the splashed yolk dripped onto the bed’s sheets. Meanwhile, the angry wife slapped the young woman’s ashen face. ‘You broken-down shoe! How dare you sleep with my husband?’ She thrust her head into her rival’s breasts, like a bull with horns pushing against its opponent. She hated to imagine her husband’s hands on the broken-down shoe’s breasts instead of hers.
“The girl was caught red-handed. She pushed the wife away, crying out, ‘I don’t believe he’s married to such a barbarian.’
“The woman picked up a bra on the floor and used it to whip the captive. ‘Sell your giant ass to other men!’ roared the enraged wife.
“Chu pulled himself up from the floor and grabbed his wife’s arm. ‘Let her go. It’s my fault,’ he begged.
“The defeated young woman darted out of the room, her face hidden under her uncombed hair. She pushed through the onlookers and hastened away.
“An elderly neighbour recognized her and spat with disgust. ‘A student! A broken-down shoe! An unmarried girl lives with a cheating husband. Despicable!’
“Like a skeleton in Chu’s closet, Li was exposed in public. But this isn’t the end of the story. As an author, I am warning any daredevils who challenge the law and commit bigamy. For a violation of the Marriage Law of the People’s Republic of China, Chu was sentenced to two years in prison. The adulterous student was suspended from school forever based on the rule that no student is allowed to have a love affair nor is any student permitted to cohabit with another. In addition, the premarital relationship was immoral.”
The author, it seemed to Nina, thought every female student should learn a big lesson from this story. It was a moralizing “tale” to reinforce the value of marriage and came off as salacious rather than news worthy.
Nina felt some empathy for Li but wondered why the author focused more on the moral lesson and not on the unfairness to the suspended student, She thought about the punished young woman, and sighed. She knew an unmarried woman in a sexual relationship was considered a “broken-down shoe.” That label might stick with Li and affect her forever.
By this logic, Nina herself was a broken-down shoe. Goosebumps appeared on her arms.
Nina wanted to interview this young woman for her book. The subsequent morning, with Liya’s help, Nina met the disgraced woman, Fangren Li, whose real name was Qing, in a dim sum restaurant.
Nina ordered a few dishes from the waitress. “Help yourself,” she said to Qing. “It’s my treat.”
Qing was in her mid-twenties and had short hair. Her bloodshot eyes stuck out in her pale face. Her fair skin made it hard for Nina to believe she had survived the hot and harsh winds of the rubberwood for five years.
“What else do you want to know about me? The newspaper sto
ry has told everyone everything,” said Qing, picking up her chopsticks to eat. “You’re from America where there’s sexual freedom. There both men and women have the right to choose their lovers, right? He doesn’t love his wife. He chose me.”
“You should defend yourself, not him. You do have the right to choose, but Chu doesn’t because he’s married.” Eyes locking on Qing’s, Nina continued. “I’m concerned about you. Do you wish to go back to the university?”
“Yes, but how?”
“Do you think the suspension is fair to you?”
Qing did not answer. With a blank look on her face, she bit into a shrimp dumpling. “That tastes good.” Then she looked at Nina. “Do American students have the right to love whomever they want and get married?”
“Yes, they do.”
“I broke an unfair rule. But I shouldn’t be completely suspended from the university. I didn’t commit a crime.”
Nina nodded. She told Qing that Liya and some other students disagreed with the university’s rule. They wanted to support her. However, Qing needed to speak to the Student Association. They could help her deal with the university authorities, and this unfair regulation could perhaps be changed.
Nina asked, “Can you tell me about yourself? I promise that if I write anything about you, I will use a pseudonym.”
“What am I afraid of? Everybody who’s read the paper already knows my reputation.” Her rising brow suggested she did not care about her reputation. “I’ll tell you what I went through in the past. It is now an old scar.”
When Nina listened to her story, she remembered bits of her own life from eight years earlier.
At the age of sixteen, in 1970, Qing was sent to a farm in Hainan Province. Like other girls, she had experienced many hardships: poor nutrition and an unsanitary environment, labour-intensive chores such as planting rice and carrying heavy manure loads with a shoulder pole, not to mention illness and lack of food and sleep.
One evening, Fang, the new leader, asked her to meet him in his office to discuss her new assignment with a performance group to spread Maoism. Pleased to be chosen for this easy job instead of cutting the barks of rubber trees to collect latex or labouring in the field, she put on her best outfit: a short-sleeved green blouse and a pair of grey pants — the only garments she had with no patches.
Lighthearted, she walked into the office. Middle-aged Fang sized her up, his heavy-lidded eyes half open. “You have a nice figure. I’ll teach you how to use it.” He blew out the oil lamp and pulled her into him. Before she screamed, he warned her, “If you don’t go along, I’ll tell my superiors that you seduced me.” He pushed her down onto the floor and raped her. After it was over, she sat on the floor, weeping silently in the dark. Fang patted her on the back. “I’m sure you can dance well. Come join the team tomorrow morning.”
Fang had raped several girls using the promise of participating in the performance group, but nobody dared to report him. Once a week, he asked Qing to meet him in his bed. In return, he arranged light workloads for her or assigned her to indoor work. After all, he told her, he liked her best. To evade the more labour intensive work, she had agreed to sleep with him. Later, the boyfriend of another abused girl reported the crime to the higher authorities. Fang was sent away so that Qing and other victims were freed from his control. But even after he was gone, her fellow workers avoided her. She had earned the name, “broken-down shoe.”
“Then some men came to the farm to meet me, thinking that I would be an easy conquest. Well, I guess I needed a man too. After I was accepted into the university and arrived on campus, I met Lutou, and we kind of liked each other right away. I could tell he had affection for me, and he was much better than other men. He doesn’t love his wife, he loves me,” said Qing. She took a sip of tea.
“If Lutou’s marriage was unhappy, he should have divorced his wife before he started a relationship with you. A married man living with another woman is treated as a bigamist. It’s against the law, but this is his problem. Remember? Your purpose is to return to the university.”
“You’re very helpful.” Qing looked at Nina. “Have you slept with any men?” She was eager to know about Nina’s life.
“Not with any married men. I sleep with my husband-to-be,” answered Nina. When she tried to fit herself into the Chinese tradition, she felt as confused as Qing.
From Ahua, Rei’s wife, Nina heard the story of a young man who had returned to Guangzhou from Xiangxi, the poorest area in Hunan Province. Injured and unemloyed, he lived with his parents. His mother worked with Ahua in the same factory.
One day, Nina followed Ahua into a crowded room of this man’s home in Guangzhou. The man sat on a bench with heaps of small pieces of fine cardboard and colourful labels lying next to him on the floor.
When Ahua introduced him to Nina, the young man said, “Welcome. My mother has told me about you.” He pointed at some wooden crates near him. “You can sit on any of them.”
“Would you mind if I record our conversation?” Nina asked as she pulled a small tape recorder out of her satchel. “This will help me remember the details of our discussion. I promise it won’t bring any trouble to you.”
“What trouble can be more than what I’ve got? In fact, I hope everybody knows my story.”
“Good. Can you start with your leg injury?” Nina asked as she turned on the machine.
“It happened six years ago, in 1972. Before the winter came, we had to cut tree branches and bushes for use as wood fuel. It was dangerous working around a steep mountainside, but we went there because it was a wooded area so we could find what we needed easily. We called our team of eight, ‘Commando.’ One day, each of us was carrying a full load, about a hundred pounds. One the way home, when we passed a dangerous section, a downpour suddenly started. Rocks on the mountain slid down. I dropped my shoulder pole and tried to find a place to hide from the falling stones. The guy in front of me froze at that moment. I called out, ‘Run! Drop your bundles!’ I don’t know if he couldn’t hear me or if he didn’t understand. He kept on carrying his load though he couldn’t move very fast. A falling rock smashed his head. His blood stained his pole and firewood packs. His life ended in a blink of an eye.
“I was hit by rocks, but not on the head. My legs wouldn’t budge. Another guy’s arms were injured. The survivors carried the dead body and us two wounded fellows back to the brigade. The authorities did nothing about the incident. We didn’t get any medical treatment. The reason was they had no money for us. The dead guy couldn’t get buried right way because his parents belonged to the ‘Five Blacks’ categories. Hopeless and helpless, all the sent-down youths in the area worked together, and made a rectangular case as a coffin out of large tree branches. We buried the body. Some of my fellow workers used herbal remedies to help cure our wounds.
“I survived the incident, but my right leg was seriously injured, has remained numb, and is now shorter than my left. The other fellow had both his hands ruined. I followed Mao’s directive to live in the countryside but finally woke up and saw only a dead-end street in front of me.
“For a couple of years, many of us continued to demand fair treatment. We also asked for medical benefits. Last year, all the farm workers who had died while officially working were finally recognized as victims of work-related accidents, and their families got some compensation. We two were allowed to return to the city. I limped with my left leg or walked with the aid of a crutch. Because I was handicapped and without skills, I couldn’t find a job, so I lived on my parents’ meagre income. Now at least I can make some money by gluing matchboxes but not enough for a woman to marry me.”
Before leaving, Nina offered him ten yuan for his help. He declined the offer. “I have a better life now than I did in the countryside. I don’t need your money. But I’d like to have one yuan as a keepsake. I can show others. I’ll tell them there’s hope in this world.
Even a stranger cares about me.”
Her throat tightening, Nina said, “My heart goes out to you. I admire you and what you’ve accomplished.” She handed him one yuan.
The man folded the banknote and placed it in his shirt pocket. Then he turned to Ahua, who had been sitting quietly beside Nina and listening to his story. “By the way, Ahua, my mother says your husband’s studying law at Peking University. Tell him to do well. Maybe he can make the justice system work for all of us.”
20.
RUINS OF YUANMINGYUAN GARDEN
NINA INTERVIEWED TWO more people during her stay in Guangzhou. Then, she boarded a train going north for Beijing. With Rei at Peking University, she had the opportunity to expand the scope of her research in the north. After travelling for a day and a night, she arrived in Beijing and then boarded a bus to Peking University. As she stepped through the gates of the university, she was struck by the way the glazed yellow roof tiles on the temple-style buildings sparkled in the sun. She took a leisurely stroll around Weiming Lake in the center of the campus; admiring the gentle sweep of willow branches draped along the shoreline. She breathed deeply and thought that all in all the campus looked the same as it had on her first visit twelve years earlier.
Nina had joined the Red Guards in June, 1966. A month later, a period of revolutionary networking started during which students were encouraged to share their experiences with other students from different places and participate in revolutionary activities all over the country. Everyone, including teachers, could book train tickets free of charge to anywhere they desired to go. Mao’s first meeting with a million Red Guards in Tiananmen Square on August 18 had helped increase the feverish desire to catch a glimpse of their helmsman. The catchphrase “Sailing the seas depends on the helmsman…. Making revolution relies on Mao Zedong Thought,” became popular and was sung across China.