The Black Star restaurant was in a wealthy area of Shanghai dominated by classic mansions with large gardens. Many of the mansions had been confiscated during the Cultural Revolution and now held multiple families, but not all of the houses were repurposed. Those occupied by party leaders, or important government heads and military commanders, had been spared the transition. In general, the area was starting to thrive again.
They were greeted upon entering the restaurant by a traditionally robed young Chinese woman who escorted them demurely to a table within the dining room. There were no exterior views from the dining room, but the interior of the room was classically elegant. Chrystal chandeliers hung throughout the room, lighting everything dimly because, generally, half the bulbs were out on each one. There was dark wood on the lower half of the walls and wall-paper with a busy pattern on the upper halves. Boris touched the wall-paper and confirmed that it was fuzzy in all the red colored parts of the pattern. He couldn't tell if it was also smoke and oil stained, or if the pattern was just so crazy.
"You're very sweet to take me here, Bori. These little crabs are a delicacy here and all the foreigners talk about how delicious they are. They're a river crab; they come from the Yangtze River."
"That's okay, I'll still eat them. I'm hoping the boiling process kills everything they might pick up in that river!" He laughed and then quickly moved his leg so that she couldn't connect the toe of her shoe with his shin again.
They visited about family and memories of holidays past. The holidays were around the corner and Julia would not be home. The opportunities and the money in Shanghai were simply too good to miss this season as an entertainer.
Julia was tight lipped about her life in general. Being the youngest in the family made her the target of everyone's opinion and direction. She got advice from her dad, her two older brothers and her older sister all the time so she was hesitant to share her plans before making her own decisions and choosing her direction. However, she'd been contemplating her next move for a while and wanted to share it with someone. Boris seemed a pretty safe bet because he was leaving tomorrow. Even if he did spill the beans, there wasn't much anyone could do from the Philippines that would mess up the next step.
"So Bori, can you keep a secret?"
"Of course I can, sister, I'm keeping at least twenty right now!"
"Very funny," she sipped her milk tea, letting the suspense build for a few moments, "I want to move to Germany. I think I can, too. I've been talking to talent scouts and agents and music lovers. There are people that think I have talent."
Boris chuckled, "Of course you have talent, sister, I’ve known that since I used to chase you down and steal the sweet cakes Papa used to make for you. You'd cry and the only way Papa could get you to stop was to sing to you and then ask you to sing along. Pretty soon you weren't crying, Papa wasn't singing and the rest of us were listening to you sing where he'd left off." He sipped his beer, contemplating before asking the obvious question, "But what does Germany have that you can't get in the Philippines or in China?"
The platter of crabs came just as he asked. They were beautifully presented on delicate bone china that was whimsically hand painted with a pristine river scape of the Yangtze. There were six hairy clawed crabs tied with string arranged in a circle around a small pot of melted butter. Boris could see the setting was supposed to depict the mouth of the river. He knew what that area looked like now and figured it represented a less industrial time…like maybe the golden age around 600 A.D.
The conversation was completely set aside in deference to eating the crabs while they were still steaming from their boiling plunge. Both siblings dove in with utensils, their hands and loud sucking sounds to separate every bit of meat and viscous bodily fluids from the hard, hairy shell that had once protected it.
As Boris was still licking his own fingers to get the crab juice and butter off them, Julia restarted the conversation about her move, "It's not so much what Germany has, as what it doesn't have. It doesn't have rules that break your incentive to sing well and try hard to improve your personal welfare. It also doesn't have thugs, despots and criminals running the country. I want to use my talent someplace where I can be the master of my destiny. Germany is full of hard working, rule abiding people. There's money there and they don't mind spending it for quality."
"There are rules everywhere, Julia, as well as despots. But I understand how you feel. If it feels like you have the talent to escape the mad house, go for it." He figured that of any of the four of them, Julia had the best chance of getting permanently out of the Philippines to a different life. One not run by the random vices and whims of whoever happened to be in power at the time. "What's your timeframe, anyway?"
"Oh, I haven't gotten that far, Bori. I have a lot of work to do to make a name for myself yet. One or two years? I hope to make it happen in less than five years, anyway. Keep your ears to the ground for Germans in the entertainment business!"
"Good luck, little sister, may your fortune be forever bright!" He raised his beer bottle to her and she took a sip from her tea.
#
After mitten crabs Boris and Julia headed back to her place to relax a bit before her set at The Bund Jazz Club.
"I'll be up later to catch your sets, okay?"
"Sure, no problem. Do you have to get up early tomorrow?"
"Nope, the ship doesn't leave until early afternoon. I'm not due till after lunch."
"I'm sorry you're not staying longer, but I'm glad you're going back to have the holidays with Papa." She went into her closet, brought out a bag and dumped its contents on the kitchen table. "I bought Papa some of the teas and spices he asked for when I was home. They're really fresh. I was thinking you could take them back. I hope the smell doesn't get to you." Most of what Julia had was in glass jars with stoppered lids, but there were a half dozen packages that were very fragrant.
"That's a great idea, sister, I have room in my bags and the smell will be pleasant. It will likely be better than whatever cargo this ship's carrying!" He laughed, honestly, at the joke. Not only that, but what better way to negate any possible smell his opium might carry with it.
After Julia left, Boris set to work with the doubloons. He had thought long and hard about how to move the heavy gold coins. Two briefcases was out. They were simply too wieldy to carry. A single briefcase was out because he hadn't found one that he knew would hold up under the strain of the weight. A box was too awkward. Finally, he'd decided on a combination plan. A single bag, backpack specifically, that he personally modified with several interior slings that dispersed the weight and volume around the bag was what he ended up using. He had to be careful not to look like he was having trouble with the weight of the bag when he was carrying it. Other than outright losing them there was not much he could do to damage the goods.
When the coins were all snug in the interior bags of the backpack Boris slipped his arms in and cinched the front strap to keep the momentum of the heavy bad from swinging around his back as he made his way to the club. He was self-conscious enough that he decided to hook a jacket on a loop of the backpack and carry it draped over his shoulder.
He took a real taxi to his destination this time since he was carrying the culmination of his life's work on his back. When he arrived he paid the fare and stepped up the curb to the sidewalk in front of the club. There was a car idling twenty-five feet away and as he watched it Orlando got out and waved him over.
"Boris, good to see you," Orlando patted Boris on the back, obviously checking for the gold he was expecting. "Why don't you let my colleague unload your bag into the truck and come have a chat with me in the car? The weather is so hot and inside the car the air conditioning is running." He indicated the open trunk of the car and the man standing, waiting to help him out of his backpack.
Boris unclasped the front strap and retrieved his coat from the loop before swinging the heavy pack off his back and stepping away, relieved of a small fortune. He watche
d briefly as the second man delicately began to check the interior contents of the backpack. Satisfied that this piece of the transaction had been made, he continued to the back seat of the car and got in after Orlando.
Orlando handed him another, similar, backpack which was lighter weight and told him to check everything. Boris took one of the interior bags and opened it enough to get a finger in. He put the powder to his tongue and it burned with a harsh taste of latex. Orlando gave him a new bag to repackage the one he'd broken into and waited while he completed that task.
"The pesos are in the lower compartment of the backpack. There's another zipper." Boris opened the zipper Orlando pointed to and took a couple of packs of pesos out to inspect them. They looked clean and real. There was a lot more pesos than opium. They were bulky, but at least they stacked well. The backpack he was going to leave with was lighter, but it was bigger than the one he came with…he began to worry about being able to layer all the bulk in the double walled luggage he came with. He may have to get home earlier than he'd planned tonight, but if not, at least he'd have time to transfer stuff and pack tomorrow before Julia got up.
"Are we good?" Orlando looked like he really did care. Maybe the guy did want to do future work with Boris, or more likely, the mayor.
"Yeah, it looks like it. I'm heading inside."
"Okay, good luck."
Boris could tell he wasn't going to be any good this evening with his sister and that he'd have to get out of the club to go get set up. He felt a headache coming on and thought, "Good, at least I don't have to fake it."
The Exit 1982
Exiting Julia's building through the stench of the garbage room was getting old, but at least it seemed that he'd given Captain Cho the slip. He'd left her apartment looking a little over burdened with a backpack, full of clothes and part of the spice gift for Gilberto, as well as his two double-wall modified suitcases. The hidden compartments in one of the cases was filled with opium. The other case held the remaining pesos. He didn't think there would be any drug sniffing dogs in the Chinese harbor, especially not in the boat he was taking, but as a precaution, he'd tried to confuse the scent with a couple of different spices Julia had given him, and he planned to add some fragrant delicacies from a couple of the food vendor's carts he would pass on the way as well.
His plan was to arrive at the dock early. Hopefully early enough so they wouldn't be organized. Instead of properly checking him in, they would simply wave through such a timely and organized passenger. He couldn't imagine it would be much of a process anyway. He'd chosen this passage because of its simplicity. It was a cargo boat that made only one stop, Taipei, before going on to Manila. Because of the straightforward Shanghai, Taipei, Manila route, there was some demand for passenger passage as well on the ship. This particular boat only had room for ten passengers though, so it was perfect. They would be totally ignored by most everyone.
He grabbed a taxi from the alley at his sister's place and it dropped him off when the road ahead got jammed up with a car / bicycle accident. It wasn't a great neighborhood, but was only a few blocks to the dock anyway. In the last few hundred feet, he pushed through a small crowd and rounded a corner. He almost ran into Manny.
"Follow me quickly," Manny said and didn't give him any chance to follow, but grabbed his arm and yanked him through a door. Once through, Manny grabbed a board laying on the floor, and just as Boris was getting set to fight, Manny rammed the board under the door handle.
Less than a minute later the handle jiggled and was pushed from the other side, but Manny was leaning hard on it and it didn't budge. Manny put a finger to his lips and pointed to a clerestory window up on a loft like landing. When Boris crept up to the window and looked out he saw a familiar hat and heard the hacking cough of Captain Cho. "Damn," he thought, "that guy's better than I gave him credit for. He followed me here." He went back down to the floor where Manny was now leaning up against the door having a smoke.
"Why?" Boris asked.
"Why, what?" Manny replied.
"Why everything, but why did you save my skin, mostly?” Said Boris.
"Eh, I don't know, exactly. Maybe I’m just a generous soul." Manny smiled and spit in the corner.
"So what now?" Asked Boris.
"Well, I'm going back to my dock, I finished what I had to do down here and then some. As for you, I guess you owe me. Pay it back in business." Manny stubbed out the butt of his smoke, kicked the board from under the door handle and left.
Even though it didn't work at Julia's apartment, Boris wandered through the building until he found another exit to another street. He turned toward the harbor docks and continued to his destination, keeping much more to the shadows, and didn't see Captain Cho or Manny again before boarding.
The boarding process was just as he thought, nothing. He walked up the gangplank, showed the stamped piece of paper that served as a ticket, and was given directions to his cabin.
Back Across The Water 1982
If he thought it was easy to get on the boat, Boris was even slightly more surprised by how easy it was to move around it. There weren't really any rules besides those on a sheet of paper, taped to the inside of his cabin door with yellowed scotch tape.
1. No smoking in your cabin. (It was pretty clear you could smoke anyplace else on the ship…just not in your cabin.)
2. No cooking in your cabin.
3. No firearms in your cabin.
4. No shooting outside your cabin without the Captain's permission.
5. In the event of an emergency, indicated by the siren, no leaving your cabin.
6. In the event of a fire, indicated by the different siren, no returning to your cabin.
7. No use of the emergency dinghies for non-emergency purposes.
8. No swimming in the ocean.
9. No fires on any of the decks.
10. No special orders from the kitchen.
Apparently the cook had been asked for input to the rules when the captain ran out of ideas after number nine.
All Boris wanted to do was disappear for the length of the trip. This ship had a Belgium born captain, a German first mate, a Taiwanese cook and the remainder of the crew was largely Filipino.
His cabin was tiny by any standard, but it was reasonably free from bugs and rodent droppings. Which he hoped meant it was reasonably free of bugs and rodents. It also had a very solid looking locker that could be padlocked. He put his precious cargo into the locker, removed the padlock and key provided by the ship and produced the padlock he purchased. After he locked things up tight he headed back out to get a feeling for the rest of the passengers.
There were only seven others on this trip. Two white guys that looked like hippies and smelled like pot. "Good luck with rule number one with those two," he thought. A very solidly built single woman dressed in blue jeans and a tee shirt. A Taiwanese couple in their sixties. And an Australian couple in their late fifties. Boris was surprised that he was the only Filipino passenger.
The eight of them had been asked to come to the dining room when they got settled in and they were now milling around looking pensive and bored, except for the hippies. They were talking animatedly with the first mate in German. Boris didn't catch any of the conversation, but the first mate looked like he was being forced to swallow an entire apple-tart sweet cake dessert and was now having trouble keeping it down. There was a smile on his face, but it was strained and he was squinting his eyes like he did not understand what was being said to him. Or maybe he did understand and found it too hard to swallow after all the 'sweet cake' shoved down his throat?
Boris went and picked up a beer that was, hopefully, supposed to be part of the deal for the passengers, popped it and leaned against the wall. He did a little 'cheers' with the can in the direction of the single woman who was drinking something as well. She acknowledged him and wandered over in his direction, "Great crowd, huh? How'd you get trapped on this barge?" she asked him in Tagalog.
"Well I
didn't get trapped, I bought a ticket," he answered in Tagalog as well, "My name's Boris."
"Mine is Nancy." She extended her hand and they did a quick shake. "Yeah, I also bought a ticket. In fact, I ride barges like this all the time."
"No need to apologize to me. This is a barge, but it's exactly what I signed on for. I'm just getting home cheaply and in a really relaxed fashion." He laughed at the last part. "A really relaxed fashion," he thought.
"Yeah, nothing like a slow boat to and from China to relax you. I'm a writer and I take these barges all over the world. It's much less expensive than a low rent hotel in Manhattan and who the fuck wants to stay in a low rent hotel in Manhattan?"
He chuckled a little and looked around the room to see if there was any other option for sane talk. Seeing that there really wasn't, he plunged ahead. "So why do you speak Tagalog, Nancy?"
"Because I'm on these barges so much. Don't tell me you haven't noticed that most of the crew is Filipino?" Nancy asked.
"Yes, I do know that. Seven thousand islands to sail around builds a love of the sea in my people," Boris said.
"And sailing with Filipino crews for seven to eight months of the year will force even the most stubborn American to learn Tagalog if they want to do anything more than survive," Nancy said.
"What do you write, Nancy?" Boris asked.
"Anything and everything, Boris, but mostly I write about mysteries and murders on the ocean," Nancy answered.
"All true stuff, then?" Boris said, with a glimmer in his eye.
"Yeah, not so much. Sailing the wide open sea gets to be just as monotonous as a newspaper job on the city desk, just without the boss looking over your shoulder twelve hours a day," Nancy answered.
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