by Li Cunxin
Zhang and I got off the plane and collected our luggage. Then we just stood there in our oversized suits and looked around. We didn’t know anyone except Ben Stevenson. How would we recognize the person who was supposed to meet us?
People around us collected their luggage, came and went, while we became more and more nervous. What if nobody showed up?
Suddenly I saw some people standing behind some glass windows on a second floor, and there was Ben, jumping up and down like a yo-yo, trying to catch our attention, with a card with my name written on it in Chinese. Zhang and I were overjoyed. Ben came to meet us just outside Immigration.
“Ni hao,” he said, one of the few Chinese phrases he knew. “Hello,” I replied, one of the few English words I knew.
Ben asked us some questions and I tried to use the words from my dictionary to show him how ecstatic I was, but Ben was just happy to share our excitement with nods and smiles and when we couldn’t understand his words we just smiled more and said yes. My dictionary became my best friend from then on, but I had at least learned some expressions already: “Oh dear me” and “Upon my soul.” They’d be very useful, I thought. I also knew a few propaganda words and some communist expressions that might come in handy. And although my English was not good, Zhang’s was even worse and I ended up translating for him as well.
We boarded a flight to Houston and with Ben by our sides we began to relax. As we flew over the American landscape I noticed how green it was and that it was neatly divided into squares by straight roads and streets. We saw many little square patches of blue too. Ben said they were swimming pools—he mimed swimming and drowning motions with his arms. He made us laugh but I could hardly believe there could be so many swimming pools in just one area. The contrast with the bareness of China was so amazing that I started to wonder once again about America’s prosperity and the stories we’d been told.
When we arrived at Houston Airport we were met by Clare Duncan, head of the Houston Ballet Academy, and two Houston Ballet board members: Preston Frazier, a very tall man who spoke softly, and Richard Holley, a medium-sized man who spoke loudly. They handed Zhang and me a small bunch of native Texas flowers and a cowboy hat each. Zhang and I hesitated. We didn’t know whether to accept these gifts or not—we were suspicious. We simply didn’t trust these Americans. But I was the assigned leader of the two of us, because my political standing was higher than Zhang’s, so eventually I told Zhang to accept the gifts. It was the first time anyone had ever given me fresh flowers.
The Americans’ happy smiles also made us nervous. This is not what it is supposed to be like. Something is wrong here. They are our enemies. Behind their smiling faces will be a hidden agenda. I’ll find out what it is soon, I said to myself.
Like the inside of the plane, the airport was surprisingly cool. I thought we had been given the wrong information about Houston’s hot weather, and I was thankful we had our jackets on. But the pleasurably cool air didn’t last long. As soon as we walked outside an intense and humid heat, like a hot wet blanket, overwhelmed us. I found it hard to breathe. Then one of the ballet board members, a woman Ben introduced as Betty Lou Bayless, ushered us into her car and it was cool in there too. Betty Lou was an elegant, softly spoken lady with a kind face. Her car was so comfortable, so smooth. This was the first time I had ever been in a car. Such luxury could only be enjoyed by government officials in China, and I felt incredibly privileged. I could hardly contain the excitement in my heart.
When we passed downtown Houston and saw all the modern office buildings and the spectacular skyline I thought to myself, if Houston looks this prosperous, what would New York and Chicago be like? Nothing I had seen so far matched the dark, decaying, depressing picture of America that the Chinese government had painted in my mind. Instead I saw high-rise buildings, wide clean streets, a green and orderly environment. I knew our foreign hosts could maybe fake their behavior, but they simply couldn’t have built these buildings just to impress us. I was confused. Someone had lied to us about America being the poorest nation in the world and China being the richest nation. It seemed to be the opposite. But still I was confident I would eventually find many things about America that I could hate.
We arrived at a large house in a fenced complex with a security gate and guards. Zhang and I were ushered through a big sliding glass door—and my jaw dropped . . .
I saw a huge room, beautiful beyond belief, with pastel colors, sofas and matching chairs. And mirrors, giant mirrors. There was carpet too—beige, soft and bouncy. To the left I saw a kitchen—and my jaw dropped even lower. A refrigerator stood against the wall, as tall as me and four times as wide. And an electric stove and two sinks. And there seemed to be many other things—gadgets whose purpose I couldn’t even imagine. The kitchen was simply enormous. So many wooden cabinets on the walls and under the counter. Has the Western world gone mad with all this? Did they have a robot toilet to wipe their bottoms? I couldn’t help myself from being constantly shocked. Everything was new. Even the air smelled new.
Ben showed us around and led us upstairs to our bedroom, which had two single beds in it, a small walk-in closet and the same luxurious carpet as downstairs. There was a chest of drawers and small tables with lamps beside each bed. It even had its own bathroom with a human-sized bathtub! I had never used a bathtub before. Couldn’t be more beautiful than a shower. Couldn’t be.
That first night in America we were taken to a local Chinese restaurant called the Mandarin. A Chinese lady greeted us at the door with rather broken Chinese. She wore a long black silk gown, and she had a heavily made-up face. I thought she looked more like a Beijing Opera singer, but she smelled so strong! She must have poured a whole bottle of perfume over herself.
The restaurant was very crowded, but we were taken to our own private room. Clare Duncan and the two gentlemen we had met at the airport, the quiet Preston and the loud Richard, were there too, as well as two other friends of Ben’s, Jack and Marcia. Both Ben and Richard joked throughout the night and made everyone laugh. But Zhang and I knew we were facing six possible class enemies here. We didn’t know what attitude we should have toward these people. If this were China they would have been killed or jailed under Mao’s regime simply because of their wealth. But here they were, relaxed, joking and laughing like they were having the time of their lives.
We had a couple of tasty Tsingtao beers from my hometown, the first time I had ever had one, and as the evening progressed we gradually let our guard down just a little and joined in the fun. Ben ordered many delicious dishes, including Peking Duck. I’d never had Peking Duck before either, and it just melted in my mouth. Here we were, having two Chinese icons right here in America. No one is going to believe me back home, I thought. I noticed too that these Westerners called Beijing “Peking” all the time—even that seemed odd.
Many courses later, Ben asked us if we were still hungry. We didn’t understand what he was saying, but we remembered that we had to keep smiling and saying, “Yes, yes!” just as the Chinese officials had told us. But more and more food kept arriving. Eventually I just held my head and shouted, “Oh dear me!” and everyone burst into roars of laughter.
In desperation I went to the Chinese lady who owned the restaurant. “Can you please tell Ben to stop ordering any more food? Our stomachs will simply burst!”
“But he hasn’t even ordered dessert yet,” she said.
“What dessert?”
“Sweet dessert. Don’t you have them after dinner in China? American people love their dessert,” she replied.
I’d never heard of such a thing called dessert.
By the end of the evening we had so much leftover food on the table I asked Ben if we could take it home. I couldn’t bear the waste. I thought of all the starvation in China. But everyone that night seemed to admire our slimness, and I couldn’t understand why. In China being thin was a symbol of poverty, and being fat meant you had money to buy good food. Later I discovered that many p
eople in America went to expensive diet clinics to lose weight. I could easily help them, I thought, just by sending people to China and feeding them those dried yams for a while.
When we got back to Ben’s place that night I had my first bath. The water soaked my body and soothed my every nerve. I even let the water come over my face and I blew bubbles like a child. It was incredible. I couldn’t decide whether I liked the shower or the bath better. The bed was a different matter, though. The soft, bouncy mattress was very uncomfortable!
When I woke up next morning I had to pinch myself to make sure that everything was real. When I heard Ben’s voice downstairs calling us for breakfast, I knew it was true. I was in America. For six whole weeks.
Ben had already cooked us some bacon and eggs. “Would you like some English muffins?” he asked.
Zhang and I exchanged horrified looks. “No, thank you!” we replied quickly. What a terrible thing for Ben to offer us for breakfast, I thought to myself.
This time Ben was puzzled. “What’s wrong?”
With the help of my dictionary, I replied. “Muffin meaning horse shit in Chinese.”
Ben roared with laughter. “First ‘Oh dear me’ and now ‘horse shit’! We’re going to have a lot of fun this summer,” he said.
Next he offered us some orange juice. He sliced several oranges and by the time he had filled up three glasses he had used nearly ten! I felt like a criminal drinking that precious glass of juice. My family had never even seen an orange before. And it was the first time that we’d ever tasted bacon, toast, butter and jam too. We had masses of food. Ben couldn’t believe where it all went. He had to cook another package of bacon and fry more eggs. It was as though we hadn’t eaten for eighteen years.
After breakfast we went straight to the Houston Ballet Academy, which was within walking distance of Ben’s apartment. The academy was in an old single-story brick building shared with the Houston Ballet Company. There were four medium-sized studios.
Clare Duncan, the head of the academy, took us around and introduced us to the teachers and students. It was the first day of the summer school, and it was like a zoo in there. Zhang and I were completely confused. Everyone looked alike, and their names were impossible to remember.
“Ballet class, when?” I asked Ben, with the aid of my dictionary. Seeing all the students dancing and hearing the music made me eager to begin.
“You can start today if you like,” Ben replied.
The only word I understood was “today,” but that was enough.
When I looked into the studios I noticed all the male students wore black tights, white T-shirts, socks and shoes. The only pair of tights I had was given to me by one of my teachers back in China. He’d gotten them from a British ballet dancer, and they were bright blue. Zhang had a white pair of tights—I wasn’t sure where he’d gotten them from.
“No pants,” I told Ben after I found the word “pants” in my dictionary.
“You don’t need pants for class.” Ben was puzzled.
“Pants, pants!” I repeated as I demonstrated a plié and pointed at my legs.
“You don’t need pants, you only need ti . . . oh, tights!” Ben shouted excitedly.
“Yes!” I wasn’t sure what the word tights meant, but it looked like Ben had understood so I smiled broadly.
Ben quickly organized for us to go to a dance-wear shop. Ben had given Stephanie, the company manager, enough money to buy Zhang and me two pairs of tights, dance belts and a pair of ballet shoes, over two hundred dollars worth each. I quickly did a currency conversion: two hundred dollars was equivalent to over two years of my dia’s salary. How could I justify Ben spending two years’ salary on my dance wear! “Do you realize how much these tights and shoes cost?” I said to Zhang.
“No. How much?” he asked.
“Over a thousand yuan!”
His jawed dropped then too.
It was lunchtime when we arrived back at the academy, and a Houston Ballet board member, Louisa Sarofim, was already waiting to take us to lunch at a nearby restaurant.
From the way the restaurant owner treated Louisa, I knew we were about to have lunch with yet another class enemy. The restaurant was amazingly elegant and cool, with fresh-cut flowers everywhere.
We were handed a menu each. I couldn’t read anything except the prices, and nothing was below $14.95. Since Louisa was going to pay, I thought I should be modest and not order anything too expensive. I didn’t want to leave a bad impression. I told Zhang of my intentions. “I will do the same,” he said.
We chose two of the cheapest items on the menu. I hadn’t any idea what I’d ordered, but I was confident that in a restaurant of this stature we wouldn’t be left starving.
Minutes later, the waiter placed a small plate of green salad in front of me and a small bowl of green soup in front of Zhang. I still remember the look Zhang gave me. I forced out a smile and quickly turned my eyes away.
“Are you okay?” Ben asked, concerned.
“Okay!” I replied brightly. Zhang just nodded. Louisa probably thinks we’re so thin because we don’t like to each much, I thought. I poked my fork into the greens and tasted a leaf of my very first salad. “Good taste!” I said to Zhang, trying to encourage him.
“Good taste!” Zhang replied and forced himself to finish his green soup. Luckily the waiter kept circling our table with freshly baked bread.
Louisa dropped us back at the studio, and Clare Duncan showed us to the men’s dressing-room. I put on the tights we had bought that morning. They felt very soft and comfortable compared to my bright blue pair from home.
The studio was packed with dancers when we arrived. On the center barre the students moved up to make room for Zhang and me. Then Ben walked in. I remember he wore a T-shirt with “London” written on it and a pair of silklike black pants. His energy and his passion for his teaching seemed to inspire everybody. During the class I kept a keen eye on other students, and to my surprise I discovered Zhang and I compared well to the others. The precision of our technique was high, and this could only have come about from the strict discipline of our Chinese training.
There were students here from England, Canada and other places, a result no doubt of Ben’s international reputation as a teacher, choreographer and artistic director. Our schedule was full each day. There were many classes—ballet, character, modern ballet, pas de deux, body conditioning and choreographic workshops. I wasn’t sure what to expect in the modern ballet class, but our Chinese folk dance classes and tai chi movements made it easy for us to find some common ground. The body conditioning class was different—it was based on something called Pilates, and I could see it would help me understand my own body and deal with my physical weaknesses and injuries.
Everyone in the classes seemed to be busy making new friends. Zhang and I couldn’t remember their names or understand what they were saying, but we were warmly embraced by many of the students. We were even given fifty dollars per week as a living allowance. I never dreamed of having that amount of money in my entire life! Eight months of my dia’s wages! I tried to save as much money as possible from that living allowance so I could help my family when I returned to China.
We soon discovered that Ben was a very good cook and he also loved entertaining, so we were surrounded by people all the time we were there. That meant a lot of nodding and smiling on our part. Zhang and I were not bad cooks either, and we were a big hit in the kitchen. We were so used to hand-washing everything, though, that we hardly used the dishwasher or washing machine. After breakfast one morning Ben had to rush to a board meeting, and he told us to put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher and turn it on. When I opened the cupboard to get the dishwashing detergent, there were quite a few boxes of powder for me to choose from. Naturally I chose the biggest box, filled the dishwasher with laundry powder and turned it on. A few minutes later the whole kitchen was foaming. Masses of foam covered the kitchen floor, and I was sent into a total panic.
During that second week in Houston, Ben’s good friend Barbara Bush invited us to her house for lunch. I remembered she even had an indoor pool. She apologized for Mr. Bush’s absence: he had to attend a presidential rally in California that day.
I felt very privileged to meet Barbara, but her husband was such a high-profile politician that I was deeply suspicious of her hidden political agendas. Would she try to corrupt our political beliefs? I mentally prepared myself. But all we received was generosity and friendliness. Barbara didn’t seem like a politician’s wife at all. She reminded me of my niang. She was elegant and generous, and talked about China very fondly.
That day we’d been asked to bring our swimming suits. We didn’t have any, so Ben had to buy them for us, like so many other things. Barbara and Ben chatted happily while Zhang and I swam in her indoor pool where the water temperature was perfect, a pool owned by one of the most powerful ladies in America. I could never have dreamed of this.
Barbara also had a little dog called Fred. She adored Fred. She’d even taken him to China with her while Mr. Bush served as the first envoy. She talked about her dog as though he were a child. She told us that Fred was a very intelligent dog. I thought that if her dog had been a dog in my hometown, someone would have eaten him for dinner.
We went to board member Louisa Sarofim’s house a few times too. I couldn’t believe her wealth. When I saw her garden, her pool and the surroundings I thought I had just walked into a well-maintained park. She took us inside, and I saw some of the most beautiful paintings I had ever seen. Ben told me later that most of the paintings were worth millions of dollars. A million dollars? The number was too enormous for a Chinese peasant boy to comprehend. She must have more money than a god, but she was so nice and unpretentious and she loved ballet and took immense pride in the Houston Ballet’s developments. The amount of wealth surrounding ballet in America seemed amazing to me. There was money everywhere. Once I even saw a ballet board member leave a hundred-dollar bill on the table after a meal. Of course I quickly tapped him on the shoulder. Didn’t he realize he’d left a hundred dollars behind? But he simply nodded his head and walked out. It blew me away. Over a year’s worth of my dia’s hard, hard work and it was simply left on the table. Sometimes I heard people talking of hundreds of millions of dollars, but again, such numbers didn’t exist in my vocabulary. The financial and cultural gaps were simply too great to comprehend.