Pao

by Kerry Young

  I would be grateful if you could tell me his answer when you write back with all your news.

  Love

  Mui

  I fold the letter and put it back in the envelope.

  ‘I didn’t know about her taking the children. Honestly, Pao. She asked me to go with her but there was no mention of the children and I never dreamed that she would do as she did. It was not in my reckoning. If Fay had mentioned it to me I would have counselled her to think again about the whole enterprise. You must believe me.’

  ‘Is alright. I believe you, Michael. I know Fay taking the children hurt you almost as much as it hurt me. Maybe just as much, I don’t know. Thank you for sharing this with me though.’ And I hand the letter back to him. ‘It means a lot to me to think that Mui write to me even if I never get the letter. But how come Fay let her write all of that to yu?’

  ‘The envelope was sealed in the way you see and Fay simply enclosed it in her own letter to me.’

  I think to myself so he get one letter from her and he reply and now he get another letter and god knows how many others in between. I take a deep breath but I don’t say nothing ’bout it.

  ‘So yu going give me Stanley’s address so Morrison can go see what he can see?’

  ‘I will, Pao, under two conditions. Firstly, that George Morrison does not make contact with anyone in Stanley’s household including, obviously, Fay and the children. I do not want it exposed that I have given the address to you. Secondly, that you do not write to Mui at that address until we have worked out the best, most discreet way for you to communicate with them. I don’t think that you writing to Stanley’s address would be advisable.’

  ‘So what return address yu think Mui give in the letter she send to me if it not Stanley’s address?’

  ‘I do not know, but neither do I understand why you have not received her letter. I would have thought that most postal workers in Kingston would have found the way she addressed it sufficient without need for a post office box number.’

  I nuh understand what Michael is saying to me. And then I get it. He think the letter never get mailed. And when I think ’bout how angry Fay was with me and how she nuh want me to have nothing to do with the children I reckon maybe Michael got a point. Maybe Fay never send the letter. So I agree to him two conditions and him give me the address he already write on a piece of thin card him take outta him pocket.

  Three weeks later Michael tell me that he been in touch with Fay and she agree for me to write to the children but she have a condition. She say I can write as many letters as I want but I must not say anything that criticise or undermine her. That I must not interfere with anything that she doing in England, especially if it involve the children, and I must not make any plan to take the children back to Jamaica. She bring the children to England for their safety and she don’t want them taken back to no war zone like the way Jamaica is. And if she suspect that I doing any of them things, even if she get the slightest whiff, she going move house and I never hear from any of them again.

  ‘That is some strong threat she making there,’ I say to Michael. But him just sit there. Well, I negotiate enough deals to know that take-it-or-leave-it look on a man face. And the truth is I can’t do nothing ’bout what Fay doing in England anyway, even though I reckon she must have do it illegally because I can’t understand how she can take the children outta the country like that when she not got no divorce. Still, I reckon she doing what she think best for them so why would I want to criticise her for that? Jamaica is a war zone. The children safer in England, that is true. And as far as her threat ’bout moving house and disappearing go, the children getting older all the time so she can’t enforce that even if she want to. Mui eleven now and Fay can’t stop her. So the situation what it is. Like Miss Cicely say, ‘What is done is done,’ and the best thing I can do is try to take a positive view for the children sake.

  So I say alright to Michael. I think the whole thing help Michael feel better ’bout himself that he able to fix something after all the guilt he have over Xiuquan and the telephone call and him too stupid not to ever think that Fay would take the children with her. I think he feel that he make amends now, and I think I feel it too.

  The only problem I got is that George Morrison already leave for Scotland and the last thing I want now is for Fay to look outta some window and see Morrison standing there ’cross the street. That would make her convinced for sure that I was up to something. And worse, that I go break my word to her. But no matter how much I ring and ring the telephone number Morrison give me I can’t get no answer. The days ticking by and I thinking any minute now this thing going turn into another calamity.

  In between telephoning George I start wondering what I going write in this here letter. What can I tell them ’bout things because in truth everything here is a mess. Unemployment, poverty, shortages, violence. The foreigners own all of the bauxite and aluminium industry, more than half the sugar industry, well over half of the tourist industry and a big chunk of the new manufacturing industry. So no matter how hard the people work the foreigners still taking out the profit and Jamaica not got no capital to invest in herself. She still the slave working to make the masa rich.

  So I think to myself what future Mui and Xiuquan really got here? Next thing you know Xiuquan mix up with some bad element and him end up dead just like Kenneth Wong, because after all the commotion die down over the bow and arrow what I discover was that it wasn’t the first time. Xiuquan been taking stuff from all over town without paying for it. That night was just the first time anybody catch him. And afterwards Ethyl tell me that when him up Lady Musgrave Road Xiuquan following after Kenneth any chance him get. So maybe he was heading that way.

  And what ’bout Mui? What kinda life is waiting for her back here? When my brother leave Jamaica him tell me he wanted to be more than a Chinaman in Chinatown. And Mui deserve better than that too. She too smart to come back here and follow in my footsteps. So maybe Fay right after all. I sit down and I write.

  Dear Mui,

  My heart warmed when I heard from Father Michael that you had written to me even though I never received your letter. I am also glad to hear that you are well and school is good. Perhaps you should try harder to make friends with the other children. They may not be used to meeting such a very smart and loving Jamaican girl like you.

  All is well here. Everybody misses you and send their love – Zhang, Ma, Hampton, Finley and everyone. And even though I am very sad that you are not here with me I think perhaps your mama is right that England is a better place for you right now so that you can grow up peacefully without all of this trouble we have down here.

  And then I stop writing and I think should I be writing to the two of them? Or maybe I should write a separate letter to Xiuquan? But what play on my mind all the time is that he knew. He knew and he plan and plot with Fay so she could do what she done. He never even give me a chance to see if I could make it up with Fay and keep this family together. He just go ahead and let the three of them take off.

  I think to myself I know two Yang Xiuquan, and both of them betray me. One with the tales him tell to Zhang, and the other one with the plotting he do with Fay. And both of them leave me. One to become a farmer in America and the other one to follow his mother to England. So maybe it was a mistake me naming the boy Xiuquan. Maybe Fay was right when she decide to just start call him Karl.

  So I finish the letter.

  I hope both your mama and Karl are well. Say hello to the both of them for me.

  With much love

  Papa

  I put it on the side because I can’t bring myself to mail it without knowing what going on with Morrison.

  And then a couple days later I finally get through to him.

  ‘Where the hell you been, man? I been ringing you for well over two weeks.’

  ‘We’ve been in the Highlands visiting some of Margaret’s family.’

  ‘Visiting family? While I been going mad d
own here wondering what the hell you doing.’

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘Never mind ’bout wrong. What yu do ’bout tracking down Stanley and Fay and the children?’

  ‘Pao, I just got here and since we arrived we have had to visit every one of Margaret’s sisters to introduce them to John.’

  ‘So yu no go down to England yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good. Don’t bother go down there. The problem solved.’

  So I mail the letter and when I get Mui’s reply she tell me all sort of things ’bout her school and what it like at Stanley’s house. And how Fay got a job working in a office, which surprise the hell outta me because I never think Fay would ever do a thing like that. Get a job. So it make me realise how serious she is ’bout making a future for the children.

  Mui write: ‘You asked me to say hello to Mama and Karl, which I have done but I do not understand why you did not call him Xiuquan. Is there a reason?’

  And when she finish send her love to everybody she say, ‘I hope Gloria and Esther are well.’ And she sign it with a PS. ‘England is fine, Papa. But Jamaica is my home and that is where I want to be. I know that you will understand that.’

  When I write back to her I just say, ‘I decide to call him Karl as a way to maybe have a new beginning.’

  29

  Resourcefulness

  Early in 1969 Norman Manley retire and him son, Michael, get elected as leader of the People’s National Party, the PNP, which at the time was the opposition party in Parliament. The first time I hear Michael Manley it was on the Rediffusion and he was saying ‘Better must come’.

  So I start read ’bout the PNP’s ‘politics of participation’, and them four basic commitments to create a Jamaican economy that was ‘less dependent on foreign control, an egalitarian society based on equality and opportunity, a truly democratic society, and a society proud of its history and heritage’. It put me in mind of Sun Yat-sen and Mao Zedong and Zhang, and my own father, Yang Tzu. And it seem like maybe there was still a chance for us. Still a chance that Jamaica could hope for a better future. And when I go listen to Manley speak at one of him rallies he stand up there and say: ‘We come too far, we’re not turning back now. We come too far, we’re not turning back now. We have a pride now. We have a place now. We have a mission now. And I say to you, my friends, together we are going to march forward under God’s heaven building democratic socialism. Glory to socialism.’

  And that was it. That was me and Michael Manley because this was how we was going to create a fair and just Jamaica. Just like how Zhang talk ’bout the right of the ordinary woman and man to live a decent life free from the tyranny of warlords and the domination of foreigners. This was the same thing, only now we wanted social justice and fair distribution of wealth, and we wanted to ease out from under so much foreign economic control.

  When Michael Manley win the general election in 1972 I celebrate more than I done for Independence ten years earlier, because this time it really seem to mean something. It wasn’t just that we going take over governing ourselves. It was like we really going do something. We really going make it different, like Manley say, we were going to ‘walk through the world on our feet and not on our knees’.

  Manley buy the public utilities, and take over all the foreign-owned sugar estates and a heap of the hotels. So instead of one man own one plantation, now we had workers’ co-operatives, and small farmers working the land that nobody used to do nothing with. People was learning to read and write. There was day care and community centres. Plus the government bring out new labour legislation that replace the old Master and Servants Law and them introduce a minimum wage.

  It was a new Jamaica. It was a new vision. It was new hope.

  Judge Finley say to me, ‘You all excited ’bout Michael Manley, but not everybody so happy with him.’

  ‘What yu mean?’

  ‘Yu nuh notice how many of them jumping on a flight to Miami since him introduce all these changes and especially since the property tax?’

  ‘If yu going to redistribute you have to take from somebody to give to somebody else. That is how it work. Anyway, they can afford it.’

  ‘Well, maybe they don’t want to because them got five flights a day to Miami and every one of them getting fuller day by day.’

  Finley was right. I just think to myself good riddance. If them don’t want every woman and man to have a roof over them head, fair wages and equal opportunities, then let them go.

  But what catch my attention was how all of them so busy trying to smuggle money off the island. They got US dollars stuff in them beehive hairdos, sew in the lining of them clothes and straw baskets, bury in cakes and little patties, stick to them leg and then put plaster over it like the leg broke. It was high adventure, that what it was. And every day in the newspaper there was more news ’bout people getting stop at the airport and where them got the US dollars hid.

  But they carry on do it anyway, because they wasn’t going leave them money behind. And they didn’t seem to care nothing ’bout it being illegal under the Exchange Control regulations.

  By the time we get to 1974 and 1975 things really getting bad because all we got is half the supermarket and wholesale business and although that going alright it not really enough to keep everybody going. The men getting restless. Sun Tzu say, ‘ When the troops continually gather in small groups and whisper together the general has lost the confidence of the army .’ So I start worry that I going lose some of them. Most likely Milton and Desmond. Me, Hampton and Finley been running together since we fourteen so I reckon we going stick together no matter what.

  Sun Tzu say, ‘ A skilled commander seeks victory from the situation and does not demand it of his subordinates ’, but I don’t know how to make it mean anything. All I can think is there is some opportunity here if I can only figure out what.

  When I write to Mui I say:

  I know you want to come home but business is very bad down here. So it is better for you to stay in England for now. I sent Karl the money he asked me for to open up his nightclub so maybe you can help him with that. Why he want to call it the Opium Den I don’t know. I suppose that is his business. But whatever you doing you need to study, because when the time come for you to come back it would be good to have a trade, like being a barrister like Norman Manley. That way you will really be able to help the people.

  Then one day Margy telephone me. She finish her college course and move to New York where she do some other course and some other course, and now she working in a cosmetics company.

  ‘What you do there?’

  ‘I scout out new products and find ways to sell them.’

  ‘You think you could do that for yourself if I set you in business?’

  ‘Are you serious, Uncle?’

  ‘Yah, man. But we need to have the company registered office in America, can be New York or anywhere you like, but New York is good. And we have to have a subsidiary here on the island.’

  We set up Yang Cosmetics Company, which import raw materials and export locally enriched face creams, body lotions and other beauty products. The company registered in New York with business premises in Port Antonio. This is where Margy want to live when she on the island, because she think it truly beautiful over there.

  The cosmetics company allow us all sorta currency exchange so now I am selling US dollars to all these rich Jamaicans in such a hurry to leave. We passing the US dollars through the cosmetics company and the Jamaican dollars through the supermarkets. And as these people getting to Canada and the US they helping me move more money through the imports and exports because they reckon they helping others like them to get their money out.

  Everything turn out fine because I was selling US dollars at ten times the official exchange rate to people who would rather have US $100,000 in a American bank account than a million Jamaican dollars in Kingston. Especially since constant devaluation mean that the Jamaican dollar worth less
and less even while it just sitting there in the bank. Plus, doing business with me mean that they nuh take no risk of getting caught at the airport and getting their money confiscated. Business was booming.

  I make sure I put a good roll in the bishop’s collection box because all the time now he got more and more projects for poor relief. And I stand by Michael Manley and his land and welfare reforms.

  30

  Wisdom

  Zhang take sick. I call Morrison and tell him to come take a look because Morrison only last six month in Scotland before he tell Margaret he can’t take it no more and she say she want John finish his education in Edinburgh and it alright with her if Morrison do what he got to, so he come back to Jamaica and breathe a big sigh of relief. When him come he say Zhang got pneumonia. Him say Zhang probably got more than that wrong with him but he would have to go to hospital to find out. But Zhang say him not going to no hospital. So that was that.

  When Morrison ask Zhang how old he is him say he dunno. I dunno how old Zhang is and it turn out Ma dunno either. It seem like Morrison think Zhang just sick from old age, which don’t surprise me none because when I come to Jamaica thirty-seven years ago Zhang was already a old man with grey on his head.

  ‘I can treat the pneumonia but I suspect this is just a secondary infection. My guess is there is more to it, but if he won’t come for tests I don’t know what else we can do.’

  When I tell Zhang what Morrison say, he say he not taking none of Morrison’s medicine. He say him live this long time without a doctor and he going go to the herbalist and get something fix himself. But just as he try get up off the cot he fall back again. This make him vex so he just lay there and start mumbling and grumbling to himself.

  Ma say it alright, she going go to the herbalist and sort it out. Zhang don’t need no medicine from the imperialists. And she give Morrison a look and brush past him as she going up the yard with a bowl of red-wine broth for Zhang.