An Ocean Apart, a World Away

by Lensey Namioka

  Eldest Brother and Liang Baoshu looked blank, since neither of them had studied English. It seemed that I would have to do all the talking. I cleared my throat. “We were walking toward our hotel, since we couldn’t find a rickshaw. Then some, uh, bad men attacked us. One of them had a gun. Fortunately he didn’t hit anybody. That shot must have been what you heard.”

  The officer looked skeptical. He didn’t see how we had escaped unharmed when we had been attacked by a gang, one of them holding a gun. Although it was wholly against my nature, I decided it was time to put on the helpless female act. “I’m so glad you came to our rescue, Officer. I was so frightened!”

  One of the policemen spoke to the officer. “We did see some pretty unsavory types slinking away just now, sir. Maybe they saw us coming.”

  The officer finally nodded. “That must have been it.” He turned and looked us over. “These two chaps don’t seem very talkative, do they?”

  “My brothers don’t speak English,” I told him. I decided to include Liang Baoshu as a brother, just to make things simpler for the policemen.

  “But you do, eh?” asked the officer.

  “I attend the MacIntosh missionary school in Nanjing,” I said, and added with a simper, “What do you think of my accent?”

  Perhaps the simper was overdoing things a bit, but it worked on the officer, and a couple of the men chuck-led. “Your accent is pretty good, miss, even if it is American,” said one.

  “Right!” said the officer. “We needn’t bother you any further, then.”

  The policemen started to walk away, but the officer turned back. “If you take my advice, you’d better get out of this unsavory neighborhood as soon as possible.”

  We continued our way along the street, which was better lit and cleaner looking than the alley. The two boys said nothing, and I could tell that they were both in a foul mood. Actually, I felt I had acquitted myself rather well in disarming the suspicions of the police. And the boys should have been proud of the way they had driven off the hoodlums. So why were they angry?

  “The arrogance of those policemen!” Eldest Brother said, finally breaking his silence. “They think they own this country!”

  “Not the whole country, just the British sector here,” I reminded him. “The French and the Americans control other sectors of Shanghai.”

  After our defeat in the Second Opium War, various foreign countries discovered how weak China really was. Among other humiliations, Britain and the United States forced China to give them control over various parts of Shanghai. France followed their example and carved out a French quarter in the city. All three did the same in several other cities convenient for their commercial and military purposes.

  It was a continual source of national shame and resentment that we had been made to hand over parts of our country to outsiders. When we came in contact with foreign police maintaining order in these areas, we always had the feeling of being a conquered people. At least I had mustered enough English to talk to those British policemen as equals. I didn’t know what I would have done if we had been in the French sector.

  When Liang Baoshu broke his silence, I found out that he was in a bad humor for a different reason. “I really have to learn English,” he growled.

  I looked at him curiously. “Do you know any other language?”

  “I know some Japanese and Korean, because they are distantly related to Manchu,” he replied. He added sourly, “I never thought English would be useful. It seems I was wrong!”

  We were nearly at our hotel before I understood why he was so annoyed at not knowing English. He hated having to stand by helplessly while I did all the talking with the policemen.

  We were staying at the Great Southern Hotel. Mother had been uneasy about my staying overnight at a hotel—in fact, she had been uneasy about the propriety of whole trip. But Father had given his permission. “Let Yanyan go. She should be safe enough with the two boys looking after her.” (I resolved never to tell him about our encounter with the hoodlums in the alley.)

  “But Yanyan can’t sleep in the same room with the boys!” said Mother. We had gone on trips to the mountains and stayed at temple guest rooms. At those times, our whole family shared a room. But this time there was Liang Baoshu, who was not a family member.

  Father thought for a moment. “Let the two boys share a room, and Yanyan can have her own room.”

  So there I was, in a room with Western-style furniture. There was a fat, fabric-covered chair and a bed so big and immovable that it seemed rooted to the floor. But what made me hug myself with glee was that this exotic room was all my own! How could I possibly sleep, with so many fascinating things to examine?

  There was a knock on my door just as I was studying an enamel vessel, trying to decide whether it was a bedpan or a spittoon. I went to the door and opened it to find Eldest Brother standing outside. He frowned at me. “Don’t open the door to anybody who knocks. Find out who it is first.”

  “Yes, Eldest Brother,” I said meekly.

  “Come on, let’s go down to the dining room,” said Eldest Brother. “It’s late, and I’m hungry.”

  As soon as he said this, I realized that I was famished. Lunch on the train seemed ages ago. “Where is Liang Baoshu?” I asked.

  Eldest Brother didn’t answer at first. We sat down at a table, and he began to study the menu. “He’s not eating with us,” he replied, not looking up.

  Then I remembered that the reason Liang Baoshu had come with us was because there were people in Shanghai he wanted to meet. “You’re not going with him to meet his friends, then?” I asked.

  “No!” said Eldest Brother. “What he does has nothing to do with me. And it’s none of your business, either!”

  It was unlike Eldest Brother to snap at me like this. Second Brother found me a nuisance, but Eldest Brother was usually more patient with me. After our adventure in the alley, I really thought I had earned his approval.

  Then I realized that Eldest Brother was fidgeting because he was uncomfortable. He had come to Shanghai at the invitation of Liang Baoshu, but he had decided not to accompany his friend to the meeting after all. Was it because he didn’t want to leave me alone at the hotel? No, I decided that was not the reason. The subject was a sensitive one he did not want to discuss. My guess was that his uneasiness had to do with Liang Baoshu and the mysterious meeting he was attending.

  Eldest Brother gave his orders to the waiter. After the food arrived, I was so immersed in eating that I had no time to think of anything else. We had braised prawns, a steamed fish, and stir-fried chicken breast. I felt very adult, and I assumed the role of a hostess by putting food in Eldest Brother’s rice bowl.

  “Never mind,” he said as I heaped more prawns over his rice. “I can help myself to the food.”

  All the better, I thought, and went back to my own food. After we had been eating silently for some minutes, a thought suddenly occurred to me. “Liang Baoshu said that he can speak some Japanese and Korean because they are distantly related to Manchu. Does that mean he speaks Manchu?”

  Eldest Brother dropped his spoon into the soup bowl, and some of the liquid splashed onto his shirt. He muttered angrily under his breath and dabbed at it. Then he looked up at me. “He speaks it because his mother is Manchu.”

  I was so startled that I dropped my chopsticks. They rolled off my lap and onto the floor. A waiter came over and mopped up Eldest Brother’s spilled soup, and handed me another pair of chopsticks. He must have thought that we were unusually clumsy.

  So Liang Baoshu was half Manchu. Now that I knew, I realized that the clues were there. Recalling the conversation at dinner when he came to our house, I knew that he loved riding horses. He was tall, with the high cheekbones characteristic of northern Chinese but even more common among the Manchus.

  The Manchus had conquered China in the mid-seventeenth century and founded the Qing dynasty, which ruled our country until the revolution of 1911. That was ten years ago, when
I was six years old, but I still remembered the suspense, the anxiety, and the excitement that we all felt at the overthrow of the Manchu dynasty and the founding of our republic.

  Eldest Brother bitterly resented the British policemen we had encountered because they were aliens who controlled a sector of Shanghai. The Manchus were aliens who had conquered our country and controlled it for more than two and a half centuries. How did Eldest Brother feel about someone who was half Manchu, then?

  As I finished the last of my rice, I examined my own feelings toward Liang Baoshu. Somehow I couldn’t think of him as one of the enemy aliens who had once conquered our country. He was only half Manchu, after all. In manner and in culture, he seemed totally Chinese.

  Who were the people he was meeting this evening? Were they Manchus? There were two things I couldn’t help remembering: One was that during Liang Baoshu’s first visit to our house, he had seen that my feet were unbound, and he had told me that Manchu women did not have bound feet either. The other was the look of admiration in his eyes when I showed my interest in the martial arts.

  When we returned from our trip to Shanghai, I finally convinced Eldest Brother to teach me some kung fu. “You never know what can happen these days,” I said. “Our country is still unsettled, and we may not be safe even in the streets of Nanjing. I might meet some unruly types on my way home from school, for instance.”

  “If Yanyan meets any unruly types, the only decent thing for her to do is to run away immediately!” snapped Second Brother. “If you teach her any kung fu, Eldest Brother, she will become an unruly type. In fact, she is one already!”

  But Eldest Brother agreed with me that I should learn at least some basic techniques of self-defense. We started practicing in one of our courtyards, to the great amusement of the servants. They always cheered me on whenever they thought I made a good move. After a few weeks, Eldest Brother admitted that I was a good pupil. I wondered what Liang Baoshu would think if he saw me now.

  CHAPTER 3

  I told my English teacher, Miss Gilbertson, about my trip to Shanghai to see Tao Ailin. She wanted to know all the details because she had been very fond of Ailin, whom she considered one of her star pupils.

  I also told Miss Gilbertson about my encounter with the British policemen. “I was so glad I attended your class! The officer thought of us as scum at first, but when I started speaking to him in English, he began to treat us like decent people!”

  Miss Gilbertson made no comment about the behavior of the policemen. The teachers at our school avoided the whole sensitive subject of foreigners’ controlling parts of Shanghai and several other Chinese cities. Even Miss Scott, our history teacher, glossed over the Opium War, the Boxer Rebellion, and other humiliating defeats suffered by the Chinese. This was frustrating for me. I wanted her to bring up these subjects so that I could have a good, fiery debate with her.

  Maybe this was just as well. I was in my last year at the MacIntosh School, and it was time to work hard and avoid trouble. If I wanted to attend college and prepare for going to medical school later, I had to behave myself and get good grades and recommendations from my teachers.

  My best subjects were mathematics and the sciences, but after the experience with the policemen in Shanghai, I began to focus more on my English studies. I thought of the American man we had met on the train. Maybe his tones were not quite accurate, but otherwise his Chinese was very good, in spite of the shape of his nose. If an American could master Chinese, I could certainly master English. Miss Gilbertson noticed my improvement and encouraged me. I didn’t have Tao Ailin’s wonderful ear, but I tried to make up for it with hard work.

  In the months that followed, Liang Baoshu came to eat dinner with us a number of times. Mother didn’t raise a fuss when I openly chatted with him at the dinner table. She only murmured a mild objection when I went to my brothers’ rooms after dinner. “It’s indecent for Yanyan to join a conversation with the boys!” she hissed as I started to follow my brothers to their rooms.

  Father looked at things differently and made his usual comment about the changing times. “What was unthinkable before is now accepted even in many of the best families. Besides, nothing scandalous can happen when the girl’s brothers and servants are all present.”

  Nevertheless, I suspected that Mother questioned the servants closely about my behavior during these talks. She seemed to be satisfied with their reports.

  What the boys discussed most often was the career each of them intended to pursue. Eldest Brother and Liang Baoshu were both nineteen years old, and Second Brother was eighteen. They would soon finish their classical studies with their teacher.

  “Things were simple in the old days,” sighed Eldest Brother. “Any young man of good family studied for the government examinations.”

  This system of examinations had been established nearly a thousand years ago for selecting able young men as government officials, or mandarins . Since my brothers were both studious and intelligent, their chances of passing the examinations would have been excellent. The fact that our family was wealthy and influential would also have helped them to good appointments, although in principle only real ability mattered.

  “Well, we have to face the fact that things are now different,” said Liang Baoshu. His words seemed to echo Father’s. “But even if the examination system is abolished, we still need able men for government positions.”

  My brothers and Liang Baoshu discussed the various ways of getting an official job. “With things all muddled these days,” complained Eldest Brother, “the only sure way of getting a position is to offer a hefty bribe.”

  “I’m not sure I want to be an official, anyway,” said Second Brother. “Maybe I’ll try to get a job as a teacher at one of these academies for advanced learning that are being set up.”

  “By academies, you mean universities?” I asked, using the English word.

  Second Brother hadn’t heard of universities, but Liang Baoshu knew the word. “I understand these so-called universities are patterned after British and American institutions,” he said. I knew that he had begun to study English. He had even tried out a few phrases with me. He turned to Second Brother. “If you hope to get a job at one of these, you’ll have to study some of those modern subjects you dislike so much.”

  “I don’t enjoy science or mathematics,” said Second Brother, turning to me and making a face, “subjects that you like so much. But surely even modern universities still have to teach Chinese writing, history, and philosophy. After all, we had a political revolution, not a cultural revolution. We don’t have to give up on our country’s history, literature, and culture!”

  “I think I’d like a job in a state library,” said Eldest Brother. “Fortunately, the revolutionaries didn’t burn all the old books, as Emperor Quin Shihuang did when he came to power.” He turned to Liang Baoshu. “What are you planning to do?”

  Our guest was silent for a moment and thoughtfully studied the teacup in his hand. Finally he raised his eyes. “I think I’d like to go into diplomatic service . . . work in a foreign consulate or legation . . . something like that.”

  “That’s exactly what my father did!” I exclaimed. Father would be pleased at hearing this, and his opinion of Liang Baoshu would rise even further. “He was in England for several years, and he also worked in France.”

  Liang Baoshu smiled. “Well, I wasn’t thinking of a European country. I’ll probably try to find a position in India, Japan . . . one of the Asian countries.” He turned to me. “And what do you plan to do when you finish school?”

  “This stupid girl says she wants to be a doctor!” said Second Brother. He still regarded me as a noisy brat with silly ideas.

  “She could probably do it, too,” said Eldest Brother. “She works very hard in school, and she might be able to enter one of those modern, uh, universities after she graduates from the missionary school.”

  Since our trip to Shanghai, Eldest Brother had begun to look at
me with greater approval. Maybe it was because he remembered my coolness during the fight in the alley. Maybe it was because his friend Liang Baoshu seemed to approve of me. I think he noticed that Liang Baoshu and I were attracted to each other. Perhaps attracted was too strong a word. We were interested, let’s say. Eldest Brother was pleased by this development.

  He wasn’t the only person to notice that Liang Baoshu and I were interested in each other. I was sitting on a china stool in our courtyard one day, doing my homework. It was late spring, and our jasmine bush was in full bloom. I couldn’t resist sitting outside, where I could smell the fragrant white flowers. It was so pleasant that I closed my notebook and just luxuriated in the warmth and the fragrance.

  Then I heard the voices of Father and Mother. They were on the other side of the bush and couldn’t see me. “It’s scandalous, letting them meet like this without a matchmaker acting as an intermediary!” said Mother.

  “Times have changed, and we must change, too,” said Father, as he always did when Mother complained about current happenings.

  “But we don’t know anything about the boy,” said Mother. “Well, we know that his mother is Manchu. I hardly call that a recommendation!”

  Then I knew that they were talking about me and Liang Baoshu. A matchmaker! I hadn’t realized that things had gone that far—or that my parents thought things had gone that far. I felt my face growing hot, and I tried to shrink down farther behind the bush.

  “I’ve asked Xuegeng about his friend,” said Father. “He told me that the Liangs used to serve the imperial household. They’ve been living in retirement after the revolution, and Baoshu’s father is primarily known as a collector of old paintings.”

  After a moment, Mother said, “Well, that sounds harmless enough. I suppose the family must be well-to-do. Perhaps we should find a matchmaker to set things in motion. I still think it’s indecent for the young people to meet like this before a formal arrangement.” She added after a moment, “Even in these changing times.”