The talk was all very discreet, which made the revelation from Song Yu’s little great-granddaughter all the more surprising when it came. She had been sitting beside her great-grandfather all along, listening attentively to both the English and Chinese conversations. Then, without warning, she did what little girls do best when they’re super proud of their relations: she began to boast.
‘My great-grandfather was a brave soldier,’ she said with gleeful naivety, ‘who fought against the Japanese and the Communists.’
The old man did not bother to listen to the English being spoken. He sat still, sipping his tea and watching a news item on the television.
‘But Chairman Mao was too strong and my greatgrandfather’s army was defeated near Yan’an.’
I resisted the temptation to interrupt, in case it stopped her in her tracks. Sure enough, she kept going.
‘Of course, he realised that Chairman Mao was a good and wise leader and, with many other soldiers, joined him to help create our great and free nation.’
She sat back as pleased as punch with this recitation of China’s history and her family’s role in it. No doubt it was a sanitised version of events, repeated word for word from her schoolbooks, and quite possibly given to her by Song Jr in an attempt to explain his grandfather’s early political leanings. One thing was sure, however: Grandfather Song had been on the side of the Nationalists under ‘Generalissimo’ Chiang Kai-shek, and was possibly even amongst those who had hounded the Long Marchers along their route. In others words, he had been the enemy. The big question was, had he really seen the error of his ways and joined Mao voluntarily, or was this now-frail and elderly gent still a dissenting voice?
The man himself was never going to answer that, however. The news had ended and he was engrossed in a game show in which two teams were being challenged to make an incredibly complex ferris wheel out of chopsticks and cardboard tubing. A ‘blue team’ of university students was competing against a ‘red team’ of soldiers and there was a lot of shouting and gesticulating by their two pushy female leaders. In the end, the red team triumphed: the army was victorious over the intelligentsia. It was the Communist Revolution all over again, on prime-time afternoon television.
We left after the last drop of tea had been drunk and eventually made our way to the hotel Liu had recommended in the centre of town. It was very cheap but clean and was located in a backstreet, with no apparent sign alluding to its presence, as far as I could tell. It was the kind of place I probably would not have been allowed to stay at if I hadn’t been with Liu. There were bigger, more expensive hotels for foreigners and the local police were often adamant that Western travellers stayed at these places — ‘for their own security’, they said.
But luxury and glamour always come at a price, and not just a monetary cost. The big hotels make you feel separate from the local people and their day-to-day activities, whereas in the small, sometimes rundown inns and hostels you often find yourself side by side with them. From experience I knew this was the best way to garner the kind of information I would require to ensure the success of my mission. If I were to discover anything about the missing boy, it would almost certainly come from meeting and talking with as many ordinary Chinese people as possible. The language was still a problem, but I had had one idea on how to deal with this while talking with Liu on the train. At my request he had selected a fresh page in my spare journal and written, in Mandarin, an explanation of who I was and what I was doing in China. This letter of introduction ended with a request for the reader, whoever it might be, to add what they knew of the boy in their own words — anonymously if they so wished. At the time I wasn’t sure whether it would be of much use, whether people could be persuaded to write anything of consequence. I thought that, at best, it might result in an interesting aside to the main story, a motley collection of ramblings from people I met along the way, which I would then have translated at a later date. In the end, however, it would prove to be something of even greater value than my passport: it would become a key to worlds I could never otherwise have entered.
A roadside hairdresser in Xining
SIX
IN THE EARLY MORNING, BARE-CHESTED AND WITH NO SHOES ON HIS feet, the boy was lying in the sun on a bed of recently butchered pigs. At first I thought he was asleep, but when the rickety old cart he was reclining in swerved to avoid a beggar in the street, he opened his eyes and happened to look in my direction. His expression was curious, then dumbfounded, as if I might have been part of his daydream. He shook his head and blinked, before a smile creased his face. The connection between us lasted for a few seconds more, until he and his bloodied cargo bumped and rumbled their way round a corner and disappeared.
I was near the bus station, having bought a ticket that would take me south, over the ranges and up onto the grasslands of the Tibetan plateau in a few days’ time. Keeping to my plan, I intended to roughly follow the route of the Long March, except in reverse. Like the fabled Silk Road, there was no path as such. Those men and women who had made this journey long ago had taken many different trails, sometimes separated by hundreds of kilometres, so it was a more general route that I would try to emulate. Actually it wasn’t so much a plan either, more a statement of intent, a loose arrangement with time and fate, designed to allow me to just drift and see what, or more importantly who, I might run into. My intention was to journey south towards the small, mostly Tibetan villages of Maduo then Yushu, before turning east and tackling the mountainous region separating Qinghai from Sichuan before the snows came. It would then be a case of tracking further east towards one of the known starting points of the Long March, an area called Yudu, also the place where Little Mao had last been seen.
For the time being, however, I wanted to get used to the altitude and have a look around Xining. My giant friend was already plying his wares at the local schools, no doubt causing quite a stir with his massive frame, all the while looking out for long-legged athletes he could recruit to play professionally. We had arranged to catch up later that evening, so I was on my own again and preferring it that way for the moment.
By the river, which was wide and shallow through lack of rain, I came across an outdoor pool hall in the shade of some willow trees. There were a dozen or so very well worn tables, about half of which were being used by a large group of young men. Most were Han Chinese, while the minority were Tibetan. The Tibetans wore felt cowboy hats, black leather boots and thick sheepskin coats of a type known as the chuba. The wool was on the inside and the sleeves were so long that they reached down to the ground. Normally on warm days the right arm and shoulder were exposed, helping to regulate the body’s temperature, but today these boys meant business. Their coats were undone completely and hung down from the waist like skirts, revealing white cotton undershirts that gleamed brightly in the morning sun.
It was the Tibetans who invited me over to watch their best player battle a Han Chinese boy in what was some kind of final. I was told by one young lad that their hero had never lost a single game and he certainly had the swagger of a champion. The relatively clean-cut Chinese boy, in his light blue T-shirt and jeans, looked quite nervous in comparison to his competitor, who walked around with his cue slung over one shoulder like a rifle, cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. Like many Tibetans, he wore his black hair long and his cheeks were wind-burnt and ruddy. Ethnically, the two boys were far apart. The game, however, was close.
After 20 minutes of play, with only the black ball remaining and the Han Chinese boy looking down his cue at an easy shot to the corner pocket, it seemed the game was over. I felt sure that at any other time he would have nailed that shot, but on this occasion a handful of pretty tough-looking Tibetans were glaring at him across the table. The ball rattled the pocket but stayed up, half a centimetre from the hole, and that was that. The Chinese boy slunk away, as did his compatriots, leaving the Tibetans to strut about victoriously once their champion had slotted the ball neatly into the pocket.
Delighted, they invited me to go with them to an Internet café in an upstairs room just across the road. It seemed that just about every kid in Xining was there, playing computer games. The darkened room was packed — evidence of the new culture pervading the old, which undoubtedly had the bigwigs in Beijing worried. Although, looking around, they probably didn’t have any real cause for concern. Rather than being corrupted by Western ideologies and unsanctioned global news sites that might criticise their government, the youth of China were simply plugged into the virtual world of online gaming.
The owner of the café was a Hui Muslim man in his forties who called himself Ma, a common derivative of the name Mohammad. He wore a white skullcap that shone brightly in the single ray of light that he allowed through the black curtains behind him. It was there he said to remind him of the time of day, and therefore the time to go to prayer.
Ma surveyed the room full of computer screens with a dispassionate look.
‘My brother owns a restaurant,’ he said in halting English. ‘I wish I also had a restaurant. The Hui are wonderful at cooking. Our food is the finest in all China. But instead of a restaurant, I have this.’ He gestured with his arm towards the room, where row upon row of faces were glued to their screens, fingers working feverishly at the keyboard controls.
‘They spend all their time killing each other.’
Sure enough, on every screen was the same fantasy adventure game, featuring martial arts and magic potions, in which, it seemed, it was every man for himself. Now and again, a cry would ring out across the room as another would-be contender was brought down by someone else’s blade or the jaws of a mystical creature, only to come to life again seconds later, the only apparent damage being to the young combatant’s ego. There were even several groups of young Buddhist monks, in their crimson gowns, each totally engrossed in what was happening on a fellow student’s screen. They clapped their hands enthusiastically as one of their group despatched foe after foe, only to then meet an untimely end and be forced to surrender his place at the keyboard to the next challenger.
All around the world it was the same, in every Internet gaming hall and many a living room: death and immediate resurrection, over and over. In this instance, of course, there was an ironic connection with the local religion. Perhaps this was the attraction: the laws of reincarnation were being brought to life in a medium these youngsters had no problem understanding. Rather than books and the endless drone of scripture to teach the basics of Buddhism, here was a more entertaining form of instruction, albeit with a somewhat unhealthy dose of violence thrown in. Quite the opposite of being idle downtime, this was quite possibly a classroom for these young, shaven-headed monks.
I stood behind them unobserved and watched as the melee of frantic button-pushing continued, until one young monk caught on and gave me away. I asked if I could play and, begrudgingly, the boy at the keyboard was made to leave his cherished seat. I was told the game was called Mèng Huàn Xī Yóu, meaning Fantasy Westward Journey, but any hope I had of understanding its complexity soon vanished as my sabre-wielding on-screen persona disappeared in a ball of fire. The voices around me groaned in despair. But no sooner had I perished than I was back up again, striding fearlessly into battle — only to meet a similar fate, this time at the end of a blue lightning bolt. That was enough for the boy whose seat I’d taken, and he reached in and started hitting buttons at high speed, invoking several deadly curses and a ball of energy that then laid waste to every living thing on the computer screen. That was it — I was done. Politely edged out, I resumed the position of onlooker rather than participant.
‘They play and play and play for hours. It is good money,’ Ma said, rubbing thumb against forefinger, ‘but not for me. I do not like all this computer fighting. It is not sport. I prefer crickets.’
My ears pricked up.
‘Do you mean fighting crickets?’ I asked.
‘The finest in all of Qinghai,’ he replied. ‘You like to watch also?’
It was a silly question of course. Clearly Ma had no idea who he was talking to. Was I not in possession of the greatest fighting cricket of all? The legendary James Bond, master of the most cunning of moves, able to turn defence into offence with a single ‘Oh look, I’ve got a busted leg; no I don’t, ha-haa!’ — Chop!
‘Watch?’ I replied, with mock disgust. ‘I can do better than that.’
That evening I returned to the Internet café with James merrily chirruping in his bamboo cage. Ma was waiting on the street with his own favoured insects, all in their own separate cages, including a rather regal looking chap, with a black body and brown head, in a Tupperware container. This was, he announced proudly, Li Mu Bai, named after the character played by Chow Yun-fat in his first big movie, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
I told him I was familiar with the movie, and the actor himself. Ma’s eyes bulged in their sockets.
‘You know Chow Yun-fat?’
It was bending the truth a little to say I ‘knew’ the actor, but, as a traveller in China in 1989, I had been invited to play a bit part in a scene in one of his early movies, God of Gamblers. The scene was set on Hong Kong harbour, on a passenger liner, and I was one of several background extras in tuxedos. It would be the first and last of my movie appearances; however, I could, to this day, still point to the few seconds of the movie where yours truly lingered, fake cocktail in hand, chatting nonchalantly with a pretty Swedish girl, as Chow Yun-fat walked by, flanked by his entourage of on-screen henchmen.
This was big news with Ma, and when we arrived at the location for the fight, which was a short distance away in a richly cushioned room at the back of his brother’s restaurant, I was introduced as ‘an actor from Hong Kong’. The group of men who sat on the floor in a circle looked up as one and gawped, then, sensing there was money to be made off the wealthy stranger, shuffled along to allow us both to sit.
At the centre of their circle was a small glass box with a central partition separating two male crickets, whose owners were stroking their antennae with sticks to make them more aggressive. Bets were laid and the money was looked after by Ma’s white-aproned brother, who then dished out the winnings while his wife dished out rice and skewered lamb in the restaurant. Cries of ‘Eurghh!’ filled the room whenever a cricket was defeated, followed by a ‘Weiyah!’ from the victor. Although it was a blood sport, if a cricket simply backed away, that was enough for the match to end, sometimes in just a few seconds, without injury to either insect. But it wasn’t always so gentle.
After each fight the little glass box was swept clean of any body parts left behind by the previous combatants and a new pairing was introduced. In due course I was invited to enter James Bond. He had been charging around in his cage for some time, seemingly agitated by all the commotion. He was ready for the fray, ready to kick some cricket butt, but when the time came to put him in the glass container to eye up his first opponent, my heart sank. He was half the size of the brute opposite him. Surely, I tried to suggest, there should be some weighing system — a welterweight cricket shouldn’t have to front up in the super heavyweight division? But my complaints fell on deaf ears. James was dropped in and the partition went up. Someone went ‘Eurghh!’ when the big cricket pounced and bit off one of James’s antennae like it was an entrée. I resisted the urge to reach in and rescue the poor little guy, knowing that this would probably bring shame upon him, but in the end I didn’t have to worry: James had the situation fully under control. He had hopped back and was rattling his wings ferociously, emitting a loud, raucous chirruping that made the brute drop his half-eaten antenna and begin to have second thoughts of an easy contest. Now my worthy little cricket was pulling the only strategies he had going for him: cunning and guile. He stuck out a leg and limped forward a few centimetres, lowering his little head dismissively as his opponent advanced. Then, in a flash, he jumped and hit the big fellow broadside, chomping off a leg in the process. Before his opponent could react, Jame
s was neatly taking off the other main leg, leaving his rival with only its two pairs of front legs on which to make its escape. That was never going to be enough. It was all over as quickly as it had begun. James dealt the mortal blow a few minutes later, when he severed the head of the beast.
Or that’s at least how I described the fight to Liu later that night when we were having dinner together. I thought the memory of my little cricket as a great champion should live on in at least someone’s imagination, for only a bunch of Hui tribesmen and I knew the truth. Faced with a terrifying opponent nearly twice his size, James Bond had done what any smart cricket would do in the same circumstances: he’d done a runner. While the goliath had been busy nibbling on his right antenna, my brave little guy had emitted one last chirrup, hopped out of the box, zigzagged between the feet of the watching men and disappeared into a crack in the floor. Admittedly, I lost a reasonable chunk of money, but that in the end was more than compensated for by the happiness I felt for my cricket. He had won his freedom.
Our meal that night was eaten under the spluttering glow of a hurricane lamp that hung from a rafter over our heads. All of Xining was in darkness because of a power cut, the only light cast by lamps such as ours and the occasional diesel generator–powered bulb. Pools of luminescence were dotted along the streets and the town’s inhabitants huddled within them: eating, drinking or playing card games to wile away the evening. Liu was in a thoughtful mood and wanted to talk about his country.
‘How much do you know about China?’ he began, lifting a bowl of rice to his lips and shovelling several loads into his mouth with chopsticks.
‘I know you have a population of young people aged between 14 and 29 that is greater than the entire population of the USA,’ I blurted out. ‘I also know that there are more Chinese people standing on street corners waiting to cross the road than there are in all of Australasia. I read that somewhere — in a National Geographic, I think, in a doctor’s waiting room.’
A Boy of China Page 4