Spider Eaters: A Memoir

by R Yang

  Other Red Guards went ahead for a mile or so. When they realized that we were missing, they came back to look for us. Fortunately they found us before we got run over by a car or a truck. Otherwise we would have become martyrs, and martyrs of this sort were later judged to be big fools who sacrificed their lives for a wrong cause. Now history has pretty much forgotten them. I'd much prefer to be alive so that I can write this book.

  15

  Semi-transparent Nights

  If I could fall asleep in the middle of a street far away from home in 1966, how could I suffer from insomnia the next year when I was back home? It seems unthinkable. But this was indeed what happened. After I was in bed three or four hours but sleep was still playing hide and seek with me, I would reason with myself.

  Last year, that was last year. Now is now. Last year Red Guards were Chairman Mao's brave young generals, charging the enemy line ahead of millions. There was so much to do and never enough time. If a day had forty-eight hours, we still had no time to sleep. Now there's nothing for us to do. A real turnaround, one hundred and eighty degrees. "Things always change into their opposites. " Chairman Mao is right. Old revolutionaries have become capitalist-roaders. Old Red Guards are now fighting against the Cultural Revolution, for the sake of their parents. Not all of them. But many are like that. Shame on them! Nowadays we are expected to become middle school students again. "Make a revolution by resuming classes, " Chairman Mao said. But what classes are there for us to go to? The teachers have all learned their lessons: those who do nothing make no mistakes. So no one can accuse them of "treating students as their enemies" later on.

  Enemies ...

  "Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? This is the most important issue for a revolution. "

  Revolution ... Was the second trip I made in 1966 for revolution or was it for sightseeing? Well, the truth is, originally I went to Mount Hua, the gorgeous Taoist mountain in central China, for sightseeing. But later I made a revolution there anyway. All because of those old Taoists. If they hadn't provoked me, I might not have ... They thought they were smart, using the Red Guards' own tactics to deal with a Red Guard. The questionnaire they made me fill out on top of the mountain, that was definitely a big mistake.

  How many questions was I supposed to answer? Sixty? More? The class status of my parents, paternal and maternal grandparents, uncles, and aunts. Their names, ages, professions, work units, and political affiliations. If any of them had joined reactionary organizations, had other historical problems, or had overseas connections ... It went on and on. Damn it! Just for one night's stay in their temple, for a room with no fire in December. The quilt they gave me was so cold and damp-I shivered in it all night. The chill penetrated my bones. Outside the window, mountain wind boomed. Huge pine trees were rumbling. Overnight ten thousand tons of northwest wind must have rolled over the mountain peaks.

  Unable to sleep a wink, I ground my teeth and cursed the Taoists in my head: Who do you think you are? Officials setting up a file for me or police in public security bureau? How dared you ask me, a Red Guard, those humiliating questions about my grandparents and relatives in the name of class struggle, instead of me asking you? Humph. Let's see. Five hundred Red Guards in the middle school of Huayin county. That should be enough for a raid of the temples. Mobilize them. Have them set off at midnight. Ten miles to the top of the mountain. Surprise attack by dawn. Search the temples for evidences of espionage and other counterrevolutionary activities. Break up the superstition. Now that's a good plan!

  Three days later, the plan was carried out. Though no evidence of espionage was found, it was still a great victory of Mao Zedong thought. All the Taoists-spiritual opiummongers and parasites-were taken down the mountain by the local Red Guards. That night I slept in the abbot's big bed. It was warm and comfortable. The quilt had a crimson silk cover and was filled with new cotton. In the room, a faint smell of incense lingered. Charcoal glowed in the dark, in an ancient brass brazier. Eternal Spring in the midst of ice and snow. Riding a crane over the five lakes and four oceans. Green pine trees on mountain peaks. Five-colored clouds. Harmony of yin and yang. Sweet dreams ...

  Sleep! I must get some sleep. Before five thirty. Don't think about five thirty! Makes me nervous all over. Relax. Count numbers. One, two, three ... sixteen. I am sixteen years old.

  I turned sixteen at Zunyi in Guizhou province. I celebrated my birthday with one fruit drop. It cost one cent. I had only one cent left by then. In November I left Beijing with five other Red Guards. We split up after we visited Shaoshan, Chairman Mao's birthplace. "The east is red. The sun rises . . . " Stop thinking about that song! It drives me crazy! Everybody in our group had a plan of her own. No one was willing to compromise. So "Good-bye! See you back in Beijing!"

  The day after my birthday, I got up at daybreak. Marched out of Zunyi City by myself. Straw sandals, leg wrappings, and a bamboo hat were the latest additions to my Red Guard's outfit. By then the walking tour was in fashion. I wanted to try it too. The route I chose for myself was part of the legendary Long March called Loushan Pass.

  In 1935 the Chinese Red Army had fought for its survival here, had crossed Chishui River four times. It was chased, ambushed, intercepted, surrounded by the Nationalist troops. Outnumbered. Tired and hungry, thousands of Red Army men and women died. Their graves stood on mountain slopes on both sides of the road. Some had names. More were simply marked as "Nameless Martyr's Grave."

  Standing in front of the graves, I heard each soldier tell me a heroic story: Bullets flew like locusts. Battle cries filled the valley. The sun turned black. The river was red. The pain and despair were fathomless. The love and dreams remained in the green mountains ... I was deeply moved. I felt that I owed everything to these men and women, forerunners who did not live to see a new China. "So from now on, I must live as if these revolutionary martyrs were living inside me. I will change my name. Rae, be it Switzerland or Auspicious, is no good. Henceforth, I will call myself hongjun! I will forget my old self and be a new person! The sun and the moon, mountains and rivers, please bear me witness."

  Hongjun-Red Army. That was the name I used on my second trip. It was what they called me, those Red Guards from Yunnan, the southwest border of China. We met on the road. We talked. In a couple of hours we got to know one another quite well. We became good friends. (In those days, none of us had heard of the idea of "privacy." So it was perfectly natural that we asked one another all kinds of personal questions. No one felt guilty. No one was offended. All answered the questions truthfully.)

  The fifteen Yunnan Red Guards, I found out, were children of silicon miners. Their hometown was Gejiu. The team leader was a seventeen-year-old young man. He was tall and handsome. Others were younger. The youngest girls among them were only thirteen.

  "Small in years, not small in aspirations." My new friends told me that their plan was to walk from Yunnan to Beijing to see Chairman Mao. First, they would walk the entire route of the Long March to Yan'an. Afterwards, they would take the road Chairman Mao had taken during the Liberation War from Yan'an to Beijing. That was a very ambitious plan. What they talked about was a journey of more than two thousand miles, on foot!

  "It doesn't matter. We can walk. Every step we take, we are a bit closer to Chairman Mao! If we cannot reach Beijing this year, next year we will certainly be there! We are all determined!"

  A girl of fourteen said this to me with a Yunnan accent that was indescribably soft and gentle, but her resolution was unmistakable. "We will walk a hundred 11 a day [about thirty miles]. Seven days a week. We'll reach Beijing by March."

  Good idea! I thought. Let me try it too. After all, I am older than most of the girls here. If they can do it, I can do it too. Let this be a test of my willpower.

  A hundred li a day, on that steep mountain road, that was much easier said than done. In the afternoon I began to realize how useless I was. A real armchair revolutionary! No matter how hard I tried, I just could not keep up with my ne
w friends. So they grabbed my bag, which was filled with pamphlets, works by Chairman Mao. (I had planned to give them out to peasants on the way. Then I realized that most of the peasants were illiterate.) Later they took my bedroll and carried that for me too. Even so I still slowed them down. So after a while I insisted violently that we split up and they go ahead.

  Then it grew dark. Mountains turned into huge black shadows. Stars were all over the sky. There was no moon. The road sank into darkness. No village was in sight. No dogs barked. I was still some ten li away from my destination. I felt like crying. Not that I was afraid of ghosts or bad people. It was a sense of utter helplessness. "Would Hongjun cry? No! Hongjun would only shed blood. No tears!

  "Chairman Mao teaches us, `Be determined. Do not fear sacrifice. Overcome ten thousand difficulties to strive for victory ..."'

  In those years, millions of Chinese had recited this quotation in difficult situations to boost their morale. Saying it aloud, suddenly I saw lights shine out in front of me. Like a miracle! Dim and flickering at first. Bright and clear later. The lights came near. Oil lanterns lit up the faces of three male Yunnan Red Guards, including the team leader. They told me that they had long since reached the village that was our destination and waited for me. Then it got dark. There was still no trace of me. They decided to come back to meet me.

  They walked me to the Red Guard reception center in the village. There the girls had gotten everything ready for me: steaming hot water in a wooden basin. A stool placed next to it. They insisted that I soak my feet first, which they said was the most important thing for people who traveled on foot. After that, they put rice, vegetables, and drinking water onto the table. Sheets and pillows, they had borrowed for me from the reception center. The bed was ready for me to sleep in. By then, it was almost midnight. All the girls had walked a hundred li on that day and the three boys who went back to meet me nearly a hundred and twenty. They must have been exhausted. Yet they stayed up to help me. Their act touched my heart.

  Afterwards I never forget that once upon a time on winding mountain roads tens of thousands of Red Guards walked to the north, sharing a dream. On this road, strangers were not strangers. People truly cared about one another. Looking back on it, I know I was part of it; yet the memory seems unreal. China has changed. So have I.

  The next day, we walked another hundred li. I was walking on big blisters. I clenched my teeth and endured the pain. This time, however, I did not insist that the Yunnan Red Guards go ahead, knowing that they would come back to meet me anyway. So we walked together and arrived at our destination long after dark.

  On the third day, a strange thing happened to me. No matter how hard I tried, I just could not get up from bed. Willpower or Chairman Mao's quotations. Nothing worked. The legs were not mine! I was very embarrassed. The Yunnan Red Guards, needless to say, did not leave me behind. Thus we stayed at Tongzi county, not for one but for three days. That made me feel bad. This time I really slowed them down.

  So on the fourth day, I told the Yunnan Red Guards that I was going to take the train to Chongqing in Sichuan province. I made the decision partly because I needed money. Although taking a walking tour I could get food and lodging for free from Red Guard reception centers, I'd much prefer to have some cash in my pockets. My parents could wire me money only if I got to a big city.

  My new friends walked me to the train station. Seeing them stand in front of my window on the platform, I was rather ashamed of myself. In the meantime, I also felt superior to them: As a Red Guard from Beijing, I have more important things to do elsewhere! Thus I cannot afford the time to walk halfway across China like them. We are not the same.

  Before the train left, I gave them my address and telephone number in Beijing. I believed that next spring I would see them again. But I was wrong. Next spring, a classmate of mine came back from Yan'an. He told me he met a group of Red Guards from Yunnan there. By then Red Guards were no longer allowed to travel even on foot. The Yunnan Red Guards were sent home. Before they left, however, they asked him to bring a bamboo hat to me.

  "They said it was yours. They told me please make sure that you get it."

  "Where is it?"

  "Oh, it was in bad shape. Really worn out. The rain had soaked it. It was almost black. And it was torn at many places along the edge. I didn't think you'd want it. I threw it away on the bus."

  That was the hat I left behind when we parted at Tongzi county. The Yunnan Red Guards carried it all the way to Yan'an! They completed their Long March, a journey of over a thousand miles. Millions of steps along those endless mountain roads. Rain and snow. Sunrise and sundown. The bamboo hat was a witness of all these. It was also a token of our friendship. When I told my classmate the history of this extraordinary hat, he felt terribly sorry for what he had done. But it was too late. I felt sorry too. Not so much for the hat but for my friends. Knowing how much they had wanted to come to Beijing and see Chairman Mao. Their dreams did not come true. They must have been very sad and disappointed when they were made to go home.

  Those Yunnan Red Guards, when we met last year, they thought I knew a great deal. They admired me for it. Last year a Red Guard from Beijing was somebody! All looked up to us. From old cadres to young students. I thought I knew a lot of things too. But really-what do I know? Now I'm not sure I know anything. Ever since I came back from the second trip, I have fallen into five miles of dense fog.

  At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Red Guards fought against the revisionist educational line, capitalist-roaders, and lists of "four olds. " Now Red Guards are fighting against Red Guards. April Third Faction, April Fourth Faction, Liandong Faction. All take sides. Comrades-in-arms of yesterday are mortal enemies now. Hatred takes the place of the love we had for one another.

  Wu, my classmate, and I are no longer on speaking terms. Before the Cultural Revolution, we had been bosom friends. We used to study for exams in a quiet peach garden called Dongbei Yiyuan. Other girls dared not go there because it was a cemetery. We also walked in drizzling rain around lotus ponds to create poems for each other ... After the Cultural Revolution broke out and we shared family histories, we loved each other as class sisters. But later she joined Liandong and I the Maoist Commune that belongs to April Third Faction. Mutual contempt grew between us with each passing day.

  Wu despises me. I know it. She thinks I'm too naive to understand upper-level struggles: Jiang Qing's ignoble history, Lin Biao's personal ambition, Zhou Enlai's opportunism, and so on and so forth. Such topics they never get tired of talking about behind closed doors. I suppose if I agreed with her, I wouldn't be naive. But does she really think I'm so naive that I can't see the hidden motives behind the high-sounding arguments made by her and others like her, all of them high-ranking cadres' children? Don't believe them for a minute when they talk about liberating humankind. When the Cultural Revolution touches their vested interests, they betray the revolution to defend their parents. They care nothing about the people! Only their privileges! They care nothing about China either, except it used to be their paradise! They are selfish and hypocritical! Even so they still think they're superior to the whole world. I simply cannot stand them!

  But at least if Wu and I did not like each other, we showed it with white eyes, not rude words. Elsewhere revolutionary people were fighting revolutionary people with bricks and sticks. Some even used rifles and machine guns. Recently a Red Guard from ioi was killed by a machine gun in Jiangxi province. Caught in an ambush, he died in a truck with many others. He was only sixteen.

  He belonged to our organization. At his funeral, which I attended, many Red Guards vowed to go to Jiangxi to take the martyr's place. While they talked, I kept my silence. Shame on me! But I really don't want to die like that!

  Da-Da-Da-Da-Da-Da-Da -

  In total darkness, suddenly my chest is punctured by a string of bullets. Each one is screaming pain and chaos. Blood gushes out. Like water from a broken fire hose. I cannot breathe. I try not to
scream. People in panic trample me down. Their boots open up my wounds. I can still feel the pain, though my heart has stopped beating. Who killed me? Why ... I'll never find out ...

  Am I a coward? Will I become a renegade? ... Renegades betray their comrades under torture ... Who are my comrades? Who are my ene mies? ... No use thinking about such things! The windmill turns round and round. Don Quixote ... I can't figure anything out when my brain is in this shape. What time is it? Oh, no. Don't look at the clock! Don't listen to it either! The ticking will grow louder and louder. I hate that sound!

  Take a deep breath. As if I'm going to dive into the ocean. Calm down. Water overcomes fire. Fire overcomes metal ... Fire smolders in my heart night after night ... Red candle sheds tears ... Try a different posture. Put both hands under the pillow. Sometimes that works.

  The night has grown light again. Almost transparent. Strange. In the past I always thought night was dark and opaque. Now I know I was wrong. Through the thin blue curtains, a faint light flows into my room. I am at the bottom of an ocean. Warm currents, cold currents, eddies, and reefs. My thoughts drift in all directions. Memories rise and fall. Pearls glisten. Sharks cast dark shadows as they swim by.

  My room, in the past it was warm and cozy. Now it feels so empty. Little Tiger is dead. Still remember the cat's warmth and weight on my quilt. How could children be so cruel? Lovely angels. Flowers of the motherland. Rascals! Little beasts! Wish I could seize them. Slap their faces till their teeth fall out. Kick their butts. Thrash them with my belt until they beg for mercy. That'd teach them a lesson and vent my nameless fire. I am so angry. At them. At myself. I'm so useless I can't even save a cat!

  Aunty is gone too. Nothing I can do about that either. I wonder if she's asleep or awake at this hour? In that old house where she lived with her husband, son, and daughter. Old memories stored everywhere. In drawers and trunks. Under the bed and over the mosquito net. Like spiderwebs, they catch the insects of drowsiness. In Aunty's stories, when these invisible insects fly into people's noses, they fall asleep ... Sleep! Are there spiderwebs in my room too?