Waste Tide

by Chen Qiufan

  Scott understood who them referred to. The Luo, Lin, and Chen clans monopolized all the e-waste recycling and processing business on Silicon Isle: a yearly processing capacity of millions of tons and an economic output measured by billions of dollars. For a large industry like that to upgrade would result in a redistribution of profits, a process that was certain to be raw and bloody.

  “Our plan would create tens of thousands of new, green jobs with full benefits. And due to TerraGreen Recycling’s superior technology, the processing would be far more efficient and reduce the losses currently experienced with manual dismantling and processing. Economic output would be increased by at least thirty percent. But most importantly, we will allocate special funds to help Silicon Isle in a comprehensive plan for environmental remediation. We’ll return your home to its former glory: blue skies and clear water.”

  This was basically a recitation of the description in the proposal. Kaizong was impressed by his boss’s powers of recall, especially since he couldn’t even rely on his augmented-reality gear.

  “I know all this.” Director Lin seemed to have completely sobered up from whatever measure of drunkenness he had had and ordered a cup of strong tea. “But no one really cares. The natives don’t care. They just want to squeeze as much money as they can out of whatever life is left in this place. The migrant workers don’t care, either. They just want to earn enough money as quickly as possible to return to their home vil lages and open up a general store, or build a new house and get married. They hate this island. No one cares about the future of this place. They want to leave here and forget this period of their lives, just like the trash.”

  “But the government ought to care!” Scott couldn’t help himself.

  “The government has more important things to worry about.” Director Lin took a big sip of tea. His speech was now unhurried, and the red flush had faded from his face. That polite, efficient, but fake smile was pasted back on, as though the sincere father that had spoken earlier never existed. “It’s getting late. We still have to get to Xialong Village. Believe me, you won’t be staying long.”

  * * *

  There are two Silicon Isles, Scott Brandle thought as he watched the scene slowly scrolling past the window of the Land Rover.

  Earlier, government officials had taken them to visit Silicon Isle Town proper. Amid the chaotic traffic, Scott had been surprised by the number of expensive cars whose drivers seemed to be always leaning on their horns: BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Bentley, Porsche … He thought he had even seen a ruby-red Maserati parked right across the sidewalk, with its young owner squatting next to it, enjoying seafood barbecue bought from a street vendor.

  Despite the peninsula’s low position on the totem pole of China’s administrative regions, Silicon Isle Town was prosperous. Scott saw many boutiques specializing in luxury brands that he had only expected to see in China’s largest cities. It was the fashion among the town residents to build expensive, traditional, hiasuanhoun-style mansions,1 but they also liked to add in elements of European influence, giving the whole place a kind of dazzling but incongruous ersatz exoticism. A visitor sometimes felt as though he had stumbled into a third-rate architectural fair: one house showing Mediterranean influence, the next displaying Scandinavian minimalism.

  It was just like Scott’s China guidebook said: these were the nouveaux riches of contemporary China. They bought the best material goods the world had to offer and used them to fill their own empty lives.

  Scott didn’t see any pedestrians wearing masks. He knew that prosthetic respiratory systems hadn’t yet been popularized here. Silicon Isle Town was located upwind from the rest of Silicon Isle, so the air quality was at least passable, though there was a pervasive stench that made breathing difficult. It was an odor that he had once experienced in a rubber-incineration plant in the Philippines, after which he had felt like gagging for a whole week. But the people here seemed to take the smell in their stride.

  The Land Rover lurched slowly through the traffic. From time to time, a three-wheeled electric rickshaw carrying drinking water would cut across the traffic, causing horns to beep and curses to ring out. But the rickshaw drivers, all speaking nonlocal topolects, simply ignored them. A ton of water, costing two yuan in Huang Village nine kilometers away, would sell for two yuan per forty-liter drum once ferried here. The natives didn’t care to earn such low profits—but their big business was what caused most of Silicon Isle’s surface water and groundwater to be undrinkable in the first place.

  That’s the price that must be paid for economic development, everyone said. It was a cliché they had learned from TV.

  “We’re almost at the village,” Director Lin, who was seated in the front passenger seat, turned to tell Scott.2

  “Holy—” Kaizong blurted out before he could control himself. Scott followed his gaze, pursed his lips, but said nothing. Although he had already reviewed a lot of background material on Silicon Isle’s conditions, reading about something could not compare to the shock of reality staring from the other side of a glass window.

  Countless workshops, little more than sheds, were packed tightly together like mahjong tiles along both sides of every street. A narrow lane was left in the middle to allow carts to bring in the trash for processing.

  Metal chassis, broken displays, circuit boards, plastic components, and wires, some dismantled and some awaiting processing, were scattered everywhere like piles of manure, with laborers, all of them migrants from elsewhere in China, flitting between the piles like flies. The workers sifted through the piles and picked out valuable pieces to be placed into the ovens or acid baths for additional decomposition to extract copper and tin, as well as gold, platinum, and other precious metals. What was left over was either incinerated or scattered on the ground, creating even more trash. No one wore any protective gear.

  Everything was shrouded in a leaden miasma, an amalgamation of the white mist generated by the boiling aqua regia in the acid baths and the black smoke from the unceasing burning of PVC, insulation, and circuit boards in the fields and on the shore of the river. The two contrasting colors were mixed by the sea breeze until they could no longer be distinguished, seeping into the pores of every living being.

  Scott observed the men and women living among the trash—the natives called them the waste people. The women did their laundry in the black water with their bare hands, the soap bubbles forming a silver edge around floating mats of duckweed. Children played everywhere, running over the black shores, where fiberglass and the charred remains of circuit boards twinkled; jumping over the abandoned fields, where embers and ashes from burnt plastic smoldered; swimming and splashing in dark green ponds, where polyester film floated over the surface. They seemed to think this was the natural state of the world and nothing disturbed their joy. The men bared their chests to show off the cheap body films they had applied. Wearing shanzhai versions of augmented-reality glasses, they enjoyed a bit of rare leisure by lying on the granite banks of irrigation canals, filled with broken displays and plastic junk. These ancient canals, built hundreds of years ago to bring water to thirsty rice paddies, now shimmered with the fragmented lights of the process of dismantling the old.

  “We’re here. Still want to get out of the car?” Director Lin’s tone was mocking, as though he were only a visitor.

  “Without going into the tiger’s nest, how can we retrieve the tiger cub?” Scott struggled to enunciate the proverb in heavily accented Mandarin. He put on his face mask and opened the car door.

  Director Lin shook his head and reluctantly followed.

  Hot, polluted air assaulted Scott, accompanied by an overwhelming stench. The mask filtered out particles and dust but was powerless against odors. For a moment, he seemed to be back in the suburbs of Manila, two years earlier, except that the smell here was ten times more concentrated. He tried to remain still, but sweat continued to ooze out of him, mixing with unknown chemicals in the air until it formed a viscous film that s
tuck to his skin and clothes and made taking even a single step difficult.

  In front of them stood a stone gate inscribed with the characters Xialong in clerical script. Normally, Scott Brandle would have considered examining it for signs of its antiquity and craftsmanship, but at this moment, what flashed through his mind was the beginning of the warning carved on the gate of Hell in Dante’s Inferno.

  Per me si va ne la città dolente,

  per me si va ne l’etterno dolore,

  per me si va tra la perduta gente.

  Scott had read these lines when he studied Italian in college; he had never thought he would need this half-forgotten skill for the rest of his life. But here, the lines seemed especially appropriate. He did his best to put out of his mind the last line of Dante’s warning.

  The laborers stopped what they were doing and glanced their way curiously. Most of the eyes were focused on Scott. Even though he was wearing a mask, his height, pale skin, and head of short, blond hair already betrayed him. The migrant workers had seen foreigners, of course, but they were confused as to why this well-dressed laowai would appear here, like some vision of Jesus of Nazareth passing through waves of heat, clouds of toxic miasma, and streets full of filth.

  Then, they all smiled. The smiles spread from face to face like a chill wind, pulling up the corners of everyone’s mouths.

  “Be careful. There are many addicts here.” Director Lin’s voice was a low murmur next to Chen Kaizong’s ears. Without waiting for a translation, Scott, walking at the front, suddenly stopped.

  On the ground in front of him was a wriggling prosthetic arm. Whether intentional or not, the stimulus loop of the arm was left open, and the internal battery, incompletely disassembled, continued to provide power. The electricity flowed along the artificial skin to the synthetic nerves revealed at the broken end, and triggered cyclic contractions in the muscles. The five fingers of the prosthesis continuously clawed at the ground, pulling the broken forearm along like some giant, flesh-colored inchworm.

  It then collided with an abandoned liquid crystal display, and the broken fingernails scrabbled against the smooth glass surface but could no longer make any progress.

  A little boy ran over, picked up the prosthetic arm, and put it back down on the ground facing a different direction. His expression seemed to suggest that the arm was nothing more than a common toy car. And so this bizarre toy continued its endless journey to nowhere, apparently only to terminate when its battery ran out.

  Scott squatted down. The little boy stared at his mask, without fear, without curiosity. “Where else can you find the same kind of … hand?” Scott asked in Mandarin. Fearing that his accent was too heavy, he also gestured with his hands.

  The little boy froze for a moment, and then pointed to a work shed not too far away. Then he turned and ran off.

  Scott stood up. An intense joy radiated from his eyes, as though he had discovered some secret treasure.

  From outside it was easy to see that no one was in the shed, but in the middle was a heap of junked silicone products whose electronic components had all been removed. The remaining silicone had to be decomposed using special industrial processes to extract the monomers and silicone oil. The local workshops weren’t equipped with the technology for this, so the heap was just waiting to be picked up by a specialized recycler.

  Director Lin finished his explanation, and then added, “These days, the rich switch body parts as easily as people used to switch phones. The junked prostheses are shipped here. Most haven’t been decontaminated and still contain blood and bodily fluids, which pose a lot of potential risk for public health—” He seemed to realize something and stopped himself, awkwardly changing the subject. “It’s too dirty here, Mr. Scott. Why don’t we go to the back of the village? That’s where the workshops are most concentrated.”

  Kaizong gave him a knowing look. Director Lin was clearly trying to hide something. He translated what Lin said for Scott, but added his own guess. Scott smiled as though he didn’t care, and continued to walk into the shed.

  Suddenly, a dark shadow dashed out of the left side of the enclosed space. Scott heard a cry from Director Lin and then felt something with a rotten, fishy smell come straight at him. He ducked, turned to the side, and shoved whatever it was away with his hands.

  A few low growls later, Scott saw that his assailant was a large German shepherd. The dog rolled on the ground, quickly righted itself, and prepared to attack again.

  Scott raised his arms into a combat stance and focused his gaze on the creature’s green, glittering eyes. His whole body was tensed and ready.

  But at that moment, a silent order seemed to hit the German shepherd, and the dog lowered its eyes, tucked its tail between its legs, and ran off into the shade behind the shed.

  “It’s a chipped dog.” Director Lin held up his phone. His chest heaved as though he had been the one attacked.

  To stop burglars, the villagers liked to keep large dogs with implanted chips. Thanks to an electronically enhanced Pavlov effect, if anyone en tered a designated area without sending out a predetermined signal, the chipped dog would attack relentlessly until the intruder was incapacitated. Each village had its own unique signal band, which changed often. Only a few individuals possessed the authority to have all the key frequencies. Director Lin was one of them.

  “A few have been killed by the dogs, most of them radical environmental activists.” Director Lin smiled. “I have to say, Mr. Scott, I didn’t expect you to be so knowledgeable in the art of hand-to-hand combat.”

  Scott smiled back, his left hand held over his chest. The sudden surge of fear and adrenaline had caused his heart rhythm to become erratic, and he needed a moment for the tiny box implanted in his chest cavity to do its job.

  Kaizong tried to hide his surprise. He could tell that Scott’s quick reaction and his almost automatic defensive maneuvers were the results of long, professional training. It appeared that his boss was not just a successful business consultant. And the goal of his trip to Silicon Isle was perhaps not as simple as project research.

  Scott entered the shed and stopped in front of the flesh-colored hill of prostheses. He squatted and purposefully sifted through the pile. A pungent disinfectant smell assaulted his nose. Translucent artificial cochleas, false lips, prosthetic limbs, breast implants, augmented muscles, and enlarged sexual organs bounced against each other, and the pile collapsed around him. His field of vision was filled with the pink glow of faux health, as though he were trapped in the storage locker of Jack the Ripper. Finally, he found what he was looking for.

  The string of letters and numbers, SBT-VBPII32503439, was obscurely etched on the inside of a rigid, mold-cast prosthetic part that resembled half of a strange shell. Glistening with a bone-white light, the empty prosthesis apparently once contained some integrated circuits.

  Scott raised this treasure in front of Director Lin’s face and tossed it at him. A trembling Director Lin caught it, his face full of disgust.

  “Director Lin, I’d like to ask you for a favor.” Scott’s voice took on a deliberate, courteous tone. “Would you help me find the person who processed this piece of trash?”

  “That is not so simple. We’re not like you. We don’t have modern management processes and databases … this might take a really long time.” Director Lin pondered the prosthesis. It didn’t look like anything that could be attached to a body, or at least not a normal body. “What in the world is it?”

  “Believe me: you don’t want to know.”

  There was a noise behind him; Scott turned cautiously. Several laborers ran past the work shed without stopping.

  Director Lin nodded thoughtfully. The peninsula was so small that there could be no secret that he wouldn’t eventually discover; it was just a matter of time.

  “I will do my best to find the man for you before you finish your research trip,” he said meaningfully.

  At that moment, Director Lin saw more people running
past the shed in the same direction as the previous laborers, their expressions mixtures of excitement and fear. He stopped a young man and—because none of the workers here were natives—asked in broken Mandarin, “What happened?”

  “Someone got clamped.” The young man dodged out of his way and ran on.

  Director Lin’s face changed, and he chased after the young man. Scott and Kaizong followed. They saw a crowd forming around another work shed, everyone arguing excitedly. The three shoved their way through the crowd to the front, and all drew a sharp intake of breath.

  A blood-covered man was lying on the ground, his limbs jerking uncontrollably. A broken, black robot arm’s pincers were clamped around his head and neck. Through the cracks between the robotic claws, one could see that his facial features had deformed under the pressure, and bloody foam was seeping out of his orifices. He was no longer coherent, and from his throat emerged the grunts of a wounded animal. His twitching body looked like an assembly line mistake that attached a robot’s head to a man’s body.

  “How did this happen?” Director Lin asked the crowd. The answer, as best as he could tell from the cacophonous responses, was that dur ing the dismantling of the junked robot arm, the man had triggered the backup feedback circuits and got his head caught in the viselike grip. This man was clearly unlucky and had angered the spirits somehow. Everyone shook their heads to indicate sympathy.

  Scott rushed over and gestured for Kaizong to hold the man’s shoulders still to avoid damaging his spine. Then he carefully examined the robot arm: manufactured by Foster-Miller, Inc., USA, Model “Spirit Claw III” (no longer in production), six degrees of freedom, equipped with embedded microbatteries that could power its servomotors for up to thirty minutes after main power had been cut off. This particular model was a basic, semi-military model widely used for riot control, public safety, bomb squad, and other similar applications.