Forbidden City

by William Bell

  On Friday morning before dawn the phone rang. I heard Lao Xu answer it and start yelling into the receiver. Then he shouted, “Wake up! There is a rumour that Zhao Zi-yang is going to Tian An Men Square to talk to the students!”

  We were all up and dressed in moments. “Let’s go!” Eddie said.

  I grabbed my backpack. No one seemed to notice that I went right along with them.

  The tall light standards in the square and the lights from the monuments make it easy to see where you’re going, although you need extra lights for TV pictures. It took us at least half an hour to push through the throng to the Monument to the People’s Heroes, which is where Eddie figured the action would be. Buses were parked in the square now, commandeered by the students for shelter when it rained. It was cold out, and a lot of people had coats on.

  Nothing was happening at the monument. Eddie said to Dad, “Let’s split up and call on the two-way if we see anything.”

  “Okay,” Dad answered. “I’ll go down towards Qian Men.” That’s the Front Gate.

  “I’ll cover the mausoleum,” Eddie said. “Lao Xu, let’s go.”

  “Alex, you can come with me,” Dad said.

  “Why don’t I stay here? That way we can cover three areas at once.”

  “I don’t know, Alex. I don’t want you to get lost.”

  What a lame thing to say, I thought. Eddie must have agreed. “Are you kidding, Ted? Your kid knows this city better than most of the residents!”

  Dad agreed, reluctantly, and the three of them waded into the crowd. I went up to the base of the monument among a hundred or so students and tried to get a look around. The first tier of the tall building still had a lot of wreaths on it. Nothing unusual seemed to be happening — other than probably half a million people, tents, parked buses, voices yelling over loud-hailers, TV lights sparking up for a few minutes then fading again.

  I fished my camcorder out of my pack. It would be worthwhile to try taping anything that happened. Then I checked my radio to make sure it was on channel one and that it was on receive mode. I put it in my breast pocket.

  I stood around for a while, fighting off the chill, before I noticed something going on over at the Great Hall of the People. A blaze of lights had come on, like a cluster of white torches. Something was up. The lights began to move towards me so I decided to stay put.

  I took out my radio and keyed it. “Dad, Eddie, this is Alex. Can you see the lights? In the northwest quadrant, moving towards me. Over.”

  “Alex, Dad here. I can’t see them. I’m on the south side of Qian Men. The smell of Kentucky chicken is driving me nuts. Over.”

  “And I can’t see anything,” was Eddie’s response.

  “I’ll check it out and let you know. Over and out.”

  I put the radio in my pocket again. The lights were moving towards me quickly. They were TV lights. Somebody important was coming.

  Right near the monument was a bus, and when Zhao Zi-yang got to the bus he stopped. He was at the centre of a tight circle of students wearing the white headbands that said Democracy Now! in Chinese. He reached up and started shaking hands with students in the bus. Amazing. This guy was the second most powerful man in China.

  By that time I was making my way towards him. I had to climb down from the monument’s base, so I lost sight of Zhao, but the lights were easy to home in on. What wasn’t easy was pushing through the crowd. Then I got an idea. I took off my hat and stuffed it in my pocket so my blond hair would show.

  “Press! Press!” I shouted, and held my camcorder up high so it could be seen. “Press! Let me through, please!”

  It worked. The crowd of students parted and I got to the bus in time to see that Zhao was talking. He was of medium height, with a high forehead and western style glasses. I put the camcorder to my eye and zoomed in to get a medium close-up of Zhao with students at the bus windows in the background. Even through the viewfinder I could see that he was crying as he spoke to the crowd.

  The only thing from his speech that I understood were the words … “too late.”

  I probably don’t need to write down how deliriously happy Dad and Eddie were when I hooked my camcorder up to our office TV and showed them the tape. I thought Eddie was going to carry me around the room.

  Within an hour Dad had found someone in the hotel who agreed to take the tape to the satellite feed station and Eddie had written a report and faxed it to Toronto.

  I was delirious myself. The reporter’s bug had really bitten me.

  We all wanted to go back to sleep but we couldn’t. Too much to do. I skipped school again. Dad went back to the square with Eddie and Lao Xu to try and interview some students about Zhao’s visit and ask them what they thought it meant to their movement. I got to clean up the office because Eddie wouldn’t let anyone from the hotel in. Pretty demeaning job for someone who got his video report on national TV, if you ask me.

  It took me all morning to tidy up the office. It’s hard to make an office neat when you know that the people who work in it are used to a mess and that if they ever came back to find an orderly workplace they’d think they were in the wrong office. I also made sure all the battery rechargers were full and charging away.

  After lunch Lao Xu came by and started using the phone as he often did. He tried to catch people after the customary afternoon nap, before the lines got too busy again. He was shouting away for an hour or so, saying “Wei? Wei?” about once a second, then he sat and made some notes.

  Eddie and Dad came back later in the afternoon, looking tired. Dad put away his camera in its aluminum case and flopped into one of the armchairs. Eddie said hello and headed for the shower with his pipe still in his mouth.

  Just as Eddie padded into the office wearing a towel around his large middle and drying his hair with another towel the phone rang. Lao Xu answered it, yelled for a few seconds, listened some more, and hung up, looking glum.

  “There is a rumour that Chairman Zhao Zi-yang has been removed from office,” he said quietly. “And my friend says we should turn on the TV.”

  I pushed the button and the screen came to life. We gathered around.

  “That’s Li Peng,” Lao Xu said. The premier was talking. He looked stern, even angry, but he had a look on his face that seemed to say, “I’m the boss now.”

  “What’s up, Lao Xu?” Dad asked.

  Lao Xu kept his eyes on the screen. “Please wait, Ted.”

  So the three of us stared at Li Peng, dressed in a dark blue Mao suit, collar buttoned up under his chin, chopping the air with his hand, karate-style, as he talked. I could make out a couple of words, like China and student and foreigner. Then it was over.

  Dad and Eddie and I turned to Lao Xu. We knew from the look on his face that the news was not good. He spoke in a low voice, as if he couldn’t quite believe his own words.

  “Premier Li Peng says that Beijing is now under martial law.”

  “Oh-oh,” Dad said.

  Eddie let out a low whistle, puffing out his moustache.

  Lao Xu continued. “And he has ordered all students and others to clear Tian An Men Square or face the consequences. Their presence is illegal. All demonstrations are illegal. It is also illegal to spread rumours. And,” Lao Xu added, looking directly into Eddie’s eyes, “foreign correspondents are forbidden to report on anything to do with the students’ presence in Tian An Men Square. If they disobey, measures will be taken.”

  I knew what martial law meant. It meant that all laws were suspended, even the constitution, and the government made policy directly, using the military to carry it out. Martial law meant soldiers on the street corners with guns, searches of persons and houses without any kind of warrant — by soldiers, not police. It meant curfews. And fear mixed with excitement.

  Which is what I was starting to feel.

  But a couple of things I didn’t understand. “What’s this stuff about rumours?” I asked Lao Xu.

  “It means —”

 
; Eddie cut him off. “Remember what I told you about how the government here controls and manages the news, Alex?” I nodded, a little put out that he was answering for Lao Xu. “Well, the government will now tell more lies to the people than ever and withhold more information than ever. If people start circulating the truth, they are accused of spreading rumours and arrested. It’s a way of controlling information.”

  I looked at Lao Xu. He sat there with a glum look on his face and nodded without saying anything.

  “What will happen now?” I asked.

  In unison, Eddie and Lao Xu shrugged.

  “Lao Xu, can you still work for Dad and Eddie?” I wanted to know. “I mean, won’t this make things more difficult for you?”

  Lao Xu smiled. “I can continue,” he answered, “for the time being, because I have not yet been told anything different by my leader.”

  I stood at the office window looking at the crowds streaming along Chang An Avenue. Martial law, I thought. That’s what Zhao must have meant when he said, “It’s too late.”

  Last night, after Lao Xu left, Eddie and Dad had a long discussion about the martial law restriction on journalists. For one thing they had to decide whether or not they would continue to send reports about the demonstrations to Canada. That part was pretty short. Eddie said he wasn’t about to pass up what could be the biggest story of the decade and maybe the biggest story in China since Liberation in 1949. “It could even lead to a book,” he added.

  I knew what Dad’s decision would be. Don’t forget, this is the guy who held up thousands of cars on the Gardiner Expressway in rush hour so he could get the capture of some bank robbers on tape.

  “Besides,” Dad added, “I think these kids over here have been peaceful and sensible in this demonstration. No one has been hurt. All they seem to want is for the government to listen to them. We have an obligation to get their story out of the country. If that means breaking martial law, so what? After all, what can the government do to us? Send us home? If we don’t cover this we might as well be at home anyway.”

  So that was that. They talked longer about Lao Xu. Dad was worried that if they kept covering the story they’d put Lao Xu in a difficult position — the position of a Chinese helping foreigners to break Chinese law. Lao Xu could go to prison for that.

  Eddie nodded all the way through Dad’s speech, puffing on the stove. “Yep. I agree. But we should let Lao Xu decide what he wants to do.”

  This afternoon Eddie got a phone call telling him that the People’s Liberation Army had sent plain clothes men into the radio and TV stations and into the offices of all the newspapers published in Beijing. The PLA, in other words, had taken over the Beijing media. It began to look like Eddie was right about information control.

  The satellite feed to North America and Europe has been shut down by the government. TV pictures can’t be sent out of China directly.

  Dad was angry. His bright blue eyes snapped. “This means we’ll have to smuggle the tapes out,” he said with determination.

  Eddie wasn’t surprised. “After all,” he said, “the whole thing was set up for Gorbachev’s visit. There was an agreement to keep the feed open for a month, with possibility of renewal. So the Chinese government broke the agreement. What else is new?”

  Early this morning Lao Xu went with Dad and me to Tian An Men Square. It was a chilly morning with bright sunshine. Beijing may be under martial law but you’d never know it — except for the military helicopters that buzzed overhead. The students in the tent city were huddled under those long green padded coats that are common here. The square is still packed with people and there are still lots of buses scattered around with students sleeping in them. The students are well organized and seem to have enough food. Lots of the food is brought by local residents.

  The temporary latrines have not been replaced, so when the wind is right — or wrong — the square isn’t a very pleasant place to be. Signs and banners are everywhere. The atmosphere is calm, as if the demonstrators expect to be there a long time, as if everyone is waiting.

  I went to look for Hong first thing, but I guess I had been right about him. He was probably in the hospital.

  There seemed to be a lot of meetings going on. We eavesdropped on one. Lao Xu said that the students were discussing tactics. Some said they should obey the martial law ban on demonstrations, some said they should stay, some said they should seal off the square by barricading the streets leading to it. They all seemed to agree that eventually the soldiers will come.

  Lao Xu read some of the signs for us. Many of them name the universities represented — Beijing University, Qinghua University, People’s University, Beijing Normal University. Some of the signs said Down with Li Peng or Down with Deng Xiao-ping. He’s the guy Eddie says really runs the country but there have been lots of rumours that he’s sick and might die soon. Some of the signs had little pop bottles hanging from them. Dad asked Lao Xu what they were for.

  “Hey! I know!” I cut in. “Xiao ping means ‘little bottle’. It’s a play on Deng Xiao-ping’s name which really means ‘Little Peace’. Right, Lao Xu?”

  Lao Xu looked uncomfortable. “Yes. It’s very bad manners. All of these signs calling for down with this person and that are rude. And dangerous.”

  Dad wasn’t listening. He had the video camera up to his eye. It was pointed at the little bottles.

  Things are getting really intense. This morning the PLA tried to enter the city. Their objective, of course, was to clear the square because the demonstrations are a defiance of martial law. Well, guess what happened? Hundreds of thousands of citizens of Beijing poured out into the streets and blocked the roads! I mean, the roads just filled up with live standing bodies! Nothing could move. People surrounded the trucks and the columns of soldiers and stopped them in their tracks!

  I took a little tour on my bike — with the camcorder rigged up and running, naturally — heading west along Chang An, past Xi Dan Street market area where I bought my bike. I didn’t even get to the second Ring Road before I met so many people that I had to get off my bike and walk. What I saw was amazing. I saw soldiers sitting on benches in the back of an army truck, looking embarrassed while students standing on the hood of the truck lectured them through loud-hailers. Some students offered the soldiers food or bottles of pop. The soldiers refused them. When I got closer I could see citizens —women with net shopping bags full of vegetables over their arms, old men with those whispy beards — talking with the soldiers at the tailgate.

  One interesting thing was that the soldiers weren’t armed. I remembered what Lao Xu had told me about the PLA being a people’s army. The citizens and students I saw obviously thought so too. They were telling the soldiers to turn around and go away.

  And they did! Later in the afternoon the army pulled out of the centre of the city.

  As I pedalled along on my way back to the hotel I thought about what I’d seen. What kind of army, I thought, goes into combat — even crowd control — unarmed? What kind of officer allows his men to sit in the back of a truck like kindergarten kids on the way to the zoo while civilians lecture them and laugh at them? Could the Chinese army be that incompetent? Was this the army that beat the Guomindang, held off the UN in Korea, skirmished with the Russians along the northern border, and whacked the Vietnamese every so often?

  I passed a road sign with some characters and an arrow on it pointing down a side street. The arrow triggered thoughts about Zhu Ge-liang and the way he fooled both Cao Cao and Sun Quan. He did it by feigning one thing and doing another. Classic strategy, I thought. Then I remembered a famous quotation from Sun Zi’s The Art of War in the chapter on strategy. Make yourself appear to be weak in order to make the enemy proud and rash, he wrote. Even though you are capable, feign incompetence. The enemy would be put off guard. Were the PLA playing games with the people? And, in their eyes, were the people now the enemy?

  This afternoon while I was out in the streets Lao Xu was called away by h
is Party boss for a briefing. He returned to tell us that he has been warned not to aid us in any way if we are breaking martial law.

  “Well, that’s it, then,” said Eddie. “You have to stay away, Lao Xu. Because we aren’t quitting, and if you stay, you’ll be in trouble that you’ll never get out of.”

  Dad agreed, but Lao Xu said he’d like to stay and help us. He just won’t help us directly if we do anything illegal. Eddie argued with him but finally said the decision was Lao Xu’s and he would welcome his help if he wanted to stay.

  Lao Xu said he wanted to. Dad’s twinkling eyes caught mine. I knew what he was thinking. Was Lao Xu staying to help, or to keep an eye on us for the Party?

  I woke up before dawn. I had been tossing and turning, having bad dreams that I forgot as soon as I woke. I felt wrung out and low, like nothing good was going to happen that day and I might as well stay in bed.

  But I couldn’t. I couldn’t get back to sleep no matter how much I tried.

  So I got up and wandered into the office. The little red lights on the battery rechargers glared angrily at me like vicious insects. I turned on the light and the red eyes almost disappeared. I shut the door behind me so I wouldn’t disturb Dad and Eddie. They were both whacked. They had been working like madmen for the last while.

  I made some tea — there’s always a big thermos bottle or two full of boiled water in the office — and turned the light off again. The red insect eyes came back to life but I ignored them. I cleared a spot on the top of the desk Lao Xu uses and climbed up, sitting cross-legged with my knees almost touching Eddie’s plants, and looked out the window. The street below glowed with pools of amber light from the streetlights. Bikes drifted by. Joggers trundled along in the bike lanes. The odd taxi swooshed past. It was nice and peaceful and quiet.