by Ma Jian
‘Thank you, Meili,’ Tang exclaims. ‘What a feast!’ He fell in love with her as soon as he heard her sing at the funeral, and now that she’s working for his family, he’s continually finding excuses to spend time with her or give her a small tip. When Hong has her afternoon naps, he teaches her to type and guides her through the internet, helping her explore her areas of interest. Meili likes to watch clips of fashion shows and pop concerts. The first time she saw a Madonna video, she abandoned her dreams of becoming a singer for good. ‘What a star!’ she sighed, gazing at her cavort around the stage in a golden bodice. Every morning, Tang puts on a surgical face mask and goes jogging around the lake. He told Meili that in England, he used to jog every day in the forest near his university campus. When he gets back, Meili gives him a bowl of fish slice congee, a bread roll or a custard tart. He’s not fussy about what he eats.
Meili appreciates the kindness he shows her, especially when his mother or Jun scold her for not cleaning the bottles properly or for overcooking the rice. On those occasions, Tang will always look up from his computer, ask Meili to pour him another cup of tea, then whisper in her ear that his mother has a mouth as sharp as a knife but a heart as soft as tofu. His words reassure her, but she doesn’t want him to grow too fond of her. She’s afraid of men, and of losing control. But when she hears him sitting at his desk talking to female friends on the phone, she feels sad, and wonders if she’d feel the same if she heard Kongzi speak to other women in a similar tone.
After clearing away the dinner and washing the dishes, Meili goes to the second floor to say goodbye to Tang. He points at his computer screen and says, ‘Look, this student has written an article about pollution in Heaven Township: “Using 19th-Century Techniques to Dismantle 21st-Century Waste”. See here, it says: “Migrants toil like bedraggled alchemists in family workshops, washing circuit boards in sulphuric acid to salvage tiny granules of gold.” And look at this picture: “Female workers strip plastic casings from electric cables with their bare hands, their only tools a fold-up table and a rusty nail . . .”’
‘That woman there . . .’ Meili gasps, ‘it’s me!’
‘My God, you’re right! I recognise that flowery shirt. Let me enlarge the photo. Yes, no question about it. It’s you!’
‘My face is filthy. How embarrassing! Close it at once!’ Meili puts her hands over the screen. ‘Must have been that student from Guangzhou University who came to our workshop last year. He walked straight in, squatted down beside me and started snapping away without asking my permission.’
‘I’m going to download the photo. How amazing! My little village songstress has entered the world wide web . . . Look at this article I found on a British website. It says: “The Emma Maersk, the largest container ship in the world, sailed from China to the United Kingdom to deliver 45,000 tonnes of Chinese-manufactured Christmas toys, then returned to southern China a few weeks later loaded with UK electronic waste . . . Heaven Township is now the largest e-waste dump in the world. As much as 70% of the world’s toxic e-waste is shipped to this area of southern China, where it is processed in makeshift workshops by migrant labourers who are paid just $1.50 a day . . .”’
‘Will everyone in the world be able to see that photograph of me?’
‘Yes, once it’s online it can’t be removed. This is the age of the internet.’
‘So, if I sang on the computer, the whole world would be able to hear me?’
‘Yes, you can upload anything you want onto the net . . . Look – this is the most important part: “88% of Heaven residents suffer from skin, respiratory, neurological or digestive diseases. Levels of lead poisoning and leukaemia among children are six times higher than the national average. In just ten years, Heaven Township, once a collection of sleepy rice villages, has become a digital-waste hell, a toxic graveyard of the world’s electronic refuse. The air is thick with dioxin-laden ash; the soil saturated with lead, mercury and tin; the rivers and groundwater are so polluted that drinking water has to be trucked in from neighbouring counties . . .”’ Tang peeps over his glasses to check Meili’s reaction.
‘I’d hate to contract a skin disease,’ she says. ‘If you know computers are so dangerous, why do you sit in front of one all day?’
‘They’re only dangerous when you take them apart . . . Look here: “High levels of infertility have been detected among women who have resided in Heaven Township for over three years.”’
‘Lucky them! No illness can match the pain of childbirth.’
‘Meili, you’re not pregnant, are you?’ Tang asks tentatively. ‘Forgive me for asking.’
‘Are you saying I look fat?’ Meili has become accustomed to this question over the last two and a half years.
‘No, no – not fat. It’s just that your belly looks a little bloated, that’s all. I was worried you might have developed a tumour, or something, from working with all that toxic waste.’
‘You’re right, I probably have cancer of the womb. I should rip my uterus out and give it back to the state.’ She turns to leave, but Tang grabs her hand and pulls her back.
‘I don’t think you look fat,’ he says. ‘I promise you. I’m just . . . so fond of you, that’s all. I can’t help saying what’s on my mind.’
‘I’d better rinse the bottles again before I go,’ Meili says, trying to pull her hand free. He often attempts to plant a kiss on her cheek before she leaves, telling her that this is what foreigners do, but she always backs away. She strokes her belly and says to herself, Yes – little Heaven is a tumour growing in my flesh. If anyone asks me if I’m pregnant, I’ll tell them I have a tumour. I have the right to have one, and I have the right to be too poor to have it removed . . .
‘How long have you been married?’ he asks, still clutching her hand.
‘Ten years,’ she says, her cheeks reddening. ‘We had the wedding in the village, then honeymooned in Beijing,’ she blurts, wanting him to know that she’s visited the capital. Since Kongzi was arrested for gambling, she no longer feels proud to be his wife. And since she returned to him after her escape from the brothel, she has felt that the old Meili died somewhere out on the road. She wants to be a strong, adventurous woman who doesn’t rely on a man for her happiness. She is comfortable treating Tang as a friend or a younger brother, but if he asked to be her lover or husband, she’d cut all ties with him. As Suya wrote in her red journal, ‘Love is the beginning of all pain.’
‘So, what did you think of Beijing?’ Tang asks, stroking the desk now that Meili has tugged her hand free.
‘The Forbidden Palace was so huge it terrified me – only emperors would dare live in such a place . . .’ Meili says, then dries up. She isn’t used to being asked her opinions. ‘I went into a supermarket to buy a drink. There was a mountain of lemonade bottles on display but when I tried to pay for one the checkout girl said no one could buy any until Workers’ Day . . .’
‘Look at these photographs I took in England. This is my lecture hall. This is the university garden when it snowed.’
‘Was one of those your girlfriend?’ Meili asks nervously, standing behind his chair.
‘She’s Spanish – a great dancer! And the other girl’s from France. I travelled to Switzerland with them.’
‘Huh – I don’t want to hear about that,’ Meili says disapprovingly. The photograph shows Tang sitting between two foreign girls, his arms around their shoulders and a big grin on his face. On the table in front of them are glasses of wine and a large birthday cake.
‘This is a protest march in Paris . . . St Peter’s Square in Rome.’
‘Let me see if any of the countries you visited have population-control policies,’ Meili says, leaning over to type a few keywords into the search box.
‘I know that England certainly doesn’t. Pregnant women are treated with respect there. They have specially allocated seats on buses and trains, and can give birth in hospital free of charge. The government even pays parents a weekly allowance to cove
r the cost of milk powder and nappies.’
‘You’re lying to me! How could such a wonderful place exist?’
‘I’m not lying. Lots of pregnant women smuggle themselves out of China to give birth in Europe or Hong Kong. If you plan to have another baby, you should do the same. Now that China has entered the WTO, foreign countries are much more welcoming to Chinese visitors.’
‘You’ll have to teach me English first,’ says Meili, then remembering how Suya said men should be used but not loved, she kneels down and looks up at him with a smile. ‘You mustn’t say I’m stupid, though. I only went to school for three years.’
Tang puts his arm around her. ‘You’re not stupid. You’re just pure and wholesome and . . . Listen, I wanted to ask you: will you let me take you out for dinner at the China Pavilion Restaurant tomorrow evening?’
‘What for? No, no . . .’
‘It’s your birthday. Have you forgotten?’ He strokes her hair and looks lovingly into her eyes. ‘You must have more belief in yourself and value your talents. In England, the first thing our professor told us was that we should find the confidence to surpass him . . .’
‘Are you still here, Meili?’ Jun calls out from the landing. ‘Then you can change Hong’s nappy before you leave.’
Tang pulls a face and whispers: ‘Better do as she asks.’ When his buck teeth show, he reminds her of the pet rabbit she had as a child.
It’s dark outside now. The fluorescent strip on the sitting-room ceiling and the blue light from the mute television in the corner make the room feel cold and stiff. The infant spirit sees Mother change the nappy of the screaming baby, put it to sleep in a cot, and move downstairs. On the ground floor, workers are dismantling and smelting. The smell of burnt Bakelite follows Mother out into the garden that is fenced with corrugated iron and barbed wire. She opens the steel security gate and closes it behind her. In a shop window at the end of the dark street she sees a seascape painting framed in bright strip lights above a bowl of pink plastic tulips. Smiling down at her belly, she whispers, Still don’t want to come out? Well, he’s noticed you, little tumour. Look at those nice jeans in the window. If it weren’t for you, I could fit into them . . . Mother puts one hand on her hip and throws the other in the air, mimicking the pose of the mannequin in the window . . . Back in the house, Father is filling out forms while Nannan is writing essays in exercise books, wearing a blue dress with a panda badge pinned to the front. ‘Did you know you can explore the whole world on the internet?’ Mother says as she walks in. ‘We must buy a computer. They’re so much more interesting than televisions.’
‘You can barely read – what use would a computer be to you?’ Father says. ‘Just stick to dismantling them.’
‘I can type words using Roman script. Once I learn all twenty-six letters, I’ll be able to go online by myself and travel the world. We’ll be able to send our relatives electronic messages and photographs which they’ll receive in seconds. I dismantled computers for two years, but I’ve only just understood what they’re used for . . .’ Mother sees Father smear green tea and ink over the exercise books Nannan has written in, and sandpaper the corners of the forms. The floor is strewn with pencils and balls of cotton wool. ‘What’s going on here?’ she asks.
‘Inspectors are visiting Red Flag Primary next week. We have two hundred pupils, but to get a larger government subsidy we need to tell them we have two hundred and fifty. So I’m having to fabricate fifty students. Help me fill some exercise books. If they’re all in Nannan’s handwriting, it’ll look suspicious.’
‘I’ve finished twelve literacy homework books,’ Nannan says. ‘Daddy said he’d buy me some candyfloss as a reward.’
‘You can do Year 3 homework, Nannan?’ Mother says. ‘Clever girl!’
‘She knows more characters than you do now, and she can write out each of the three hundred Tang poems from memory. She will be a worthy descendant of Confucius!’
‘Daddy, Confucius was an evil man. I wish we didn’t share his surname.’
‘Who told you he was evil?’ Father says. ‘Confucius was a great sage. You should feel proud to have him as an ancestor.’
‘If he was so great, why don’t they mention him in our textbooks? Lulu keeps singing “Down with Kong the Second Son!” but I pretend not to hear her.’
‘I assure you, Nannan: Confucius was a great philosopher and teacher. He taught us to respect learning, honour our parents and care for our young, and lead a virtuous life, even in times of turmoil. He said that people should obey their leaders, but only so long as their leaders rule with compassion. For two thousand years, his words formed the bedrock of Chinese culture. The Communist Party may have cursed him, vilified him, dug up his grave, but his ideas live on. You’re almost nine years old now, Nannan. You must study hard and build up the knowledge that will help you carve a path through this difficult world. Tell me how that saying goes?’ Father puts down the forged exercise book he’s holding and stares into Nannan’s eyes.
‘“Children who don’t read books, don’t know the treasures they contain. If they knew . . .” blah, blah, blah.’
‘That’s right. But listen to me, Nannan. The tide is changing. Confucius’s name is being mentioned in the newspapers. One day he’ll be rehabilitated, and those evil cadres who spat on his corpse thirty years ago will light incense sticks in his temple and beg forgiveness.’
‘Don’t talk to your classmates about any of this, Nannan,’ Mother says. ‘Your school may not teach you about Confucius, but it will teach you Tang poetry, so I’m sure you’ll rise to the top of the class. Remember: learning is a joy, not a burden.’ Mother turns on the electric fan and takes off her dress. ‘Kongzi, I want to open my own shop. I only need twenty thousand yuan to get started.’
‘I’m too busy to talk about that now,’ Father says. ‘Fill up this homework book for me. Use your left hand. No, come to think of it, you write like a child with your right hand so just stick to that.’
‘I want to open a baby shop that sells milk powder, toys, cots,’ Mother says dreamily. ‘When mothers see me stand at the counter with my pregnant bulge, they’ll come flocking in. Or I could sell refurbished computers. This town has mountains of scrap components but no one’s thought of reassembling them to make functioning machines. I’m sure we could earn more money assembling computers than these workshops do taking them apart. We could sell them to people in the countryside. The market for cheap second-hand computers there must be enormous.’
Nannan completes an exercise book then starts writing on the first page of another, her long hair dangling over the desk.
Meili walks barefoot over the white vinyl mat. A large black spider crawls behind her. Kongzi has become very close to Nannan, she says to herself. Perhaps by the time the baby’s born, he’ll come round to the idea of having another daughter and everything will be fine. I’ll find a nanny for little Heaven, set up my own business, then return to Nuwa County and open a chain of second-hand computer shops.
Three hours later, Kongzi is still crouched on the floor, scribbling in the exercise books. Meili has nodded off on the chair, her ink-stained hands resting on her belly. In her dream she sees her future self galloping up a hill, her hair and the grass blowing in the wind. When she reaches the top she takes flight. From a heap of computers below the infant spirit shouts out to her, ‘Keep flying, keep flying. You’re crossing the border. If the soldiers see you, they’ll gun you down . . .’
KEYWORDS: clam dance, zero protein, sticky rice, banana tree, steel tower, rainbow.
WHEN MEILI OPENS the door in the morning, she has to drag the children’s bicycles and baby-walkers onto the pavement before she can make her way to the counter. This shop may be small and cramped, but it has given her a foothold in society. With a look of calm contentment, she plugs her mobile phone into the charger and gazes out of the window. The shop belongs to Tang’s family. She pays them two hundred yuan a month in rent, and buys the stock herself. In her
spare moments, she surfs the internet on the computer Tang has lent her. He’s taught her to breach the firewall and access the BBC Chinese-language website, so she now knows that Chinese illegal immigrants in America can earn more in one year than their families back home earn in a lifetime. She has also researched the local component trade and worked out the cost of reassembling a computer. Tang has told her she has a good business brain.
It was Hong’s first birthday yesterday. Meili phones Tang and asks how the party went. She was sacked from her job as nanny because while she was changing Hong’s nappy on the ironing board, Hong burned her hand on a hot iron. Jun was furious, and banned Meili from ever setting foot in the house again. Meili still feels terrible about the accident. A couple of days ago, she chose the most expensive baby-walker from her shop and asked Tang to give it to Hong for her birthday.
‘Your present’s a great success!’ Tang tells her down the phone. ‘Hong’s walking around the sitting room with it. She loves the music and flashing lights.’
‘Make sure she doesn’t push it anywhere near the stairs. And remind Jun to tidy all the electric cables away. At twelve months, babies start chewing everything in sight.’
‘No chance of Hong doing that. She has a dummy stuffed in her mouth all day.’
‘Really? I may sell dummies in the shop, but don’t let Hong use one – they make babies’ teeth stick out.’ Meili bites her lip, afraid that the buck-toothed Tang might have taken offence.
‘I need to answer some emails,’ Tang says. ‘I’ll pop by at lunchtime.’
‘To collect the rent? But it’s not due until Monday . . . Well, if you’re coming, you can fix the electricity meter for me – it keeps tripping. Fine. See you later.’ Meili puts the phone down and goes online. Last month she searched the name Wang Suya, and it produced 4 million results. Adding the keyword ‘university’ returned 6,500 results. Remembering that Suya studied English and was from Chengdu, she narrowed the results down to twelve and managed to send each of these Wang Suyas a letter. Although she still hasn’t found the Suya she’s looking for, she has struck up online friendships with two of the Suyas who replied. She’s also visited chat rooms where other women like her lament the babies they’ve lost through forced abortions. The babies’ ghosts haunt the conversations, making the website feel like a graveyard. The women are planning to set up a virtual memorial garden to give the aborted fetuses a safe resting place. Meili has learned that 13 million abortions are performed in China each year, an average of 35,000 per day.