The Forbidden Game

by Dan Washburn

  The outdoor kitchen was simple: a gas-powered wok, three large pots cooking on open flames and a long rectangular barbecue pit filled with burning coals. That, and a small cutting space, were all Wang and his family needed to produce a rather diverse offering of dishes. The most expensive was stir-fried pork with green vegetables – only fifteen yuan ($2.25) and well within the budgets of the golf course workers. Those who were saving money to send back to their families on the mainland opted for cheaper items – grilled chives on a stick (one yuan); grilled beef on a stick (1.5 yuan); grilled chicken wings on a stick (3.5 yuan); grilled squid on a stick (seven yuan); or boiled dumplings, fried rice noodles or stir-fried sea snails (each five yuan).

  Bottles of Anchor, Yanjing and Tsingtao beer sold for four to five yuan. There was also a considerable selection of harder alcohols – rice wine and huangjiu, or “yellow wine,” mostly – ranging from four to sixteen yuan, and you could get a pack of Lotus cigarettes for 2.2 yuan. For those craving something a little bit healthier, Wang kept a pile of young coconuts next to the TV, the water from which he’d serve up for two yuan.

  The games Wang had installed proved to be a good investment. The mah-jongg table, tucked off in a side room of the shop, was twenty yuan for a morning or afternoon of play. Mission Hills security guards came early each day to take their places at the table. The pool tables, which ran three yuan an hour, attracted a different sort; young men with spiky hair and blue jeans who arrived on motorbikes. There were plenty of ways to while away the hours at Wang’s restaurant, and many customers did. Sitting at one of Wang’s tables in the dark, you could look across the road and see lights from the Mission Hills dump trucks and cement trucks working into the night.

  These were long days for Wang and his family, too. But as the orders raced in, as the hours drew later and later, they were always smiling and laughing. They seemed happy. Could that be? “No, we are not happy at all,” Wang’s wife said with a chuckle. “But just because we are tired doesn’t mean we can’t laugh. We are too busy for any rest, but we can still laugh. We tell jokes to each other.”

  It was 2 a.m. on a Wednesday and Wang looked exhausted. He was sprawled out across two pink plastic chairs, his arms resting across his stomach, his legs up in the air. It was monsoon season, and the rain sounded like a hundred hammers banging on the steel roof. “This job is tough,” he said. “The money is better than before, but all at the expense of our health and time.”

  Wang’s wife nodded her head. “He started to lose weight the moment we opened the restaurant. He was a little bit fat when driving his truck. Now, he can’t have regular meals.”

  Regardless, Wang’s brother-in-law knew this was better than the life he’d had before. “One thing we are happy about is that we get to work together. If I was working as a bricklayer, I’d be alone and unhappy.”

  Later that morning, Wang was out on the patio, preparing for the day’s trip to the wet market. He took a look at the pile of beer bottles to see how much it had grown and thought to himself, Not bad. Then he turned his attention to the commotion in the clearing on the other side of the cement road. Mission Hills workers were using an excavator and a tall hydraulic crane to plant a long line of fully-grown palm trees. Wang had never seen anything quite like it.

  “There were already trees there before they bulldozed the land,” he said, shaking his head. “They were old and tall. Some were probably hundreds of years old. Now they are planting new ones that look old?”

  He shook his head again and got back to work. He had another long day ahead of him.

  *

  There was still one section of Wang’s land yet to be developed. It was a small but lush gully between his brother’s property and his own. Wang wanted to fill it in and build on it. For what, he hadn’t figured out yet. “I will build it first, and then decide,” he said. “I can rent it to others who want to do business.”

  He sounded like one of the big bosses over on the construction site. But becoming “Boss Wang” wasn’t part of his plans. “I am just a self-made man,” he said.

  Still, he was concerned whether everything he had worked so hard to build might be taken away at any moment. What if Mission Hills decided they wanted to expand? If he had learned anything over the past few years, it was that nothing could be guaranteed, that what you thought was rightfully yours could be taken away with very little warning.

  “If they want to rent our land by force, we have no way out,” Wang’s wife admitted. “That land over there” – she pointed to acreage that Wang Puhua and other Meiqiu villagers were contesting, on the other side of the cement road – “was bulldozed without compensation or measuring. Instead, they built a road to the course on that land. They said that it was owned by the public, and that they could take it at any time.”

  There used to be more butterflies in Meiqiu. Not long ago you could see them nearly anywhere in the village. They seemed especially fond of a clearing near a small temple not far from where Wang Libo built his restaurant. Until recently, trees surrounded the temple and its garden, and the butterflies would flutter around and drink the nectar from the thousands of wild flowers that dotted the yard.

  “The butterflies are becoming fewer and fewer,” Wang’s wife said. “In the past, we had more trees. When they bulldozed the trees, many of the butterflies went away.”

  The temple, like so much of Meiqiu, was now neighbor with the massive Mission Hills golf complex. Where there were once trees on one side of the garden, there was now a short wall and a wide-open view of overturned earth, new roads and freshly planted palm trees. The tall white employee dormitories loomed on the horizon. Not far from the temple, there was an old stone tablet, etched with the names of villagers who had passed away – the character for “Wang” is everywhere. An archway of lava rock sheltered the tablet, but it had once been protected by so much more: trees, shrubs and isolation. Now it was right out in the open, just a few feet from a new thoroughfare leading to one of the biggest developments in modern China, a small monument to the old way of life and a stark reminder that, in this new China, everything and everyone must be prepared to adapt and change, whether they want to or not.

  In the years since Mission Hills had broken ground in Hainan, Wang had been inside the compound many times. When he worked as a san lun che driver, he’d often taxi workers in and out of the site. Security guards came to know him and allowed him to pass freely. Occasionally Wang would forget he was now driving on private land. To him, it still felt like home.

  Now that Mission Hills was open to the public, there was no way a villager on a san lun che would make it past the gate. Thankfully, Wang’s cousin, Wang Liguo, the local government official, had an official pass to get through security, and he was more than happy to flaunt it. He had stuck it to his dashboard, for everyone to see. Beneath a large Mission Hills logo, it read, “Yangshan District Land Consolidation and Ecological Restoration Project.”

  Life had been good to Wang Liguo since Mission Hills had arrived. He wore a diamond ring on his pinkie finger. He’d opened a restaurant in Yongxing, and he was building a hotel along the cement road. He’d given his BYD car to a younger brother and bought a new Honda Civic for himself. That was the car with his official pass, the one he drove when he gave his cousin Wang Libo a tour of the grounds around the Mission Hills clubhouse.

  They took the road right around the corner from Wang’s restaurant, and they didn’t have to drive far to realize they were no longer in Meiqiu. As soon as they passed through the gates, it was obvious they had left the randomness of nature behind them. There were trees and shrubs and even lava rock walls intended to keep the local flavor, but everything had its own place; everything appeared planned and polished. Off to the left was a collection of cookie-cutter mansions, the garages for which probably cost more than Wang Libo’s entire new home. It was amazing what a difference a two-minute drive made.

  “Many stars will come here. I don’t know their names,” Wang Liguo
said, referring to the upcoming celebrity tournament, the Mission Hills Star Trophy.

  His cousin knew the names, as did many of the people on the other side of the gates, in Meiqiu. “Jet Li, the kung fu star, will come,” Wang Libo said. “And Eric Tsang, the Hong Kong comedian, will come, too. Many people in the village know this.”

  To discover the rest of the names, all they had to do was read the banners attached to the light posts lining the road. Wang Libo didn’t recognize many of the faces, a sign that he perhaps wasn’t the target audience. In typical Mission Hills fashion, the first public event at their new resort was destined to be the biggest celebrity golf event ever held in China. Dozens of famous faces greeted visitors as they approached the clubhouse. There were professional golfers, such as Greg Norman, Nick Faldo, Colin Montgomerie, Lorena Ochoa, Annika Sörenstam, Se Ri Pak and Zhang Lianwei. And there were celebrities, like Catherine Zeta-Jones, Michael Phelps, Hugh Grant, Matthew McConaughey, Christian Slater, Li Ning and Sammo Hung. Another banner appeared regularly along the road. It was red and let people know they were arriving at “The World’s Golf Club.”

  “Mission Hills has given me tickets to see the Star Trophy,” Wang Liguo noted proudly. “I have been to Shenzhen to learn to play golf. I went there twice and I played golf. I have also been to Beijing and Shanghai to play golf. Project 791 has asked me several times to return to Mission Hills in Shenzhen, but I refused. Because soon I’ll be able to play near my house.”

  The Blackstone Course, on which the celebrities would soon be playing, was stunning. With its irregular lines and eroded sand traps, it managed to appear rugged and natural, even though there was very little natural about it. Incorporated into the design were old, overgrown lava rock walls and archways left over from the land’s previous occupants, along with some mature lychee, ficus and acacia trees that managed to elude the clear-cutter. The result was a landscape that seemed as though it had occupied the earth for decades, maybe centuries – not months. A drive along the cart path made of crushed lava rock gave the impression of a Jurassic-era safari – that is, until the massive hotel and clubhouse came into view. Fashioned in a “Mediterranean Revival” style, white with red and black tile roofs, they were unlike anything else in Haikou.

  Wang Libo didn’t say much as he walked through the lobby of the Mission Hills luxury hotel. It was a lot for him to take in. The decor was immaculate, everything shiny and new. There was plush furniture, marble floors and art hanging on the walls. He’d never seen anything quite like it before. He followed his cousin out to the big balcony, which looked out onto a swimming pool the size of a football field. The pool was surrounded by dozens of red-and-white umbrellas and lounge chairs, and for each one there were two palm trees. Behind it all were two towering man-made volcanoes. Kitschy nods to the region’s actual volcanoes, the two mounds looked like giant primary-school science projects, poised to spew vinegar-and-baking-soda “lava” at any moment. Mission Hills was trying hard to impress. And largely, it succeeded.

  Wang Libo stood at the railing and stared at the scene in silence. “There used to be a mountain here,” he said. “I think this looks better.”

  On the drive back to the village, Wang Liguo explained why he thought the Mission Hills development was good for the area. “If the lands are not rented out, the farmers have very little chance to make money,” he said. “Even if they grow lots of fruit trees in their fields, they’ll never make enough money for a new house. Building materials are much more expensive than before, but the fruit still costs the same as years before. The 791 project gives us land compensation with which we can start our own businesses; also they can provide us with jobs. People may lose land in the short term, and their quality of life may not immediately improve. But their children will have better opportunities.”

  Back in the village, Wang Libo took a seat underneath the phoenix tree where he and the rest of the village had first heard about “land compensation,” Project 791 and Mission Hills – before anyone had ever questioned whether he was a true Meiqiu villager or not. The setting was undeniably different from the five-star resort he had just returned from. The old volleyball court was full of weeds, its net sagging sadly in the middle. The stone top to the Chinese chess table was broken in half and lying on the ground. It all put Wang Libo into a reflective mood.

  “Quality of life is getting better and better,” he said. “More and more people are building new houses. But the thing is, more and more traditions that were once available under this phoenix tree are disappearing. We always played volleyball or chess or talked about the news right here. Today, all of our attention is focused on how to make money. Interaction between villagers is not that close anymore. I doubt this will get any better in the future. Look around. Nobody takes care of this infrastructure.”

  Wang thought about what the village might look like in ten years’ time. “More buildings probably,” he mused. “I had thought that the volleyball matches would continue no matter what development came here. I never thought things like chess or even just nighttime chatting between villagers would disappear so quickly. And I think in the near future all of the old stone houses will be replaced.

  “Times are changing. You see it in other villages, too. Some have more new houses than we do. If we don’t build more cement houses, my sons will have difficulty finding girls to marry them. People now are very materialistic, right?”

  But Wang couldn’t reflect for long. It was time to get back to work. He had two businesses to run.

  ‌13

  ‌Chasing the Next Dream

  “I still think about the fourteenth and sixteenth holes.”

  Zhou Xunshu was sitting in the dining room of his Chongqing apartment, five months after his gut-wrenching one-stroke loss at the Handa Fraternity Cup.

  “I won’t forget it for the rest of my life,” Zhou said. “It’s not about the difference in prize money for first and second place. What really matters is the honor. If I won the tournament, I think my future as a coach would be more brilliant.

  “It’s such a pity that I didn’t win.”

  But, over the past several months, Zhou had come to learn that even coming in second had its privileges. First, his top-three finish meant that, in the eyes of the China Golf Association, he was no longer a second-class citizen. Now, he was not just a “professional coach,” he was a “professional golfer.” It was a distinction lost on 99.9 percent of the Chinese population, but it was an important one to Zhou. It meant he had reached the highest classification possible in his chosen profession.

  He was a success. And he was no longer unemployed, as had been the case a year before.

  “I never see him resting for one single day,” Liu Yan said. “He has such a big family to support.”

  In fact, Zhou now had two jobs. He was still coaching at Seasons International in Chengdu, earning his eight thousand yuan per month from the club. But these days he was only making the long trip from Chongqing a couple times each month, cramming in as many clients as possible one weekend at a time. Back at home in Chongqing, he had picked up a job as a part-time sales executive for a local golf cart manufacturer. That brought in another three thousand yuan a month, plus a commission for each sale – that is, if he ever managed to make a sale.

  “I can’t sell anything,” Zhou confessed. “They hired me because I am a golfer, and I know people at the management level from different courses. But I don’t really like making small talk with people. And I don’t like bargaining.”

  Liu Yan agreed. “In my mind he is inadequate for sales work,” she said, before adding with a giggle, “He is good at physical labor – like carrying heavy things.”

  “They call me every day wanting me to stay in the office,” Zhou said. “I am thinking about quitting.”

  Not long ago, Zhou would’ve taken just about any job he could find. Now, it seemed, he could afford to pick and choose. After his second-place finish in Beijing, a longtime student – a wealthy alum
inum dealer – had convinced the head of Chongqing’s first regulation golf course, Sun Kingdom, to sponsor Zhou. He was the best golfer in a city of thirty million, and people were finally starting to pay attention.

  It was the kind of arrangement Zhou had dreamed about for years. Sun Kingdom, which had opened back in 2005, was paying him six thousand yuan plus all expenses, just to show up for a tournament. If he met certain performance goals, there were bonuses, too. Zhou was given free rein to use Sun Kingdom’s facilities for practice, as well. He could play a round whenever he wanted, free of charge. No questions asked. All he had to do in exchange was wear the Sun Kingdom logo while he played in public.

  “Look around,” Zhou said, during a cart ride around the club grounds. “This golf course is so in accordance with nature. Basically, this course hardly occupies any arable land. On wasteland like this, the farmers couldn’t grow anything. So building a golf course is the best choice.”

  Sun Kingdom had been built on the site of a very poor village, Zhou said, so poor that “some of the male villagers couldn’t even find girls to marry, because of their poverty.” The villagers in the area had been relocated to brand-new apartments, and many were now working for the golf course, he believed. Others had received compensation and opened “small-scale” businesses.

  It all sounded very good to Zhou. “I welcome developers to go to my hometown and build a golf course.” Finally, with Sun Kingdom’s backing, Zhou could focus entirely on his game. He didn’t have to worry about whether he could afford the airfare or the hotel or his meals. He didn’t have to worry if he’d break even at the end of a tournament. It was all taken care of, and a huge weight had been lifted from his broad shoulders. But even with that support, Zhou didn’t come close to repeating his performance at the Handa Fraternity Cup for the rest of the season. He placed in the top twenty-five a few times, finishing as high as eleventh at one event. But the magic largely eluded him.