by Yangsze Choo
The seventh day of the seventh month was a festival to celebrate two heavenly lovers—the cowherd and the weaving maid. Amah told me this tale when I was small. A long time ago, there was a cowherd with nothing but an old ox to keep him company. One day, the ox suddenly spoke and told him that he might win himself a wife if he hid beside a pool and waited for the heavenly weaving maidens. As they bathed, the cowherd hid one set of clothes and when one of the maidens was left behind searching for her garments, he accosted her and asked her to be his wife. Eventually, the magic ox died. At this point, I always burst in with questions. Amah would brush aside my protests, continuing her well-worn tale. She was a pedantic storyteller who repeated her stories in exactly the same words each time.
When the magic ox died, it told the cowherd to keep its skin for a time of great need. And soon enough, the Queen of Heaven was angered that one of her best weavers had married a mortal and commanded that she be brought back to heaven. In despair, the cowherd followed his wife on the magic ox skin, bearing their two children in baskets at the end of a pole. To prevent him from catching up, the Queen of Heaven took her hairpin and drew a river, the Milky Way, between them in the heavens. On one day each year, however, the magpies of the earth took pity on the lovers and made a bridge so they could cross to see each other. This was the conjunction of the two stars Altair and Vega on the seventh day of the seventh month.
When Amah told me this story, I couldn’t understand why such a tragedy was considered a festival for lovers. There was no happy ending, only endless waiting on each side of a river. It seemed like a miserable way to spend eternity. Instead, I was most interested in the ox. How did the ox know that the heavenly maidens were coming? Why could it speak? And most of all, why did the ox have to die? Amah never gave me very satisfactory answers to these questions. “The point of the story is the lovers, you silly child,” she said, and, indeed, the festival was particularly suited for young girls who took part in competitions to thread a needle by moonlight, bathed their faces with flower water, and sang songs to celebrate needlework. I had never had a chance to take part in these maidenly activities, however, because the other thing that was celebrated on the Double Seventh Festival was the sunning of the books.
The seventh day of the seventh month was also considered a particularly fortuitous time to air old books and scrolls; and as my father had vast quantities of both, this was our major activity during the festival. Tables were placed in the courtyard and his collection was laid out in the sun, papers turned to ensure even drying. A careful watch must be kept to ensure the ink would not fade. I still remembered the smooth, hot feeling of the paper beneath my palms, and the brilliance of the colors intensified by the sun. Our climate was hot and damp, an adverse environment for libraries. Many times I would find that silverfish or bookworms had begun to consume the paper, and I would be set to tracing the wormholes to get rid of the pests. That was why my memories of the Double Seventh Festival were inextricably linked to the smell of moldy paper. This year would be different, though. I suspected that the Lims would celebrate in a far grander fashion.
The performance was in the afternoon, to be followed by a dinner afterward. I spent the morning laying out what few pieces of good jewelry I had. Amah pressed the new dress with a heavy charcoal iron until it was smooth and crisp. I rarely wore a kebaya, but I wished I did so more often because it was very flattering. The baju, or shirt, was fitted at the waist and made of sheer white cotton with cutwork embroidery down the front and edges. The front of the baju was fastened with three gold brooches shaped like flowers and attached to one another by fine gold chains, while the ankle-length sarong was made of fine batik in a curling pattern of green leaves and pink and yellow flowers. When I had bathed and dressed, and Amah put my hair up, I barely recognized myself. But as I gazed at my reflection, it seemed as though there was someone in the corner of the room watching me. Glancing round, I saw nothing out of the ordinary. Yet in the mirror I had the distinct impression of a figure standing near the large wardrobe. Uneasily, I continued to stare into its depths. Amah came in as I was doing so and caught my anxious looks.
“Why so sour? No one will marry you if you pull a face like that!”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that I thought I had seen someone in the mirror so I put on a smile, although my pleasure in my appearance was quite dampened after that.
At the entrance hall of the Lim mansion, I had my first glimpse of the master of the house. Lim Teck Kiong was short and inclined to a certain porky affluence, but he had an imposing personality. He greeted my father warmly and studied me with interest.
“So this is your daughter!” he said. “Where have you been hiding her?”
My father smiled and murmured something noncommittal, glancing around the reception room with an air of familiarity. He must have been here many times before while my mother was alive, I realized.
I didn’t have much time to observe however before I was sent off for refreshment with the ladies. In accordance with Islam, the upper-class Malays kept their ladies in purdah and no men other than immediate family members were allowed to glimpse them unveiled. The local Chinese did not observe such strict segregation of the sexes, though too much intimacy between young people was discouraged.
The house was full of people. Children ran underfoot with an air of excitement, reminding me of my own childhood, when my cousins and I had raced around the courtyards of our house. But my cousins had long gone to Penang, together with my two aunts when their husbands had relocated. I had only sporadic letters from them, especially since three of them had already married. Servants passed swiftly bearing trays. I looked around to see whether I recognized any of them, but the one I sought wasn’t there. A stage had been set up in the main courtyard. “I heard a famous opera singer will give a private performance today,” one young matron told me. She had a face like a floured dumpling, but it bore a kind expression. I had been introduced to her before but could not remember her name.
“You’re Pan Li Lan, aren’t you?” she said. “I’m Yan Hong, the eldest daughter of the house.” As I stammered my apologies for forgetting her name, she smiled. “Now that I’m married I don’t live here anymore, but I come back from time to time to help out and show off the grandchildren.”
“How many children do you have?” I asked.
“Three,” she said, rubbing the small of her back. “My eldest is already seven, but the younger two are barely walking.”
Just then Madam Lim passed us. “The performance won’t start for a little while,” she said. “Why don’t you get some refreshments?” She still looked ill to me, although she had applied a little rouge to her sallow complexion.
“Is your mother all right?” I asked Yan Hong.
Yan Hong laughed. “She’s not my mother. My mother was the Second Wife.”
“It’s hard for me to get used to a household with so many people.”
“Your father has only one wife?” she asked.
“Yes, he never remarried.”
“You’re lucky.”
I supposed it would have been strange to have a stepmother or two. But then Yan Hong didn’t know my father and how the god of smallpox had stripped him of almost everything he had. “My father lost interest in life after my mother died,” I said. “We’d never have as many people over as this.”
Yan Hong grimaced. “It’s a good show, isn’t it? But I’d never want to be a second wife. If my husband thou
ght about remarrying, I would leave him.”
“Would you?” Silently I wondered at her confidence. But then she was from a rich and powerful family. Presumably that gave her a certain amount of clout with her husband.
“Ah, I’m frightening you. Marriage isn’t so bad, and my husband is a good man. If you can believe it, I was madly in love with him.” She laughed. “They didn’t want me to marry him because he was too poor, but I knew he was clever. He got a scholarship from his Clan Association and went to Hong Kong to study with my cousin.”
I looked at her with new interest. I knew that some of the sons of rich men went abroad to Hong Kong and even England to study, and came back as doctors or lawyers. Had I been a boy, I would have liked to do so too, and I said as much to her.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said. “The voyage can be dangerous because of the typhoons. And once you’re there life can be difficult.” She looked as though she was about to say something further, but pressed her lips together. I had heard about the unrest in Hong Kong, despite its British rule, and was curious as to what she meant, but she merely said that her husband had studied at the new Hong Kong College of Medicine, founded by the London Missionary Society.
“Come,” said Yan Hong. “Let’s find something to eat.”
We wandered toward a large inner room from which issued the sounds of musicians playing. I was transfixed by the music. The er hu was a two-stringed Chinese violin played with a horsehair bow. The strings were steel and the resonator cover made of python skin. It had a peculiarly haunting quality, like a voice singing. The small ensemble here was playing folk music, and the tunes were traditional and lively.
“You like er hu music?” asked Yan Hong.
“Yes, I do.” A blind musician used to play in the street near our house and the melancholy sound of his instrument had always exemplified dusk and yearning to me. The performers today were two er hu players and one yang qin player who accompanied them on the hammered dulcimer. To my surprise, one of the er hu players was none other than the young man who had been repairing clocks. Seated on a low stool with the instrument held vertically before him, his fingers flew over the neck while his other arm plied the horsehair bow. Despite his loose-fitting cotton gown, I could see the square breadth of his shoulders as he leaned over the instrument and how his torso tapered to narrow hips. I must have been staring for quite a while when I realized that Yan Hong had asked me a question.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I was listening to the music.”
She looked amused. “Listening, or looking?”
I flushed. “They’re quite good, don’t you think?”
“Yes, for amateurs. My father enjoys music and encourages his household to play.”
“Who are they?”
“The older er hu player is my third uncle, and that’s his son on the yang qin. The other player is my cousin.”
Cousin! I looked down to hide my confusion. My heart was beating like a drum. The music ended, but I could still hear the blood rushing through my ears. Embarrassed, I selected a large and sticky kuih angku, a steamed red cake stuffed with yellow bean paste, and bit into it. When I looked up again he was standing next to Yan Hong.
“Li Lan, this is my cousin Tian Bai.”
We did not shake hands as I had heard the British do, but under his gaze, I felt a flicker run through my veins.
“In addition to cleaning the clocks, I also play a little music,” he said.
Yan Hong looked at him with amusement. “What are you talking about?” Turning to me, she said, “Li Lan is the daughter of the Pan family.”
I tried to swallow my kuih, but it was sticky and clung to my throat.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“I’m fine,” I said with as much dignity as I could muster.
“I’ll get you some water,” said Yan Hong, darting after a passing servant.
There was a little crease at the corners of his eyes, exactly like the fold in a freshly laundered sheet. “I had a hard time finding out who you were,” he said. “You just ran off the other day.”
“I was away too long.” I was too embarrassed to admit I had thought he was a servant, but had a horrible feeling that he knew anyway.
“You don’t like mahjong?”
“I never learned to play well. It seems like a waste of time.”
“It is. You have no idea how much money some of these women can gamble away.”
“What would you rather they spent their time on?”
“I don’t know. Books, maps, maybe clocks?”
I hardly dared to look him in the eye, yet I was drawn to his gaze like a moth to a flame. It wouldn’t do to appear silly and empty-headed. A man who had traveled across the ocean must surely be bored by small talk. He gave no sign of it, though, asking me what books I had read and why I knew about the sea charts.
“The world is almost mapped,” he said. “There are a few places still unknown: the depths of the African continent, the poles. But the vast landmasses are charted now.”
“You sound more like an explorer than a doctor.”
He laughed. “Did Yan Hong tell you that? I’m afraid that I never finished my medical degree, although her husband did. My uncle called me back before I was done. But it’s true I would have preferred to be an explorer.”
“That’s not a very Chinese sentiment.”
China had eschewed sea voyages in the past, disdaining contact with barbarian peoples and only interested in her own affairs. China was the center of the universe, as even we overseas Chinese were taught. The British were amazed at the speed at which news of China’s affairs reached us in this far-off colony. The clan associations had couriers on fast junks, and they regularly exchanged information before the British, with their spies and settlements in Canton and Peking, could do so.
“Maybe I’m not filial enough,” he said with a smile. “People have often complained about that.”
“Complained about what?” Yan Hong reappeared with a cup of water for me.
“About my disobedience,” he said.
She knit her brows in mock annoyance. “You’ve been talking to Miss Pan for far too long. The performance is beginning and Father is looking for you. Hurry up or he’ll never be able to arrange the seating properly.”
I wish I could remember more of the operatic performance. I’m told it was quite good. A well-known troupe was in town and had been hired to give a private performance. They did a few scenes from the opera about the Cowherd and the Weaving Maid, but I hardly paid attention. From where I sat among the women, I tried surreptitiously to catch a glimpse of Tian Bai. I could see his uncle, Lim Teck Kiong, seated in front with a number of important-looking gentlemen, but he wasn’t with them. Finally I caught sight of him in the back, arranging additional seating for some late guests. No wonder he was considered useful in the household. Had his life changed since Lim Tian Ching, the son of the house, had died the past year?
Thinking about the dead man gave me an oppressive feeling, as though the air had curdled in my lungs. My father was very dismissive about things like ghosts and dreams. He would often quote Confucius, who had said it was better not to know about ghosts and gods, but rather to focus on the world we lived in. Still, thoughts of Lim Tian Ching cast a pall over the proceedings. I hardly saw the actors as they leapt and postured before me, faces elaborately painted and embroidered costumes quivering with feathers. W
hen I raised my head again, I caught Tian Bai’s eye from across the courtyard. He gave me an unreadable look.
The dinner that followed the performance was of the first quality. Even the rice was this year’s new crop, the grains chewy and tender. At home we bought only old rice because it was drier and you could get more rice per kati. I would have been content eating only the white rice, but there were many other delicacies to sample. Steamed pomfret, the silvery sides of the fish veiled in soy sauce and shallot oil. Fried pigeons. Tender strips of jellyfish quivered under a sprinkling of sesame seeds; and I was delighted to see my favorite kerabu, a dish of fiddlehead ferns dressed with shallots, chilies, and tiny dried shrimp in coconut milk.
After dinner, there were games for the young ladies in the courtyard. The daughters of the house, together with their innumerable cousins, displayed their needlework, which was exquisite, and were complimented on their fair complexions. I stood shyly on the side. No one had told me about this so I had brought nothing to show. In any case, my own sewing was very poor and mostly restricted to mending things nowadays. There were so many people that I was sure that no one would care if I did not participate, but soon I heard Yan Hong calling.
“Li Lan, come! Join the needle-threading competition!”
The lamps were blown out and the silvery radiance of the moon permeated the courtyard, bathing everyone in its pale glow. A table was set up with several stations of needles and thread. The unmarried girls would compete to see who could thread all their needles the fastest. As I took my place, I was jostled by my neighbor, a large-boned girl with horsey good looks. She gave me a cold glance, her eyes sliding over me dismissively.
“Ready?” cried Yan Hong. “Ladies, start!”
There were five needles in front of me in varying thicknesses from large to very fine. I quickly threaded the first three but the last two were more difficult. Girls sighed and complained coquettishly. In the wavering moonlight, the harder I squinted, the less I could see; so I used the tips of my fingers to feel for the holes, just as I had traced the pathways of insects and bookworms in my father’s manuscripts. The thread slipped through and I waved my hand in excitement. “I’m done!”