River Town (22 page)

“China has no Capitalist Characteristics,” she said flatly. “It is Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.”

It was pointless to argue with Teacher Liao, at least with regard to politics, where she strictly followed the government line. And it was remarkable how far this line stretched; in Fuling bookstores you could buy a copy of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, which included Article 35, Section II:

That was almost as good as the slave-owning American revolutionaries writing about equality. My favorite part of the Chinese Constitution was Article 32, Section 1:

Newspapers were the same way, and anybody in Fuling who wanted real news relied on either the Voice of America, itself a propaganda organ, or
xiaodao xiaoxi
, which translated as “small alley news,” or word of mouth. It seemed incredible that in a modernizing country of China's size many people turned to rumor as the most reliable source for information about current events. To me, this was the most substantial political distinction between America and China—even though much of what America believed about itself was also fraudulent, at least the press and publishers could express unorthodox views. It wasn't until I went to China that I realized a person could become homesick for conspiracy theories.

At the start of the spring semester, an English-speaking teacher from another department asked if he could borrow some literature books, and I invited him to stop by my apartment. I showed him my small collection—Hemingway, Jack London, Mark Twain, a Norton Anthology. I also had some political books about China, which he examined carefully.

“Those books all criticize China,” I said. “I don't know if they are true or not, but probably you wouldn't like them.”

His eyes lit up. He was a tiny man with thick glasses and a jutting jaw, and he took my copy of
China Wakes
and looked at the back cover. “In China we can't get books like this,” he said.

“That book is very negative,” I said. “It was written by two reporters for the
New York Times
. Some of it is about the student protests in 1989.”

“Can I borrow it?” he asked.

I saw no harm in that and I gave him the book. I asked him how he usually found out about things that were forbidden, and he mentioned the small alley news. Recently the foreign press had carried reports of ethnic unrest in the far-western province of Xinjiang, and out of curiosity I asked if he had heard anything.

“I've heard that there are some problems there,” he said. “Or actually, they said on the television that there are no problems there. But if there were no problems, why would they say so on the television? So I knew there must be something wrong. But I don't know exactly what is happening.”

I gave him a recent copy of
Newsweek
that included an article about Xinjiang, and he took his book and left. Over the semester he came periodically to borrow my books, although he never said much about what he thought of them. He was a shy, quiet man who never seemed comfortable talking with me, and it was the same way with a couple of young English teachers who occasionally stopped by my apartment. I sensed that these men were searching for friendship, but something seemed to be holding them back. Perhaps it was their own uncertainty, but more likely it was the warnings of the college; I never learned for sure. To me they were nothing more than shadowy figures who seemed to be groping for something that couldn't be found in Fuling.

Teacher Liao was different—she had no patience for the foreign view of China. In some ways I couldn't blame her; the American press tended to portray a China that was overwhelmingly negative and Beijing-centered. And yet like any
waiguoren
in China, I knew that I had access to a great deal of information that was unavailable to the Chinese, and as a result I often felt as if I understood the political situation better than the locals. It was impossible to avoid this type of arrogance, even though I realized that it was misleading and condescending, and I was careful not to voice my opinions openly. But Teacher Liao obviously noticed my skepticism about the material we studied, and I, in turn, sensed her suspicion of what I had been taught in America. She liked that I was learning Chinese fairly quickly, and I could see that she respected my efforts to study the language. But as my Chinese improved we began to see each other more clearly, and soon there was no avoiding the central issue in our relationship: that I was a
waiguoren
and she was Chinese.

During the spring semester our relationship grew increasingly
unhealthy, fueled by the political and historical lessons in my book, and often there was a definite tension as we prodded each other carefully. When the textbook discussed the Opium Wars, she quietly pointed out that America had also benefited from the unequal treaties that were forced upon the Chinese, and she lingered over the description of the
waiguoren
looting and burning the Summer Palace. During our review of the chapter on science and technology, she was careful to note that although the American experts had said there were no major oil reserves in China, native scientists had discovered the vast Daqing fields after Liberation. This pleased Teacher Liao immensely—she pointed out that the Chinese were now self-sufficient in oil, whereas America had to rely on the Middle East.

I had never been a patriot, and certainly I had never been patriotic about oil, but things were different now—I was a
waiguoren
, and I was developing a
waiguoren
's sensitivity to any sort of slight. The second time Teacher Liao bragged about China's oil self-sufficiency, I noted that China had actually become a net oil importer in 1995. Although Teacher Liao distrusted my sources (
Newsweek
), I could see that she was annoyed by the readiness and precision of my statistics. And I pointed out that Americans don't worry much about being self-sufficient in things like oil, because we have good relations with many countries and have never made an effort to close ourselves to the outside world. More sensible voices sounded in my head—what about Pat Buchanan? America First? the anti-Chinese laws in the nineteenth century?—but balance was not my goal. I was fighting fire with fire, and I responded to propaganda with more of the same.

Those were our Opium Wars—quiet and meaningless battles over Chinese and American history, fueled by indirect remarks and careful innuendo. The same thing was happening in Adam's classes, and sometimes we discussed the best way to react when Teacher Liao started to needle us about the unequal treaties or the loss of Hong Kong. It was difficult because she always had the advantage; the book was on her side, and so was the language. In Chinese, the Korean War is known as the “War of Resistance Against the Americans and in Support of the Koreans,” and it is difficult to discuss a war with that name and make the Americans look good. And the Chinese use personal pronouns when they speak of national affairs—it's “our China” and “your
America.” I found this to be a small but critical quirk in the language; every political discussion quickly became polarized, and every aspect of America—both its successes and its failures—became my personal affair.

In response, Adam and I learned to attack Teacher Liao's soft spots. It was always effective to mention innocently how rich Hong Kong had become under British rule, and we knew that we could get a rise out of her by talking about Premier Li Peng. He wasn't popular in China—in particular, many Chinese intellectuals hated him, because of his old-style conservatism and because he had supported the use of violence in quelling the Tiananmen Square protests. And it was no secret that the foreign press criticized him mercilessly. One day there was a lull in class and I brought up the subject, just to see how Teacher Liao would react.

“What do the Chinese people think of Li Peng?” I asked.

“All of us like Li Peng,” she said quickly. Invariably her responses were like that—all or nothing, white or black.

I nodded and continued, “He had some
guanxi
with Zhou Enlai, didn't he?”

“What do you mean?”

“I don't know how to say it—I read in a history book that Li Peng didn't have parents.” I was trying to say “orphan” in a roundabout way I was hoping to get to nepotism. “How do you say it if a child doesn't have parents?” I asked.

“
Sishengzi?
” she said.

“Right,” I said. “I read that Li Peng was a
sishengzi
, and Zhou Enlai took care of him.”

Her reaction was immediate.

“
Budui!
” she said angrily. “That's foreign
luanshou!
That's
waiguoren
talking noise! It's not true! I know you read that in your foreign newspapers, but it's completely false!”

It was the first time I'd seen her openly angry, and I had never imagined that Li Peng's adoption was such a touchy subject. I asked her to write that word,
sishengzi
, and she scratched it hard on my notebook, her face red. The three characters translated literally as “personal child.” I grabbed my dictionary and looked it up: “illegitimate child; bastard.” I had been saying that Li Peng was Zhou Enlai's bastard son.

“Uhm,” I said, “that's not the right word. Sorry.”

I picked up the dictionary again and fumbled through it until I found the correct term:
gu'er
. I apologized again for the mistake and she seemed relieved; yes, she said, Li Peng had been adopted by Zhou Enlai. I left it at that—I was embarrassed to have pushed her so far, even if it had been partly unintentional. The next class she asked me pointedly why the American government helped its athletes take performance-enhancing drugs, and we went around again, this time with me on the defensive. And so it went every other week, our Opium Wars raging as the countdown to Hong Kong's return drew closer and closer.

 

ONE DAY IN LATE MARCH
, I was studying Chinese at my desk when I saw a lizard skittering across the ceiling. He was dull green with bulging black eyes, and he moved in jerks and starts, like a film missing every third frame.

He was the first one I'd seen since October. On warm autumn nights the apartment had been full of them, slipping across the ceiling in search of mosquitoes. Light startled them; often I'd walk into a room, flip the switch, and three or four would fall off the ceiling. They always landed flatly, their webbed feet slapping against the concrete floor. The March lizard was a small one, and he crept slowly around the doorway and disappeared.

The peach trees on Raise the Flag Mountain showed tiny white buds. Flowers on campus were beginning to bloom, and every few days we had rain. The sand banks and rocky islands in the rivers were steadily shrinking. The White Crane Ridge disappeared.

For two days the winter fog faded and the sun shone more brightly than it had in months. I went running in a short-sleeved shirt. Peasants in the fields were wading behind oxen, plowing the mud. Rice-planting season was here.

And then the cold returned as suddenly as it had left. The fog came back and settled thick above the rivers. Some of the flowers died. The buds on Raise the Flag Mountain paused. The peasants kept plowing. In the stairway outside of my apartment, I found a dead lizard, his dusty eyes gray and dull.

 

A FEW DAYS LATER
I took a long hike up the Wu River. I packed my tent and sleeping bag, along with my camping stove. I put a compass in my pocket. Recently my younger sister Angela had sent me an old paperback copy of Ted Williams's baseball autobiography, which I brought as well. I hoisted the pack onto my shoulders and walked out the side gate of the college.

I headed south past the mouth of Mo Pan Valley and up the street through the Taiji medicine factory district. Everybody stopped to stare as I walked past; I heard laughter behind me. An old man paused on the side of the road, smiling. “Are you going home?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said, and I waved to him and kept walking.

It was a gray, misty morning, with a cold wind blowing down the Wu River valley, but it felt good to have a full pack on my shoulders, and it felt good to be walking. I came to the Wu River Great Bridge, where the East River road swung west across the water, and I crossed the street, taking the footpath that ran above the river. All winter I had looked out my window at the steep green hills and the far bend of the Wu, hazy in the distance, and all winter I had been thinking: Someday in the spring I'll see what's beyond that bend.

The water was a chalky green and I followed the paths along the Wu's western bank. I passed the first side valley with its broken Buddhist shrine tucked underneath low trees, and I walked through some small farms and came to the Fuling Liangtang ore factory, where they dug gravel out of the hills. A pale dust covered everything—the docks, the workers' dormitories, the massive steel chutes that carried the rocks down from the hills. In the center of the complex was a sign:

 

Happy Happy Go to Work,
Safe Safe Return Home

 

In Chinese you can double adjectives for emphasis, and that was a common propaganda message in factories and construction sites. It was always a pretty good indication that you should keep moving. There were lots of those signs across the Yangtze River, where they were blasting the hell out of the mountains with dynamite to make a new highway to Chongqing.

The air in the ore factory tasted like dirt and jackhammers roared steadily. Workers—curious curious, surprised surprised—stared at me as I passed. I climbed the torn hillside above the factory, the dust settling dry in my throat, and then the path swung west into another cross valley and I had entered the countryside.