探鄉記(4)——敬少年犯！

Hometown Visit (4) - To juvenile delinquent!

 

"Do you think anti-corruption storm will save the Party?" Yang asked me in a low voice.

"Wow! That's a first." I replied in a lower voice.

"What?"

"The first time I see you ask such a serious question."

Yang flattened her face and stared at me.

"Okay, okay. It's a good and sophisticated question. Honestly, I have no idea. Plus, I'm not a Communist. I think Nipple would give you a better answer."

"But Nipple is not a formal Communist yet either."

"I heard my name."

"Oh nothing." Yang waved her hand.

"Actually I have something to tell." I didn't look Yang's way.

"Then tell openly to us all." Tingting demanded.

"Yah. One day I was on the GO train. Uh, GO means Golden Horseshoe region, Ontario. It's a transit system for Southern Ontario. By the way, the area of Ontario is little bigger than the sum of the areas of Shaanxi, Henan, Shandong, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Zhejiang, Anhui, Beijing, Tianjin, and Shanghai."

"Wow! That's huge." Yang commented.

"Yah. It is. So, a woman and her son around 5 years old came aboard and sat opposite to me, on the upper deck of the train. They are from northeast China, to be precise, Shenyang."

"How did you know?" Zhen asked.

"The woman was on her cell-phone constantly and talked so loud that every one turned to look at her. I don't think she felt anything or sensed anything. She merely kept talking and talking. Very annoying."

"What was she talking about on phone?"

"Hehe, she was like," I gestured holding a cell-phone by my ear and then gave play to my Manchurian dialect gift, "'Oh, I have been to Dalian. I also lived in Dalian for a while before. But I just couldn't get used to living in a small city. So I moved back from Dalian to Shenyang. Living in a big city is still my favourite.'"

"What?! Shenyang is a big city? I never know that." Zhen couldn't wait to comment.

"But at least Shenyang is the capital of Jilin." Yang argued.

"The capital of Jilin is Shenyang? Are you kidding me?" Zhen looked astonished.

"Then which city is the capital?" Yang asked.

"Harbin," answered Zhen. "How long haven't you been watching CCTV's weather report?"

"I've never watched that."

"But at least we don't talk like we didn't receive proper junior high school education whereas we graduated from universities." Zhen suddenly talked to me, "why do you scratch your thigh so hard? What's wrong with your thigh?"

I successfully turned emotionless the moment I raised my head to face her. "Nothing."

All the others tried hard to control their countenance.

To Yang and Zhen, outside our province was like overseas. Beside Shaanxi, they only knew something about Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, plus Hong Kong and Taipei. When they came back from travelling around in different provinces and cities, literally they could tell you nothing. Even when you picked up a photo they had taken by themselves and asked them where this place was or what name this historical site was called or in which city this park was, they could never tell. Their definition of travelling only limited to eating, drinking, sleeping, taking pictures, using bathrooms, and following the tourist guides so as not to get lost. Anything other than those were not their business. Fairly cute.

"Can I? Can I continue?"

"Yah. Yah."

"And then, the woman began to talk about something between her and her husband. She was like, 'I said to my hubby, what the heck do they mean by the leaders must be the same as the masses? Why can't a leader be treated in a special way? If leaders are treated as masses and masses are treated as leaders, then who the hell are leaders and who the hell are masses after all? If leaders are not treated special, then what's the difference between leaders and masses? Leaders are leaders, masses are masses. It's always like this. Nice and easy. They don't get it, then they learn to get it. You well know, they always say leaders should shoulder more duties and responsibilities, then naturally, leaders should shoulder more profits at the same time. Isn't it always so? We are entitled to everything we are entitled to. So what's becoming a Communist leader for? Isn't it for some profits you make yourself, your wife, and your kid entitled to? What? ... Xi Jinping? Wang Qishan? ... F u c k it off! No worry. It's just a puff of wind. A gale. After the puff, everything will resume to what everything was. Thank god, my hubby was enlightened by my words long ago. How otherwise could I and my son be here today? Do I work? Of course not. I don't even speak English. Actually, I won't work even if I speak English. You know what, I've checked the life cost and level of prices here. To be honest with you, I won't have to work for at least 20 or 25 years. And who the heck knows where the heck I will be after 20 or 25 years? Actually I can simply live on the interests of the money I'm going to deposit in the bank or the dividends of the stock-fund I'm going to buy, forever, if I don't often go crazy shopping on those luxuries'."

"That money can't be hers," Nipple broke in, "it must be our Chinese people's hard earnings."

"Every cent of it." I nodded agreement.

"What did you do?"

"What did I do? Hehe. I did nothing but merely looked at that bitch in 'admiration'. Pardon me for the swearing word. Look, look, remember what she said? 'Isn't it for some profits you make yourself, your wife, and your kid entitled to?' Some profits? An adult with a kid living a life without working for 25 years is called 'some profits'. Damn it!"

"I swear to Confucius that if I were to come across that bitch, I would tell Wang Qishan on her," said Nipple.

"She and her husband are just teenie-tiny flies. There are still a whole bunch of big tigers waiting for Wang Qishan to catch ahead." Skinny reminded.

"Moreover, you don't have Wang's phone number. Actually, you don't even have Wang's subordinate's subordinate's number. Just how can you tell anything to him?" Fatty also asked. 

"Howsoever. No matter." Zhen answered on Nipple's behalf.

"But still, we don't have any clue other than the fact that we know it's a woman with a 5-year-old son from Shenyang. Maybe she lived in Dalian for certain period in the past, plus, her husband is corrupt official. That's it. That's all we know." Ling concluded.

"Oh, there's one more thing she mentioned."

All turned to look at me.

"She said, 'even Li Peng's wife could take Rolex watch at extremely low price under the counter, then why can't we make profits for ourselves?' Does this help?"

"No, it doesn't help. Which Li Peng? Her husband's brother? Cousin? Boss? Any high official in Shenyang? Or ex premier? We don't know. There could be five millions of people named after Li Peng in China."

Silence followed Ling's words.

"But how did she and her son get overseas from China with so much money?" Yang looked at me.

"I wish I could tell you."

"How?" Skinny said, "'how' doesn't matter here, does it?"

"There are so many Communist officials who sent their wives and kids to the United States, Canada, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Britain. Those people never go abroad without money. At the same time, they give us a show and let us know how deep they are in love with our country, how loyal they are to the Party." Fatty further commented.

"And how clean their ass are," Zhen continued.

"And how little and tiny their properties are," added Yang.

Tingting suddenly asked, "why are they so afraid of showing their properties to the public while other countries' public servants do?"

"Oh, because that doesn't apply to the specific situation of China. God! Why else? Once they show, the public will know their properties never match their salaries, and then Wang Qishan will come to kick their ass." Nipple took Wang as his hero.

"Are they proletariat or property hiders after all?" Skinny asked and gestured covering stuff.

"What? Proletariat? Oh my god. When did we hear this term last time? Before Pizza Hut entered into China?" Zhen waved a slice of pepperoni in her hand.

Yang took a big gulp of beer. "F u c k them off."

"Our home-class teacher had hoped that we would become hard workers for our society and patriots to our country." Ling took the floor now. "Somehow I think she can be proud of us now. We are what she expected us to be, generally. We haven't let her down, so she likes us."

"Not me, not me. Miss Chen always hated me."

"But you always made troubles for her." Tingting said.

"I made troubles for her? Excuse me. It's her who gave me hard time." I defended.

"But look what you had done to her. Nipple already told me."

I turned to stare at Nipple.

"Chill, chill, buddy, chill." Nipple smiled to me. "It's already passed so many years. Who cares whatsoever any more?"

"What's that? What was it?" Now every one was asking, even including Ling.

"I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it." Tingting looked askew at me and prolonged her voice.

"Ignore him! Ignore him! Just say it." Zhen and Yang were hurrying Tingting.

"Go gossiping is not the core value of socialism." I spoke out loudly though I knew this sentence couldn't stop them.

"But you are someone hailing from capitalist country. Plus, as it is, I'm only gonna tell what took place. So!"

Now my friends focussed all their attentions on Tingting as though she were the teacher giving them certain tips for upcoming exams.

"Remember that time, he got caught and punished by Miss Chen for he drew our English teacher into a nude woman on the English class?"

"Yes, yes." All echoed.

"And I remember the title of that drawing is The Woman of French Lieutenant, right?" Yang asked.

"No!" All shouted. "The title is Inclined Miss XXX."

"The Woman of French Lieutenant is also a nude woman he drew, you are right about that. But it's Inclined Miss XXX that got him punished." Fatty clarified.

"Right, right, right. I mixed them up."

"You shouldn't put the teacher's name in the drawing." Ling said to me.

"I didn't put her name there. I only wrote Miss XXX. How many times do I have to say this?"

"But every one knew XXX referred to our English teacher because that's the acronym of her full name." Zhen added. "And it's her in the drawing. That's all that mattered. Plus, you also falsified Miss Xiang's words into 'English class is finery art class. Drawing is allowed on my class' and put them in the drawing."

"I didn't falsify anything. The two NOT's were actually blocked by her head in the drawing, what I wrote is, well, never mind."

"There's no way you could escape from the charge."

"And why did you use the word 'inclined'?" Ling asked again a question no one else had asked me before.

"If you go check those world famous art works, you will easily find those titles are always 'inclined this', 'inclined that'."

"But Miss Chen really didn't know much about art. And you know she's quite conservative. To her, that word implied seducing and sex. Plus, you used XXX which obviously formed another charge against you in Miss Xiang's eyes because she's English teacher and she knew what that meant in English. So all these aggravated the penalty though these were still not the worst part."

"The worst was," Skinny smiled, "buddy, you really shouldn't draw the two nipple rings on her."

"We all thought this was very bad." Tingting said in a serious tone. "And Miss Xiang was a young teacher, just graduated from Normal University, and she was single. It hurt Miss Xiang badly."

"But our home-class teacher should never have let Miss Xiang see that, first place." I argued. "And many thanks to you, Nipple."

"You point your finger at me again? How many times do I have to explain to you that I already kicked the chair to warn you?"

"Yah! Yah! Yah! Maybe the tip of your shoe head touched the surface paint of my chair, but that's not kick!"

"But by the time I was trying to give another kick, she already moved away from the window and entered the door."

"Where was your desk-mate that day?" Ling asked.

"She was sick at home. Otherwise, well, it was just a bad day that day. If such thing happened today, who would care what? Many years back, the whole society was not as open as today. Just like, if China had introduced the movie Grease  in 1978, it could be a storm, a revolution, and an atomic bomb to high school students then. But today? Time just changed. Actually, a fortunate thing among these unfortunate things is, my dad was in the United States and didn't come back until 2 weeks later. So, I wasn't punished as badly as you guys thought I was."

"Lying." Tingting said. "Otherwise you wouldn't have done that as retaliation to Miss Chen."

"What did he do to Miss Chen?"

"Yah, yah, what happened after that?"

"Go on, go on."

People got excited again.

"He stalked on Miss Chen and tailed all the way to her home. And he was very tired. Why? 'cause he ran and Miss Chen took ride on bike. But he successfully followed her unnoticed. Miss Chen parked her bike against the wall, and then opened the door to enter into her apartment which was on the first floor. No, he didn't do much this moment other than checking around and thinking how the whole operation should be optimized. Observation was important, patience was important, timing was important. So, he waited and waited. We all knew Miss Chen was Sichuan native. When the air was permeated with Sichuanese cuisine flavour, he knew it was time. Why? Because, first, Miss Chen was busy cooking and the chance she would come out was tiny. Second, the noise of stir-frying covered the sound outside, especially he knew how noisy cooking of Sichuanese cuisine was. But the smell was so irresistible that he almost gave up and intended to go home for food. However, his anger beat his hunger and the retaliation volition won. He walked struttingly to the bike as though no people were around and the bike were his. He lifted it up and laid the bike frame on his right shoulder. Why was he so fearless? Why didn't he worry about causing people's suspicion? Because, A. he thought he wasn't stealing, but merely shifting, and he was shifting something from Point X to Point Y. B. he wasn't carrying it away like bike thieves, but was carrying it i-n-t-o the apartment building instead, so this way, people's stereotype mind would tell every one around, 'oh, he just carries the bike upstairs back to his home or somewhere in the stairwell close to his apartment door like I do every day'. Honestly, we have to admit, he's a good actor. He acted with ease as an inhabitant of this community. And we still have to admit, the very insight and perception of a young artist is really something the people like us so much lack of. Oh crap! It was heavy. We all know Miss Chen's bike was a big Phoenix and it's a heavy-duty model. The second floor, then the third, then the fourth, stair after stair he ascended. If it was any of us, we would have given up. But him? No. Because fire of anger was burning in his chest. But in the meantime, he also complained that the design of the building staircase was so stupid because his father had once told him that the ratio between tread depth and rise height should be 9 : 5 while the ratio of the stairs he was now stepping on was 1 and it didn't have to be 24 steps in-between every two stories. Every joint linking the first flight of 12 steps and the second flight of 12 steps was a challenge because that place, as we all know, was always piled with stuffs or occupied by bikes giving the residents extremely limited room to pass through, many years ago. There was  another question that kept bugging him - why does our home-class teacher ride such a bloody big bike, a bloody big heavy-duty bike while she is only 1.56 metre tall? When he reached at the flight joint between the fifth floor and the sixth floor, his energy depleted and his head spun. But right at that moment, Chairman Mao's instruction sounded up around his ears - when there's a will, there's energy..."

"Hey, I hate Mao. Why do you ..."

"Ssssh!" Yang slapped me on the thigh.

"Instantly, he was fully energized like automatically blood-refilled in web games. Nothing in the world could stop him now. Nothing. When he eventually completed the last flight and stepped on the sixth floor, sunshine, golden sunshine pierced through the clouds, through tall poplar trees' branches and leaves, through the grate of corridor windows, and spread on his victorious and wet face."

"Lord!" I shook my head non-stop.

"Quiet." Demanded Zhen.

"Beside the ladder leading to the roofing hatch was there a space, fairly small, but big enough to accommodate 5 bikes. One by one he moved aside all the 4 bikes that were already there. Miss Chen's heavy-duty Phoenix was put innermost before everything got replaced. But in this process, his right foot instep accidentally hit the end of foldable stand of the Phoenix. Ouch! It hurt. It hurt so much that we saw him walk oddly the next day."

"Where the heck is that from? I didn't ..."

"Focus." Yang slapped my thigh once again.

"That was the only bike Miss Chen and her husband had whereas her husband's company was very far and he had to take bus to go to work every day. As we all know, to a resident on the 1st floor, with nothing special or no important matter, who would bother to go to the sixth floor usually? Therefore, his conspiracy worked. As of that day, just as of that day, the small figure of our home-class teacher Miss Chen was seen walk to our school and walk back home in the wind and rain. In sympathy, the fellow students found a few extra grey hairs on Miss Chen's temples."

"Can you stop?"

"Eight months later, Lunar New Year came. As per the customs of Spring Festival, Miss Chen and her husband paid New Year visit to the 17 neighbours from the 1st floor to the 6th floor like previous years. When the couple came to the 6th floor, Miss Chen surprisingly found her treasured Phoenix was right in the corner, quiet and dusty. She couldn't recall that she had ever done this. She explained to her husband that it wasn't her who had moved the bike here. The husband is a very nice man. He didn't complain to his wife at all after the bike was reported stolen. This moment, he didn't say a word but opened his arms. The couple hugged together affectionately as if a couple had found their lost baby."

"You don't go to Hengdian? What a waste!" I swiftly shifted my thigh aside right after my words. Yang's third slap missed.

"The husband rolled up his sleeves to take the bike out and carried it back home. This time, the bike was carried inside. Why? Because they had to break the lock with certain tools as the key was long thrown away. Right on that Spring Festival, Miss Chen welcomed the second spring of her life."

No matter her favourite classical literature work was Anna Karelina or was Gone With The Wind, reading, made Tingting so different from Zhen and Yang and made her close to Ling in spirit.

"This is hilarious!" Fatty shouted.

"What a pal!" Skinny reached over to punch me on the shoulder.

"Thank you Tingting. Nipple, you told this to Tingting, but didn't tell us? All right, I will bear this in mind."

"Fine, fine, fine."

Fatty ignored Nipple and said to me. "And you. Thanks a lot for telling Nipple and not telling Skinny and me."

"Buddy, I just didn't want to get more people involved into this. What if I had got caught?"

"So amusing! But how did you know all the details? Like the key thing, like Miss Chen's husband thing?" Zhen asked Tingting.

"Miss Chen mentioned those to Nipple's mom when they both attended the teachers meeting at school together. The hug is my imagination by the way, but it's logical."

Zhen turned to me. "Had you told me all these early, you could have been my idol, my hero for all these years. I was never aware there was a criminal among us. How exciting!"

"I didn't commit any crime. That's not a crime!"

"Oh, don't be too modest! Here," Zhen raised her beer, "cheers to juvenile delinquent!"

Yang immediately lifted hers. "To juvenile delinquent!"

 

Notes:

01. Zhen suddenly talked to me, "why do you scratch your thigh so hard? What's wrong with your thigh?": 阿臻突然對我說：“你為啥使勁撓大腿？你大腿咋了？”

 

02. I said to my hubby, 'what the heck do they mean by the leaders must be the same as the masses? Why can't a leader be treated in a special way? If leaders are treated as masses and masses are treated as leaders, then who the hell are leaders and who the hell are masses after all? If leaders are not treated special, then what's the difference between leaders and masses? Leaders are leaders, masses are masses. It's always like this. Nice and easy. They don't get it, then they learn to get it.' You well know, they always say leaders should shoulder more duties and responsibilities, then naturally, leaders should shoulder more profits at the same time. Isn't it always so? We are entitled to everything we are entitled to. So what's becoming a Communist leader for? Isn't it for some profits you make yourself, your wife, and your kid entitled to? What? ... Xi Jinping? Wang Qishan? ... F u c k it off! No worry. It's just a puff of wind. A gale. After the puff, everything will resume to what everything was. Thank god, my hubby was enlightened by my words long ago. How otherwise could I and my son be here today? Do I work? Of course not. I don't even speak English. Actually, I won't work even if I speak English. You know what, I've checked the life cost and level of prices here. To be honest with you, I won't have to work for at least 20 or 25 years. And who the heck knows where the heck I will be after 20 or 25 years? Actually I can simply live on the interests of the money I'm going to deposit in the bank or the dividends of the stockfund I'm going to buy, forever, if I don't often go crazy shopping on those luxuries'.: 我就對我老公縮（說），‘他們縮（說）領導要和群眾一個樣算啥意思啊？領導憑蛤（啥）不能特蘇（殊）對待？雨果（如果）把領導蕩（當）成群眾，群眾蕩（當）成領導，那特麽到底誰似（是）領導、誰似（是）群眾啊？雨果（如果）領導不能特蘇（殊）對待，那領導和群眾害（還）有蛤（啥）區別啊？領導就似（是）領導，群眾就似（是）群眾。自古如恥（此）。簡單明了。他們沒嫩（弄）明白，就讓他們學著去嫩（弄）明白。’你很了解的，他們總縮（說），領導幹部要分擔更多的義務和責任。那不就得了，領導幹部也硬（應）該分擔更多地（的）利益。可不似（是）咋？我們該拿我們該拿的，該得我們該得的。要不然捏（呢），咱當官似（是）為了個蛤（啥）？不就似（是）為你自己、為你老婆、孩子甑（整）點兒該得地（的）福利麽？啥？……習近平？王岐山？……扯犢子吧！不用擔心。仄（這）就似（是）陣風兒。刮會兒。風一刮過，一切造（照）舊，該似（是）蛤（啥）玩意兒害（還）似（是）蛤（啥）玩意兒。謝謝老天爺，我老公被我開竅的早。要不延（然），我和我兒子今天哪能在仄旮捏（這裏呢）？。我工作不？當然不啦。我連個英文都不會。其笥（實）吧，即便我會英文，我都不去工作。你猜咋，我已經看了一下仄旮（這裏）的僧（生）活開銷和物價。老笥（實）跟你縮（說），二笥（十）或二笥（十）五年我都不用工作。再縮（說），誰又茲（知）道二笥（十）或二笥（十）五年以後我又在哪？其笥（實），雨（如）果縮（說），我不去經常買那個蛤（啥）、那個蛤（啥）、那個色次品（奢侈品）蛤（啥）玩意兒的，我就把錢前存銀行裏、再買些股票基金、就靠糍（吃）利息和糍（吃）分紅就夠了。

 

03. Are they proletariat or property hiders after all?: 他們到底是無產階級還是捂產階級？

 

04. home-class teacher: 班主任

 

05. Go gossiping is not the core value of socialism: 八卦不是社會主義核心價值觀

 

06. Inclined Miss XXX: 《斜倚的XXX老師》

 

07. But right at that moment, Chairman Mao's instruction sounded up around his ears - when there's a will, there's energy...: 然而就在這時，毛主席的教導在他耳邊響起——“世上無難事，隻要肯登攀”。

 

08. "... When he eventually completed the last flight and stepped on the sixth floor, sunshine, golden sunshine pierced through the clouds, through tall poplar trees' branches and leaves, through the grate of corridor windows, and spread on his victorious and wet face."

"Lord!" I shook my head non-stop.

"Quiet." Demanded Zhen.

“……當他登完最後一段台階，踏上六層樓的時候，陽光，金色的陽光穿過那雲層，穿過那高大楊樹的枝葉，穿過走廊上的窗欞，照在他勝利的、浸透汗水的臉上。”

“臥靠！”我不停地搖頭。

“別吭氣兒！”阿臻喝道。

 

09. "... As of that day, just as of that day, the small figure of our home-class teacher Miss Chen was seen walk to our school and walk back home in the wind and rain. In sympathy, the fellow students found a few extra grey hairs on Miss Chen's temples."

"Can you stop?"

“……從那一天起，就從那一天起，我們看到我們的班主任陳老師那矮小的身影，風裏來、雨裏去的走路來學校上班，又走路下班回家。同學們心疼地發現，陳老師的兩鬢增添了幾許白發。”

“你夠了沒？”

 

10. "You don't go to Hengdian? What a waste!" I swiftly shifted my thigh aside right after my words. Yang's third slap missed.: “你不去橫店，可惜了！”話音一落，我敏捷地把大腿一閃，阿揚的第三下沒拍著。