Falling Leaves: The True Story of an Unwanted Chinese Daughter (29 page)

Two days later, we flew into Shanghai. As our bus drove from Hongqiao airport towards the Jinjiang Hotel, where we were scheduled to stay, I felt tense with excitement. We passed impressive red-brick Tudor mansions built in the British colonial style, complete with walled gardens and lush green lawns. The bus turned a corner and I found myself travelling on familiar Avenue Joffre. I saw once more the wide, straight, tree-lined boulevard stretching on and on. I craned my neck to read the

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street signs written in the new, abbreviated, Chinese script. Avenue Joffre was now renamed Huai Hai Road. The bus headed east, on and on away from the afternoon sun, dispersing hundreds of bicycles in its wake, like a giant whale surrounded by teeming fish. Now we were on Huai Hai Zhong (Central) Road. Some of the buildings began to be recognizable. It was five o’clock and amidst the tinkling of bicycle bells and swishing of tyres, crowds of workers dressed in identical dark blue Mao jackets were rushing home from work.

Suddenly there they were! As our bus approached the centre of the former French concession, out of the cityscape arose a vision more powerful to me than any other on earth: two modest pillars guarding the entrance to the lane leading to my lao jia (old family home). I sighted the concrete grey villas, solid and unchanged as in a painting from the past. Bamboo poles poked out of many windows, heavily laden with underwear, sheets, blankets, Mao jackets and trousers, all flapping in the wind.

Soon our bus was traversing the landmarks of my childhood. I caught a glimpse of Do Yuen Gardens and the Cathay Cinema. The myriad shops between and beyond no longer bore fanciful, bilingual placards. Gone were the neon signs lit up in blue, red, yellow, green, purple and white. Gone were the hair salons, boutiques, booksellers, coffee shops and French bakeries.

Now the stores, unpainted and weather beaten, carried drab names in the new, simplified characters proclaiming their wares. Nothing frivolous was offered. Thirty years had passed, during which Shanghai had lost its gaiety and sparkle, but at least it was now a city without beggars or newspaper-wrapped female baby corpses.

Our bus turned north a short way east of the Cathay Cinema and pulled up in front of our hotel, only a few hundred yards from my old Sheng Xin primary school. Bob and I dropped our luggage and immediately took a taxi to visit my aunt.

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It was a bitterly cold December day. The city horizon was enveloped in a haze of dull yellow pollution. Bob told me to instruct the driver to take a short detour along the Bund, once known as the Wall Street of China. It thrilled me to converse with him in my native Shanghai dialect and to hear it once more all around me after thirty years. Already it seemed as if I had never left the city. Fifteen minutes later we were driving along the wide loop of the Huangpu River, whizzing past the well-remembered Huangpu Park (once infamous for prohibiting entry to dogs and Chinese) and the majestic office towers erected by the British in the 19305. None of the exterior fafades had altered, though some lofty edifices did spout laundry-laden bamboo poles incongruously from their upstairs windows.

Our taxi turned left at the Peace Hotel, with its distinctive triangular tower glowing against a fading sky, on to bustling Nanjing Lu (formerly Nanking Road), awash with pedestrians and bicycles. We drove past the department stores, photography studios, restaurants and provisional markets; past my Grand Aunt’s Women’s Bank at 480 Nanking Road, still imposing but now called the Bank of Commerce and Industry. It was dark when we arrived at our destination. Aunt Baba was living in No. zi, a once stately dwelling fallen into disrepair, as were all its neighbours. The lane was badly lit and we had to grope our way into the building. Its front door stood half open for the world to enter.

The stench hit us like a physical blow as we stepped into the hallway. We had never smelt anything like it before. The grime and sweat of those who had lived in this house for the past thirty years had penetrated every crevice. It was the stink of rotting food, unwashed bodies, unlaundered clothes and untended plumbing. Although rubbish and dirt covered the stairs and hallway, there were a few polished, oiled and chained bicycles gleaming against the filthy walls.

My chest felt heavy as I slowly climbed the stairs and called out, ’Aunt Baba! Aunt Baba!’ All at once she stood there, a tiny

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figure silhouetted against the light of an open doorway. How small she was! Bob and I both towered over her. I hugged her tightly and felt her bony body inside her bulky padded Mao jacket. She could not have weighed more than eighty pounds.

She led us into her room and made us sit down on her bed. She took a long look at us, her eyes glowing with tender pride.

’Your handwriting hasn’t changed much from that of the little girl who left in 1948! It’s not the calligraphy of a physician with degrees from England and America. It’s still that of a child going to primary school!’ she exclaimed, her voice rasping with emotion.

Her room was cold and dingy. The only furniture was a bed, a wooden table and one small, hard-backed chair. All her earthly possessions were kept in one large wooden trunk and some cardboard boxes stacked in rows. Near by was a small kerosene stove on which she was cooking a large pot of soup noodles. She kept a portable enamel urinal under her bed. From the centre of the room dangled some wires, attached to which was a single, naked, electric bulb.

She considered herself incredibly lucky to have been assigned a room of her own for the last thirteen years. Just down the hall, the owner of the house had to share his single room with his wife and two sons. The whole dwelling now gave shelter to nine families.

She served us freshly cooked noodles covered with pickled vegetables. I watched her intently as she bustled about her room, the way I used to when I was little and she was my entire world. Her thinning hair was now greyish white and combed tidily into a neat bun at the nape of her neck. Her large eyes appeared sunken, delineated by eyebrows matching the colour of her hair.

I clasped her small hand while we related the stories of our lives, trying to bridge the thirty-year span that separated us. My aunt’s voice dropped to a whisper. Fear of informers and denouncers could not be so soon overcome. ’It seems incredible that we should be sitting across from each other and speaking

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of absolutely anything and everything. This would have been dangerous during the Cultural Revolution three years ago.’

We” talked deep into the night. She recounted the story of our family and begged me to write down these memories before time obliterated all. ’Our entire family suffered when your Niang entered our home. The spell she cast over your Father was like that of the fox-devil of our ancient folklore. Besides her youth and beauty, he was probably in awe of her foreign blood. Remember, he grew up in the French concession during an era which was unique in China. We are all victims of history.’

Before we left that night, Aunt Baba said she had a present for us. She rummaged for quite a while through the contents of her old trunk and finally extracted from the lining of her winter coat a neatly folded envelope. On opening it I saw that it was an old American loo-dollar bill which she must have hoarded for at least thirty years. For a long while we remained silent, afraid that words might shatter the magic of this moment beyond joy and sorrow.

The next day, I took Aunt Baba back to our hotel, where she enjoyed her first bath for many years. Our designated tour guide, a Party member, regarded her with contempt. At that time, an unofficial policy existed in China which divided people into four classes. Each class was treated accordingly.

First class were the white tourists, especially if they were rich North Americans. Second class were the overseas Chinese who could speak Chinese. I belonged to this category. We were dealt with as returning heroes who would provide financial support for a new economic structure in China. Third class were the hua qiao (American-born ethnic Chinese) whose parents had emigrated before 1949 and who could not speak Chinese, such as Bob. They were attended to with a mixture of mild contempt and overt honour, the balance being swung by the degree of their prosperity and professional achievements. The general assumption was that anyone from America was probably rich and well connected. Fourth class were the hun-224

dreds of millions of native Chinese such as Aunt Baba. Her clothing and demeanour easily earmarked her.

Our tour guide was furious when I invited my aunt to lunch with us at the eleventh-floor dining room of the Jinjiang Hotel. He scolded her for not knowing her place and abusing my hospitality. Bob and I did not hide our anger. With the support of members of our tour group, Aunt Baba was eventually served lunch but refused to set foot in the diningroom again.

On each of the five days we spent in Shanghai I collected my aunt and she would take her hot bath in our hotel room. There wasn’t time enough for all we wanted to say to each other.

I offered to buy my aunt an apartment in Shanghai which was being erected at a site close to our hotel. She declined, saying that she had no wish to leave her neighbourhood. ’I have lived in the same lane since 1943,’ she told me. ’This is my home. The only place I wish to move to is our old house at No. 15. If you can get it back for me, I shall die happy.’ Two , years later, Bob and I were able to procure the house on her behalf and she lived there till she died.

I asked her if she regretted staying behind in Shanghai.

Her answer was an unequivocal no. ’It has been bad here. All those campaigns and struggle meetings. The savagery of the Cultural Revolution. Poverty, hardship and fear. Quite honestly though, all the miseries put together were more tolerable than living under the same roof as your Niang. I am content with cu cha dan fan (coarse tea and plain rice).

’I often think of life as a deposit of time. We are each allocated so many years, just like a fixed sum in a bank. When twenty-four hours have passed I have spent one more day. I read in the People’s Daily that the average life expectancy for a Chinese woman is seventy-two. I am already seventy-four years old. I spent all my deposits two years ago and am on bonus time. Every day is already a gift. What is there to complain of?’

Our eyes met. The defiant courage I saw in hers stunned me. Then in a voice whose forcefulness contrasted strangely with

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the frailty of her body, she declared, ’The way I see it, the nineteenth century was a British century. The twentieth century is an American century. I predict that the twenty-first century will be a Chinese century. The pendulum of history will swing from the ying ashes brought by the Cultural Revolution to the yang phoenix arising from its wreckage.’

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While drinking Water, Remember the Source

Our tour group flew into Beijing on New Year’s Eve, arriving on a sunny but cold afternoon. On the roof of the new airport terminal, a giant photograph of Chairman Mao beamed down, flanked by two huge scarlet Chinese characters, Beijing (Northern Capital). Through loudspeakers came the lilting Mandarin of a female announcer, ’Beijing welcomes you!’

As we emerged from an immigration booth, a small, stocky middle-aged Chinese woman rushed towards us. Her black hair was badly dyed and she wore a brown coat with a fake fur collar. ’Ww met!’ she called, ’i-fcji Wu mei (Fifth Younger Sister).’Is that you?’

No one had called me wu mei since those forlorn days of my Shanghai childhood. She was now standing in front of me, smiling from ear to ear. Something about her posture, the shoulders a little lopsided and uneven, the roundish flat face tilted, the semi-paralysed left hand held tightly by her right with all ten fingers interlaced, struck a chord from long ago. Involuntarily my tongue twisted into the familiar Chinese language of early childhood. Jie jie (Elder Sister),’ I answered respectfully. ’It is I.’

Though I was not expecting anyone, my sister Lydia and her? entire family had travelled from Tianjin to greet us at theS

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airport. Aunt Baba had telephoned from Shanghai and given her our itinerary. It had been thirty-one years since I had last seen her and her husband. I had never set eyes on their children.

As we stood side by side, I realized that I was now an inch or two taller than Lydia. Excitedly, she gestured towards the rest of her family. Samuel was then already in his sixties, dressed in a Mao suit covered by a shiny, dark blue vinyl overcoat and worker’s cap. Behind him stood a tall young man, their zyyear-old son, Tai-way, and their diminutive thirty-year-old daughter, Tailing.

Our tour group was booked to stay in the massive Friendship Hotel. Built by the Soviets in the 19505, it retained a distinctly Russian feel in both its architecture and formal, landscaped gardens, reminding me of photographs I had seen of the tsars’ winter palaces. Lydia and her family had made reservations at the same hotel. Their taxi followed our tour bus and we checked in together. I cringed when I saw some bellboys rudely shoving Samuel aside while respectfully ushering a few straggling members of our tour group to the front of the queue.

After dinner, Bob and I went to their suite as arranged. Their daughter Tailing was unwell and had already retired for the night. The five of us sat down to begin what was to become a very long evening.

In a tone full of remorse, Lydia confessed, ’It’s painful to remember how neglected you were as a child. I was especially at fault because, as the eldest, I should have set an example. This I failed to do. Being the youngest and therefore the most insignificant stepchild, you were not only slighted but often bullied by all of us. My only excuse is that I was only a child myself. Besides, we were not encouraged to be loyal to each other because Niang was afraid that we might unite against her.

’When you were little, our parents made it clear that you were unwanted and expendable. Sometimes, Niang even said out loud that you were abominable. ’

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’When Father and Niang came to Tianjin in 1948, Niang gave orders that I was not to visit you at St Joseph’s school or take you out during the holidays. She stressed that she would not tolerate any disobedience and that the nuns had been instructed to send her regular reports. At that time, I was too miserable myself to think about you. I was wrong and I beg your forgiveness.’