Hiroshima Joe (26 page)

He had halted once to buy some sticks of sugar cane. Biting strips off and sucking the sweetness into his throat before spitting the woody fibre on to the path ahead would give him the strength he required to climb the fifteen hundred feet ahead of him. The shopkeeper had been surprised, though he had managed to hide most of his amazement, to see a European in his small store. Although they occasionally passed through the village
en route
for the mountain, they seldom if ever stopped to make a purchase, and they certainly never came in the summer. It was too hot for them to face the mountain paths in the middle months of the year: they generally arrived in February or March.

The shop was made of charcoal-grey bricks, as if it were solidified from the dull sky overhead. Across the front and under the canvas awning that was flapping and tensing in the wind hung several strands of fish and squid, drying in the air. He had asked after the price, but they were too expensive for him. That, too, had surprised the shopkeeper – that he should have been asked, then have the European refuse after counting through his loose change. Strange behaviour for a
gweilo.

A cube-shaped rattan basket blew over the stone-slabbed platform below the awning as Sandingham left. A girl not yet in her teens, with an infant sister strapped in place on her back by a brightly-coloured cloth that criss-crossed her childish breasts like a gawdy parachute harness, came out and prevented the basket from bowling away towards the river.

The paddyfields he took to after leaving the village were dark emerald with tall, near-ripe rice although the colour was muted by the dull weather. The heads of grain hung over and swished together in the wind like a million distant cicadas.

On the path stood an old man who was watching the crop with a worried frown. It was not ready for gathering and he knew that if the eye of the storm hit the island with accuracy, as was forecast, then by morning most of the grain would be levelled to the dense, muddy water in which it was rooted. A peasant woman wearing baggy black trousers, the legs rolled up to her knees to display her muscled calves, was taking no chances. She was approaching along the path, a bamboo pole over her left shoulder with an overloaded basket of cabbages and assorted greens hanging from each end. The old man stepped on to a paddy wall to give her passage and they muttered incoherently together as they reached each other. To let her by, Sandingham stood aside upon a stone balanced over an irrigation channel.

The rain began. At first it was a meagre drizzle but this cleared, to be followed shortly afterwards by large drops that were warm and heavy and hit the top of his cropped head with a firmness that was so definite he could count the impacts until they grew too numerous. It was then he knew he would have to find shelter.

Ahead were a few houses, but they lacked awnings. The windowless front walls were punctuated only by single doors, beside each of which, pasted to the stone doorposts, hung red paper scrolls bearing prayers in black characters, faded by the sun. The eves were typically shallow, and water cascaded from them – for there was no guttering – pitting the soil beneath.

Just before the houses was a ruined fort. Sandingham made for that.

He pushed the overhang of branches aside and sat down in the doorway of a collapsed room. While the rain fell he chewed upon the cane and listened to the water’s clamour on the leaves. When it ceased, he stood and went up the crumbling steps to the battlement. Several rusting cannons poked their snouts over the low balustrade and into the top foliage of the trees. He sat upon one of them. From there, he had a good view over the fields towards Ma Wan Chung, a panorama that had been studied previously by Chinese soldiers serving in the Opium Wars of the early nineteenth century and, before that, Portuguese soldiers trying to prevent the scourge of pirate junks from raiding the fertile valley.

He spoke out loud to no one. The wind whipped the words away. He tried to remember who had said it to him, and when.

‘History is now. War is all the time. There is always a fight going on somewhere. It’s all a part of human activity. Common as buying and selling.’

Beyond the fort the path skirted a wooded slope before crossing another expanse of flat fields prior to rising up the first foothill. He adjusted the army pack on his back, altering the brass buckles so that they did not bite into his shoulders or chafe his collar-bone. The knapsack was not a left-over from the war years, a relic treasured for its associations with memory. He wished it were: he could have done with it then. In fact it had been stolen from a soldier in transit through the hotel.

The ascent was gradual as far as the temple but, shortly after that, it increased sharply. The path narrowed as it wound through a belt of pine trees, then ran up a valley beside a gushing, splattering brook. The rain-swollen torrent, plunging down from the upper slopes of the mountain, was undermining the roots of the saplings by the path and, from place to place, was gouging out the pathway itself.

After an hour’s climb, he reached the first gate to the Buddhist nunnery. Here he paused and sat upon a rock, looking back over the route he had just taken. The drizzle had set in below him, and he could only see as far as the start of the valley.

With the wind tossing the trees, he set off once more, the path following the contours of the bleak sides of Lantau Peak. Short grass clung to the steep slope and he had to brace himself against the wind which tugged at him with no motive beyond a primitive desire to point out his human weakness to him.

As soon as he had reached the gap below the summit he paused once more. He sat down under a ceremonial archway, mist swirling around him and drops of dew collecting on his clothing. He was hot from the climb but not uncomfortably so.

Through the gap was a plateau and the mist lifted sufficiently for him to see the neatly planned fields of the monastery. Ten minutes later he was within the precinct and standing by a door. He banged with the palm of his hand upon the wooden panelling.

The wind was flinging grit up from the forecourt to the temple. It rattled upon his shoes. By and by, the door was opened by a shaven-headed monk in a dark habit.

‘Tso shan,’ Sandingham said, although he knew by now it was mid-afternoon. ‘Seung tso fong. Saam yat.’

The monk beckoned for him to enter, and closed the door against the weather.

‘Okay’, he replied. ‘Three night okay. Welcome to Po Lin Buddhis’ Monastery. Follow me. I show you to our gues’ dormitory.’

The monk’s English pronunciation was better than most Chinese could manage, and Sandingham felt he had lost face in speaking in pidgin Cantonese to him. He also knew that he need not worry. Face did not concern the inmates of Po Lin.

The two men passed through a bare room containing only a table and several chairs, pausing for Sandingham to write his name and address – he non-commitally wrote ‘Waterloo Road, Kowloon’ – in a visitors’ book. It had all the formality of a hotel. The monk watched over his shoulder as he wrote.

They left through a rear door and went down a narrow alleyway towards a two-storey, stone building. The monk pushed at the door with his hand. It stuck, then swung open suddenly, helped by the wind funnelling along the passage. Sandingham was ushered inside.

It was dark in the building but he could see a long table with forms to either side running down the centre of the room that constituted the entire ground floor. At the far end, by the only window, there was an open wooden staircase with no railing.

‘M koi – thank you.’

The monk told him what time the evening meal was and then asked, ‘You wan’ to eat here or wi’ monks?’

It would be easier for him to eat with the community. He was certain that he was the only guest, and to dine alone would seem churlish. He replied that he would eat with the monks.

‘T’ank you,’ said the monk and turned away, only to stop on the way to the door. ‘You been to Po Lin before?’

‘Yes. Last year.’

‘Tha’ righ’. I remember you.’ He paused. ‘You wan’ see abbot again?’

‘Yes,’ replied Sandingham, not a little surprised that the man should recall him.

‘Okay. Can do.’

Sandingham had first learned of the monastery when he overheard two Europeans discussing it on the Star Ferry. One of them had visited it as a weekend trip, taking a long hike to what he obviously considered, in a patronising way, to be a typically Chinese – he implied ‘native’ from his tone – and yet movingly strange and wonderful place. He had gone simply as a tripper and, although he had not really regarded his visit as anything more than a curiosity call, Po Lin monastery had left its mark on him.

‘Anyway. This monastery’s a quiet spot and no mistake. Buddhist. No cars, no phones. No electricity, either. Or hot water: had to shave in a trough fed by a stream. Just the monks muttering prayers about the place and one old boy ringing a damn great bell all the time. Must be bloody freezing in mid-winter as it’s a fair way up the mountain. Still, they like a bit of ascetic discomfort, don’t they? Purges their souls!’

Both men chuckled magnanimously.

‘Cost you much?’

‘Ferry fare. And the pain of undiscovered muscles. But staying in the place is buckshee. The monks are bound by an oath of hospitality. Can’t turn you away. Naturally, you drop a bit in the old box before you leave, but how much is up to you.’ The ferry slowed as it approached the pierhead: the man looked at his watch and continued, ‘The food’s bloody good. All vegetarian, of course.’

For the rest of that day, as he sought tourists to filch from, the thought of the monastery lingered in Sandingham’s mind. Such a place might do him good. He wanted such peace so very badly.

The monk left and Sandingham went up the stairs.

The upper floor was made of bare planks. Along all four walls were two-tiered bunks. It had the familiar security of a dormitory, the certainty of comrades, the safety of numbers. Over each bunk hung a mosquito net tied into a suspended knot, and at the foot of each was a thin cotton quilt. In lieu of a pillow was a chocolate-brown lacquered box shaped to fit the neck. There were no mattresses but instead there were dun-coloured blankets.

He looked out of the window. The wind was risen higher still and the force of it had dispersed the mist. The storm was coming. He placed his knapsack on the bunk nearest the window and, going downstairs, left the monastery to walk south through the adjoining fields. Ahead of him was a low rise on the sides of which were pagoda-like vaults, fifteen feet high, the tombs of former monks. He walked up to one, looked uncomprehendingly at the characters engraved upon the stone, then topped the rise. There was a boulder there that was shaped like a crude seat: the abbots sometimes went to sit upon it and meditate.

Sandingham looked down over a deep, wide valley beyond which was a thin strip of beach and the open South China Sea. The swell was heavy and crashing in spray upon the sand and the rocky outcrops nearly two thousand feet below. The village that was halfway across the base of the valley seemed to be cowering from the imminent storm. Each breath he took was a struggle to snatch from the howling wind. When the rain started once more, rising vertically up the hillside towards him, he left the boulder and returned to the monastery where he lay down on his bunk and let his limbs slacken.

*   *   *

The dull bell boomed against the wind. It was not a continuous ringing, such as one might hear from a church belfry, but a deep, broken knell that came every ninety seconds exactly. The monk in charge of the bell rang it daily, for hours on end, and his blood was attuned to the sound and the timespan for each impact of the log-like hammer that hung from two points on a rafter over his head.

Sandingham could hear it as he shaved in a basin of cold water he had collected for himself from a trough outside the dormitory. A small mirror was screwed on to the wall near the stairs and, by the light of a paraffin lamp, he was able to do a fair job of his toilet. He washed under his armpits and sluiced his chest. The water refreshed and renewed him.

‘We eating in t’irty minutes,’ the monk said who had come to tell him. He was ready; even his shirt was clean – he had rinsed the one he had worn for the climb in the overflow from the trough.

The wind was vicious but warm and the rain had eased off as he opened the door to the dormitory, turned left and made his way through a round moon-gate into a tidy garden in which shrubs were flourishing in porcelain pots under the shade of Chinese willow and plum trees. Faint lamplight from the windows cast a waxy pallor on to the swaying boughs.

A row of twenty-three monks was filing in through a rear doorway as he entered the refectory. They chanted as they moved and the sound that issued from them was more like the wind’s than a man’s voice. The guestmaster pointed to the place at which Sandingham was to sit.

There was no table. The monks squatted along the walls of the room on child-size stools. A rice bowl, china spoon and chopsticks were laid on a woven reed matting before each setting.

The abbot sat at the head of the gathering, coming in last. He made no acknowledgement of Sandingham’s presence. Nor did any of his brethren.

A monk worked his way round the oblong of monks with a ladle and cauldron. From this, he filled each bowl with a thin soup in which small yellowish leaves floated. Sandingham did not eat. He watched what the others did. In their turn, they prayed, intoned and murmured, sipping at the soup between verses or prayers. Sandingham could not understand – could hardly hear – a word of their speech. It was so low that even the simplest words escaped him. He was even doubtful they were speaking in Cantonese. Slowly, so as not to appear in a rush, he drank.

Over the space of an hour other courses followed. Each was served by the same monk. They consisted of dishes made with vegetables, milk, eggs and cheese, bean curd and rice flour. Several looked like meat and tasted like meat but Sandingham knew that they were not. It was against the Buddha’s teaching to kill flesh.

When the last of the meal was eaten, tea was served in smaller bowls. When the tea arrived the monks stopped their incantations, but they did not start to speak.