POW! 22
Another burst of fireworks blossoms in the sky, and four red circles transmogrify into large green characters——spelling out ‘peace on earth’. They disintegrate into dozens of green meteorites that then fizzle in the darkness. Another cluster quickly fills the void, illuminating the lingering smoke from the previous burst and thickens the heavy smell of gunpowder that hangs over the field and makes my throat itch. Wise Monk, I witnessed many celebrations back when I was roaming the city streets, grand parades in daylight and fireworks displays at night, but I've never seen anything to match tonight's display of pyrotechnic words and intricate patterns. Times evolve, society progresses and the skill of fireworks artisans keeps improving, as does the art of barbecuing meat. Going back ten years, Wise Monk, the best we could manage here was lamb kebabs over a charcoal fire. But now there's Korean barbecue, Japanese barbecue, Brazilian barbecue, Thai barbecue and Mongolian barbecue. There's quail teppanyaki, flint-fired lamb's tail, charcoal mutton, pebble-roasted pork liver, pine-bough roast chicken, peach-wood roast duck, pear-wood roast goose…it's hardly farfetched to say that there's nothing in the world that can't be barbecued or roasted. An announcement signals the end of the fireworks display amid whoops and shouts from the spectators. Grand feasts must end some time, good times never last long, a thought that I find especially depressing. The final, and largest, pyrotechnic burst drags a fiery thread five hundred metres into the sky. Then it bursts to form a big red —meat—from which sparks cascade earthward, like drippings from a hunk of meat as it's removed from the pot. The people's eyes—bigger, it seems, than even their mouths, which in turn are bigger than their fists—are glued to the sight, as if waiting expectantly for the in the sky to drop into their mouths. In a matter of seconds breaks up into dozens of white umbrellas that float slowly to the ground, trailing white silk streamers, before being swallowed up by the inky night. It does not take long for my eyes to adjust to the darkness, allowing me to see hundreds of barbecue stands on the open field across the street. As one, their lights snap on, each covered by a red lampshade, the red rays of light creating an air of mystery in the night. It reminds me of the ghost markets of popular legend: flickering shadows, indistinct features, pointed teeth, green fingernails, transparent ears, poorly hidden tails…The meat-peddlers are ghosts, the meat-eaters human. Or else the meat-peddlers are human, the meat-eaters ghosts. If not that, the peddlers and the eaters of meat are all human, or all ghosts. If an outsider were to wander into a night market like that, he'd be witness to all sorts of unimaginable things. When he thought about them later, they would send chills up his spine but would give him a wealth of things to boast about. Wise Monk, you have left the mortal world and the bitter seas of humanity, and so have escaped the stories of the ghost markets. I grew up in the gory confines of Slaughterhouse Village, and spent much of my childhood listening to those tales. Like the one about a man who walked into a ghost market by mistake and caught sight of a fat man roasting his own leg over a charcoal fire, slicing off edible pieces when it was done. ‘Watch out!’ the visitor yelled. ‘You'll turn into a cripple!’ With a cry of anguish, the man threw down his knife, knowing he was now a cripple, something that would not have happened if the visitor hadn't shouted out. Then there was the man who got up early to ride his bicycle into town to sell meat. But he lost his way. When he saw lamplight ahead, he discovered a thriving meat market where curling smoke welcomed him with an extraordinary aroma. Peddlers shouted their wares and sweat dotted the diners’ foreheads. Business was lively, to the great joy of the newcomer, who set up a stall, including his butcher block, and laid out an array of aromatic, freshly roasted meat. His first shout drew a crowd of people who fought to place their orders—one jin for this person, two for that—without even asking the price. He had trouble keeping up with the demand of people who were in no mood to wait. They flung the money into his rush bag, grabbed the meat with their bare hands and began to stuff their faces. And as they chewed and swallowed, their faces underwent a hideous change and green lights began to shoot from their eyes. Realizing something was seriously amiss, the man scooped up his rush bag and fled, stumbling away and not stopping till the roosters crowed the coming dawn. Then he looked round him and discovered that he was standing in a wildwood. And when he checked his rush bag all he found was ash. Wise Monk, the barbecuing night market in front of us is an important component of the Twin Cities Carnivore Festival, and should not be a ghost market. But even if it were, would that matter? People these days enjoy nothing more than making contact with ghosts. These days it's the ghosts who are frightened by the people. The meat-peddlers out there all wear chef's hats, and they look top heavy as they busily chop meat and hail customers with their exaggerated claims. Charcoal and meat create a smell that seems to come from a time long ago, from past millennia, blanketing as much as a square kilometre. Black smoke merges with white smoke to form smoky colours that rise into the air and send birds weaving crazily in the sky. Gaily dressed young men and women happily wolf down the meat. A beer in one hand and a skewer of lamb in the other, some take a bite of meat, then a drink of beer and produce a loud belch. Others stand facing one another, man to woman, in a feeding frenzy. More daring couples hold a single piece of meat in their teeth and eat their way closer, until the end of the meat signals the beginning of a kiss, to the raucous delight of people round them. I'm hungry, Wise Monk, and I have a greedy mouth. But I took a vow to abstain from eating meat. I know that what's going on out there is your way to put me to the test, and I'll resist temptation by continuing my narration—
A number of important events occurred in our family round the Spring Festival. The first was on the afternoon of the fourth day of the new year, that is, the day after Lao Lan had dinner at our house, even before we had a chance to clean the tableware and furniture we'd borrowed for the occasion. Mother and Father were having a casual conversation as they washed dishes. Actually, it was anything but ‘casual’, since the talk did not stray far from Lao Lan, returning to him every two or three sentences. Once I'd heard enough, I went outside, where I peeled back the tarp covering the mortar, took out a packet of grease, and, for the last time before it was moved into the storeroom, laid on a protective coat. Now that the family had re-established friendly relations with Lao Lan, I no longer had an enemy. But that didn't remove the need to keep my weapon in good working order, if for no other reason than to remain alert to something my parents said over and over during that talk: ‘No one stays an enemy for ever, and no friendships are eternal.’ That is to say, an enemy today could become a friend tomorrow, and today's friend could turn into tomorrow's enemy. And there's no enemy as savage and full of loathing as someone who was once a friend. That's why it was important to keep my mortar in good working order. If the need to use it ever arose, I could put it into action immediately. I'd never consider selling it to a scrap dealer.
I began by wiping off the old coat of dust-covered grease with cotton yarn. Starting on the tube and moving down to the bipod, then from there to the gun sight and, finally, to the base plate, I cleaned it with painstaking care, reaching into every nook and cranny, including the tube, for which I used a stick wrapped in cotton yarn, back and forth hundreds of times, since my arm would not fit inside. The now-greaseless mortar had a dull, gunmetal-grey finish, and the spots eaten away by rust over the years lay exposed. Too bad, really too bad, but there was nothing I could do about that. I'd tried sanding the rusty spots with a brick and sandpaper but was afraid that I'd scrape off so much metal it would no longer be safe to fire. After removing the old grease, I spread on a new coat with my fingers, smooth and even. Every nook and cranny, of course. I'd bought this packet of grease at a little village near the airport. The villagers there, who'd steal anything, with the possible exception of an aeroplane, told me it was aeroplane-engine grease, and I believed them. A protective coat of that grease made it a very lucky mortar indeed.
My sister watched me while I tended to it.
I didn't have to look to know that she was following my every move, wide-eyed. Every now and then she'd come up with a question: ‘What is that thing?’ ‘What's a mortar used for?’ ‘When will you fire it?’ and so on. I answered all of them because I was so fond of her. It also gave me pleasure to play the role of teacher.
I finished applying the grease but just as I was thinking of putting back the tarp, a pair of electricians from the village strolled into the compound. With startled faces and flashing eyes, they warily approached the mortar. Though they were in their twenties, their childlike expressions made them look like awkward little boys. They asked the same sorts of questions as Jiaojiao, but they were far less sophisticated. In fact, they were ignorant, ill-informed dopes, at least as far as weapons were concerned. Which is why they didn't receive the patient responses I'd given Jiaojiao. I either ignored them or teased them. ‘How far can this mortar reach?’ ‘Not far—about as far as your house. Don't believe me? No? Let's give it a try. I'll bet I can flatten your house with one shell.’ My teasing didn't get the rise out of them I'd hoped for. Instead, they bent over, cocked their heads and squinted down the tube, as if it contained a mysterious secret. So I smacked the tube with my hand and shouted: ‘Ready—aim—fire!’ They nearly fell all over themselves as they scuttled away, like frightened rabbits. ‘Scaredy cats!’ I shouted. ‘Scaredy cats!’ echoed Jiaojiao. They laughed sheepishly in response.
My parents came into the yard and rolled up their sleeves, exposing pale arms for Mother and dark for Father; if not for his swarthy skin as a contrast, I'd never have realized how pale Mother's were. Their hands were red from steeping in cold water. Unable to remember the men's names, Father hemmed and hawed but Mother knew who they were. ‘Tongguang, Tonghui,’ she greeted them with a smile, ‘it's been a long time.’ Turning to Father, she explained: ‘They're the sons of the Peng family, both electricians. I thought you knew them.’
The Peng brothers bowed respectfully to Mother. ‘Aunty, the village head sent us to instal electricity in your house.’
‘But we haven't asked for electricity!’ Mother exclaimed.
‘We're just following orders,’ Tongguang replied.
‘Will it cost a lot?’ Father asked.
‘We don't know,’ Tonghui said. ‘We just do the installing.’
‘Since the village head sent you,’ Mother said after a moment's hesitation, ‘go ahead.’
‘That's what we like, Aunty, someone who makes up her mind!’ exclaimed Tongguang. ‘Since we're doing this on the village head's orders, at most there'll be a modest fee for the material.’
‘Maybe not even that,’ Tonghui said. ‘It's the village head, after all.’
‘We'll pay whatever it costs,’ Mother assured them. ‘We're not the kind to abuse the public trust.’
‘Aunty Luo is a generous person, everyone knows that,’ said Tongguang with a smile. ‘People say she brings home bones found in scrap heaps and boils them to feed Xiaotong.’
‘Go to hell!’ snapped Mother. ‘Do what you came to do or get out of my yard!’
The Peng brothers giggled their way out onto the street and began moving a folding ladder, electric wiring, electric sockets, meters and other equipment into the yard. They were an impressive sight with their wide brown leather belts from which hung grips, shears and screwdrivers in a variety of colours. Mother and I once found a set of tools like that in a lane behind the city's fertilizer plant, but she took it to one of the hardware outlets behind the department store and sold it for thirteen yuan. That made her so happy she rewarded me with a meat-filled flatbread. The Peng brothers, tools at their waist, dragged the electric wire up over the eaves before going inside. Mother followed. Father squatted down to inspect the mortar.
‘It's an 82 mm mortar,’ he said. ‘Japanese. During the War of Resistance, the most outstanding service you could perform was to get your hands on one of these.’
‘You surprise me, Dieh,’ I exclaimed. ‘I never thought you knew stuff like that. What do the shells look like? Have you ever seen one?’
‘I served in the militia and trained in town,’ he said. ‘They had four just like this for our use. I was the second man on a team. My job was to feed ammo to the man firing the mortar.’
‘Tell me more!’ I said excitedly. ‘Tell me what the shells looked like.’
‘They were like…like…’ He picked up a stick and drew a picture of a shell with a bulging middle and a pointed tip in the sand. And tiny wings at one end. ‘Like this.’
‘Did you ever fire one?’
‘I'd have to say yes. As Number Two, my job was to hand the shells to my comrade, who took them, and…’ He bent, spread his legs and pretended to hold a shell. ‘Then dropped them in like this, and, with a pop, they were on their way.’
POW! 23
Several paint-spattered men are pushing a two-wheeled flatbed wagon up to the temple door. They have only a blurred view of us, since they're in the light and we're in the shadows, but I see them clearly. One, a tall, slightly stooped old man, mumbles: ‘I wonder when these people will stop eating.’ ‘With meat that cheap,’ one of the shorter fellows answers, ‘they'd be fools to stop before they have to.’ ‘The way I see it, the Carnivore Festival ought to be called the Waste Money and Manpower Festival,’ says a man with a pointy chin. ‘It gets bigger and louder every year, and more and more money is poured into it. But it's been ten years now and it's brought in neither more business nor more capital, not as far as I can see. What it does bring in are big-bellied people who eat like wolves.’ ‘Huang Shifu, where are we supposed to be taking this Meat God?’ the short fellow asks the stooped old man. All four, if I'm not mistaken, are from a sculpture village not far from Slaughterhouse Village. The residents have a long tradition of producing fine sculptures of religious idols, not only out of clay and hemp but out of wood as well. The Wutong Spirit in this temple was probably made by their forebears. But village traditions crumbled during the campaign against superstition, and the artisans were forced to take up new occupations: they became tile masons, carpenters, house painters, inside and out. These days, with all the temples being rebuilt, their skills have grown useful again. The old man takes a look round. ‘Let's leave him here in the temple for the time being,’ he says. ‘He'll have the Wutong Spirit to keep him company. One's hung like a horse, the other's a meat god, a match made in Heaven, wouldn't you say?’ He laughs at his own witticism. ‘But is that a good idea?’ Pointy Chin asks. ‘You can't have two tigers on a mountain or two horses at a trough, and I'm afraid two deities will be too much for a small temple like this.’ ‘No,’ the short man says, ‘these two aren't proper deities. The Wutong Spirit is the bane of beautiful women, and I hear that this one is really a boy from Slaughterhouse Village who loves to eat meat. After something terrible happened to his parents,’ sighs the fourth, lean-faced man, ‘he travelled the countryside with his mysterious airs, challenging people to meat-eating contests. They say he once finished off more than twenty feet of sausage, one pair of dog's legs and ten pigtails. Someone like that would have to become a god.’ All the while they're sharing opinions, the four men drag the clay idol—a good six feet in length and an arm-span in thickness—off the wagon and tie ropes round its neck and feet. Then they slide a pair of shoulder poles under the ropes and, with a shout, hoist it onto their shoulders. Bent at the waist, the four men struggle to move the idol through the narrow door and into the temple. The ropes have been left too long, so the idol's head bangs loudly against the threshold. I feel dizzy, as if it's my head and not the idol's that's been thumped against the door. But the stooped old man, who's carrying the feet, notices the problem and shouts at the others: ‘Lay it down, don't drag it like that!’ The two men at the front immediately take the poles off their shoulders and lay down the idol. ‘This prick of a god is damned heavy!’ Pointy Chin complains. ‘Clean up your talk,’ warns one of the others, ‘or—’ ‘Or what!’ asks Pointy Chin. ‘Will the Meat God stuff my mout
h full of meat?’ The old man at the back shortens the rope, then gives another shout. The poles are hoisted back onto their shoulders and the four men stand up straight. The idol rises and is carried slowly into the temple, the back of its head barely brushing against the floor. In a flash, I see it nearly bang into the shaved head of the Wise Monk, but fortunately the two men at the front change direction. But then the idol's feet nearly bump into my mouth, and this time the good fortune is mine, as the men at the back change direction. I detect a mixed odour of clay, paint and wood wafting off the men's bodies. Some men and women with torches appear in the doorway, caught up in a discussion of something or other. A few words later I know what they are going on about. This year's Carnivore Festival was supposed to be celebrated along with the Foundation-Stone-Laying Ceremony for a Meat God Temple. The spot across the way, where the festive night market is still abuzz, is where the temple was to be built. But a ranking official who's come to participate in the Carnivore Festival is critical of the twin cities plan for the Meat God Temple. ‘He's much too conservative,’ a boyish woman with bobbed hair complains indignantly. ‘He accuses us of creating gods and fostering superstition. Well, so what? Aren't all gods created by human beings? And who isn't superstitious? I hear he goes to Mt Yuntai to draw tallies, and then gets down on his knees in front of the Buddha statue to kowtow.’ ‘I think that's enough from you,’ says Xiao Qiao, a middle-aged official. ‘The main reason is there wasn't enough in his red envelope,’ she grumbles, ignoring him. ‘I said, that's enough from you, Comrade,’ repeats Xiao Qiao, with a pat on her shoulder, ‘Don't let your mouth get you into trouble. But she carries on, though it's increasingly hard to hear what she's saying. Their torch beams criss-cross inside the temple, the brightest swinging past the Horse Spirit's face the Wise Monk's face my face. Don't they know it's rude to shine a light in someone's eyes? The beams swing past the faces of the four men carrying the Meat God into the temple and finally pool on the face of the idol stretched out on the floor. ‘What's going on here?’ Xiao Qiao demans angrily. ‘Why is the Meat God on the floor? Pick him up, quick!’ The carriers lay down their poles, untie the ropes and take their place round the upper half of the idol's body, where each gets a handhold and then, in unison, they shout: ‘Heave!’ Not until the six-foot Meat God is on its feet do I perceive its immense size and realize that it's been carved out of the trunk of a single tree. I've always known that idols with long histories have been carved out of fine woods like sandalwood, but in times like these, when environmental protection and forest conservation are major concerns, it's almost impossible to find such a stately old sandalwood tree, even deep in the forest. And if you did, it'd be illegal to cut it down. So what was the Meat God carved out of? The stinking new paint on it concealed both the kind of wood it was made out of as well as any chance of the wood's natural odour providing a clue. If Xiao Qiao hadn't asked the workers that very question, I'd have never known what this god, which is so closely tied to me, was made of. ‘Is this sandalwood?’ he asks. ‘Where could we possibly find sandalwood?’ the old man replies with a smirk. ‘Then what is it?’ ‘Willow.’ ‘Did you say willow? Insects love willow trees. Aren't you afraid they'll hollow the thing out in a few years?’ ‘I agree’, the old man replies, willow isn't ideal for carving statues, but trees this big are hard to find, and before the carving began we soaked the wood with insecticide.’ ‘The carving lacks proportion,’ points out a young, bespectacled official, ‘the boy's head is too big.’ ‘It's not a boy,’ the old man corrects him with another smirk, ‘it's a god, and the heads of gods and humans are different. Look at the Wutong Spirit. Have you ever seen a horse with a human head?’ A torch beam swings over to illuminate the Horse Spirit. First the face—a captivating face—then the neck—the spot where the human and horse necks ingeniously meet evokes seductive eroticism—and then lower, stopping at the unnaturally large genitals—testicles the size of papayas and a half-exposed penis that looks like a laundry paddle emerging from a red sheath. I hear masculine giggles in the dark. The female official shines her torch on the Meat God's face: ‘This boy will definitely be a god in another five hundred years,’ she says in a huff. One of her male comrades, who's shining his light on the Horse Spirit, says in a more studious tone: ‘This god reveals a historical vestige of bestiality in remote antiquity. Have the rest of you heard the story of Wu Zetian engaging in sexual congress with the Donkey Prince?’ ‘We know you're an educated man, dear fellow,’ one of his comrades responds, ‘but go home and write an article instead of showing off to us.’ Xiao Qiao turns to the four carriers. ‘It's up to you to take care of the Meat God. His temple will be built as an expression of the people's yearnings for a good life, not to promote superstition. Meat on the table every day is an important standard of a comfortable, middle-class life.’ Once again, the torch beams light up the Meat God's face. By concentrating on the boy's outsized head, I strive to find traces of myself from ten years earlier. But the longer I look, the less likely I am to find any. A round face in an oval head, slitted eyes, puffy cheeks, a dimple on each side of the mouth and big, floppy, palm-like ears is what I see. Then there's the look of joy on its face. How in the world could that be me? My memory's clear—ten years ago there was a lot more suffering, a lot more sorrow than joy or happiness. ‘Section Chief’, the old man says to the official, ‘we've delivered the Meat God to the temple—we've done what we were hired to do. If you expect us to take care of it after this, you'll have to pay.’ ‘Do you actually expect to get paid for a good deed in addition to accumulating merit?’ Xiao Qiao asks. The four men burst into complaint: ‘How are we supposed to live if we don't get paid for our work?’