I love Philipp Inos
To confirm that my memories of Lisa and her merry band of dancing, morocca-shaking, chef-hatted Filippinos were solely the product of a great dream, I went back to the same restaurant last night, at half past eight. Even if they actually existed, which I was convinced they didn't, surely they wouldn't be back in Zhuzhou for this week's gigs, as promised.
On the street, I dodged the beggar girls, which I had also dismissed as products of my imagination, and entered the restaurant, heading upstairs. The room looked quite dark and deserted, and no "Day-O"s, or any other music, could be heard. Indeed, suspicions confirmed, I thought.
But I entered more closely, and was met by a few of the teen-age girls who work there. It was 8:30, past closing time -- welcome to Zhuzhou nightlife --and they were in their jeans and sweaters. Their eyes lit up when they saw me, and they pointed excitedly at me. I said in Chinese that no, I wasn't interested in eating, as I figured they thought I wanted feed. But they grabbed my arm and led me further into the restaurant.
There, in the dark, sat the entire merry band of Fillipinos, just done with their night's performance, eating a feast. They gathered to hug me and erupted in cheers of "Daniel, we love you!" and "We missed you!" and "Let's have a dance!" I apologized for being late, told them I was eating with Shu Jie (shoe GEE-uh) -- one of my students -- and her entire extended family. They asked me if Shu Jie is my wife. I told them no, I'm in China alone.
Instantly, they broke out the guitars and played and sang "You Are Not Alone," by Michael Jackson. During the course of the song, some of them would start beat-boxing, as others turned the song into rap, as others made farting noises to musical effect, as others bellowed, Aretha Franklin style. It was goofy, spontaneous fun, the kind known only to people who grew up in enormous families.
Indeed, Lisa, with a mere six siblings, comes from the smallest family of the bunch. "My family is a basketball team," said Luis. "Two starting fives, two coaches." "His parents believe in Family Planning," said Lisa, "BIG family planning!" Laughter followed, and Lisa said "joke-joke-joke."
And on the night went like this, joke followed by "joke-joke-joke", followed by goofy song followed by giddy laughter. At one point, I took out my just-developed photos, five rolls of the recent trip to Shanghai and Beijing with my older brother Bob, his wife Michelle, and my younger sister Patty.
First the seven Filippinos dug into the pile, each grabbing a handful. Then the Chinese teen-agers dug in, and quickly my photos were strewn all over the restaurant, amid the widespread food. The first was of my sister Patty and I riding a camel on the Great Wall.
"This is your wife!" one of the men shouted as the others gathered around excitedly. Not sure if he was referring to my sister or the camel, I nonetheless reminded him, "I'm in China alone." "But, this is your America wife," he said.
Sensing that they wouldn't stop until I had acknowledged the presence of a wife, I replied, "One of them." They laughed. I said "joke-joke-joke." They laughed again. And so every other woman who appeared in the photos -- my sister-in-law Michelle, strangers on the street, my students, acrobats in leotards -- became another of my "America wives." And the joke-joke-joke never got old-old-old.
The fun continued every night of this week, at the same restaurant. They played from 6:30 until 8 as I cha-cha-cha-ed, tangoed and limboed with Lisa and Mirna, and then we sat down to chow, sing and joke-joke-joke.
They were the most gregarious bunch of human beings I have ever encountered, another symptom, I think, of growing up poor amid a brood of brothers and sisters. Their jokes and laughter and songs would pause periodically, at which time Mirna and Lisa would point at me and scream, "EAT," stretching this itty-bitty word into two syllables and about five seconds.
"It makes us very sad if you don't eat," explained Mirna. Fair enough, except that, true to my nature, I was doing nothing but eat. And yet the commands continued.
Over the course of the week, we met Rocket, a Chinese student whose major is English, and he joined the fun. We sang a lot of Beatles songs, some John Denver, some They Might Be Giants, some Chinese songs and of course a ton of Filippino songs.
Pretty much whenever anything resembling a song lyric was uttered by anyone, they instantly broke into the song it belongs to. And so when they were about to go downstairs to change clothes, and I told them I'd wait upstairs, they sang, "Wherever you go, whatever you do, I'll be right here waiting for you." And when I remarked that their workload was heavy, of course out came "Hard Day's Night" by the Beatles. In anyone else, at any other place, this habit might have been annoying, but they were such total goofballs, and such great musicians, that all I could do was join them.
To make things ever cozier, they, newsflash, like America! They have the good sense to oppose Bush and all his evil deeds and empty promises, but they remember when Macarthur saved them from the marauding Japanese army during the second World War. "We owe our independence to your military," remarked Crisanto, one of the dancing chefs. "We will never forget." And Lisa pumped her first and repeated a line that Macarthur said, "We will return," and they broke into a Filippino patriotic song, in their language, spinning off from that line.
As I travel, I just assume belligerence toward America in any foreigners I meet, so it felt like a blast of fresh air for them to praise us. They all expressed a dream to move to America, believing that it's the path to financial opportunity. All I could think was, I want to move to the Philippines, as there lies the path to personal happiness.
What felt like all-night revelry usually would end at about 10 or 10:30, at which time they'd prepare for another show -- they had to perform at 11:30 each night at a different restaurant -- and I'd split.
I rode half an hour back to the village on a minibike taxi, the State Highway for the Insane completely deserted, ghostly dark, and I'd tilt my head back for a good look at the stars, let the winter air blow through my nostrils and fall into a trance, not seeing another vehicle or light for miles and miles. A few times, this inspired me to break into a song we had sung earlier that night. And the minibike would stop suddenly, the driver mistaking "Daylight come and me want to go home" or "Everyone's your friend in New York City" for, "this is my house, please stop." How to explain? I had to muzzle myself from then on, but it was tough.
Tonight was to be our grand finale -- their last night in Zhuzhou, my last night in China. I had withheld my most cherished dance move -- the backspin -- and was planning to unveil it for tonight's show. However, Lisa, in addition to teaching me to tango and to cha-cha-cha, also infected me with gastroenteritis.
For the past two nights, she visited the water closet with the frequency of Dagwood Bumstead at the deli, and complained of a sour stomach. We always sat next to each other at dinner, and the slightest hesitation in my chopsticks' motion from dish to mouth was met with a chorus: "EAT!" "EAT!" "EAT!" And so I ate, ate, ate, out of dishes touched also by Lisa, and everyone else, and, today, the water closet has been my living room, and it's no joke-joke-joke.
Cha-cha-cha
Campus is ghostland. No one is here, the buildings are locked, the restaurant shacks are boarded up. Because of this, no meal for me around here tonight, so I had to head into Zhuzhou City, aboard a kamikaze minibike taxi, to feed.
I know of two restaurants in Zhuzhou City: McDonalds and KFC. I didn't want to grub at either joint, but sort of resigned myself to it, as they're the only places I know I'll both eat for cheap and know what I'm eating.
I passed McDonalds, unable to stomach the thought of another freakin McSawdust burger, and was on my way to KFC, just down the street. A little girl, about six, filthy, wearing rags, started tugging on my sleeve, holding a cup and begging for some loot.
Prior to China, I would easily have helped her out. But, in China, giving to beggars carries almost the same dishonorable stigma as being a beggar. Once I was downtown with Charles and Turbo, two of my first-year students. I was about to hand over some loose change to a beggar when Turbo, normally painfully polite, ripped the coins out of my hands, furious.
"They are scum," he told me. "They are not poor, they put on rags to trick you into feeling sympathy. Never, ever give them money, please!"
Wow. Turbo comes from poverty. He grew up on a little farm with his parents, spent a good portion of his childhood carrying water and other farm supplies on a shoulder-pole, was a total stranger to computers until he got to university, and, obviously, has worked tirelessly for everything he has. He doesn't lack compassion; quite the opposite. It's just that he, and everyone else I've met here, thinks of the work he's done to get to where he is, and sees beggars sitting idly on the street, tugging on the arms of strangers, and views them as vultures, not victims.
Always, my students apologize endlessly when beggars approach us, embarrassed to their bones. I tell them that the streets of urban America are lined with beggars, much more than in China, and that they're as much a part of the urban landscape, everywhere, as shopping malls and skyscrapers. Out of respect for my students' requests, though, it's my policy never to hand over any loot.
The girl made a convincing case. I'd walk, she'd stand in front of me, forcing me one way or the other. This went on about four series, and then she got even more crafty: she dove down on the street in front of me and tugging at my legs, trying to trip me. I hurdled her, she got back back up and dove down in front of me again. After three hurdles, I gave up. There was a restaurant to my left, the only one between McDonalds and KFC, so I turned in there and entered.
Instantly, a young woman, wearing the usual elegant, full-length red dress worn by hostesses all over China, greeted me -- in English! -- and escorted me upstairs. I had a seat, scanned the menu and what in the bejesus: steak, pizza, pasta, chicken?! On an English menu!?
I had stumbled, quite literally, into Zhuzhou's only Western restaurant. I ordered a fruit plate, a salad plate, and pasta and chicken as my entree, thoughts of the little girl unsettling my mind. The restaurant was filling up quickly, all Chinese people except me, and people greeted me warmly as they entered. I dug into my dinner, immersed in fabulous conversation with Gabriel Garcia Marquez's autobiography. I know of no better company, and the food, amazingly, tasted delicious.
I was about done, scraping the last crumbs out of my salad bowl, when in walked my boss and his boss, my uber-boss. My boss is a man I would never intentionally pursue as a dinner companion. He's uptight, prim-and-proper, spic-and-span, and has been described by three different women friends of mine, on separate occasions, scornfully, as "such a woman."
Alas, he's a kind gent, and he was a familiar face, and it was nice to see them after we'd been away for about three weeks. We wished each other happy New Year in Chinese and talked about my family's trip to Beijing. They've both visited there and, like me, loved it.
As they were chomping down their main course, and I was sipping a beer, out of nowhere came a cry of "Day-O, Daaay-O" from the back of the room. There was a Hispanic man, dressed in a black tuxedo, making these cries. I looked up to the front of the room and there were two guitarists, dressed in chef's hats, a guy shaking moroccas, a woman playing a Spanish flute and three dancers: another mustached Latino in a black tuxedo; an older, heavy-set woman in an elegant red dress; and a radiantly gorgeous, enchanting young Latina woman, the same red dress draped over her svelte frame.
Within seconds, the band was in full rhythm, playing a seductive tempo, and the radiantly gorgeous dancer was next to me, begging me to dance, speaking flawless English.
And so there I was, tango-ing, cha-cha-chaing, twirling all over the floor with one of the most gorgeous women I have ever seen, as the chefs strummed their guitars, the flautist tooted her flute and moroccas shook. The other dancers were clapping their hands, encouraging the audience to clap along, and my Chinese bosses joined the chorus, "Day-O, Daay-O, daylight come and me want to go home."
As we cut floor furiously, and the crowd went berserk, the woman introduced herself to me as Lisa, said she's from the Phillipines, lied about what great rhythm I have and asked me how on earth I'm here. I told her I'm a teacher in China, that she is the first person I've met who can speak flawless English, and remarked on the utter absurdity of what was currently happening.
This was the second time that, out of nowhere, "culture," as I've previously understood it, erupted unexpectedly in this industrial backwater. Music is performed only at karaoke bars, only by Chinese people, singing only Chinese songs.
This time as last time, the sudden eruption of culture shot adrenaline through me as though delivered by a fire hose, and I seized the moment, sensing that it will likely be the last.
I am no maestro on the dancefloor, and I was dressed in thermal long underwear, jeans, a turteneck and my Irish sweater, but none of it mattered. Spurred on by the infectious energy and endless encouragement of Lisa, I busted a move with all the meager rhythm granted by God to a white kid from Falcon Heights, MN. It seemed the more ridiculous my movements felt, the more frenzied the crowd's response, and the faster the tempo Lisa ordered for us, as the band played on.
As we twirled and tangoed and bumped, my only thought was that, before long, Murphy's Law of dancing dictates that I'll land an elbow to Lisa's cheekbone. She was maybe 5-foot-4, and we were in such close proximity, performing such difficult stunts, that it could only end in TKO.
But there was no pulling out now, Lisa's cheekbones be damned. She ordered me around with the stern hand of an aerobics instructor, "Back, forward, cha-cha-cha, Forward, back, cha-cha-cha, now faster this time, no slacking!"
The TKO fears never materialized. The usual sweat fears, though, did. My metabolism needs no encouragement to start the sweat flying, and it had plenty: layers of winter clothes, an overheated restaurant, a workout at aerobic pace. Without question, I was burning lactic acid, and within minutes, sweat was flying from my head. I looked at Lisa and, what the bejesus: she was dripping sweat, too! Her make-up was starting to run, her eyes were starting to sting, and yet she was boogying feistily, screaming about what a great pair we are and how great it feels to sweat on the dancefloor. There is a God.
After ten minutes of "Day-O," the song finally ended, and I said a prayer of thanksgiving for that opportunity to be with Lisa. Well, the next song started, this one with an even more rapid tempo, and there Lisa stood alone. Before long, she walked back to my table. "Won't you please dance with me again?"
I flung off the Irish sweater and resumed cha-cha-chaing with Lisa, in front of the still-frenzied crowd. Now, with the uptempo rhythm, we may as well have been doing quarter-mile repeats, all-out.
Lisa was her usual charismatic self, dancing furiously, smiling seductively, barking out instructions to me, and rousing the crowd to a deeper state of euphoria. All the while, she was dripping sweat like no one I have ever seen, except for me or my brother Bob, and completely revelling in it. Still, my own sweat-drenched body was creating some serious self-consciousness.
Finally, I excused myself about 15 minutes into the endless song, and the men in tuxedos looked at me and started clapping furiously, as though my drenched shirt was somehow a mark of a real maestro. Instead, it's the mark of a Simmons, but their cheers, coupled with the crowd's hoots, plus Lisa's whistling and cries of "Bravo, Bravo!," were enough to make me feel like a maestro and, for a moment, to forget that I'm in Zhuzhou City freakin China.
After the show, Lisa gave me her email address and told me to come back next week: they're performing every night, same place, from Tuesday through Friday. Score.
I walked outside and, suddenly, I was back in China. I thought it was only fair that I give the girl some loot for having me pointed me toward Lisa, but she wasn't there anymore. God bless her anyway.
I'm back
After two weeks away, I rode the overnight train from Beijing to Zhuzhou City, arriving at 8:44 a.m. -- exactly as promised on my ticket.
I caught a cab at the train station. It felt lovely to be back in the snarled madness of downtown Zhuzhou traffic. Immediately, a minibiker was in our sights, headed for a head-on collision. To avert him, we swerved into the opposite lane, where we found ourselves staring at the headlights of an oncoming blue dumptruck. Morning pleasantries, voiced through about a dozen horn honks apiece, were exchanged, and lives were spared, again, against all odds, with deft swerving, neither vehicle slowing a bit.
Before long we were on the State Highway for the Insane, heading out of the city and into the countryside, eventual destination this university. The road was quite deserted, so no collisions or near-death experiences.
The morning sun, radiant in the eastern sky, reflected off the standing pools in the rice fields. Mist rose from the frosted cabbage patches. Beige teepees, made of wheat stalks left over after the fall harvest, stood firm, spaced about fifteen feet apart. Narrow ribbons of red clay, raised about three feet above the soil, snaked between the fields, separating wheat from rice from cabbage from grain, providing workers transportation between the fields and an easy perch from which to water their crops.
Farmland here is more a collection of hundreds of little gardens than one enormous plot, and so fields have the look of an immense patchwork quilt, with the clay passageways the seams. They curve and twist constantly, and intersect at odd angles with curvy, twisty other ribbons of clay and thus form a Gaudi-ian geometry, and end only when they collide with a fifteen-foot-high dirt wall, rounded and shapely and announcing a rise to the next terrace. There, the same patchwork exists, and ribbons of clay snake between the fields, colliding at odd angles and eventually meeting their end at the next fifteen-foot wall of dirt, rounded and shapely, announcing the next terrace.
And the pattern continues, and all I can do is recognize that farmland is art and I better put on my running shoes for my next ten-mile trip through the museum that surrounds the State Highway for the Insane.
As we got closer to campus, an elderly man walked along the road, a live carp dangling from a rope in his right hand, flapping gently. And then a boy walked by with his father, his left hand clutching his father's hand, his right hand holding about five dozen bottle rockets, a smile of expectation on his chubby face. It's Spring Festival, and the villagers are stockpiling food and fireworks to celebrate, and everone is giddy. Firework explosions shake the earth and threaten my hearing, piles of leaves are burning everywhere, children are romping through campus.
Ever since I arrived in Shanghai two weeks ago, I've longed to return to Zhuzhou. At first, I thought the feeling would subside and I'd settle into life in what's known as civilization and forget my longing for life in the village. Instead, it grew only more intense, and now that I'm here, amid the sights and smells and noises that are by now perfectly familiar, I understand why I longed to be back, and I understand that, in four short months, Zhuzhou is home, and I'll miss it wherever I go in the world.
