Terracotta Typewriter

Issue #3 Fa

ll 2009

Unsolicited manuscripts are welcomed throughout the year.

Terracotta Typewriter seeks submissions of literary works

with a connection to China. The definition of “connection to

China” can be stretched as much as an author sees fit. For ex-

ample, expatriate writers living in China or who have lived

in China, Chinese writers writing in English, translators of

Chinese writing, works that are set in China, manuscripts

covered in Chinese food (General Tso’s chicken doesn’t

count), or anything else a creative mind can imagine as a con-

nection to China.

© 2009 by Terracotta Typewriter. All rights reserved.

Cover art by Elrond Burrell © 2009

Visit our Web site at http://www.tctype.com.

This literary journal is free for distribution.

NOT FOR RESALE.

Terracotta Typewriter

A Cultural Revolution

of Literature

In This Issue

Letters to the Editor 1

Genghis and Me 3 Kaiser Kuo

Poster Boy 6 Karen Hunt

Letter 20 John Bennett

Interview with 22

Gene Ayres

Review: The Beijing 31

of Possibilities

Penjing 33 Rebecca Demarest

Hello, Good-bye 38 Vivian Liao

ChiNa 49 William S. Tribell

Contributor Notes 50

Letters to the Editor Dear Sir/Madam,

We are looking for a trustworthy representative in New Zealand that

can help as a link between our company and our client over there.we

would like to know if you are interested to work from home for us and

earn up to $800 to $1,500 Dollars weekly for your services.

Our company produces various clothing materials, batiks, assorted

fabrics and traditional costumes.We have clients we supply goods weekly

in New Zealand and our clients make payments for our supplies every

week in form of money orders and Bank Transfar which are not cashable

here in China,so we need someone in New Zealand to work as our repre-

sentative to assist us in processing payments from our clients and we will

pay him/her weekly wage.

All you need to do is to receive this payment from our clients in

New Zealand on behalf of our company and get it cashed at your bank

then deduct your 10% and forward the balance to our company here in

China.

Thank you as we await your further response.

In Trust And Good Faith

Mr.Zheng Choua, Sales Manager,

Ghangzhou, China

Mr. Zheng,

Thank you for your kind offer, but I’m having difficulty finding Ghangzhou

on a map. I also asked the bank and they don’t know how to do a “transfar.”

Please send me a check and I will see if my bank can transfar it to your non-

existent city for laundering.

-The Editor

1 一

I am suzy,

I saw your contact , and i was deeply moved.I think that you are a

very interesting person.So I decided to use the chance to get to know

you.i dont think that the age appearance is so important. The most impor-

tant is what is inside you and how do you feel about the life. I know this

life from many sides and I am rather mature already to know how to

make a man happy.I think we should use every chance to find our

happiness. and I am contacting you for obvious reason which you will

understand.

i am sending this mail just to know if this email address is OK,reply

me so that i will send my photo and more details to you,and i have a very

important thing to tell you, i still hope for your reply,

have a pleasant day,

suzy

suzy, We appreciate your interest even though you know nothing about us. While

you may not care about age or appearances, we do. We kindly request that you

forward a photo of yourself in a bikini, wearing an eye patch, and holding an

over-sized vodka martini with a parakeet perched on the rim of the glass. We will

post this photo on our Web site for all interested parties to view and ridicule.

-The Editor

If you have any questions or comments for the editor of Terracotta Type-

writer, please send it in the form of electronic mail to tctype@gmail.com. 2 二

Kaiser Kuo

Ghengis and Me

S o I was just minding my own business, hauling a cartload

of millet as tribute for the local Jurchen grandee when I

caught the unmistakable whiff of a Mongol horde. "Oh,

shit, not again," I thought, and tried to hide in a sack of

millet. But then the horde and its overpowering stench were

upon me. Two leathery Mongo bruisers hauled me out by my

ears and slammed me on the ground before the man himself. I

made all obsequious—Great Khan this and O Man of the Millen-

nium that. I also apologized for soiling myself, something of which

I'm not proud, but man, I was scared and you would've done the

same.

"Get your Han ass up off the ground and tell me why I

shouldn’t just let my men use you for target practice," said Genghis

Khan in a voice that was surprisingly high and tinny—not what

you’d expect from a legendary butcher of men.

"Mighty Khan, the Empire may be conquered on horseback,

but cannot be ruled on horseback," I said, my voice cracking. I was

in the throes of puberty, you see. It occurred to me the horde

thought I was mocking the Khan’s girly voice. Some drew their

swords andsnarled. But then this effete-looking Khitan dude with

a braided forelock pushes forward and says, all indignant,

"Excuse me, kid, but the horseback bit? that's my line,

okay? And besides, it was a total non sequitur." It was Yelü Chu-

cai: I recognized him from his campaign posters from when he ran

for mayor of Beijing. "Your mama!" I shot back, and for some rea-

son that cracked all the Mongols up, and Genghis Khan most of all.

After that the Khan's horsemen chased me around whipping my

buttocks for a couple of hours, but in the end Genghis suf-

fered me to live and let me clean up.

Turns out that it really was Yelü Chucai first said that thing

3 三

about ruling on horseback, and I reckon he was right about it being

a non sequitur too. I told him so, explaining that I was

scared and it was the first thing that popped out, it being so quot-

able. Later, he sent his thugs for me, had them pull out a couple of

my fingernails and torture my feet with a red-hot poker for a cou-

ple of days, and after that Chucai and I were cool—friends,

even, and we would privately snigger together at the Mongols

when they would leave camp to "go among the sheep."

The Khan had some real hotties for daughters, and in a bid to

get close to one, I figured I’d make friends with his sons. The eld-

est, Jochi croaked early—he went among the sheep and caught

something, I’m told—but I was tight with Ogodei and Tolui, the

youngest boy. Chagatai was a nasty bugger and even his brothers

shunned him. He would hot-box the lot of us in his yurt—he’d seal

up the flapsand the smoke hole up top, and fart nasty mutton farts.

Then he’d wave his scimitar around and threaten to behead any-

one he thought was breathing through their mouth.

Genghis Khan had the dopest of yurts. Whether we were chill-

ing in Karakorum or out in the field on campaign, the man’s deco-

rator knew how to pimp a yurt: the finest wool carpets of Per-

sia and the Caucuses, silk from the lands south of the Yangtze,

copper andbrass wares from the smiths of Anatolia, the grinning

skulls of princes and satraps foolish enough to oppose him. I

taught Genghis to play the board game Risk and we often stayed

up playing all night in that stylin’ yurt, me and Genghis, Og-

gie and Tolui, sometimes Chucai and the general Subotai too. We

regulars always let the Khan win. But one night, after imbibing a

bit too much of single-mare, this general named Jogdach (who was

a nice enough guy when he wasn't catapulting rotting corpses into

recalcitrant Chinese cities he happened to be laying siege to) at-

tacked the Khan in Kamchatka from Alaska. He rolled a bunch of

sixes and took him out. Genghis kicked the board over, and while

Tolui and me sorted the armies and put away the game, poor Jog-

dach was trussed up, rolled into a carpet, and dragged behind

4 四

horses until he was tenderized to death.

The years went by. We wiped the floor with the Jurchen,

who’d gone soft from a high-carb Northern Chinese diet, took out

Western Xia, conquered Khwarezmia, and laid waste to the great

Silk Road cities of Samarkand, Bukhara and Merv. I started to get

the hang of the looting and pillaging. I wasn’t the best rider in the

horde, but pretty soon I was as surly and bow-legged as the next

guy. I developed a taste for fine, single-mare kumiss, which I’d

loot from duty-free shops.

The daughter I was keen on, Magda, seemed to take a shine

to me, too, and so after some deliberation I asked her out to view

the Mountain of Skulls we’d made after the sack of Samarkand.

When I went to pick her up, the Khan was there, and while she got

dressed, I had to endure the third degree from her old man. "What

is best in life?" he asked in his weird falsetto. Ordinarily I was sup-

posed to answer with some variation on "To kill your enemy, ride

his horses, and hear the lamentations of his women," but some-

thing told me that wouldn’t work before I took Magda out, so I an-

swered with some half-remembered, goody-goody Han stuff about

studying the Four Books and Five Classics and becoming an up-

right official. He thought about this for a while, then said, "Okay,

you may take my daughter out, but if you are set upon by our ene-

mies, you bend your bow, and slay them without mercy." Roger

that, O Great Khan, I said, and we rode off.

The Mountain of Skulls was oddly depressing for Magda—

lots of flies and carrion fowl, still—and as we trotted back to camp,

she said she thought I’d make more money as a Southern Song

prefect than as a mere lackey for her dad. She said she’d always

wanted to open a tavern where she might profit from the famous

hospitality of the Mongolian people. Maggie’s, she’d call it. I

thought about Chagatai’s cruel pranks, and poor Jogdach in the

carpet, and decided maybe she was right. So we turned our horses

south and east, toward the Jade Gate, and rode toward a new fu-

ture south of the Yangtze.

5 五

Karen Hunt

Poster Boy

O n that fateful day, I sat where I always did on my

lunch break, on a bench in the mall that offered me a

perfect view of the poster. It was for “Moon Wars,” a

sci fi movie. I was obsessed with the lead actor in the

movie, Phillip Chow. Chow is the greatest Chinese action hero ever.

His martial arts moves are off the hook, and I know a little bit about

moves...unfortunately. Thinking about Chow, living in a fantasy world of

perfectly choreographed fights were nobody really died and everything

turned out okay in the end, was helping me to forget my unpleasant ex-

perience of the not-to-distant past.

In the poster Chow stood bare-chested, golden skin glis-

tening with sweat highlighting every exquisite line on his perfectly

formed body. Long black hair woven with feathers framed his no-

ble, intensely alive face, the slanted eyes on fire with passion, nos-

trils flared, mouth set in a determined line.

The force of Chow's energy leaped off the poster and

grabbed hold of me as I sat there, pulling me in. I felt myself trans-

ported to a magical place, Chow by my side. We were fighting to-

gether, beating off an entire army of evil sorcerers and when the

last of the enemy fell we turned to one another, sweat pouring

from our bodies, clothes torn, locked eyes, drew close and...

“Excuse me, mind if I sit here?”

I stared, unseeing, my eyes finally focusing on the timid, bald-

ing man leaning over me, a hint of impatience hiding behind his

forced politeness. I gathered up my trash and left.

I’m obsessed with Chow but more obsessed with China and

everything Chinese. Who would I be without Crouching Tiger

Hidden Dragon? I’d be nobody—just one more ordinary reception-

ist of European descent, working in a ridiculous Beverly Hills plas-

tic surgeon’s office, living a dull, meaningless existence. I must

6 六

have watched Crouching Tiger a hundred times. I wish I lived in

that kind of magical world. I bet I was a warrior in another life. I

love Bruce Lee. I’ve memorized all his karate moves. Fist of Fury is

the best. I wish I was Chinese. I wish I knew Mandarin. I want to

go to China so bad—and I’m going to, just as soon as I save

enough money.

When I was thirteen, I got into trouble with a girl named Jes-

sica and was thrown out of school. Jessica was one of the “good”

girls, from a rich family, always wearing designer clothes, perfect

make-up even at that age. She got straight “A’s” of course, was a

cheerleader and volunteered once a week at a homeless shelter.

But she was a weasel, I’m sorry. I used to go to school dressed as

my favorite anime characters and she'd make fun of me. Not di-

rectly, she was too sly for that. She’d play the goody-two-shoes all

day long and then, when nobody was around except her skanky

posse, she'd pick my clothes apart, make fun of every single acces-

sory and they'd all have a good laugh. She even got physical.

When nobody was looking, bam! She’d brush up against me, elbow me

out of the way, toss her long blond hair in my face—I hated that—and

always she’d say things like, what’s that smell, or we’re praying for your

sinful soul at church but it’s a lost cause.

One day, after taunting me for weeks, she tripped me in the

gym and I fell flat on my face. Next thing I knew I was standing

over Jessica and she was on the ground howling with blood pour-

ing from her nose. I tried to explain to the principal that “she

started it,” but of course he didn’t care—not when Jessica looked

so awful, while I looked perfectly fine. My parents had to pay her

medical bills.

I have to say that whoever fixed her broken nose did a great

job. It looked even better afterwards than it did before.

I was put in continuation school and the day after the fight,

my dad marched me down to the local martial arts gym, handed

me over to the owner and said, “Do something with my daugh-

ter.” My dad was a wise man. Suddenly I was channeling my pent-up

7 七

energy into an activity that resulted in positive progress instead of end-

less trouble. By the time I was eighteen I was boxing and had competed in

a slew of amateur fights and had won them all. I’d trained in every kind of

weaponry imaginable. I'm especially good with knives.

When I graduated from high school I got this job so I could

continue my training. When I leave Dr. Franken’s office, I leave the

world of the ordinary behind (if you can call plastic surgery ordi-

nary) and walk into the gym, sweaty, smelly, vibrating with

pounding fists and booming rap music. I love it. It’s my world,

where I belong, what gives me purpose.

But that night, I had a special mission: the premiere of the

Moon Wars film. I was going to stand along with all the little

groupies in front of Groman’s Chinese Theater and watch Phillip

Chow walk down the red carpet. Embarrassing, I know. My best

friend Olivia agreed to come with me and I trusted her to keep her

mouth shut. Olivia didn’t exactly understand my obsession but she

loved the idea of it and she was down to be a groupie for the night.

After work, I picked her up and we headed across town. Luckily, a

parking space was waiting for us just a few blocks up from the

theater and we hurried to take our places amongst the crowd. With

a few well-placed nudges, we managed to make it to the front by

the ropes, close to the theater doors.

A wave of anticipation swept the crowd, murmuring voices

swelling to a higher pitch of excitement as on cue, necks craned in

the same direction and we all looked down the red carpet. The first

limo arrived, followed by a train of others, the crowd showing

good-natured enthusiasm for the occupants, while saving the big

welcome for Chow.

At last the moment came that everyone was waiting for. A sil-

ver cloud pulled to the curb and the door swung open, revealing,

not Chow first, but a pair of long shapely legs followed by the

body and head of a breathtakingly beautiful young woman wear-

ing a shimmering cream colored gown so sheer it might as well

have been see-through, the front cut so low her voluptuous breasts

8 八

seemed ready to pop out but never quite did. Blond hair, shiny as

satin, cascaded down to her shoulders like Lauren Bacall’s in The

Maltese Falcon. She struck a pose and bulbs flashed but clearly the

paparazzi were waiting for the person who exited next: Phillip

Chow.

And then, there he was, in the flesh, looking even better than

all my dreams. He was tall and infinitely elegant in his Armani

suit, yet emitting a magnetically animal charisma, as if at any mo-

ment he'd tear off the suit and prowl amongst the crowd, a panther

surveying his prey. Which woman would he devour? Any one of

us pushing against the ropes would have gladly submitted to a

thorough ravishing right then and there.

As the glorious couple moved in unison down the carpet, in-

sanely in those few moments when Chow was so close I could al-

most reach out and touch him, I had eyes only for his cream-

colored companion. Who was this woman, how did she get so lucky?

They came abreast to me, pausing for another camera moment and for an

instant my eyes locked with those of the woman before she looked away

again, flicking her hair back in an arrogant gesture. Something clicked in

my brain. As she moved on by, her profile with its absolutely perfect nose

was displayed and I thought, I’d know that nose anywhere, that thing she

does with her hair….

Holy shit…it was Jessica, the girl I’d beaten up in Middle

School, that perfect girl who had so infuriated me because she’d

known exactly how to do it. And she was doing it still.

At the theater door, the couple turned to the crowd for a final

smile and royal wave and then they were gone, followed like a

swarm of killer bees by the paparazzi, the other cast members and

all the hangers on who had somehow bamboozled their way into

the premiere.

It was uncanny how quickly the crowd dispersed after that.

Olivia and I went across the street for a drink but my heart wasn’t

in it. Deflated, depressed, completely out of sorts, I made some ex-

cuse saying I had to leave. Olivia pouted a bit but her friend Sarah

9 九

was on her way and could take her home so we said good-bye.

I walked in front of the now silent theater, all the beautiful

people sealed inside, Phillip and Jessica chief amongst them. As I

passed the side of the theater a movement caught my eye and I

saw that someone was smoking in the semi-darkness of the alley,

just beyond a set of steps leading down from a theater side door.

More importantly, close to the entrance of the alley three hooded

figures all but blended into the shadows, crouching behind a large

trash bin and watching the smoker. This was getting interesting

and I pulled back, deciding to see what would happen next. A

stealthy advance ensued, the flash of a knife appearing in one of

their hands. The knife-wielder let the others move ahead and I cal-

culated that their job was to loosen up the victim, then he’d move

in to execute a little carving, the artist of the group.

I couldn't help myself, elation gripped me, every muscle taunt

for combat, my world reduced to this alley and nothing beyond. I

loved this world of combat where right and wrong, winning and

losing, wasn’t distinguished by rationalization or theoretical con-

versation but by actions. And those actions brought immediate results.

No waiting for years to find out whether or not you’d made the right

choices. You knew instantly because either you ended up on the ground or

they did.

I went first for the one with the knife. It took less than ten sec-

onds to break his arm, sending the blade clattering to the ground. I

snatched the blade and turned my attention to the other two who

had brought the smoker down. They were so busy kicking him, it

took a few seconds for them to notice me. As they jumped up and

turned, I kicked the closest thug in the kidney. His accomplice

tensed, a look of stupid surprise on his face, and I punched him in

the nose with the blunt end of the knife, sending him staggering

backward, clutching his face, blood gushing between his fingers.

Fear and confusion registered in both their eyes as I swung the

knife, while behind me the other one scurried out of the alley,

clutching his arm. In five seconds the other two had done the

10 十

same, rats in the dark.

Helping the smoker up, I received a mind-numbing shock.

The man staggering to his feet was none other than Phillip Chow.

“Where are they?” he gasped.

“Gone.”

He eyed the knife in my hand, moving slightly backward.

“What do you want—money?”

“What?” I gasped.

This was not how I’d fantasized our meeting would be. Could

this despicable, pathetic man be the glorious specimen in the

poster?

Carefully, I offered him the knife and he snatched it, grimac-

ing with pain. “I got a bad back or I would have killed those

mother fuckers. Where’s Manson?” He glared at me petulantly,

clearly expecting an answer.

Before I could voice my anger, the stage door opened and a fat

little man burst out, calling, “Phillip?”

Jessica was right on his heels.

Jessica looked back and forth between me and Chow, her big

violet eyes narrowing. “What’s going on here,” she demanded,

marching up to Chow, ready to lay into him. Her expression

changed to one of horrified concern when she saw his face.

She turned on me. “Did you do this?”

I hoped she’d lunge at me so I’d have the pleasure of breaking

her nose again. No such luck. The fat man took her by the arm and

steered her away.

“How many times have I told you not to sneak out to smoke?”

he barked at Chow.

Jessica glanced back at me, recognition dawning. “Hey, aren’t

you--?

I didn’t hear the rest because chaos descended on the alley.

Magically, people began to appear as if the universe had sent a

message to all interested parties that this was the place to be. Cam-

eras and microphones materialized in front of Chow’s face.

11 十一

“What happened?” everyone wanted to know.

Chow never even looked at me. Under the spotlight, his trans-

formation was miraculous, becoming the star once more, nobler

and more impressive than ever, if possible, thanks to his develop-

ing shiner. He told an incredible story and I must say his acting

was superb. I listened in amazement as he recounted how he’d sin-

gle-handedly fended off not just three but six attackers. His Shakes-

pearian voice slowly faded away as I allowed myself to be pushed to the

back by the jostling crowd.

As I walked away, an arm grabbed me and I tensed. It was the

short fat man, his pale piggy eyes viewing me with small-minded

distrust and cynicism.

“Name’s Manson, Terri Manson. You are?” He extended his

hand to shake mine.

“Natasha Beil,” I said hesitantly.

He smiled, but the effect was blisteringly cold.

“I’m going to make this fast, Ms. Beil, ‘cause I don’t have a lot

of time. Nothing happened back there that you know anything

about, if you understand my meaning. You do understand my mean-

ing?”

My smile was no less frigid. Between the two of us, we could

have stopped global warming. “I’m not sure that I do, Mr. Manson,

can you explain?”

He put his face two inches from mine and said in a menacing

voice meant to frighten, “Don’t mock me.”

I moved my face an inch closer. “Okay,” I said and walked

away.

Back home I flipped on the television, unsurprised to find that

every station in LA showed Phillip Chow recounting the story of

how he’d been attacked by six knife-wielding psychopathic gang-

bangers and how he’d disarmed them. It was a PR moment made

in heaven and Chow’s celebrity status sky-rocketed. Not only did

“Moon Wars” become the highest grossing movie of all time but

over the next few weeks—and I know this is hard to believe but it’s

12 十二

absolutely true, the press went so far as to suggest Phillip Chow

should run for president—and he wasn't even an American citizen.

And then, he did a public service ad for Homeland Security.

It was enough to make a person gag. I’d actually saved Phillip

Chow, the most famous martial arts actor in history, who turned

out to be a charlatan and a coward. I couldn’t shake the image of

him lying on the ground in a fetal position begging for mercy and

me reaching down to help him up.

What should I do, tell the press? I laughed at the absurdity.

No one would believe I’d saved Chow’s ass. And I’d been warned,

oh yes, the piggy man had warned me big time.

Amazingly, after a few weeks I almost convinced myself that

the whole thing had never happened. I was pretty good at telling

myself lies—making believe that the real violence had never hap-

pened, covering it up with play-acting in the ring.

It was spring, a busy season at Dr. Franken’s since the pres-

sure was on for all the desperate LA women to look perfect for

summer. Between work and training, I barely had time to think

about anything else. In the evenings I pushed harder than ever and

was rewarded with news of my first pro fight in the fall.

But somehow, ever since I'd beat up the thugs, my heart had-

n't been in my fighting. At home one night brushing my teeth be-

fore bed, I allowed myself to voice a concern that had always been

at the back of my mind—where is this leading me? Boxing and

MMA are short-lived careers and then what? Like my dad had al-

ways told me, before he passed away, When you gonna develop long-

term goals, not just live in the moment?

As if things weren’t bad enough, the next night in the gym I

heard someone say the police had caught the knife guy. The min-

ute I got home, I turned on the television and sure enough, it was

all over the news.

That’s when Terri Manson called, sweet as sugar, and invited

me to lunch at Koi.

He was already seated when I got there and rose to greet me,

13 十三

his smile bright—too bright—piggy eyes still cold and cynical. Af-

ter ordering a fortune in miniature helpings of artistically pre-

sented sushi, he said, “We got off on the wrong foot, Ms. Beil.”

“Call me Natasha,” I said.

He nodded, encouraged. “Lovely Natasha, so young, your

whole future ahead of you.” Deftly and at a stupefying rate, he

popped food into his mouth with the chopsticks, never pausing in

his conversation. “Five people know what happened that night.

One’s an apprehended criminal who’s probably spilling the beans

right now. Obviously, whatever he says is a lie. Isn’t that right, Na-

tasha?”

“How would I know,” I said testily, trying to steal some food

before he ate it all.

“Sarcasm isn’t flattering in a young woman. Let me spell it out

for you: the police found one of the muggers before we did. No

doubt he’s spouting off about some mysterious female superhero.

Before long they’ll be knocking on your door and that’s not in our

best interests—or yours. That’s why we’re offering you a little va-

cation—say for one year—to anywhere outside the United States.

There must be someplace you want to go Natasha?”

The eel I’d finally managed to secure slipped from my chop-

sticks and slithered down to the plate. Manson immediately

snapped it up.

“You must be crazy,” I said. “I have a job, a career.”

He winced. “Please. A pretty girl like you has no business

fighting in the ring—or out of it. We checked up on the boyfriend

incident. Lucky to get out of that one, Natasha—but who am I to

judge?”

The “incident,” he called it, the little encounter I was trying to

forget. Yes, the piggy man had done his homework.

Once again, there it was, playing back in my mind. My boy-

friend, seven time world champion kick boxer Danny Lada, a liv-

ing legend in the ring but useless at anything practical—like pay-

ing the rent—coming at me in a drunken craze, long, thin kitchen

14 十四

knife in hand, accusing me of cheating on him with his trainer,

Mickey. Yeah, can you believe it, cross-eyed Mickey. Me, wrestling

the knife away and Danny falling forward onto the blade. Always

made sure those blades were sharp and so it went in clean and

easy, flesh made of butter. Dead center in the heart. Dead all right,

no chance for survival. Mickey bursting in, knowing nothing of

what had happened, just seeing Danny convulsing on the floor,

knife sticking straight up as if we were all in the middle of a horror

movie, and Mickey thinking, and why wouldn’t he, that I’d killed

Danny. Mickey, flashing the knife he always carried on his hip—

too many knives around that night—and me pulling the blade out

of Danny and killing Mickey for real, just like that, fast, hardly any

effort, slitting his throat. No accident. Self-defense.

The weird thing was, I didn’t feel remorse, just satisfaction,

exultation in fact, victorious, a rush like no other; my world, my

element, the only “right” being to get them before they got me. Not

fantasy, a real fight, where you really know whether you've won or

not, because someone ends up dead.

I was acquitted, thank God, thanks to my neighbor who heard

the noise, walked in and saw it all. For a few days, I was a bit of a

celebrity, splashed everywhere in the news until, finally, the hype

died down. But it left its mark on me—killing people does that,

you know. Leaves a mark. Even if it's in self-defense. Especially

when you realize that the act of taking a life comes with a rush of

power like no other and you have to push it down, deny it or it'll

consume you.

And then the publicity. I hated publicity.

“You listening to me?” The little creep was jabbing at my arm

with his chopsticks.

I cut my eyes to him so sharp and cold just like those knives,

he actually stopped his jabbing, slightly subdued for a second.

Of course, his recovery was quick and he continued, “You

must know that given the circumstances of your past, this is a very

good offer. You see Natasha, you can go this way,” he pointed left

15 十五

with a chopstick, “or you can go that way,” he pointed with the

other one. “Make the right choice and your future is wide-open.

Make the wrong one and you’ll end up… well, let’s just leave it at

that, shall we?”

“Why do I get the feeling I don’t really have a choice?”

He sighed. “What will it be, Natasha?”

“China.” The word popped out of my mouth, just like that,

before I could stop it.

Surely now he’d laugh, a camera would appear and someone

would yell I’d been punked. But none of that happened. He sim-

ply shrugged. “Not my first choice but never mind, I'm not the one

going. You leave late tonight. We’ve gathered some things for you

and taken them to a hotel. Can’t risk you going back to your apart-

ment. The police might be there already.”

“I can’t get a visa to China just like that!”

He rolled his eyes. “You wait in Mexico while we arrange

your papers.” He motioned for the waiter, who hurried over, and

Manson signed the tab and got up. “Everything’s been arranged.

We won’t meet again.”

He was gone then in a black convertible VW Bug—who would

have guessed—and I was left to ruminate as I was taken by taxi to

the hotel.

I was screwed. I knew enough about powerful people to real-

ize that the whole “you have a choice” speech was bogus. It was

useless to fight someone like Manson. No matter that I could put

him on the ground in two seconds. People like him controlled the

media, the money, the masses—everything. Maintaining Chow’s

image was worth a fortune to them and they weren’t going to let a

little nobody like me ruin it all.

And then it hit me: so what? Wasn’t this what I’d been dream-

ing of? And here it was falling into my lap. Not exactly how I’d

planned it, but hell, this was better than scrimping and saving for

years and maybe never getting what I wanted. Thank God I hadn’t

signed a contract for the fight yet. To hell with the fight, it was all a

16 十六

stack of cards ready to fall anyway. And women got no respect in

the ring, who was I fooling?

That night as I exited the hotel, a car pulled up and the dark-

ened window rolled down just enough to reveal a pair of violet

eyes. Jessica.

“Get in. I’m taking you to the airport,” she said.

I got in.

“You were a real asshole in school,” she said.

“So were you.”

She smiled. Even in her sweats, no make-up and hair pulled

back in a ponytail, she looked gorgeous. “What the hell were you

doing at the premiere?”

I flushed. “I had a crush on Chow, but no more.”

“Ditto that, though, much as he’s a prick I don’t want him

dead. I’m going to be the love interest in his next movie, so, thanks

for saving the mother fucker.”

I gave a mock bow, as best I could in the car. She looked at me

thoughtfully. “After you beat me up in school, nothing was ever

the same. I hated you, was scared of you, too. Everybody made fun

of my nose job and I couldn’t do anything about it. I’m pretty good

at kicking ass now, though.”

“You were always good, Jessica, much better than me.”

“No, I claw my way up just like women always have, with sex.

But you...” she moved closer, wide eyes filling my vision, hunger

on her face. “I heard you killed two men. I’d give anything to

know what that feels like.”

Her face had turned to me so I now saw her left side. I realized

that she was, indeed, wearing skillfully applied make-up, covering

a black and blue mark by her left eye.

“Does he hit you, Jessica?” I asked bluntly.

Her body recoiled and she laughed, bitter. “I know what I’m

doing. I’m using Chow and when I’m done, I’m going

to crush him.”

“Ouch,” I said. “What if it doesn’t turn out like that? Where’s

17 十七

your pride?”

Naked hate twisted her fine features into a clownish, repulsive

caricature of herself. “You fucking hypocrite! I hope you enjoy

your exile because you’re more in a cage as I am. You talk tough

but you obeyed Manson and did what you were told, just like eve-

rybody does. You punch someone and maybe get a few thousand

bucks—so what? I sleep with the right guy, take a few punches, and

end up with money and influence beyond your wildest dreams. I’ll go for

that any day. Now get the fuck out of my car.”

I got out and boarded my plane for Mexico. Two weeks later,

on my way to China I still hadn’t shaken the encounter. I’d never

felt what Jessica felt when my fists were in her face. I’d never cov-

ered my wounds with make-up. I wore them with pride. I’d never

cowered on the ground, begging for mercy like Chow. I was the

one who made others cower, even killed if necessary. Did it have

to be like that, one who controlled and one who submitted?

“You are so deep in thought,” said a deep voice.

Startled, I turned to look into the face of the Chinese man sit-

ting next to me on the plane; a beautiful, serene face with deeply

intelligent, inquiring eyes and a finely chiseled mouth, slightly up-

turned in an inscrutable smile.

I blinked as if to clear my vision. “I guess I am.”

He nodded sympathetically. “Long flight ahead. How about a

drink?”

He called the flight attendant over, then said with a hint of

playfulness, “You have a secret. Secrets cannot resist a good cham-

pagne.”

Great line, I thought cynically. Then, I shook my head as if to empty

it of negativity. For once in my life, I was going to enjoy the ride. At

thirty thousand feet, suspended between heaven and hell and hurtling

towards the unknown, a giddy rush of anticipation ran through me. The

champagne came and I toasted Chow and Manson. Hell, I even toasted

Jessica.

“And who are they?” the man asked.

18 十八

“My benefactors,” I said, reaching for more champagne, our

glasses clinking merrily.

“Then they must be very good people, indeed,” he remarked.

I laughed. “Oh, yes…indeed.”

I gulped down my second glass. I was feeling

great, really great. Life had a crazy way of turning on its head and in a

split-second shift, becoming something altered and unexpected. Case in

point, who’d have thought that a creep like Manson, my old nemesis Jes-

sica and that pathetic poster boy Chow would have helped to make my

dreams come true. Here I was, heading towards China and adventure,

seated next to a gorgeous man who was surely a million times more inter-

esting and sexy than Chow could ever be.

Or at least, that's how it seemed so far.

“Let’s drink to poster boys, cheerleaders and the powerful lit-

tle pigs who own them,” I said.

“Whatever you wish,” said my companion, smiling know-

ingly.

And to that, we toasted again.

19 十九

John Bennett

Letter

To the great master Shakespeare

From a poet o

The court of the Emperor

I send you greeting

Now you know how news travels

Along the trade routes

With the silks and spices

Over meat and wine

At every inn from Nanking

To where the sun sets

And so I heard of you my

Contemporary

Writing your plays creating

Evenings of magic

They say you sing of princes

Of the olden days

And lovers quarreling

In the soft moonlight

And so do I write of the gods

Of the Emperor

Shen-Tsung who wasted twenty

Years by whom I was

Sent away from the palace

Down south to Hsu-Wen

They say you wrote of lovers

In mid-summer dreams

I sing of Fair Bride Li-Mang

And also of Liu

Who came to her bed that night

20 二十

Now I T’ang Hrien-Tsu

Will dedicate strings of cash

And rice to Ching-Yuen

Goddess of us poets

For what we shall write

That it should live forever

And be read by everyone

21 二十一

An Interview with Gene Ayres

An award winning novelist, journalist, columnist, critic, and film

and television writer/producer, Gene (E. C.) Ayres is a graduate

(B.A.) of Syracuse University, worked in New York for seven years

producing short films for Children's Television Workshop

("Sesame Street,") ABC, and Time Life Television, then went on to

write and produce for various other PBS television series at sta-

tions in Maryland, Arizona, and California.

Moving to Los Angeles in the late '70s, Ayres began writing for

commercial television, primarily in animation, worked as a feature

development writer for Jack Arnold at Universal Pictures, and was

recipient of a Warner Brothers Writers Fellowship in 1982. Since

leaving Hollywood in 1989 he has published five mystery novels

including winner of the St. Martin's Press/Private Eye Writers of

America Best First Novel competition in 1992. He was a single par-

ent for more than a decade prior to his nearly three years living

and working in China between 2004-2007. There he served as a

freelance editor, writer, and university lecturer in English at

Harbin University of Commerce in northern Manchuria, where he

wrote his current book A Billion to One: An American Insider in the

New China (2009). He is married to a Chinese national, and now

lives in Seattle with his wife and daughter. He can be reached at:

geneayres@juno.com His blog and Web site are at:

www.geneayres.org

22 二十二

Excerpt from A Billion to One: An American Insider in the New

China (to be republished in March, 2010 by Transaction Publishers and

Rutgers University Press as Inside the New Chinese: An Ethno-

graphic Memoir):

I t was the day after the Sports Day banquets that the generals

and Party bosses who had invited me to lunch and dinner

with the Governor turned their brigade of crack young

troops (i.e. the incoming freshman) over to me. What were

they thinking? Can you imagine the responsibility in that? It

would now be my job to properly mold their eager young minds.

Or at least those of the English majors: a daunting challenge.

They'd just finished three weeks of rigorous and intensive training,

ten hours a day, seven days a week, marching, drilling, doing calis-

thenics and tai chi-like exercises, and getting yelled at a lot. Usu-

ally outside my window, at around 5:00 a.m. But as Sports Day

had shown, the results were impressive. It was easy to see, during

the Beijing Olympics to come, how such remarkable precision

could be wrought in such a short time. These kids—offspring of

the Red Guard and heirs to the Cultural Revolution—were physi-

cally fit, tightly drilled, and ready to rock and roll. Or at least,

study English.

I must admit my new students seemed none the worse for all

that drilling, and well prepared for the very different rigors of aca-

demic life to come. I wasn’t so sure about myself. Asian (i.e. Chi-

nese) students had been rising to the top of every conceivable chart

in the U.S. for decades, and as of 2004 were the dominant minority

group at California’s top colleges and universities. At U.C. Berke-

ley they were actually the majority. So it was no surprise that they

might be ready to excel here in their homeland as well, even at a

mid-level university. These students were motivated, had been

taught to focus, to value hard work from an early age, and had put

up with all that marching and saluting just for the chance to show

what they were made of. They were going places, and in a big

23 二十三

hurry to get there, eager and anxious to join the outside world. So

there I was, the new conductor, facing thirty members of our

newly matriculated Chinese state university freshman class, who

would now become my new charges. Imagine an ex-hipster and

unreconstructed peacenik assigned as new commanding officer of

a company of Chinese People's Liberation Army irregulars, and

you get the picture. Think Jack Black in School of Rock and that was

me. TCType: What were your reasons for moving to China?

Gene Ayres: A freelance writer for many years, I'd been raising a

son as a single parent, who was finally college bound, and I was

once again, for the first time in almost two decades, a free spirit. So

when an offer came from an old friend and colleague to come to

China to teach English at a state university in Manchuria, I was

hard pressed to come up with a good reason to say no. Plus, I

needed the job.

TCType: What was the most difficult part of life to get used to in

China?

Ayres: The one thing I never got used to was the spitting, and simi-

lar public discharges of waste matter from other bodily orifices. It

was mostly men, of course, who were the offenders, although I'd

seen women spitting even on busses in Harbin, and in the south

the common practice of chewing betel nuts exacerbated the prob-

lem. This habit is not uniquely Chinese, of course--I have seen

plenty of Americans behave the same way. But it offended me to

the point that I felt driven to write a letter to the Beijing Review

complaining—in a humorous fashion—about this problem. And

while I can't claim credit since it was never published, I was

24 二十四

pleased to note a few months later that, no doubt in anticipation of

the forthcoming Beijing Olympics, spitting in public would thence-

forth be, at least in Beijing, a fineable offense. Not that it worked.

TCType: How did you handle moving back to the U.S.?

Ayres: I have a full chapter about this in my book A Billion to One,

because having married a Chinese national (in China) with a child,

it was an unbelievably daunting and expensive process to get the

necessary visas to bring them back with me. And as they were both

loyal Chinese citizens and happy in their native country, that made

it even harder.

TCType: Was there some part of life in China that you missed?

Ayres: I missed and still miss the degree of respect and admiration

I experienced there, especially from my young charges, many of

whom still remain close friends on Facebook, LinkedIn, and via e-

mail.

TCType: What is your favorite phrase in Chinese?

Ayres: Mei wenti (no problem).

TCType: What is your opinion of stinky tofu?

Ayres: I am not fond of tofu, stinky or otherwise (actually in the

north it is not “stinky”). But as it is a staple in my wife's cuisine I

have grudgingly gotten used to it, at least on occasion.

TCType: How much of your work do you plan before sitting down

to write? Do you write an outline or just dive in?

Ayres: My nonfiction memoir was originally based on a series of

25 二十五

dispatches via email to friends and family in the U.S., and each fu-

ture chapter was based on an event, incident, or observation from

that prior week or so. So I had a subject in mind, and the basic ele-

ments, and would then sit down and wing it.

TCType: Prior to A Billion to One, you wrote mysteries. How was

the process of writing different with each genre?

Ayres: Writing fiction is a different matter. That I would outline

first, a practice I learned in Hollywood, when a short premise, fol-

lowed by a detailed outline, was mandatory in writing for the

screen.

TCType: Besides outlining your work more for fiction, what is dif-

ferent about the overall writing process?

Ayres: For me, not that much is different. Both genres need organi-

zation, structure, a driving story line, and theme. My fiction is

more message-based than some. Although I once worked in Holly-

wood, I strongly reject Louis B. Mayor's theory that “if you wanna

send a message call Western Union.” I think all fiction, actually,

delivers a message of some kind, including even MGM's films (all

that cheerful happy times song and dancing was propaganda, after

all). My “message” themes have to do with the basic issues of our

time, as does all good fiction (and nonfiction). This goes back to

Aeschulus and Arisophanes. We all write because we have some-

thing to say, and need to say it.

TCType: Has writing a memoir affected your writing style or proc-

ess in fiction?

Ayres: Both are creative processes for me (my memoirs, with more

to come, are of a relatively new genre called “creative nonfiction.”

Both originate in the realm of experience, enhanced by the stream

26 二十六

of consciousness which, at least to me, is another very real world

and universe in and of itself.

TCType: Do you plan to write more about China or will your writ-

ing take you to new genres?

Ayres: As my China memoir is going to be republished under a

new title by a major university press next year, I may well feel in-

spired to write a sequel. Especially since I remain closely con-

nected to China and its people, having married one, being step-

parent of another, and having taught hundreds of others. I have

also finished a mystery-suspense novel set in China, based on a

real murder (resulting from an internet date gone wrong) that took

place on my campus. I haven't yet found a publisher for that one.

TCType: What is the best writing advice you have received?

Ayres: Two things: write what you are passionate about, and never

give up (the latter is a common belief these days in China).

TCType: How much time would you estimate you spend editing a

book?

Ayres: I have long resented and much resisted the need for and

process of editing, in the erroneous belief that was someone else's

job. But having learned the hard way that “editors” (having been

one myself) no longer edit, at least not at publishing houses, I have

grudgingly learned to do it for myself. It typically takes months.

TCType: How do you decide that your work is complete?

Ayres: One of the ironies of modern word processing technology is

that, by making editing so easy, it has become almost impossible to

truly determine that a work is finished. Complete, perhaps, in the

27 二十七

sense that all the major story points etc. are in place. But finished?

Perhaps never, because every time a read something I have writ-

ten, I feel compelled to correct, improve, change, or delete some-

thing. Therefore, I guess it is complete only when the publisher has

committed it to print. And even that has become an uncertain and

nebulous thing. Because with the advent of POD publishing,

changes can always be made.

TCType: Were you worried about offending anyone while writing

A Billion to One? How do you deal with the possibility of confron-

tations from writing the truth?

Ayres: Yes, and no. I'd been sending many of my most outspoken

observations about life in China while living and working there via

email, with no problem. I'd even been warned by a local TV news

director (from Israel, as it happened) that I was being watched and

monitored, and this was completely hyperbolic, because there was

only one person in the entire region, a person I knew, who had the

capability of understanding and interpreting contemporary Ameri-

can idiomatic English (the subject I was in fact there to teach). Es-

pecially on a running basis. This guy had in fact been a govern-

ment interpreter and had quit in disgust.

So, that said, I wasn't worried about being too critical. I also

wrote the article about spitting to the Beijing Review without cen-

sure, and in fact the ordinance against it was passed soon thereaf-

ter (I used a satirical approach, incidentally, which often works

better with political criticism). It wasn't published, though.

One of my former students recently did read the entire book.

I'm proud of her for that. She only had one negative comment, in

general, that it might not be able to get published in China as writ-

ten. And that was mostly because of a chapter called The Mother in

Law from Hell about the rigging of the national Ministry of Educa-

tion university ratings (ours, of course, being managed by U.S.

News, is totally objective, of course!). There was a lot of systemic

28 二十八

cheating, though, in China, which I also satirized. But since I could

not substantiate this other than personal observation, I have de-

cided to remove that chapter from the forthcoming new book from

the Rutgers U. press Transaction next spring, Inside the New China:

An Ethnographic Memoir. But I am replacing it with two new chap-

ters that should have been in the first version anyway, one about

an arranged marriage that had been planned for one of my stu-

dents, whose generation had outgrown such things; the other

about what happens when you let a bunch of previously tightly

controlled young former soldiers write and stage a comedic play.

Bottom line is I expect Transaction, which has a Chinese publish-

ing partner, to put this book out in China, now.

TCType: How do you handle rejection of your work?

Ayres: No writer is exempt from rejection. My favorite case is a

then-fellow screenwriter named Melissa Matheson, in L.A., from a

famous local writing family, in fact. She'd written an original script

that had been all over the place without success. She finally got

lucky, she thought, and hooked up with a well known up and

coming director. Even the director got shot down more than 100

times, which must be some kind of record. Nobody wanted this

project. Finally the director made a deal at his new studio, Univer-

sal, where I was working at the time. He would only make the next

of his newly popular action series if they would allow him to make

this film next. They finally grudgingly agreed. The next series film

they wanted was Indiana Jones II. Melissa Matheson's script was

called E.T. End of story.

Alas, I probably don't have any E.T.s waiting in the wings, al-

though I have one semi-legendary screenplay called Roll Over Bee-

thoven that has been optioned three times but never made (I still

think it would make a great film, it's a romantic comedy—details

on my Web site for those interested. I do have another novel, The

Shakespeare Chronicles which my then agent had absolute confi-

29 二十九

dence in: it was going to be the Da Vinci Code of English literary

history (about who really wrote Shakespeare—and no, it wasn't

Oxford). A top foreign agent, Danny Baror picked it up and in fact

made sales in five or six countries, all in Eastern Europe, and thus

apparently sufficiently far from the sway of the Shakespeare ortho-

doxy, which as it turns out is a lot more powerful and influential in

literary circles than, say, the Vatican. No one in NY or London

would touch it (World Audience does want it for an e-book, but

I'm reluctant to go there). My favorite edition is the Czech version,

beautifully bound and printed in Prague. I haven't even seen the

Russian or Italian ones yet, if they ever even came out. The Euros

were, of course, counting on this book being a big hit in the States

and UK which never happened.

This kind of rejection--after so many near misses, so many

close calls-- is always the most painful. But on the other hand,

Melissa Matheson never wrote another script (too hard to top that

one, maybe?). I have to wonder how happy she is these days, or

frustrated (even in her jodphurs?). J.D. Salinger had a hit first time

out and look how happy he is. I keep at it, because my mysteries

were a small success once, I've had a few accolades--enough to get

me up each morning and keep me going. Who knows, maybe my

next book will finally break out. Or the one after that. I have no

doubts about the quality of all of them, so it isn't that, and never

was.

For those readers here full of self-doubts, as all of my Chinese

students were, incidentally, I say this: read some of the so-called

“best sellers” out there. Then read your own best material. You

decide. Then get back to work.

30 三十

Review: The Beijing of Possibilities

I f Beijing is the center of the universe, it’s only natural that the

circus sideshow should come to town. At least it seems that

way at times in Jonathan Tel’s The Beijing of Possibilities. All

roads from across the vast land of China lead (or allude) to

Beijing and all that it offers (bizarre twists and magical turns in-

cluded) in this collection of short stories from the author of

Arafat’s Elephant and Freud’s Alphabet. The touch of humor and

surrealism mixed with reality of China is what makes Jonathan

Tel’s collection of twelve short stories entertaining and insightful.

The stories stretch across generations and regions of China, but

portray the universal struggle of a country that changes rapidly

while holding on to the past. The problem with many collections of stories is that each story

stands alone with no connection to the others, but Tel threads his

tales together, occasionally alluding to the others like they are an

integral part of each other. All of his characters face hardships,

whether they are factory workers, thieves, or societal elites, yet

they never despair. Everyone strives for the sky but is held back by

fate or circumstance—though it sometimes arrives in the form of

surreal occurrence that provides a kind of comic relief from the

darker tales of misfortune and civil disorder.

“The Year of the Gorilla” sets the tone for the following sto-

ries—portraying modern China with entrepreneurial concepts and

contradictions of society. The gorilla may not be the Monkey King

of Chinese myth, but he certainly entertains the masses and per-

forms wondrous acts. The stories are filled with migrant characters

trying to make a living in a variety of ways, including singing in a

hot gorilla suit.

Tel’s stories range from the amusing and unusual of “The

Glamorous Heart of Cosmopolitan Beijing,” which depicts a team

of pickpockets and an unimaginable coincidence, to melancholy

31 三十一

realism in “Rise Upward to the Blue Clouds,” about a village girl

who has to work off her uncle’s debt to snakeheads by working as

an ayi in Beijing. There are also tales that bridge the gap between

the Cultural Revolution and Deng Xiaoping’s reforms—“Love!

Duty! Humanity! Virtue!” portrays the immediate effects of the

reforms and the opportunity created by hardship. Many of the sto-

ries set in present day reference the 2008 Olympics and its effects

on the economy and society.

It’s not often that one comes across a collection of short stories

that maintains consistency and a semblance of cohesiveness. Jona-

than Tel’s The Beijing of Possibilities manages to flow rather seam-

lessly from one story to the next. Tel provides the reader with real-

istic perspectives of China while transforming it at times into un-

believable fiction that elicits laughter.

32 三十二

Rebecca Demarest

Penjing

“W hat kind of tree is that one?”

Using one dirty finger, she pressed against

his forehead until he was no longer block-

ing her light. “It’s a brush cherry.” Picking

up the metal clippers, she snipped carefully at the younger leaves,

slicing them away from the mature plant’s older branches.

“Don’t you want it to be nice and bushy? All…fluffy and

stuff?” He picked up her root shears and scissored at an invisible

enemy.

She laid the clippers aside and picked the shorn leaves from

the glazed bowl the cherry filled. “No. Part of the attraction of pen-

jing is the sparseness of the plants. The carefully planned and exe-

cuted designs.”

“I thought they were bonsai, that Japanese thing with tiny

plants.”

“The Japanese got it from the Chinese. The Chinese call them

penjing, or penzai.”

He was quiet as he watched her continue to strip the plant.

“But that plant, that’s the one with the flowers, right? If you cut it

down, do you still get flowers?” He leaned on the edge of the pot-

ting table again.

“Too many leaves on a plant are unhealthy. Too few as well.

The balance needs to be maintained in order for the plants to grow

and flourish.” He stared at her, twirling a marking pencil in his

fingers until she sighed. “Yes, it will still flower. And quite well. It

doesn’t need all the new leaves sapping its energy.”

She nudged a little dirt off the lip of the bowl and placed it

carefully back on its display stand on the bookshelf.

“What are you doing here anyway? You knew I was going to

be working with my penzai all day.”

“Oh, you know.” He spun around on his stool until he could

33 三十三

recline against the table with his elbows propped, angling the chair

back and forth. “I was bored, lonely. Thought I might be able to

offer a hand.”

She gave the display stand one last nudge and returned to her

table and the other plants lined up along the wall edge. “Really, a

hand.” She pulled a ficus towards her, the plant peeking out over

the top of a pillar of tinfoil. “In that case, hand over those root

shears you were playing with earlier.” Again he stared at her. “The

blue handled ones.”

“Oh, right.” He picked them up and placed them in her out-

stretched hand. He let his fingers trail up her wrist before sagging

back on his stool and waggling his hand at her. “See, a hand.”

She snorted and started to tug away a small section of foil, uncov-

ering the top of a pillar of dirt that stretched five inches over the

pot.

“So, a few of my friends are going out this afternoon, Ultimate

Frisbee followed by beers at Joe’s. I was thinking, maybe, you’d

want to…”

“Maybe.” She started to brush away the dirt that she’d uncov-

ered, revealing the top of the ficus’s root system and the tip of a

rock wound within it. “If I’m finished here. These trees need my

attention. It’s been elsewhere recently.” She used a tiny foxtail to

brush away the last of the dirt on the exposed inch of roots and

used the shears to cut away the smaller trailer roots that had

started to form since she bound its roots around the rock.

“I know.” His grin looked as though it would slide off his face

and into the bag of potting soil at his feet. “Speaking of atten-

tion…” He got up from his perch and circled behind her, kneading

her shoulders.

She rolled her shoulders and shrugged him off. “Let me fin-

ish.” He raised his hands in the air and slouched back around to

the stool, a small furrow between his brows.

“What are you doing to that tree anyway? I think it’d be a bad

idea to let the roots stay exposed like that.”

34 三十四

She kept one hand on the ceramic tray of the ficus as she reached

up to the shelf above the table and pulled down a dirt-stained

book. Running her finger along the tabs in the side, she stopped

about three-quarters of the way and grabbed a green tab. The

creased and smeared pages fell open to a two page spread of ficus

trees, all between five and ten inches tall, all with their exposed

roots bound around a rock. She spun it around to face him. “It’s a common style for the ficus. It has strong roots that don’t

mind being exposed, and so forms like this…or…” she flipped a

few pages, “or like this dragon design come naturally to this tree.

It just takes time.” “That dragon design sure looks ugly, all those twisting, bare

roots.” He fingered the page, running the pads of his fingers over

the pictures as though he could feel the convoluted and twisting

root system.

“It is one of the great designs, in my opinion. It represents the

unification of the Chinese nobility.” She snatched the book back

and thrust it onto the shelf.

“Yeah, but the roots? Why not the branches? They’re sleeker

and cleaner looking.”

“Roots are a tree’s strength. They keep it rooted, draw nutri-

ents. If the roots are not strong, the tree will invariably fail and

soon. They have to be anchored and…and secure.” She caressed

the exposed roots, snatching the tray from the table as he stretched

out to touch it. “I don’t know what you have on your hands. It

could hurt the tree. The roots are sensitive when first exposed.”

He crossed his arms on the table and rested his chin on them.

“They’re clean.” She carried the ficus to its spot in the window and

he mumbled, “Clean enough, anyway.”

He spun on his stool to face her again. “Why do you like play-

ing with these runty trees anyway? Seems like they take a lot more

patience than you normally have.”

“They take a lot less patience than dealing with people.” She

shot a glance at him and then back to the ficus under her hands.

35 三十五

“They calm me down. Plus my dad used to work with them, and I

was always fascinated by the wire frames and the miniature, well,

everything. I liked the small scale, the possibilities. Do you know

just how many different forms you can train a tree into? There is

nothing more satisfying than seeing the possibilities you dreamt

for your trees coming true.” She wandered over to the end table

which displayed a maple in a sweeping, cloudlike style. “This is

my first.” She laughed a little and trailed her fingers softly over the

canopy of leaves. “Well, first to survive that is. I killed a few before

I figured it out. The kind of care it takes.”

As she returned to the table, she dragged another tree towards her.

“Hey, what’s wrong with that tree? Is it sick?” He flicked his

fingers at the dead branches evident among the juniper’s green

leaves.

She swatted his hand away and pressed a finger tip to the end

of a dead branch. “Nothing’s wrong with it. It’s supposed to look

this way.”

“What, half dead?”

She glared at him and started pulling out razors and a scalpel

from her drawer. She also pulled out a little bottle and miniscule

paint brush. “Sharimiki is frequently practiced on miniature trees.

It gives the tree character. It is representative of the daily struggle

to survive.” “Shari-what-y?” His eyes kept flickering to the blades she set

out and back to the tree.

“Sharimiki. The practice of stripping bark to give the appear-

ance of dead wood. Jin,” she pointed to the lifeless branches, “and

shari are both techniques of sharimiki. I’m starting a shari on this

tree today.” She picked up the scalpel and, holding the trunk deli-

cately in one had, she started the careful process of cutting into the

bark. “So, do you think when you’re done with this one, we could

maybe…” He grinned at her until she looked up from her cutting. “I have three more trees to see to today. They haven’t been

36 三十六

trimmed in over a month and it’s the growing season. And one of

them needs to be repotted. Maybe when I’ve finished with them.”

She looked back down.

“Fine. I guess I’m waiting for you to get your nose out of the

dirt. I’ll call you later.” He jumped up from the stool and left it

rocking as he strode to the apartment door and slammed it after

him.

She flinched as he left and when she looked back to the juni-

per, she realized the scalpel had slipped to the side, scoring the

bark and her hand. She watched a drop of blood absorb into the

soil.

She shook herself and stooped down to see what damage her

slip had caused. She fingered the cut carefully, tracing the section

of bark up into the tree. It looked as though she might lose one of

the smaller branches. Nothing disastrous, just more jin.

37 三十七

Vivian Liao

Hello, Good-bye

W hat she remembers now about their first night was

how tender he was. Her family did not have much money to

spend on finery, but Fan-Len’s mother had in-

sisted on a red lace veil, which they sewed together in the week

before her wedding. They sat across from each other by kerosene

light with opposite corners held in their laps, listening to the sound

of thread whistling through the lace, not talking except to trade

occasional comments on the progression of the veil. Falling into a

rhythm, Fan-Len’s mind wandered to images of a village she rec-

ognized only by name, a place she imagined not so different from

her own. Almost everything she knew about her betrothed had come to

her in song, the night her father came home late from working the

fields, the smell of liquor on his breath. As Fan-Len bent over to

help him soak his cracked and soiled feet in a bucket of warm wa-

ter, he patted her on the head and whispered to her softly in the

sing-song voice he adopted after drinking too much.

“Xiao nui, xiao nui. Soon you will be leaving me. Small girl,

small girl. It’s time to go away.” She leaned back on her haunches, taking in the nice lilt of his

voice and the airy baritone like a bassoon in their small two-

bedroom house, before she registered the meaning of his words.

“What did you say?” Her tone seemed to call him to attention, and he looked

straight into her eyes when he said, “I found you a husband.” “A husband? For me?” “You’re almost thirteen. It is time to enter a new home.” Her eldest brother’s fiancé had also been thirteen when they

married, and Fan-Len had been preparing herself for this moment.

Now that it was here, she felt more curious than frightened.

38 三十八

“Who is he?” But her father simply smiled and patted her on the head again,

went back to humming his favorite Peking opera. Over the weeks

that followed, she managed few details—he is 19 years-old, he has

two brothers and a sister, they also live on a farm—which she

turned over in her mind as her fingers turned their way over and

under the red silk thread of her wedding veil. As the fishtail pat-

tern started to emerge, Fan-Len imagined she was weaving a pic-

ture of the life she was about to assume. Snow fell on the eve of her wedding day. Her mother called it

a sign that the marriage would be prosperous—good snow means

good year—but Fan-Len found it particularly troublesome as she

would have to walk nearly a mile to the sedan carriage in her thin

cloth shoes. The cold on her feet, she did not dwell on the ceremo-

nial signs of her exile from her father’s house—the spilled water

and the door to her home slammed shut behind her—until she was

seated in the carriage. She had not thought to look back upon her

father’s face and she knew her mother’s would be covered in tears,

but Fan-Len did not hold these thoughts long. She would see them

at the banquet hall, after she had taken her traditional ride. As the sedan chair bounced up and down with the gait of the

men carrying her, she winced each time a man lost his step, fearing

the shame of a broken carriage more than a broken bone. Her fam-

ily had not been able to afford the full ride from her village, so her

father paid the men to carry her around the block of the banquet

hall three times, hoping the luckiness of that number would ward

off any misfortune they invited by forcing her to walk to her own

wedding. The crunch of feet on day-old snow began to take on a regular

rhythm, and Fan-Len leaned back into the cushions of the carriage

and inhaled deeply. She could smell faintly the Tiger balm her

mother used to rub into her arthritic joints as the web of red lace

swished back and forth against her nose. It soothed her while she

rode, but later, during the ceremony, it frustrated her, adding an-

39 三十九

other layer of irritation to cloud her vision of the man she would

soon be joined to for the rest of her life. She tried to study him through the red lace, but could discern

only outlines: a wide sloping face, big teeth when he smiled, and

hair that seemed to chart its own course. Later, when he removed

the veil to kiss her, she had time only to register the nice smooth

curve of his nose, before he pressed his trembling lips to hers. The wedding meal was the combined effort of the newly

joined families. Hers provided rice and vegetables from their

fields; Yang’s brothers had slaughtered a few of their chickens and

spent days fishing the lake for trout and catfish. As they dined on

red-dyed eggs and steamed whole fish and pickled pig’s feet, the

feasting was peppered by a rumor that spread round the room

nearly as fast as the rice wine flowed: The Japanese had bombed

Shanghai again. Yang’s father stood to say a few words, and all eyes turned to

him, as if their rapt attention could quell the disturbing dispatch

they had just heard. When he sat down and all the men had

toasted, they turned once more to their food, bowing their heads as

if to pray, the conversation a silent din and no match for the imag-

ined sounds of explosions and gunfire and death in the streets of

Shanghai. The news did not trouble Fan-Len. What she heard were mere

words—distant scenes—compared to the drama unfolding beside

her: this man, whom she now could study at length as they ate,

had become her husband. He had uttered his first words to her

moments after he had pulled his lips away from their first kiss,

words whispered so close to her face that she could feel the whirr

of his breath as he spoke them: xiexie ni, thank you. She thought about these words, thinking her new husband a

finicky eater as she watched him pick the choicest pieces of meat

and place them into his bowl. He took the head of the fish, prying

out the eyes and cheeks with his chopsticks, before throwing the

bones to the floor. Last, he grabbed long, leafy stalks of mustard

40 四十

green and cong xing cai and laid them on top of the rice. Then he

had set the bowl before her. But he would not look into her eyes. Not even when she re-

turned the words he had used—xiexie ni—and he had bowed his

head slightly and reached for the empty bowl sitting beside the

steaming bowl in front of her and started filling it with his own

portion. They ate—side by side, husband and wife—looking

straight ahead, occasionally lifting their glasses together when a

relative stopped by their table to pay respects with a toast. She could feel the rice wine going to her head, and it seemed

like all her words were tumbling out in a detached voice she could

not control. Her cheeks hurt from smiling so much, and she won-

dered if people were staring at the teeth she didn’t like to show.

Fan-Len noticed Yang stealing glances at her, but no, he wasn’t

looking at her lips, he was looking at her eyes now. When she

matched his gaze, he quickly looked away, and she realized she

was laughing again. The good part about the wine was that it made the rest of the

evening go faster, and soon Fan-Len found herself alone with her

new husband. She sat on the bed and giggled as he helped to take

off her shoes. She thought he was reaching down to undo his own

shoes when he suddenly righted himself and held open his palm to

her. “What’s this?” “It’s for you.” “Me?” She regarded the ring a moment before reaching for it and

slipping it onto her finger where it fit snugly. She held her left

hand out in front of her face and turned it side to side so she could

admire it. She had never seen anything so fine before. The flash of

the gold delighted her, and she was surprised to see that what she

had heard about jade was true. “Look, it gets darker on my finger!” She turned to look at

Yang, whose expression she could not discern. She thought of

41 四十一

something her father had told her offhand, not as a warning, but

more as a hint of what she could expect in days to come: if a boy

gets married, it’s happiness; if a girl gets married, it’s sadness. Where was the sadness in this? Surely someone who valued

her enough to give her jewelry would not demand the things she

had been taught a husband demands. “Is this what I am worth to you?” “I saved for many months to buy it.” “Why?” She tried to read the expression on his face. “I wanted you to have something…special.” “Why?” All of a sudden, he looked as if he would start to cry, and she

began to doubt herself. “Suan le. I just wondered if that was all I was worth. Or if a

wife meant more to you. Nevermind.” She didn’t know what else to do, so she changed the subject by

reaching for his pants, undoing the buckle like she had seen her

brother do when he met the neighbor girl in secret. Fan-Len had

followed him once—to the bamboo grove behind their house – and

watched as they made love among the tall tubular reeds. It was not

her brother she had wanted to spy on, but his girlfriend, Mei-

Gwan, a tall, long-haired beauty Fan-Len had idolized ever since

chasing her around the village as a toddler. Yang put out his hand to stop Fan-Len, and his embarrass-

ment surprised her; this wasn’t how she thought a man was sup-

posed to behave. She pulled back and crossed her arms and spoke

in a voice bolder than she felt, “Aiya, don’t you know how to use

it?” Her words seemed to help him recover, and he nodded as he

shut off the light and slipped out of his pants, lowering himself

onto the bed. They sat there side by side—their eyes adjusting to

the dark as they looked straight ahead much as they had at din-

ner—until he turned to her and kissed her, groping awkwardly at

her softer parts.

42 四十二

When he finally entered her, it felt nothing like she had imag-

ined it would. It was too quick, too painful, and she tried to keep

from shouting out, but she couldn’t help it, and that only made

him push harder. She closed her eyes, trying not to look at the face

grimacing inches above her, and after a few dark minutes, it was

over. She opened her eyes when Yang had rolled off of her, and

they started to water because she had been squeezing them so

tight. She tried not to move, hoping he would go to sleep next to

her, but she could feel the unevenness of his breathing and even in

the dark his eyes upon her. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m not, I don’t—” She turned her face toward him and felt the wetness of her

tears as she rested her cheek on the pillow. She didn’t know what

she was supposed to say, so she said nothing. They had simply

laid there looking at the whites of each other’s eyes until sleep

overtook them both. She tried to picture those eyes now, imagining them behind

his eyelids shut in their last forever blink. All she saw was the line

across his jawbone marking the edge of where the mortician had

swiped the cosmetic sponge—a color too pink and not golden

enough—a last and final ignominy for her husband to take to his

grave. “Ma.” “What?” “Come. Sit.” “Wo bu yao. You sit.” She watched as Xinyi seated himself in the first row next to his

sister, bowing his head and fumbling with his hands, first on the

seat and then on his legs and finally folded with interlocked fin-

gers in his lap. Behind him, she saw some of Yang’s coworkers

from the Biltmore Estates and the Lee family he had been visiting

the night he was killed. The room was small enough to look part

43 四十三

full, but that only made the empty seats stick out even more. None

of his friends from San Francisco had come, not even Wong Lao Jiu

or his sons who Yang had helped sponsor out of China. She turned back to her husband and fingered the pale pink

satin lining the coffin and picked invisible specks of lint off his

charcoal gray suit and thought of Lanyu and Chuen—still back in

Tianjin—unaware of their father’s death. Why did you leave me to bear your burdens again? Huh? That’s all

you do is leave. Somewhere behind her, she heard expected sounds—the shuf-

fle of feet and the loud rustling of people trying to be quiet—and

then unexpected sounds. Deep, heavy wailing filled the air, ca-

cophonous cries that sounded like the imitation of grief, like the

attempt of the lungs to mimic the soul’s pain. You think I should be crying for you? Like I cried for my ma and ba? She had not emptied out her sorrow like this since her

mother’s funeral—and then her father’s a few months after that.

Then it had been collective anguish, the mourners there all sharing

their burdens, raising their voices also for their own dead, buried

in the unyielding earth whose barrenness had put them there.

“Ma.” The wailing stopped. “What?” “Come. Let’s go.”

“No.” She turned back to the coffin, gripping the sides and

straining to hear the others. What did you do with them? You would deprive your widow of her

agony? She realized then that it had been her. She had been mourning

alone, her cries not subsumed by the grief of others in the room;

her grief had been the intrusion. “It’s time, Ma. They need the room.” She looked down, releasing her grip. You see that! Now I’m the one who has to leave. How does it feel?

44 四十四

She let herself be pulled away by Xinyi whose hands had sud-

denly found a purpose: they gripped her arm where the black

band of cloth was pinned to her beige-colored suit. It had been the

closest she could get to white without offending her children. “It’s not right, Ma.” “Who says it’s not right? In China, you wear white to a fu-

neral.”

“This isn’t China, Ma.” There was Yuming now, walking around in that half-

conscious way she had whenever she didn’t want to face reality.

She had worn black of course. You see that? Your daughter can’t even properly mourn you. They drove to the cemetery in Xinyi’s brown Rambler. She sat

in the front seat and leaned on the dash in front of her for support.

Every time they made a turn, she pressed her fingers into the vinyl

and felt the heat of the desert sun baked into the cracks of its sur-

face. She kept her eyes on the car in front of them, hoping the black

tinted glass on its backside was doing a proper job of shielding the

heat. The make-up would be sliding off his face now, tingeing the

collar of his white shirt a pinkish shade of clay. Good thing no one

had to look at him anymore. She followed the dark black car with her eyes as it wound its

way through the gravel paths of the cemetery. It kept going when

their car stopped and parked in the blacktop spaces designated for

families. As Xinyi came around to open the door for her, she

stepped out and looked around for the others, but no one was

there. No other cars had followed them. They walked in silence across the thirsty lawn—Xinyi on her

right and Yuming on her left—and she felt the blades of grass

pricking at her ankles through her pantyhose as she craned her

neck to look for the dark black car. All around her, silent eyes stared, eyes etched into stone with

thick gray letters: some up and down, some left and right, a few

45 四十五

curved at the top and bottom. Granite slabs encroached upon each

other, like the tilt of a woman’s head seeking her lover’s shoulder.

Except these lovers were strangers, all of them, forced by chance

and circumstance to share eternal residence. In China, the dead

were given room to breathe: massive ancestral burial chambers

sometimes carved into mountainsides, members of an entire family

entombed within. In America, her husband would rest between

Mitzhaufen and Davis—that’s what the man in the sales office had

told them. She had lost sight of the car and gave up, setting her gaze

ahead of her, and that’s when she saw it. They had been walking

straight toward it the whole time. She watched as a man in a suit

emerged from the driver’s side and began fiddling with something

in his hands. He looked up and then opened the back of the car,

fiddled some more. By the time they reached the burial site, Fan-Len could see he

had removed the coffin from the belly of the dark black car. She

looked at his skinny arms and doubted he possessed the strength

to lower the coffin on his own, but there were no other workers in

sight. It was just the man in the suit and Fan-Len and Xinyi and

Yuming. The three of them stood there with their hands crossed in

front of them and watched as the man started to crank a pulley.

The coffin began to descend into the ground. Wait! She grabbed her son’s arm. “I want to see him.” “What Ma?” “I want to see him.” “Ma, you already saw him. Back at the funeral home.” “Don’t argue. I want to see him. Again.” Xinyi sighed, and she watched as he stepped forward to talk

to the man in the suit, who by now was sweating profusely. She

felt their eyes upon her and their shared exasperation, but the man

46 四十六

must have wanted the break, because a moment later Xinyi was

stepping back and pulling her toward the edge of the rectangular

depression in the earth. The top of the coffin was almost level with the ground they

were standing on, and the man in the suit kneeled down and pried

open the lid, pushing it back so it rested on the cranked part of the

steel arms attached to the hinges. Xinyi and Yuming stood behind her, giving her some privacy

as she kneeled next to her husband. She was right. The make-up

had started to run. She took out a handkerchief and dabbed at the

line of skin above his collar. She hadn’t been this close to him since

the coroner at the morgue had pulled him out of a cold gray locker

for her to identify his broken body. At the funeral home, the coffin

had been set up on a platform, and she had to stand on her tiptoes

to see both sides of Yang’s face. Now she looked full into it. Will you be okay? She didn’t feel angry anymore. She thought of a cold February

night, sedan chairs, food she had not tasted, Japanese bombs, red

lace, milky jade set in gold, the dark, and his arms on either side of

her, propping himself up. Underneath him, this time she dared to

open her eyes and look. It’s time to say good-bye, okay? You’ll be okay. She reached out with her finger and touched his closed eyelids

and then his cheek. She had thought his face would be sticky, but it

wasn’t. She sat back on her heels and looked around her. There, that one must be Davis. His headstone was surrounded

by yucca stalks poking out of the ground like hair. A few of the

strands had turned yellow—the spiky flowers long since bloomed

and withered. Not so bad, huh? Next spring, you can see the new flowers. Mitzhaufen had a simple marker—sitting on a small incline –

parallel to the ground. Hmph. No frills. She’ll be a good listener. Behind her, Xinyi cleared his throat. It was time to say some-

47 四十七

thing. She didn’t know what. She said what she remembered. What she knew he would remember. “Xiexie ni.” They walked back to the car across the same thirsty lawn,

without looking back at the man in the suit who was still strug-

gling with the pulley. She looked instead at the witnesses around

her, blinking her eyes in response: thank you. Thank you for coming. When they got into the car, no one spoke. Fan-Len fingered

the ring which only fit onto her pinkie now because the heat had

swelled every part of her body. She looked down at the jade,

rubbed her thumb around its edges, and realized that that was

what Yang’s face had felt like: cool, and full of luster, when they

had made love on a night she could remember now with fondness.

Hard, but rounded like a moon, when he had answered the touch

of her finger, just moments ago, with release: I am not here any-

more. You can let me go.

48 四十八

William S. Tribell

ChiNa

Hemp and Mulberry ride the winds, blooms have fallen.

Amid the willow’s swayed dance I lie down at night,

Though can take no rest, rambling skies my temple plain.

Terracotta lotus blossom in the moon’s light.

49 四十九

Contributor Notes

John Bennett was born in England and came to the U.S. and

worked as an ambulance EMT. He takes creative writing classes at

New York University.

Elrond Burrell (cover art) is an architect and a poet from New Zea-

land who lives in the UK with his Taiwanese partner. While study-

ing Architecture at university in NZ he also studied Chinese cul-

ture and Mandarin and wrote a thesis on the Aesthetics of Pago-

das. At this time a tutor gave him the Chinese name Pu Erhan (卜尔瀚) which he has subsequently used as both a Chinese name

and as a pen-name. He practices Chan Buddhism and this has a

strong influence on his poetry which can be found at http://

puerhan.blogspot.com/

Rebecca Demarest is an MFA student at Emerson College in Bos-

ton, MA. She has been published in The Chrysalis and several

school literary journals. She is an avid student of Chinese and

world culture and an amateur penjing artist.

Karen Hunt is the author and illustrator of nineteen children's

books and co-founder and former president of InsideOUT Writers,

a nationally acclaimed writing program for incarcerated youth.

She's currently working on her memoir, Into the World, inspired by

her childhood adventures traveling with her eccentric fam-

ily during the 1960s, as well as Night Angels, her urban fantasy se-

ries for Townsend Press. “Poster Boy” is an excerpt from Love

Wars, a series of seven stories of seven diverse women and

their battles with love. When it comes to battles, Karen knows

what she's talking about. A second degree black belt in Tang Soo

Do, she has trained extensively in Eskrima and Okinawan weap-

ons, and has fought as a boxer and kick boxer in the ring. She

lives on the edge of Los Angeles with her three greatest inspira-

50 五十

tions--her children. You can find out more at: www.redroom.com/

author/karen-alaine-hunt and www.karenalainehunt.com

Kaiser Kuo is an American writer, rock musician, and culture/

technology commentator. He previously worked as director of

digital strategy, China, for the advertising agency Ogilvy, as China

bureau chief for Red Herring magazine, and as a freelance reporter.

He is the author of Ich Bin Ein Beijinger, an anthology of columns

written for that's Beijing/The Beijinger magazine since 2001. A 15-

year Beijing resident, he was co-founder of China's first and most

successful heavy metal band, Tang Dynasty, and remains active in

the rock scene in Beijing as lead guitarist for Mandarin metal band

Chunqiu (Spring & Autumn). He lives in Beijing with his wife Fan-

fan and two young children.

Vivian Liao holds an MFA from the University of Colorado at

Boulder and currently works as a speechwriter in New York City.

Hello, Good-bye is an excerpt from her first novel, a work of histori-

cal fiction entitled The Kitchen Master, portions of which have re-

ceived awards from Glimmer Train, the Denver Press Club, Aspen

Writers’ Foundation, and Center of the American West. Her writ-

ing has also appeared in Sotto Voce.

William S. Tribell is an American expat traveling through Europe;

currently living, and writing in Budapest Hungary. Born in rural

Kentucky; The Bluegrass State, in 1977. A long time resident of the

Vieux Carre, in New Orleans, Louisiana, and Katrina Refugee. Wil-

liam has lived and traveled through out the U.S. and abroad, look-

ing for inspiration, culture, and the human condition. 51 五十一