Lenin's Kisses (72 page)

Like his father, the son never returned.

In order to encourage her husband and son to come home, Sister Hua stopped planting crops on the hillside, and instead covered the hill with flowers and grass. She planted carriage-wheel chrysanthemums, rizhao plums, magnolias, and white orchids. They were fragrant in autumn and bloomed red in winter, and all year round there was a floral fragrance that could be smelled for more than ten
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in every direction.

Sister Hua hoped her husband and son would smell her flowers and return to Balou. Every year when the flowers were in season, she would sit on the hillside gazing out at the world with tear-filled eyes. The year when the flowers and grass were most verdant, and their fragrance spread to permeate the entire region, she was sixty and blind in both eyes, having lost her sight staring out from that flowery hillside.

In the end, Sister Hua’s husband and son never returned. The people of Liven and of Balou never again planted crops in the rich soil of that hillside, and instead just let it continue growing flowers and grass. The hill came to be known as Sister Hua Slope.

5)
Loose earth.
The term refers not only to the land that each family has planted for itself, but also to a form of farming and a style of life that Liven has practiced for a long time, and that are directly antithetical to those associated with the land and labor collectivization movements. More specifically, the term refers to an existence in which one eats what one grows, does not pay grain taxes, and has no relationship whatsoever with the government.

7)
Loose days.
This term refers to a kind of free and unfettered life, a form of existence that, from time immemorial, has been made possible by loose earth.

9)
Dragon Day, 11) Phoenix Day, 13) Old People’s Day.
These are unique holidays honoring men, women, and the advanced age and accumulated wisdom of the elderly, which Liven used to celebrate but which disappeared many decades ago. Dragon Day honored men, and was held every year on the sixth day of the sixth month; Phoenix Day honored women, and was held every year on the seventh day of the seventh month; and Old People’s Day honored the elderly, and was held every year on the ninth day of the ninth month.

The origins of these holidays can be traced back to the Ming dynasty. After the Great Migration, Liven was founded in the Balou mountains, but because the vast majority of its residents were blind, deaf, paraplegic, crippled, or mute, most of the men were not able to plow the fields or harvest the crops. They enjoyed a solitary existence, but many people were not content with Liven’s style of life and mode of existence. One day, an elderly person arrived in the village and reported that if people headed southeast, the blind could regain their sight, the deaf could have their hearing restored, paraplegics would be able to walk as energetically as if they were flying, and mutes would be able to speak and sing. Even unattractive wholers, as long as they were willing to head southeast, could become handsome and powerful. Therefore the men, behind their wives’ backs, all agreed to leave, and secretly departed in the middle of the night, heading southeast.

If they got hungry along the way, they would help people work the fields, do odd jobs, or even beg for food, and if they were thirsty they would get water from a river or pond. They endured immense hardship and were exhausted, but one day, after walking for a year and a half, they encountered a gray-haired man lying by the side of the road. The old man was extremely hungry and thirsty, and asked them for something to eat and drink. In handing him food and water, the men noticed that he was blind, crippled, and deaf. After the man had had his fill, they said, Although we are all disabled, we are nevertheless young, and each of us has only a single disability. You, however, are already over eighty and furthermore have multiple disabilities, including being blind, crippled, and deaf, and missing a leg. Why didn’t you just remain at home?

The old man replied, I’ve already been on the road for sixty-one years, for more than a full
jiazi
cycle. He said, When I was nineteen I tried to take my life several times, on account of being disabled. But later God sent me a dream, telling me to head northwest, where there is a Balou mountain and a village called Liven. In Liven, there is an enormous old honey locust tree, beneath which there is buried a secret that can enable the blind to regain their sight, the deaf to regain their hearing, the mute to regain their voice, and cripples to run again. The old man said, It was in order to find that secret that I left my home in the Southeast and have been walking for sixty-one years. I set out when I was nineteen, and now I’m already eighty-one. He added, I know that if I continue for another year and a half I will reach Liven, but unfortunately I’m already over eighty, and am afraid I won’t survive long enough to see it.

As he was saying this, the old man started sobbing.

The people from Liven immediately turned around and headed back to the Balou mountains, carrying this severely disabled man with them. However, despite the fact that they were diligently attending to him, the old man passed away three days later, in the middle of the night. Before dying, he said, I’ve lived for eighty-one years, and have been traveling for more than a full sixty-year
jiazi
cycle. But it was all worth it, just to have enjoyed these past three days. Then he went to sleep, and the next morning he didn’t wake up.

After selecting a grave site for the old man, the villagers spent another six months on the road, until they finally made it back to Liven. Once there, they quickly took out their pickaxes and shovels and started digging beneath that old honey locust tree. They dug out a large porcelain jar, inside which there was a small redwood box. The mouth of the jar was so narrow they had to shatter it to get the box out. When they finally succeeded in opening the box and peered inside, they discovered that it was actually empty, without even a scrap of paper or a speck of soil.

The villagers threw the box away, cursing the old man, then they each headed home to rest. Because they had spent a full year and a half traveling southeast, and another year and a half traveling back to the Balou mountains, they had spent a total of three years on the road. They were all exhausted, and no one brought up again the possibility of leaving Liven and their wives. Instead, they focused on working their fields and being with their families.

However, during this season of harvesting the wheat and planting sorghum, the one-armed men discovered that, after having spent three arduous years on the road, they could one-handedly reap the wheat and dig the fields, even doing the work of two-armed wholers. The cripples discovered that after having been away from home for three years, they were now so used to walking that they were even faster and more vigorous than able-bodied people. The blind discovered that, because they had walked so far, they could now use their canes even more effectively than sighted people used their eyes. The deaf similarly discovered that after having spent three years on the road and spoken with so many different people, they had learned to guess what anyone was saying just from watching their lips. The mutes discovered that as a result of having needed to sign to people while on the road, they had gradually developed their own sign language.

All those who’d been on the road found they could farm and live as well as wholers. When they remembered the benevolence of that eighty-one-year-old man, they decided to designate the ninth day of the ninth month Old People’s Day. In order to congratulate the men not only for having returned, but for having learned special skills to compensate for those that they lacked, the women designated the sixth day of the sixth month—which is the day the men returned—to be Men’s Day, and called it Dragon Day. In order to thank their wives for having remained so busy and raised their children during the three years they were out traveling, the men decided to designate the seventh day of the seventh month to be Women’s Day, also known as Phoenix Day. On Old People’s Day, all members of the younger generation would kowtow to their elders, and not only would give the elderly good things to eat and drink, but would take out the unlined and lined garments that they had prepared for the elderly to wear all year round and would compete to see whose was the most attractive, and afterward they would donate the garments to the elderly.

The sixth day of the sixth month is generally a busy time of year, but after this day was designated Dragon Day, the men would not do any work on that day, and instead the women would be responsible for preparing food and drink and working the fields, while the men would stay home all day and rest. After spending the day resting, however, the men would then have to go into the fields and work overtime to compensate. On the seventh day of the seventh month, meanwhile, the busy season had already passed, and by this point the women would also be tired, so it would be their turn to rest for a day. On this day, the men would not only cook the meals, but also prepare their wives’ favorite foods.

Of course, it was also necessary to invite people to sing Balou tunes on Dragon Day, Phoenix Day, and Old People’s Day, and the village would spend an enormous sum of money hiring a group of wholer lion dance performers from several dozen
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away. Naturally, the children would want to light firecrackers and wear new clothes, just as they would on New Year’s.

15)
Livening Song.
The Livening Song was the earliest prototype of the Balou tune. Its melody was mostly that of a call-and-response song, and less frequently would take the form of a solo. However, the performance of the Livening Song could take many different forms: Some people sang the tunes while alone on the mountain ridge when they felt lonely and tired; others would sing them back and forth from one mountainside to another; and there was even a group of people who might loiter at the entrance to the village singing the songs together. The melodies had set patterns, but the lyrics varied depending on the setting and the season.

The lyrics that were most popular among the older generation of disabled villagers were:

Hey, hey hey hey . . .

You deaf man on the hillside, listen up.

In the sky there is a celestial fairy who is singing.

If you can hear her clearly, she will marry you,

But if you can’t, you will need to spend the rest of your life alone.

Hey, hey hey hey . . .

You blind man on the other hillside, watch this.

There is a golden rabbit sleeping at your feet.

If you can catch it, you will enjoy good fortune for the rest of your life,

But if you can’t, you will need to eat plain bread for the rest of your life.

Hey, hey hey hey . . .

You cripple down in the gorge, listen up.

You must run up the hill in a single breath.

If you can make it up, you’ll become a wholer,

But if you can’t, you’ll limp for the rest of your life.

Hey, hey hey hey . . .

You paraplegic on the mountain ridge, listen up.

The celestial maiden in the sky is lonely.

If you can stand up, she will give you her hand,

And if you lead her home she will become your wife.

Usually, the person singing this would be someone farming on the mountain ridge, who would start singing to relieve his loneliness. The melody would be similar to the duet’s, only more carefree and lyrical. In order to write this novel, I lived in Liven for several years, but the only lyrics that I was able to collect were the following.

The lyrics of the first song:

The soil is rich, oh yeah, it is flowing oil.

The wheat grains are as large as stones.

I pick up a wheat grain on the side of the road,

And when I toss it aside, I accidentally break open your head. . . .

And the lyrics of the second song:

I am a blind man, and your leg is lame.

You sit on the cart while I pull it.

My feet stand in for yours,

While I borrow your eyes from you. . . .