Elsewhere, p.2
Elsewhere, page 2
Speaking of criminals, said Small Bamboo,
the armadillos were Chairman Mao’s favourite
when he was a guerrilla
in Jinggang Mountain
back in the old days
The day after the dinner party, a real crisis set in. It had rained so much the previous night that the water had swept through the wreckage, where hundreds of thousands of bodies were still buried, and into the reservoir.
‘Now we’ll have to drink skin-flavoured water,’ Chilly said.
‘Ew,’ Vertical said.
We were sitting outside the Little House. Old Stone had advised us earlier to relax and not to worry about the water. There were at least eight or nine cartons of beer stocked in the Little House so we should be well hydrated for another couple of days. ‘Trust me, before we finish the beer somebody will sort the water out,’ he concluded, and went to join Small Bamboo, Young Li and Calm for a game of Mahjong.
The rest of us sat, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes. In the centre of the square, a man stood on a table, looking down at the crowd while shouting: ‘One last ticket to Beijing! The train leaves at ten tonight! Any higher offers?’ In the opposite direction, a young nurse held a megaphone, calling: ‘Volunteers needed! Volunteers needed! The bus leaves 8 a.m. tomorrow at the community medical centre!’ A group of teenagers chased a boy out of a convenience shop a few doors down. ‘Give us the milk you cocksucker!’ A woman walked by in front of us, weeping, holding a small child in her arms.
‘It’s like watching a movie,’ Six Times said.
‘I feel troubled that I’m not really sad,’ said Chilly.
‘I’m not very sad either,’ Vertical said. ‘And you, Pigeon?’
‘I’ve been thinking,’ I said slowly. ‘All of this is great material. But I don’t think I’ll ever write about the earthquake.’
‘I’ll never write about it either,’ Six Times said.
‘And what do we say when many years later people ask us about the big earthquake in 2008?’ Vertical said.
‘We can talk about the aggressive beer-drinking,’ Chilly suggested.
‘And the sounds of intercourse at night,’ Six Times said.
‘And the banquet Old Stone cooked for us,’ I added.
Vertical turned to me and smiled. ‘Is everything alright, Pigeon?’
A woman screamed in the square. A tent fell. Some young men shouted loudly.
‘What do you mean?’ I said.
‘You’ve mentioned that dinner a number of times already,’ Vertical said. ‘And you’re reading Old Stone’s poetry book.’
‘Young Li lent me the book,’ I said. ‘But I find it difficult to understand.’
‘Poetry is not for understanding,’ Chilly said.
Six Times downed his beer. ‘Think about it this way,’ he said, ‘when you write a story, you’re essentially creating a dish. You want people to see the meat and the veg and even to smell the fragrances. But they can’t actually eat it. They can only imagine the taste of the food by interpreting the image of it.’
I thought of yesterday’s dinner again. They all seemed to have forgotten what happened.
‘But none of this matters to us,’ Six Times continued. ‘When poets come into the room we simply chomp on the fictional dish you’ve created. We eat up the food and shit it out later. And the shit is poetry.’
Chilly laughed and clapped. Vertical and I laughed as well.
——
That night, I stayed in Six Times’s tent and we made love like primitives. There were no condoms so he came on my belly. Later, to help me clean up, he poured some beer there and wiped it off with his socks. I told him I would prefer to have dried sperm on my belly than cold beer and the filth from his socks. He said he was sorry.
Afterwards we slept. A series of magnitude 4 to 5 aftershocks struck, rocking us into deeper sleep. In my dreams I had a conversation about the earthquake. I remembered it clearly even after waking up. My deceased father sat in front of me, his face stained by a thick tawny paste, his nose crooked. And he asked me: ‘How do you know this is all real and happening? How can you be sure you haven’t already died in the earthquake and are just living in the afterlife?’
I told Old Stone about my dream and he laughed for quite a while. ‘That is a very Zhuangzian dream,’ he said.
‘You could say that about every dream,’ I said.
‘Have you ever eaten butterflies?’ he said. ‘I haven’t had butterflies per se but once in Kunming I had caterpillars. They were nicely deep-fried, lightly seasoned with chilli-pepper powder and cumin, and tasted like crispy air.’
We sat outside the Little House, facing the square. Nearly one-third of the tents had disappeared, leaving discoloured spots on the ground, like the surface of the moon. Young Li’s red tent remained standing.
‘How much longer do you think we can last without water?’ I asked.
‘Not long,’ Old Stone said. ‘But we might surprise ourselves – this morning, a search team dug out a man who’d been buried for more than seventy-two hours, still alive.’
‘That’s something,’ I said.
‘So I suppose the real question is – another Zhuangzian one – do you actually want to live or not?’
He continued: ‘With my girlfriend, I realised she had given up when she lost her appetite. First she said she wasn’t hungry and then she just hated food, couldn’t stand looking at it, smelling it, or even hearing about it. One day we got up I said what do you want to have for breakfast and she screamed as if someone had stabbed her with a knife. That was when I knew she’d made up her mind.’
I was about to say something when the others came back in Sister Du’s mini-truck, carrying cardboard boxes and bags of bottled water, instant noodles and other stuff. Small Bamboo sat down by us, unscrewed the lid from a bottle of water and gulped down half of it. ‘Motherfucker!’ he said. ‘I’ll never drink beer again.’
‘Where did you get these?’ Old Stone asked.
‘The community medical centre,’ Small Bamboo said. ‘Sister Du heard a new batch of volunteers arrived from Xi’an, so we called over.’
‘You prawns,’ Old Stone said. ‘These are for the victims of the earthquake.’
Young Li sat down and started taking cartons of cigarettes out of his box. ‘We are the victims,’ he said. ‘We’re all enduring.’
A man walked by. Young Li whistled and threw him a bottle of water and a carton of cigarettes. The man caught them swiftly and went away.
Later, Chilly, Vertical, Six Times and I sat by the flowerbed, eating tins of braised pork and sweet chilli fish.
‘These are not very good,’ Chilly said, exerting himself to swallow.
‘Xi’an people don’t know how to cook. They live only on noodles,’ Six Times said.
‘Tastes fine to me,’ I said.
Six Times turned around. ‘Since when are you eating meat?’
‘I think Pigeon has a crush on Old Stone,’ Vertical said.
They all looked at me and I said: ‘What?’
‘You’re reading his book all the time. You put it right beside our pillow,’ Six Times said.
‘Because I’m trying to understand poetry,’ I said. ‘Plus, I finished Camus.’
‘Can I have Camus? I’ve always wanted to read The Plague,’ Chilly said.
We then talked about The Plague and The Myth of Sisyphus, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes. Not far from us, Old Stone, Small Bamboo, Young Li and Calm were playing mah-jong on a square table. Calm wore a green cardigan on top of the red floral dress. She hurrahed, pushed down her tiles and clapped. The three men handed over their money. The others were watching TV inside the Little House. The volume was loud, announcing that the government was installing a new water filtration system in the reservoir. ‘… we are fighting minutes and snatching seconds,’ it said.
For the first time in many years, I felt a tingling of contentment. I ate meat and drank water. I had a bed to sleep in. Before long, I would go to my bed and have a dream about butterflies, and, just like Zhuangzi, I would not be able to tell if it was me who dreamt about the butterflies or a butterfly who dreamt about me.
Shooting an Elephant
when shanshan woke up, declan had already left the house. It took her a while to remember where she was. Ireland. Quietly she pronounced the word, her tongue curling back, brushing across her upper palate with a soft tingling. ‘Ireland.’
The country was still new to her and the horse chestnut trees in Phoenix Park were rustling freshly as Shanshan walked beneath. Around her, the wild fields extended, the wind combing through the tall and lush grass. Shanshan had never seen a place so green and immense. It made her breathe deeply.
Shanshan had been coming to the park regularly since moving with Declan into a terraced cottage off the North Circular Road. At the viewing, she hadn’t particularly liked the cottage because it smelled of mould, but Declan had told the agent right away they’d take it. ‘It couldn’t be more convenient,’ both he and the agent had agreed. The house was five minutes’ walk to the Special Criminal Court where Declan had started his new job as a court reporter.
Declan had promised her that this job would allow him plenty of holiday and spare time so he could repaint the house, show her around the city and even, when the weather permitted, drive her to the sea. However, a big case had come in as soon as Declan had started, and he had been stationed at the court ever since.
The case involved someone called ‘Slab’ Murphy. The name sounded odd to Shanshan so she asked why the man was named Slab. ‘I have no idea,’ Declan said, typing on his laptop. ‘Maybe he has a flat forehead?’
A couple of days after this conversation, when Shanshan was getting milk from Londis by the quay, she glimpsed a headline on the news stand: Tight Security Outside Court as Case Against Ex-IRA Commander ‘Slab’ Murphy Gets Under Way. Then she saw underneath the headline a picture of an old Irishman with a weathered face and red cheeks. The man wore a khaki-coloured flat cap so there was no way for Shanshan to know the shape of his forehead.
Shanshan brought the milk to the cashier before remembering the thing Declan had asked her to get. She took out her phone and opened Notes.
‘Can I also get this please?’ She raised her phone to the cashier so he could see the words on the screen.
‘Blu-Tack,’ the cashier read out. ‘Sure.’ He walked away and soon returned with a slim, square packet.
‘What do you need this for?’ he asked, scanning the packet.
‘I don’t know,’ Shanshan said. ‘My husband asked me to get it.’
The cashier smiled. ‘My little brother used to love Blu-Tack,’ he said. ‘It was his favourite thing and he played with it all the time.’
He popped the packet beside the milk. ‘Four sixty-five please.’
While Shanshan searched for the change in her wallet, the cashier said: ‘It’s been five years since he died. My little brother. He had autism.’
Shanshan looked up at the cashier. He was a tall man with a full, dark beard, his hair a neat crew cut. ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ she said, giving him the money.
‘Thanks.’ He punched open the cash machine and handed her the receipt. His forearm was covered in tattoos. ‘Have a good day.’
Shanshan had been learning to enjoy her days since moving to Dublin. In this foreign city, her anonymity soothed her. Although she was struck that, here, anyone could turn to her at any moment and start a conversation about practically anything.
One day, in Phoenix Park, she complimented an old couple on their adorable beagle, and they told her in turn about their son who had lived in Shanghai for seven years and had just proposed to his Chinese girlfriend.
Another rainy day at IMMA, when she and a young man happened to stop, at the same time, in front of a painting of the Ox Mountains, she learnt about the time he got totally pissed in Sligo and fell into the river.
In the cafeteria of the Chester Beatty, as she was queuing beside the salad bar, a woman behind her asked where would be a good place to get authentic tofu. The woman was pleased that, since she had begun a vegetarian diet, her eczema had cleared up like a miracle.
At dinner, Declan said: ‘Did you enjoy the Chester Beatty? Did you see their ukiyo-e collection?’
The radio hummed in the background. Some country music was playing.
Shanshan nodded, chewing the chicken. ‘There were also Ming Dynasty snuff bottles.’
‘An oriental paradise.’ Declan reached out for the butter. ‘Back in college, it was one of my favourite places to go.’
‘I took their brochure for the winter exhibitions and talks,’ Shanshan said. ‘I’ll definitely visit again.’
The music stopped. A soft-spoken man began to speak. A man of constant sorrow, Shanshan heard the voice saying.
‘Sorry you’re doing everything by yourself,’ Declan said, mashing a potato with his fork. ‘I wish I could go with you, but this case is just crazy. They are going through the ledgers and cheque books the guards found at Slab Murphy’s farm and it’s taking forever.’
‘I didn’t know he had a farm.’ Shanshan cut the broccoli.
‘Sure he does. It’s what all this fuss is about. Some tax he didn’t pay for extra herds of cattle.’ Declan poured some gravy on the potatoes. ‘Mam wants to know if we’re going back for the October bank holiday.’
‘I thought we are painting the house that weekend, to get rid of the mould,’ Shanshan said, glancing across the table at her husband.
‘That’s right,’ Declan said. ‘Then I’ll tell her we’ll be back for Christmas.’
‘I can’t believe we’re already talking about Christmas,’ Shanshan said, letting out a big yawn. The radio host’s voice was hypnotising.
Declan reached over and squeezed her hand. ‘Go lie down,’ he said. ‘I’ll sort out the dishes. Remember you still need plenty of rest.’
Shanshan did not tell Declan that, in fact, she had not thought of the mould for a while. The odour had either disappeared or had subsided into the ordinary along with the other mundane aspects of her life. She kept it hidden from her husband that the real reason she didn’t want to go back to Longford was that she could not bear the attentive and measured enquiries from Declan’s parents, their incessant wondering whether she had got better.
Shanshan thought she was doing well, as much as circumstances allowed. She had been dutifully taking iron supplements every day, plus three red dates. She had told the translation agencies that she would not take on any new jobs until perhaps next year. She had moved to a new country where the sky was azure and the air revitalising and clear. She had been coaching herself not to look back.
At Londis, after she paid for an Innocent smoothie, the cashier said: ‘Can I ask you something if you don’t mind?’
‘Sure.’ Shanshan screwed open the bottle and took a sip. The icy drink ran down her throat.
‘Do you speak Chinese?’ he said.
Shanshan told herself not to frown. She thought of the homeless guy on Seán Heuston Bridge who’d always shout ni hao to her whenever she passed by. ‘Let’s say I do.’
The cashier grinned and rolled up his short sleeve to show her a fist-sized tattoo stretching on his upper left arm. ‘Can you check this for me? I told the artist I wanted the word for home, does it look right to you?’
Shanshan then recognised the black curlicues, 冢.
‘Oh no,’ she gasped slightly.
Behind her, a man queued with a full basket. ‘Just one second,’ the cashier said to the man before asking Shanshan: ‘Is it not right?’ He checked his biceps.
‘Uh,’ Shanshan said. ‘This is not the character for home. It means grave.’
‘You’re kidding me.’
Shanshan glanced back at the uncomplaining customer. ‘It should be easy to get it fixed,’ she said to the cashier quickly. ‘You just need to move the dot in the middle to the top of the character and then it’s home. Do you want me to write it down for you?’
The cashier thought about it for a few seconds. ‘Ah never mind,’ he said, ‘I’ll keep it as it is. Grave is grand.’ He rolled down his sleeve and waved to the man to come over.
Later that day, Shanshan returned home after a long walk in town and slumped on the sofa in exhaustion. She stared at the slanted white ceiling and the apex that was the furthest away from her and fell asleep.
Then she had a dream, in which she was still a girl, about nine or ten. She was in a residential area with nobody around. The sun beamed above the potholed asphalt road. As she walked on the road, she felt the sharp heat grilling her soles. All the houses seemed abandoned, the roofs covered by moss and the paint on the walls peeling off. She noticed this smell coming from somewhere. The stink of mouldy food and dead animals. She walked for a long time and thought she was lost. The street signs were in a language she couldn’t understand. Eventually she saw someone approaching in the distance. She ran towards them and recognised it was a thin Burmese woman, carrying a basket on top of her head. The woman looked at her and in English she asked: ‘Are you okay, little girl? Do you need help?’
The girl in her dream looked up, her face covered in tears. She cried to the Burmese woman in Chinese: ‘Wo zhao bu dao wo mama le.’
Shanshan woke up with a shiver, her mouth dry and bitter and her feet cold as ice. Mawlamyine, she thought. Outside the window, it had gone completely dark. The clock on the wall said five past six. There would be another hour or two before Declan finished work and came home. She walked to the kitchen to prepare dinner and turned on the radio.
The days were getting shorter and much wetter. The rain had been lashing down for days and, even when the bank holiday weekend began, showed no sign of stopping.
‘I don’t think we can paint the house,’ Declan said, sipping his coffee. ‘In this weather, the paint would never dry.’
Shanshan looked out the kitchen window. The geranium drooped, drowning in its flowerpot on the windowsill. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘A week ago, it was so glorious and sunny.’
