A Kiss From Heaven (Excerpts)
I posted the opening of A Kiss from Heaven (fiction). Here posted are some excerpts of the narrator's (Mimi) voice and a scene of the narrator in one of the otherwise discrete stories without the narrator. When I first thought about writing this fiction, I pronounced my purpose as "to see the larger society from the smallest perspective (i.e. one person's perspective)." This person is the narrator, a mind lost and distraught. I did and still do intend this fiction only to present a time period of 10 years (late 1990s and early 2000s) in one part of China (north) as close to the social reality as possible. The 10 years immediately before this period to a certain extent explains the depicted 10 years. I am writing while improving my writing skills as I hope in the end this fiction can be precise and logical.
As a sociologist, I cannot help observing and agreeing that professionals are gradually yet actually moving away from that authoritative figure of knowledge to a service provider, not much different from the construction workers in one of the excerpts.
A Kiss from Heaven (Excerpts)
Cynthia Zhang
2009
Chapter 2 The City: On the
Unavertable Route to Modernity
Imagine you see a unicorn
in your garden. You don’t know if you’re crazy or the unicorn is crazy. You
stare at each other. The eyes of the unicorn are as big as Shandong red dates:
watery and alert, ready to escape. A giant head on a skinny body, the unicorn
has a belly smaller than its eyes. It’s almost like God snapped a lion’s head
and roughly put it on a street hound’s body.
You know what? That’s
what modernity looks like. A head full of crazy thoughts sets on a body of malnutrition.
The intestines of the unicorn don’t digest anything other than the vomit of the
alcoholics, the cynics, the wonderers, the ass lickers, and the zombies of the
past bright dynasties. The hard wired brain, though, winds back again and again
to that rustic peace of green pasture, black cattle herds, and a bull riding
kid shepherd playing a slow piece on a jade flute. Its head wants to go west.
Its body east.
You know where in the end
modernity goes? Nowhere. Its head just twists on its body, wanting to go east
now. And of course, its body really really wants to go west now.
Chapter 3
The
Mass: On the Usefulness of Monarchy
Mimi looked up into David’s eyes: the
pupils, black yet bright like laser light, squat on the glassy light blue shade
around. Mimi waved her hands and turned around. She paused at the door, but there
was no voice from behind to invite her back.
It was a cold morning outside.
Mimi decided to visit those
temporary on-site dormitories of the workers. It had been nice living in the
headquarter villa with other staff in the developmental zone, but as the
secretary to the general manager, she felt the responsibility to know and care
for her workers. She strolled in the dorms with some cigarettes in her pockets
to befriend the workers.
The dormitory buildings were
two-storied bright blue steel sheet structures arranged in two rows on the
inner part of the site. On each floor, there were about 5 to 10 rooms ranging
from 15 to 30 square meters. Mimi stepped into a 30-square-meter room. There
were dozens of black iron bunk beds, spreading randomly around. Most beds were
mot made. In fact, there was no need to make beds as the one or two filthy quilts
in each bed were usually dragged hastily to cover the workers’ cold bodies
after work. There were a couple of electric heaters in the room which barely
warmed a corner of the room, a gift from the general contractor company. There
were a couple of luggage cases under each bed. No toilet. The cold running
water was outside for brushing teeth, washing faces and dishes. There was a
kitchen close to the general manager’s office providing food and hot drinking
water.
Mimi noticed some one-story mud houses
with straw roofs. For a moment, Mimi felt she was back to her grandparents’
house. But these houses were much lower and of a temporary nature. Mimi
hesitated. She had always been frightened by horror movies, especially those
from Hong Kong. The ghosts never showed themselves to people other than a long
shadow slamming the doors of a disserted house. She opened her eyes wide to
stare at the doors made of black canvas supposed to be white, quite sure the
chill worming along her cotton military coat collar was colluding with those
unknown creatures.
This
is where my people live. They should have a revolution. But do I know my
people? Are they ghosts or angels? To have a revolution, I need to talk to
them, like Mao Zedong himself.
Inside the house was like a huge
cave. The dim light forced in from the ceiling windows made of plastics. Some
crude lumbers were propping the ceiling every 5 meters. Mimi blinked, trying to
see something. The smell of cigarettes was wafting across from somewhere.
Out of the darkness came an elderly
voice, “Miss Mimi, have some time to walk around?”
Mimi turned her head to the direction
where the voice came, “Yes, are you all right with that?” She had to be
cautious without knowing what was inside there.
“We’re honored to have you here.
Would you like to take a seat? Lao Chen, get that stool for Miss Mimi.” The
voice ordered.
Mimi caught a shadow fetching a stool
to her, “Here you are, Miss Mimi.” A younger voice invited.
“Thank you.” Mimi sat down. There
were two men sitting in one bed side by side. The bed was a wood board less
than 20 centimeters above the dirt floor. One man was around 60 and the other
40.
“We just got back from the site. We
finished our shift.” The older man smiled to Mimi.
“Oh, it must be a long day.” Mimi was
very quick to switch to a tone she used to talk to her farmer aunts and uncles.
“Yes, it was.” The younger man – Lao
Chen nodded. “Miss Mimi, how did you decide to lower your status to visit us?”
“Oh, I’m the manager secretary. It’s
my responsibility to know your condition.” Mimi didn’t have to rehearse. “Lao
Chen, you and …”
“Just call me Lao Wei.” The older man
answered, “We came from the same county. Miss Mimi, it’s dirty here. The only thing
we have here is cigarettes.”
“No need to be polite. I don’t need
anything. Help yourself with your cigarettes.” Mimi smoothed out her woolen
scarf.
“Talking about cigarettes, I have to
feed my addiction worm now.” Lao Wei turned to Lao Chen, “You want one?”
“Sure,” Lao Chen nodded, massaging
his crew cut with his palm.
Lao Wei dragged a piece of
newspaper from under his bed, folded it nicely into small rectangulars and
reversed the seams to cut it into small pieces. He then groped in his pant
pockets for a while. He took out a dark red sash, opened it. In the sash was
almost powder like raw tobacco bits. He pinched some tobacco and spread it
evenly on the newspaper laying open on his left hand, rolled the paper with his
right hand and sealed the cigarette with saliva. He handed the cigarette to Lao
Chen and then made himself one.
When Lao Wei and Lao Chen each had a
cigarette in their right hand, Lao Chen lit the cigarettes for them, Lao Wei
first.
They smoked deeply for a while,
smelling each puff.
Lao Wei then looked down on the floor
and pondered slowly, “It’s close to spring festival. We’re going home soon.”
Mimi took over the topic, “Isn’t that
exciting? You’ll bring back home your salary and everyone will be happy.”
Lao Chen sneared, “Salary? We haven’t
seen its shadow yet since last year.”
Mimi was in disbelief, “How could
that be? This is a big company, right?
Lao Wei hushed Lao Chen who was about
to spit out his anger, “Miss Mimi, we’re just down to earth farmers. We left
our family behind to come here to build this stadium. But we’ll go back to our
farms when we’re too old, maybe 70.”
Lao Wei stopped and then continued
after a long pause, “Now it’s time to get the seeds ready for the spring.”
Chapter 8 The Corruption: A City of
Desire
When
the night comes, a city begins its life. So they say. The nightlife of a city
is rich. So it seems. You can shop, dine out with friends, watch Peking opera,
go to a bar, a concert, and best of all, you can go to a theatre. There, you
are often amazed by some soul searching dialogues, monologues stripped of all
the derivatives: costumes, make up, and even set. All the performing skills are
nude in your naked eyes. You feel your spirits leap, drop, rise and ebb. You go
to a bar, some bands are playing. The ode of joy in life blares. The cello sighs
over some loss that cannot be named. The black long hair of that young singer
glistens in the dark room and covers his expression of homelessness.
In the city, everything glows in the
evening: people’s jewelry and skin, streets, buildings and that unique light
heartedness. If you lose your job, you’ll find another without much delay
unless there is an economic crisis. If your heart is broken, you’ll find it
full the next day in a new lover’s arms. Sometimes you have more than one
lover. So your heart never breaks. Yet, this lightheartedness is unbearable
sometimes. You struggle to grab something to keep yourself afloat on the
surface of a starless sea. You know your life is so light that you might lose
it to yourself, to the invisibility and the smallness people inevitably assume
in their daily life begging for some meaning.
That meaning is hard to
find and retain, though, with so much desire so easy to satisfy. The sound of
desire was the softest at night under countless roofs by the side of the lonely
lovers.
