View China from the Other Land
After his leaving England for a year and a half, finally E, my friend’s mate in
school decided to come to visit us. I had heard a lot about E from my friend: He should be funny, less tolerated about shitty things than normal people, adventurous, politics-sensitive, and most impressively, erudite.
So gradually I started to expect his arrival along with my friend. Once in a while seeing my friend so excited about E’s visit, I would ask him how he was so sure that time hadn’t changed E. People always change, especially after they left school. I said this because I didn’t want my friend to get disappointed too much. After all, they two hadn’t seen each other two whole years.
The expected morning finally arrived. As planned, my friend went to the airport
to pick E up, whilst I was home tiding up and setting up beddings for E. It was
exciting in a way I guess. Besides, winter is coming around; it is nice to have
someone come over to stay for a while. It was around lunchtime they finally came
back. E was quite an easy-going guy. Soon after I saw him, my unease faded away
.
My friend led him to the Bund, Yu Garden, TV tower, walking street on Nanjing Road, and the new Xiangyang Market within the following days. It was strange to see that how anxiously most people, when they landed in a strange land first time
, wanted to view what other people wanted to view. It was even stranger when you heard them complain there were just not enough westerners to make them feel at
ease.
The first time when I heard E say that from my friend, I couldn’t believe it. But then when the other day I led them to the neighbouring city and heard E say that myself, I had to believe it. It was understandable in a way, since he couldn
’t speak Mandarin and might feel crippled at times. But what I couldn’t understand was why you need to see people, with the same look as you, around in order
to feel at ease. Feeling alienated in my opinion has more to do with your inside
rather than anything else.
It seems in E’s eyes China is a piece of land full of dormant danger. Even the
stray dogs on the streets could make him uneasy and nervous. Dogs all have rabies, food are all dirty, people all like spitting to make you want to throw up, and cars all want to run you over if you are not careful. It is a dangerous land that it is simply not enough to only go around with an adventurous spirit. Hence,
you need to have someone of your sort to be around to drive you back to the ground, to remind you that all is just temporary and all insanity you see will disappear once you leave this piece of land.
Having said that, I also find many of them also couldn’t help liking China. Here you can buy fake cheap products. E just couldn’t help buying things that he normally could live without, such as LV wallet, bags, and dozens of DVDs. Last week I just said goodbye to a French couple, who were leaving China permanently. The husband said he just couldn’t stop himself from buying shit: crystal lamps,
videos, fake Columbia ski equipments, and even contact lens. China is a piece of
wasteland in his opinion, full of cheesy products, but where value and quality,
failing to be acknowledged, don’t want to linger.
This morning E left for England, going back to his homeland, with a bulging bag
full of crap. I don’t know how much he will value things he bought over here. But one thing is for sure, this piece of land doesn’t belong to him. He felt alienated and actually he was. I guess I am still glad that he came to visit us. But on the other hand, I am gladder that my friend didn’t go to buy those shit,
and that hopefully we are leaving this country soon.
