THE PRODIGAL SON

I’m back in China and it’s the Spring Festival (the weekend of February 17th and 18th). Day and night, fireworks have been exploding outside by my home in an enthusiastic declaration that feels custom made for my return. Yes, it’s remarkably egocentric to turn the ancient tradition of the Chinese reverie of the New Year into a celebration of "me" but I like to think that China missed me as much as I missed China.

It’s not that being home wasn’t wonderful (with a few snags; a root canal for one, the truly confusing and utterly psychotic meltdown of a former friend for two, to say nothing of the fact that two weeks really just is too short a visit resulting in me not seeing my Michi as well as several other friends) but I really missed China. I’ve come to realize that, at this point in my life, I really am a marginal man. I simply don’t fit in if I’m supposed to. I never have. I don’t know if I ever will. Being home reminded me of all the things I’m supposed to have together and all the things I simply don’t. Being home reminded me of how social I’m supposed to be and how very much I’m just not. Being home reminded me of how small the "continental" life can be; most people I spoke to simply fear the great unknown of China with very little desire to dispel the vague haze of (currently) unfounded fear. This is to say nothing of the racism displayed by my fellow "enlightened" and "cultured" college educated types typified by the comment, "God, you SMELL like China. China smells musty, right?" not an hour after I disembarked a 16 hour flight and before I had a chance to shower.

Somehow, "Yeah, but they’re communists" is supposed to explain to me the unwieldy enigma that is the horrifically terrifying "Chinese." I still don’t get what’s so unforgivably wrong with communism. I definitely prefer democracy (but it’s not like the US can really lay claim to that right now) but there’s more than one way to get things done. Every argument I’ve heard about the terrors of communism all seem to go back to the violence of revolution as if revolution could possibly be peaceful and fun. France didn’t call it the "Reign of Terror" for nothing. And for that matter, what must the Iraqis think of "democracy"? Revolution hardly seems like a reason to forgo an entire political system. Frankly, I’ve yet to hear a single argument about the current state of things that justifies the perspective most people I know seem to have of China.

It’s clear to me that a large number of Americans have their Regan-era perspective of China and refuse to hear a post-internet revolution perspective. Most everyone was quite sure that I’d have a meeting with some sort of Gestapo-esque thought police or that one day I’d simply vanish from the face of the earth, not to be seen or heard from ever again. I spent so much time dispelling other people’s fear of the great, scary question mark that is China that I spent almost no time whatsoever discussing the cool stuff I’ve seen or the adventures I’ve had. I had a brief moment where I busted out the map of Xi’An and started explaining the where’s and what’s with my uncle, aunt and mom but that was cut short by the invasion of the ego that is my sister-in-law. Essentially, the closest anyone has come to understanding my experience here is a friend of the Jude’s who came to Xi’An on a guided tour (read: in a Western bubble) and found the locals to be scary, money-grubbing peasants because she made a huge spectacle of herself.

So, as much as I missed my friends, it was a relief to get back to China; the one place in my world where notions of "China" are what I recognize as "Chinese" and simply a part of everyday life. China and Xi’An in particular have progressed so much in the past 5 or 6 years that it’s difficult for even Chinese immigrants to understand what a fucking cool place Xi’An has become. I’ve made friends with a wonderful Australian in West Egg and he’s been splitting his time between Xi’An and Sydney for about three decades and he’s said that the perspective I’m building about Xi’An and China is a very recent thing and that he’s seen all these improvements spring up very recently. I hope I am at the beginning of a new era in China and not simply at a blip on the map because, really, it’s wonderful here.

Nonetheless, my trip back was a bit haggard as, in typically Chinese fashion, my stopover was scheduled WAY too short and WAY too dependent on everything working like machinery and not like life. It was fully believed that a less-than-two-hour stopover was enough for an international flight to transfer to a domestic flight. Less than two hours is generally not enough time to get off the (theoretically not-delayed) plane, get your bags, get through customs, re-check in, find your gate and board. I knew when we were delayed by two hours at JFK that there was simply no way I was going to make the transfer. I don’t care how much time the pilot makes up; I knew I wasn’t going to make the next flight. However, I also know the Chinese and so I knew that I would be very efficiently (read: I would be taken directly through the appropriate chain of command with none of that American bullshit of "sorry, you’ve spent 45 minutes in line 46B but your paperwork says you should be in line 46b" or my "can you please help me" met with "you should have filed the appropriate paperwork previously for an escort"; it may take them a moment but the Chinese will always get you to the right place provided you ask for help… if you don’t ask for help, they probably won’t offer it because it’s considered rude to openly acknowledge an adult having a hard time) and generously taken care of (there would be no question of me having to pay for anything involved with their fuck up), even if it did end up taking a little while (read: while I would always be with the right person to get to the next right person immediately, I would end up waiting a little while as the Chinese, by and large, are incredibly overworked and so I would not exactly be the only person this one person would be dealing with).

As I got in to the transfer re-check in location, it was noted that my plane already took off. My ticket and passport were then handed off to several people (by the way, most Chinese are casual about taking and passing around passports within the appropriate spheres; a most nerve wracking habit for Westerners because we’ve all seen one too many movies where the innocent White American loses sight of their passport while surrounded by the slanty-eyed officials speaking a funny language and promptly end up either forced into prostitution or in a third world prison on charges of drug trafficking but, in the real world, it’s a common gesture for the Chinese because the Chinese who own passports are proud of the fact that they have them; it takes an obscene amount of money, interviews and time to get a passport… the more people who see that you have a passport, the more people see that you’re important). Not much to my surprise, I caught a fair amount of the rapid fire Mandarin about how my plane had already taken off.

I could tell from the nervous way everyone kept glancing at me that my flight was the last one going out that evening and I was going to be spending the night in Beijing. I could also tell exactly why it is that Hollywood uses this setup a lot. The nervousness of the Chinese is often exhibited in quickly shifting glances but without the Western furrowing or twisting of the eyebrows indicating low-grade anxiety. In other words, Chinese nervousness often resembles Western conspiracy and the fact that everyone was getting a solid look at my passport in an attempt to buy time would absolutely freak out the big wigs in Hollywood.

Nonetheless, I had missed my flight. Frankly, there’s nothing to be done about that. Shit happens. However, it was amusing to watch as no one wanted to tell the American who just got off a 13-hour flight that her next flight has gone and she’s stranded. Most of us foreigners tend to freak the fuck out under that situation; especially if we’re American. However, most of the people working around me were men and I was a helpless, stoic, calm single woman. I knew there was no way I wasn’t going to be getting the best treatment possible.

Nervously, a kindly dude with a walkie-talkie looked me up and down.

"Ah, here’s the gentlemen whose job it is to inform me of the bad news," I thought.

"The flight is…" he paused to look for the right word, "gone." He finished quite softly and nervously in English.

"I know. At 5 o’clock I knew. We were…" I said in Mandarin and drifted off as I realized I didn’t know the word for "late."

His eyes grew wide and quickly slid into a smile. "You know?" He asked in English.

"Yes." I replied in Mandarin.

He laughed a little, clearly relieved I not only wasn’t going to throw a fit but that I could speak Mandarin. The Chinese have had the notion that their language is unacceptably opaque jammed down their throats. Consequently, any Westerner who speaks any modicum of Mandarin is unspeakably obsessed with accessing China and therefore the chance of a Mandarin speaker treating a Chinese person like shit is highly unlikely. This goes double for Western women who are not seen as Robber Barons or pilfering the "untouched" poontang and so we are seen as having even less reason to need to learn it.

Just as I had predicted, because the Chinese are nothing if not dependable in their support systems (for the gainfully employed), I was escorted to the appropriate place, met with the appropriate people, provided water and every possible comfort during my long-as-expected wait, rescheduled for the first flight out the next morning and shuttled off to a hotel. Of course, everything was paid for by the airline and I was shuttled back to the hotel the next morning.

On the flight from Beijing, I was seated next to two thirds of a family while the father was placed further up in the cabin. So, I swallowed the suckitude and offered my beloved aisle seat (at over 6 feet tall, the only chance for leg room is either the emergency exit aisle or an aisle seat) so the father could sit with his wife and son. I hate little more than the middle seat and that’s what the father had but it’s the New Year and the most important thing to the Chinese is to be with their family.

In my terrible Mandarin, I suggested that he and I switch and I found myself planted between a New Yorker and a young Chinese teenager. The New Yorker and I chatted for a bit and as the plane took off, I noticed the Chinese teen was starting to have a panic attack.

"You okay?" I asked in Mandarin knowing that even though she should be able to speak English, in the midst of a panic attack, a foreign language isn’t exactly the most forthcoming.

Without speaking, she shook her head as her knuckles turned white around the armrest.

"Breathe," I said in English because I don’t know the word in Chinese. I showed her a deep breath and said, "This" in Mandarin. Then I mimicked her hyperventilation and said "Not this" in Chinese. "Together" I said in Mandarin as I took a deep breath in. "One," I said in Mandarin as I took one breath in. She watched me nervously and breathed in with me. "Two" I said in Mandarin as I took a second breath. Her deep breath got a little deeper and as we continued to ten.

By the time we got to ten, we had leveled out. Her nerve had returned to her and she began to look out the window at the morning mist lingering between the mountains.

"Beautiful" I said in Mandarin.

She looked at me and nodded. As she nodded, the plane banked hard to the left and I could see her anxiety rise again.

"It’s nothing." I comforted her in Mandarin.

Wide eyed, she looked at me to sort out if I was just saying it to comfort her or if I really meant it.

I shook my head casually to emphasize the irrelevant nature of the plane banking on our safety and returned to my newspaper. She seemed to be comforted by my blasÈ behavior and was soon out like a light, lightly snoring next to me.

In fact, she didn’t wake up again until the seatbelt sign turned off and people were up getting their things to disembark.

Once I was off the plane, I hopped into a cab, negotiated a good price (actually, I just named my rock-bottom price and he simply agreed) and chatted a little with the cab driver. It was really cool to be able to figure out what he was saying and he really seemed to enjoy our conversation as much as I did.

As we got to my compound, he leapt out of the car to help me with my bags and teased me a little about my heavy bags. I do love when Chinese men feel comfortable enough to tease me a little. We wished each other well and he was off.

I collected my things and as I turned to enter, the main entrance on my side of the compound exploded in a cacophony of fireworks. Every color imaginable exploded before me and a mind-numbing series of explosions unleashed themselves all around me. The excitement in my head at being back manifested itself outside my head in a cinematically well-timed unleashing of more fireworks than I’ve ever seen at one time. I made it through the arch of blinding light and one of my guard-friends smiled broadly at seeing me.

"Ni hao!" He called out to me.

"Ni hao!" I called out, positively glowing.

And then, in my brilliance, I was wandering about my apartment, giddy with excitement, as I tripped over my phone cord, effectively pulling it out of the wall and severing the line. I now have to go to the store first thing in the morning to get another one.

The dumb ass is back.