When Rape Flowers Bloom (4)
Swannlee-126 01/18 9978
4.5/156
When Rape Flowers Bloom
By Swann Lee
Chapter 4
On the first Saturday of the winter break, around four o’clock in the afternoon, Datong and I leave for the town. On the hill the snow has melted, so again we can see the big white slogan “Welcome to the 1980s” painted on the slope. When we pass the pond at the border of Mulberry Village and Peach Village we stop to take a rest. The pond has frozen like a huge mirror, with dried lotus stems and leaves scattered on the surface. Wind blows the yellow reeds by the pond and they dance like river waves.
“Hua, someone can turn that into a fish pond and make a lot of money with it,” Datong says, wiping his forehead with a linen handkerchief, steam rising from his hair.
On our way, Datong has been telling me one after another of his ideas: fruit orchards, chicken farms, sausage factories. He says he will create lots of job openings and the villagers will all get rich together. He has heard about the upcoming new policies on the radio.
“With a wedding and all the changes to look forward to,” I say, “you’re indeed a lucky man, gege. But we have to hurry. The dianying is starting soon. The sun is already setting.”
“Really?” Datong jumps up and we begin to sprint through the fields.
We get to the cinema just before the dianying starts. What an exciting place! Three intensely bright light bulbs mounted over the entrance make the evening almost as bright as the day. A lot of people are walking about, chatting and occasionally patting each other’s back. Young women with curly hair and pretty bags hanging from their shoulders make me feel ashamed of my cotton-padded jacket with holes. Young men with shiny hair and wide-legged pants strut about, looking around to see if anyone is paying any attention to them. Datong notices that I keep looking at the peddlers selling roasted peanuts and sunflower seeds. He takes out twenty fen from his pocket and buys two paper cones of roasted sunflower seeds. I put one seed in my mouth. Crack! It tastes delicious with few grains of salt on the shell. We walk in, find our seats, and sit down chatting over the din of sunflower-seed cracking in the cinema, waiting for the dianying to start.
Suddenly the lights dim. A picture appears on a huge piece of white cloth suspended from the ceiling in the front of the hall. Everybody inhales in shock. This is nothing like the shadow play on a small piece of cloth that we have seen before. It is not just a much bigger shadow. It is real. We feel we are no longer in the cinema of Yulong Town; we have entered a different world with a beautiful lake and an exquisite pavilion. It looks like a wind is blowing, as the pink lotus blossoms in the lake begin to sway gently. Dew drops on green lotus leaves roll off and fall into the lake, ripples spreading on the clear surface.
“This is soooo fancy.” Datong and I look at each other in the admiring sighs rising up in the cinema. I feel grateful that Teacher Zhang has granted me a peek into such a wonderful world.
Music flows from boxes suspended on the two sides of the cloth, sounding like flutes, gongs, and drums all playing at the same time. So this is why we can hear: those boxes give out such loud sounds. Then a single flute is singing a soft melody. A woman dressed in a short skirt appears and tiptoes by the lake as if she were floating.
"Ah!” the audience yells. “Shameless!”
"Isn’t she grown up enough to know how to cover herself properly?” A few women throw hands over their eyes.
I have never seen anyone dressed in so little in front of people. How embarrassing! Out of unexplainable worries, I look to Datong. He is watching with an open mouth, not moving at all. It looks as if he wanted to jump into the screen himself. I turn back to watch the woman on the screen.
So much flesh. A slip of white cloth barely covers her chest. An awkward ditch between her breasts is quivering with every jump she makes. And her skirt: it can’t even cover her behind. Her underwear, the bottom rims of her buttocks, and her legs are all showing below the umbrella-shaped ruffled skirt. She is flinging her legs this way and that, exposing more for people to see.
The music changes. A man darts onto the screen, dressed in a pair of incredibly tight white pants. I cover my eyes, ashamed to see the big bulge between his legs. He looks ridiculous with the bulge swinging around when he jumps and jumps into the air or turns and turns on his toe. Why do his pants have to be white?
The two people on the screen begin to gently wave their arms this way and that with the woman on the man. Then the man holds the woman’s hands and she leans back, her body an elegant arch. A dreamy expression comes over her face. Her eyes are almost closed. Her mouth is slightly open. She trembles slightly.
A young woman in front of us covers the eyes of her boyfriend. “I don’t want you to get rotten thoughts,” she whimpers.
“Bad, bad woman,” an old man to my right is murmuring, “so shameless.” The man puts his hands under the woman’s armpits and holds her up in the air. He begins to turn slowly . Every few seconds, the woman’s buttocks and the underwear and the faint contour of what’s in the underwear flicker past the screen. The woman shakes her head helplessly, her arms making waves in the air, trying to reach the man’s face. Finally the man lowers her and holds her tight. Her breasts are pressed into his chest. His hands are on her legs, right below the buttocks. Their necks cross and rub like two birds.
“Shameless, shameless…” the old man goes on murmuring.
I look to Datong. He crosses his legs. Catching my eye, he holds the cone of sunflower seeds to me, “You want it?”
“You don’t want it?” I ask.
He shakes his head. Even in the dim light, I can see that his face looks red. His breathing sounds heavy. I worry about him as I begin to crack his sunflower seeds.
Now the man and the woman are twisted together. Their arms and legs are all mixed up. The woman is arching backwards toward the floor. Her breasts are right in front of the man’s mouth like peaches shivering in the wind. The man runs his forehead along the woman’s waist and legs. The woman throws back both arms, exposing the armpits. And suddenly the man lifts the woman up with her straddling him, their crotches squeezed together!
“My Buddha!” people cry and jump out of the seats. The picture suddenly disappears, followed by a lightening-shaped pattern flickering past the screen. A cadre-like man walks toward the screen, holding a plastic corn-shaped thing in one hand.
“I’m very sorry, comrades,” he says, his voice louder than usual. “There has been a mistake. Our staff is new and still learning things. Now we’ll watch the right movie.”
Then a movie about a Red Army’s Bridge begins to play. People calm down.
Before I realize it, the lights are back on in the cinema. People stand up slowly from their seats, spreading arms into the air. Gradually they begin to file out.
“Let’s go,” Datong says to me, his face still faintly red.
We walk out of the cinema and into the dark night outside. Yulong is back to its old self in winter nights, quiet and calm. But I am new; I have been washed inside and out. Dianying has transformed me into someone higher and better. Every step I take feels holy, because now I know what a wide and wonderful world I am treading in. Pigs’ shrill cries from the slaughter house hardly bother me like they used to do. All I hear is the river singing, first from afar, then right beneath us when we pause on the bridge. Oh, the way they hold each other. How divine it must be to be held like that, by, yes, by Teacher Zhang. The thought of his face fills my mind with sunshine, which I have always felt when he is nearby. And how under the weather I have felt whenever he talks to girls taller than me. I must grow up fast to catch up with him before he is snatched by someone else. When the day comes that he belongs to me, I will be in complete harmony with the world, wanting nothing else from it. Oh, just to have him look at me all the time, and then, maybe put his arms around me, how strengthless and sweet that will make me feel. In the darkness, I blush and sigh.
I look to Datong, but he is staring at the river, not uttering a sound. We start walking again. All the way across the town, over the bridge on Yulong river, and into the fields, Datong says nothing. In the starlight, we rush in silence on the earthy banks through dry fields. I try to bring up topics such as growing exotic flowers that we have seen in the dianying, but Datong never responds. His head is hanging down, lost in his own thoughts. Still, from the side, I can see his eyes are shining bright in the dark blue night, almost like a drunkard. I begin to feel a little uneasy beside him. Dogs bark here and there in villages.
On the first Saturday of the winter break, around four o’clock in the afternoon, Datong and I leave for the town. On the hill the snow has melted, so again we can see the big white slogan “Welcome to the 1980s” painted on the slope. When we pass the pond at the border of Mulberry Village and Peach Village we stop to take a rest. The pond has frozen like a huge mirror, with dried lotus stems and leaves scattered on the surface. Wind blows the yellow reeds by the pond and they dance like river waves.
“Hua, someone can turn that into a fish pond and make a lot of money with it,” Datong says, wiping his forehead with a linen handkerchief, steam rising from his hair.
On our way, Datong has been telling me one after another of his ideas: fruit orchards, chicken farms, sausage factories. He says he will create lots of job openings and the villagers will all get rich together. He has heard about the upcoming new policies on the radio.
“With a wedding and all the changes to look forward to,” I say, “you’re indeed a lucky man, gege. But we have to hurry. The dianying is starting soon. The sun is already setting.”
“Really?” Datong jumps up and we begin to sprint through the fields.
We get to the cinema just before the dianying starts. What an exciting place! Three intensely bright light bulbs mounted over the entrance make the evening almost as bright as the day. A lot of people are walking about, chatting and occasionally patting each other’s back. Young women with curly hair and pretty bags hanging from their shoulders make me feel ashamed of my cotton-padded jacket with holes. Young men with shiny hair and wide-legged pants strut about, looking around to see if anyone is paying any attention to them. Datong notices that I keep looking at the peddlers selling roasted peanuts and sunflower seeds. He takes out twenty fen from his pocket and buys two paper cones of roasted sunflower seeds. I put one seed in my mouth. Crack! It tastes delicious with few grains of salt on the shell. We walk in, find our seats, and sit down chatting over the din of sunflower-seed cracking in the cinema, waiting for the dianying to start.
Suddenly the lights dim. A picture appears on a huge piece of white cloth suspended from the ceiling in the front of the hall. Everybody inhales in shock. This is nothing like the shadow play on a small piece of cloth that we have seen before. It is not just a much bigger shadow. It is real. We feel we are no longer in the cinema of Yulong Town; we have entered a different world with a beautiful lake and an exquisite pavilion. It looks like a wind is blowing, as the pink lotus blossoms in the lake begin to sway gently. Dew drops on green lotus leaves roll off and fall into the lake, ripples spreading on the clear surface.
“This is soooo fancy.” Datong and I look at each other in the admiring sighs rising up in the cinema. I feel grateful that Teacher Zhang has granted me a peek into such a wonderful world.
Music flows from boxes suspended on the two sides of the cloth, sounding like flutes, gongs, and drums all playing at the same time. So this is why we can hear: those boxes give out such loud sounds. Then a single flute is singing a soft melody. A woman dressed in a short skirt appears and tiptoes by the lake as if she were floating.
"Ah!” the audience yells. “Shameless!”
"Isn’t she grown up enough to know how to cover herself properly?” A few women throw hands over their eyes.
I have never seen anyone dressed in so little in front of people. How embarrassing! Out of unexplainable worries, I look to Datong. He is watching with an open mouth, not moving at all. It looks as if he wanted to jump into the screen himself. I turn back to watch the woman on the screen.
So much flesh. A slip of white cloth barely covers her chest. An awkward ditch between her breasts is quivering with every jump she makes. And her skirt: it can’t even cover her behind. Her underwear, the bottom rims of her buttocks, and her legs are all showing below the umbrella-shaped ruffled skirt. She is flinging her legs this way and that, exposing more for people to see.
The music changes. A man darts onto the screen, dressed in a pair of incredibly tight white pants. I cover my eyes, ashamed to see the big bulge between his legs. He looks ridiculous with the bulge swinging around when he jumps and jumps into the air or turns and turns on his toe. Why do his pants have to be white?
The two people on the screen begin to gently wave their arms this way and that with the woman on the man. Then the man holds the woman’s hands and she leans back, her body an elegant arch. A dreamy expression comes over her face. Her eyes are almost closed. Her mouth is slightly open. She trembles slightly.
A young woman in front of us covers the eyes of her boyfriend. “I don’t want you to get rotten thoughts,” she whimpers.
“Bad, bad woman,” an old man to my right is murmuring, “so shameless.” The man puts his hands under the woman’s armpits and holds her up in the air. He begins to turn slowly . Every few seconds, the woman’s buttocks and the underwear and the faint contour of what’s in the underwear flicker past the screen. The woman shakes her head helplessly, her arms making waves in the air, trying to reach the man’s face. Finally the man lowers her and holds her tight. Her breasts are pressed into his chest. His hands are on her legs, right below the buttocks. Their necks cross and rub like two birds.
“Shameless, shameless…” the old man goes on murmuring.
I look to Datong. He crosses his legs. Catching my eye, he holds the cone of sunflower seeds to me, “You want it?”
“You don’t want it?” I ask.
He shakes his head. Even in the dim light, I can see that his face looks red. His breathing sounds heavy. I worry about him as I begin to crack his sunflower seeds.
Now the man and the woman are twisted together. Their arms and legs are all mixed up. The woman is arching backwards toward the floor. Her breasts are right in front of the man’s mouth like peaches shivering in the wind. The man runs his forehead along the woman’s waist and legs. The woman throws back both arms, exposing the armpits. And suddenly the man lifts the woman up with her straddling him, their crotches squeezed together!
“My Buddha!” people cry and jump out of the seats. The picture suddenly disappears, followed by a lightening-shaped pattern flickering past the screen. A cadre-like man walks toward the screen, holding a plastic corn-shaped thing in one hand.
“I’m very sorry, comrades,” he says, his voice louder than usual. “There has been a mistake. Our staff is new and still learning things. Now we’ll watch the right movie.”
Then a movie about a Red Army’s Bridge begins to play. People calm down.
Before I realize it, the lights are back on in the cinema. People stand up slowly from their seats, spreading arms into the air. Gradually they begin to file out.
“Let’s go,” Datong says to me, his face still faintly red.
We walk out of the cinema and into the dark night outside. Yulong is back to its old self in winter nights, quiet and calm. But I am new; I have been washed inside and out. Dianying has transformed me into someone higher and better. Every step I take feels holy, because now I know what a wide and wonderful world I am treading in. Pigs’ shrill cries from the slaughter house hardly bother me like they used to do. All I hear is the river singing, first from afar, then right beneath us when we pause on the bridge. Oh, the way they hold each other. How divine it must be to be held like that, by, yes, by Teacher Zhang. The thought of his face fills my mind with sunshine, which I have always felt when he is nearby. And how under the weather I have felt whenever he talks to girls taller than me. I must grow up fast to catch up with him before he is snatched by someone else. When the day comes that he belongs to me, I will be in complete harmony with the world, wanting nothing else from it. Oh, just to have him look at me all the time, and then, maybe put his arms around me, how strengthless and sweet that will make me feel. In the darkness, I blush and sigh.
I look to Datong, but he is staring at the river, not uttering a sound. We start walking again. All the way across the town, over the bridge on Yulong river, and into the fields, Datong says nothing. In the starlight, we rush in silence on the earthy banks through dry fields. I try to bring up topics such as growing exotic flowers that we have seen in the dianying, but Datong never responds. His head is hanging down, lost in his own thoughts. Still, from the side, I can see his eyes are shining bright in the dark blue night, almost like a drunkard. I begin to feel a little uneasy beside him. Dogs bark here and there in villages.
