Lisa See - The Interior

How different all this was from the last time Hulan traveled to and | from Da Shui Village! In 1970 she had joined other friends and neighbors! from Beijing on a train that superficially looked like this. That train had been packed, overflowing really, with other young Beijingers. (She remembered one whole brigade of kids who'd climbed on the roof of the train and had stayed there for the whole trip.) Hulan and the others had worn old army uniforms handed down from parents. They had spouted slogans, although secretly they'd rejoiced that they were just being sent to the west instead of the Great Northern Wilderness along the desolate and inhospitable Russian border. They had harassed the compartment attendants, even booting some of them off the train. In one village, a group-not one of them over sixteen years old-had decided that the train's engineer and those who helped him were running dogs of capitalism tied to the old ways. These people were set on the station platform and harangued for two days. Villagers came out to watch the spectacle. Finally someone realized that none of them was ever going to get out of that godforsaken place unless the engineer and his helpers were put back on the train.

Coming back to Beijing two years later had been no different. That trip too was plagued by numerous stops for rallies and struggle meetings. Instead of reaching Beijing by sundown on the direct route, it had also taken two days. That time Hulan, fourteen years old and still filled with the wild passions that were so much a part of the Cultural Revolution, had traveled in the safe and comforting company of Uncle Zai. Meanwhile her father had been under house arrest in their hutong home and her mother, having fallen from a second-story balcony, had lain in the dirt outside an office building during Zai's four-day round trip to retrieve Hulan from the countryside. The people at the office had worked for Hulan's father for many years. They had all known Jinli, but they had been forbidden to come to her aid. By the time Zai and Hulan reached Beijing, Jinli was crippled and her mind destroyed.

The closer Hulan got to Taiyuan, the capital of Shanxi Province, the more she worried about coming back to this place of so much bloodshed and sorrow. Shanxi meant "west of the mountains," and the entire province was a mountainous plateau that looked out over the fertile North China Plain. That rich land had been attractive to foreign aggressors for millennia. In ancient times invaders had come from the north. Their first obstacle was the Great Wall; their second and more formidable barrier was Taiyuan. This city had seen more violence over the last two thousand years than any other in China. Those centuries of bloody turmoil lay buried in the soil and in the souls of the people of this province.

Hulan's train pulled into Taiyuan at three-thirty. She made her way out onto the street, flagged down a dented Chinese-made taxi, and asked to be taken to the bus stop for Da Shui Village. As a young girl she had been to Taiyuan only a few times-when she'd come and left on the train and on those occasions when her team at the Red Soil Farm had participated in demonstrations at the Twin Pagodas, the double temples located on a hill that served as the city's emblem. In those days few automobiles or trucks plied the streets. Instead the avenues and alleyways that made up the city had been filled with the reassuring hum of bicycles transporting people and merchandise. The air-even on a hot and humid day like this one-had been clear and filled with the perfume of flowering trees and the rich soil that even in the middle of the city exuded a warm scent.

Twenty-five years had passed, and Taiyuan was not at all what Hulan expected. Her taxi driver jolted the car in and out of bumper-to-bumper traffic. He kept his hand on the horn, despite Hulan's repeated requests that he stop. She rolled down her window-it was too hot not to-and her nostrils filled with exhaust and other fumes that spewed from factory chimneys.

These last ten years had seen an invasion of another sort to Taiyuan. American companies, the driver explained, had set up joint-venture coal mines in the outlying areas and export companies in town. Australians were raising special pigs, which were not as fat as local pigs and considered to be far more tasty. New Zealanders had arrived with sheep to grow wool for carpets. Germans and Italians, meanwhile, had gotten into heavy industry. These varied enterprises had brought prosperity to the city. All around Hulan saw construction sites for offices and foreign hotels. For now, though, foreigners stayed at the Shanxi Grand Hotel. "Year in, year out, they live there," the driver said. "Those VIP-ers have water every day, all day, while in the rest of the city we only get water on certain days of the week." Then he added, bragging, "I went inside the Shanxi once. It was amazing, but then you think of the new hotels…" He sucked air through his teeth. "The Shanxi Grand will seem like nothing once they open."

After the driver dropped her off, she discovered that the bus to outlying villages to the south wouldn't arrive for another hour. Carrying her bag, she walked down the block, passing an open-air cafe filled with customers. Another two doors down she found another cafe all but deserted. If she'd wanted a meal she would have gone back to the first place, but in such heat all she wanted was a bit of shade, a little solitude, a place to pass the time, and something cold to drink. The Coke came cool but not cold. At five, the owner of the establishment, a woman, returned to the table.

"You have been sitting here too long! You have to leave so I have room for other customers!"

Hulan looked around. There were no other customers. "I am a traveler."

"A Beijinger! Big-city woman! So what! I am a business owner, an entrepreneur. You are taking up space."

"As an entrepreneur you should be more welcoming to your customers," Hulan retorted.

"If you don't like it, go somewhere else."

Hulan gazed at the cafe owner in surprise. This woman was insulting her in the same way a salesclerk in a Beijing department store might. Customer service had gotten so bad in Beijing that the government had inaugurated a politeness campaign and issued a list of fifty phrases that were to be omitted from speech. Either this campaign hadn't filtered out to Shanxi Province, or the people here simply didn't care.

But maybe this campaign, like others before it, was doomed to fail no matter who ordered it. Hulan could remember back when the government had launched the Four Beautifications and Five Spruce-Ups Campaigns to combat incivility. In those days people had been accustomed to obeying every decree, and still no one had carried out the new orders. The masses argued that it was bourgeois to wait on customers, but Hulan had always seen the lack of manners in another way. It was hard to be polite to strangers when the government assigned the job and guaranteed the paltry salary no matter how rudely you acted. Now the pattern was hard to break. But clearly China's most successful entrepreneurs had learned the benefits of good customer service, which might have been why the first cafe had been filled with diners and this one was about to lose its only patron.

Hulan paid her bill and headed back to the bus stop. By now the sun had passed behind a tall building and shadowed the sidewalk. Hulan sat on the curb and waited.

The bus, when it arrived, was filled to capacity with commuters. Still, Hulan and five more people were able to squeeze onto the back-door steps. At first the bus moved slowly through the crowded city streets. After twenty minutes and only two miles, the bus reached the huge bridge that traversed the Fen River. Hulan couldn't believe what she saw.

Twenty-five years ago the Fen had been a huge, raging river a half mile wide. Today it was a meandering stream. The now-wide banks were lush with river grasses and shrubs. Children played. Families picnicked. A few people flew homemade kites.