Yan Lianke - Lenin's Kisses

In this way, One-Legged Monkey notified each household.

He called out, “Hey, Lead Blind Man, tomorrow morning there’ll be a livening festival. The county chief wants to distribute grain and funds. Whoever doesn’t attend runs the risk of starvation!”

He called out, “Hey, Fourth Blind Man, tomorrow there will be a livening festival, though of course if you plan to starve to death next spring there is no need for you to attend!”

He called out, “Hey, Crippled Auntie, didn’t you say you wanted to see the county chief? Then you should turn out for the livening festival tomorrow.”

He said, “Little Piglet, why don’t you run home and tell your parents that tomorrow at the break of dawn a three-day livening festival will begin.”

And in this way, everyone was notified.

When the sun came up the next day and the eastern sky was enveloped in a rosy glow, everyone finished breakfast and proceeded to the main field in the village. The weather was warm and pleasant, and there was a slight breeze. The men were all wearing loose-fitting gowns, while the women wore comfortable blouses. The field was a large clearing that was as flat as the surface of a lake. Originally, this was used as the communal threshing ground, but after the land was redistributed it came to be used as the blind men’s threshing ground, and therefore whenever the villagers held an event, they would always attempt to include the blind men. The blind men in Liven were well looked after, like babies who are always given a few extra gulps of breast milk. Although this was now the blind men’s field, the village would use it whenever there was a public event for which everyone needed to gather together. The field therefore came to be used as the village’s meeting space and performance stage. It was one mu in size, with one side abutting the road, two sides abutting a set of fields, and along the fourth side a three-foot-high earthen dam, on top of which there was a pockmarked slope.

The owner of this slope was fifty-three years old. He had only one arm; the other was merely a stub. But even with only one arm, he could still plow the fields, turn the soil, and use a hoe to smooth the earth. When people came to observe the festivities during the livening festival each year, if there wasn’t enough room for them in the main field, they would go over and sit on that pockmarked slope. The slope had been plowed and hoed, but after being trampled for three straight days, it was left as flat as a pancake. After the livening festival, the owner once again needed to hoe and turn the soil, and as he was using his ox to plow the field a second time, he complained vehemently that people had destroyed his field. But even as he was complaining vociferously, he continued smiling broadly.

Once, someone noticed that after the harvest every year, the one-armed landlord would invariably go and plow his field beforehand. The person said, “Uncle, the livening festival has not even taken place yet. What’s the point of plowing the field now, if it will only be trampled flat again?” After looking around to make sure no one else was listening, he laughed softly and said, “Nephew, don’t you know, when I plow this field and then allow it to be trampled, all of the dust from everyone’s shoes and the filth from their bodies will go directly back into the soil, making it unnecessary to add any additional fertilizer for the rest of the year.”

This year, the one-armed man once again plowed the slope. He originally assumed that, on account of the summer blizzard, there wouldn’t be a livening festival this year, but now it turned out that there would be one after all and that the county chief would host it himself. The one-armed man, therefore, was the first to arrive at the field, and the other villagers soon followed. They brought chairs, benches, and mats, and some of them notified their relatives in neighboring villages, urging them to come take part in the excitement. They also brought seats for their relatives, in order to reserve a spot for them. By the time the sun had risen three pole-lengths in the sky, when everyone would normally be working, the field was already full. There were bundles of beams bound together with wire resting on some piles of wood, on top of which there were some door planks covered with reed mats, which functioned as a makeshift stage. This stage had been erected by the one-legged Lame Carpenter, with the assistance of several young men. They brought saws, hammers, axes, and other tools, and in no time at all they completed their work.

The benches in front of the stage were arranged in neat rows.

Men and women from neighboring villages were invited to come sing Balou tunes.

In the past, the musical troupes would come to Liven several days prior to the festival to discuss their proposed compensation, but since this year the festival was being hosted by Chief Liu, the percussion and musical troupes didn’t know how to organize, or whom to approach. The news that the county chief would personally host the livening festival spread quickly through the villages, like the aroma of food at mealtimes. When the sun came up that morning, the entire mountain pass was filled with visitors from neighboring villages who had come to observe the excitement. By the time the sun reached the head of the village, a huge crowd had gathered in the field, and the slope along the dam was completely full of people. The fifty-three-year-old one-armed man walked around shouting, “You’re all trampling my field!. . You’re all trampling my field! I just plowed this field, but if I had known you were going to trample it like this, I wouldn’t have bothered.” Even as he was complaining, he continued smiling broadly. When he saw relatives and acquaintances from other villages who didn’t have anywhere to stand, he said to them, “Why don’t you go sit over there in my field. I can always plow it over again later.”

As a result, there were more and more people sitting in his field.

The crippled woman who worked as the village pharmacist took a portable coal burner to the field, and used it to prepare a pot of dark tea-eggs, the fragrance of which quickly spread everwhere.

A deaf man was roasting peanuts by the side of the field.

Someone selling sunflower seeds set up a stand right next to his.

A woman from the neighboring village cooked tofu strips on the slope. The tofu strips were dipped in hot oil, then strung up on a skewer and dunked in a pot of boiling water. Although the pot contained only water and no oil, and was seasoned with only salt, pepper, anise, and MSG, those tofu strips were so fragrant they could be smelled from miles away. A balloon seller arrived, as did a whistle peddler. People selling candied apples and poached pears also arrived. Someone selling clay Buddha and fat boy figurines set up a water basin on a tall bench, and after the figurines were dunked in water, they turned bright red. Because the water was hot, when the peddler pulled out the fat boy figurine, its little pecker stuck straight out and a thin stream of liquid flowed from it, as if it were a real boy peeing into the air. Everyone laughed at this, and someone even forked over money to buy it and the Buddha figurine that was still sitting in the water. The field was raucous, with more and more people arriving at every moment. It was like a temple ceremony in the mountains. Even incense and paper money sellers arrived.

The livening ceremonies that Grandma Mao Zhi typically hosted were also intended to celebrate the year’s harvest. After working hard all year, the villagers were permitted to relax, to gather together for three days to eat and drink. But this year the ceremony was hosted by the county chief, and for this reason people came surging in like the tide. They not only filled the one-armed man’s field on the slope but also lined the sides of the field.