Mo Yan - Pow!

Three months before Lao Lan's wife died, he and I dealt with two clandestine visits by reporters and were each proud to have managed so successfully.

The first came disguised as a peasant sheep-seller. With a scrawny old sheep in tow, he mixed in with the crowd of people who had brought animals to sell—cows and sheep on the hoof, pigs in handcarts, dogs on shoulder poles. Why shoulder poles? Try putting a halter on the dogs! The sellers dull the animals’ senses with liquor-laced buns, tie their rear legs together, slip their poles under the ropes and then hoist them onto their shoulders. Since it was market day, the sellers formed a large crowd. Once I'd planned the day's production schedule, I took a walk round the plant with Jiaojiao.

Our prestige soared in the wake of the contest. Nearly all of the workers we encountered looked at us with respect. As for my defeated combatants, Liu Shengli and Wan Xiaojiang, they nodded and bowed and greeted me as Young Master. Despite their sarcasm, their admiration was genuine. Though Feng Tiehan maintained the restraint he'd displayed during the competition, there was no hiding his admiration either. Father observed everything and then took me aside for a heart-to-heart talk, urging me to act humbly and to avoid any signs of arrogance: ‘People shun fame, pigs fear bulk,’ he said. ‘A dead pig doesn't fear boiling water,’ I countered with a giggle. ‘Xiaotong, my son,’ Father sighed, ‘you're too young to take my words seriously. It's in one ear and out the other. You won't know how hard a brick wall is till you smash your nose against it.’ ‘Dieh,’ I said, ‘I know how hard a brick wall is. Not only that, I know that a pickaxe is even harder.’ ‘You must do as you see fit, son,’ he said resignedly. ‘This isn't how I wanted my children to turn out, but there's nothing I can do about that now. I've not been a good father, so I guess I'm to blame for how you've turned out.’ ‘Dieh,’ I said, ‘I know what you wanted of us. You wanted us to go to school, to go to college. Then abroad, to complete our education. But Jiaojiao and I aren't student material, Dieh, any more than you're official material. But we have our unique talents, so why should we follow in everyone else's footsteps on the path to success? As they say, if you have something fresh to offer, you'll never go hungry. We can do things the way we want.’ Father hung his head. ‘What unique talents do any of us have?’ he wondered aloud, dispirited. ‘Dieh,’ I said, ‘other people can look down on us, but we can't look down on ourselves. Of course we have unique talents. Yours is evaluating livestock, ours is eating meat.’ He sighed again: ‘Son, how can you call that a unique talent?’ ‘Dieh,’ I replied, ‘as you very well know, it's not everyone who can consume five pounds of meat at one sitting without adverse effects. And it takes a unique talent to determine the gross weight of a cow just by looking at it. Don't you call those unique talents? If you don't, then the whole concept of unique talent is meaningless.’ He shook his head: ‘Son, the way I see it, your unique talent isn't eating meat, but twisting false logic until it seems true. You should be somewhere where you can show off your eloquence, somewhere like the United Nations. That's where you belong, a place where you can debate to your heart's content.’ ‘Would you look closely at that place where you think I belong, Dieh? The UN? What would I do in a place like that? Despite their Western suits and leather shoes, those people are all phonies. The one thing I can't stand is to be tied down. I need to be free. But even worse, there'd be no meat for me there and I won't go anywhere where there's no meat, not even Heaven.’ ‘I'm not going to argue with you,’ Father said, exasperated. ‘It's the same thing all over. Since you say you're no longer a child, then you have to answer to yourself for whatever happens. Don't come crying to me in the future if things don't work out.’ ‘Take it easy, Dieh,’ I said. ‘Future? What does that mean? Why waste time thinking about the future? There's a saying: “When the cart reaches the mountain, there'll be a road, and a boat can sail even upwind.” And another one that goes: “Favoured people are free of hustle and bustle, others blindly rush about.” Lao Lan says that Jiaojiao and I were sent down to earth to eat meat and that we'll go back after we've consumed our allotted amount. The future? Not for us, thank you!’ I could see he didn't know whether to laugh or cry, which delighted me. I now knew that I had put Father behind me as a result of the meat-eating contest. A man I'd once revered was no longer worthy of that feeling. Nor, for that matter, was Lao Lan. I was struck by the realization that while they seem complicated, the affairs of the world are in fact quite simple. There's only one issue that deserves worldwide attention—meat. The world's vast population can be divided into meat categories. In simplest terms, those who eat meat and those who don't, and those who are true meat-eaters and those who aren't. Then there are those who would eat meat if they had access to it and those who have access but don't eat it. Finally, there are those who thrive by eating meat and those who suffer over it. Amid those vast numbers of people, I am among the very few who desire meat, who have a capacity for meat and love it, who have constant access to meat and who thrive by eating it. That is the primary source of my abundant self-confidence. See how long-winded I get, Wise Monk, when the talk turns to meat? People find that annoying, I know, so I'll change the subject and talk about the reporter who dressed up like a peasant.

He was wearing a tattered blue jacket over grey cotton trousers. He had yellow rubber sandals on his feet and a bulging old khaki bag over his shoulder as he joined the crowd with his scrawny, tethered sheep. His jacket was too big for him and his trousers too long, which made him look sort of lost in his clothes. His hair was a mess, his face ghostly pale and his eyes constantly darted here and there. He didn't fool me for a minute, but I didn't take him for a reporter, at least not at first. When Jiaojiao and I approached him, he looked away. Something in his eyes bothered me, so I scrutinized him more closely. Refusing to look me in the eye, he covered up his discomfort by whistling, which made me even more suspicious. But I still didn't think he was a reporter in disguise. I thought he might be a delinquent from town who'd stolen a sheep and brought it here to sell. I nearly went up to tell him he didn't have to worry, since we never asked where our animals came from. None of the cows the West County peddlers brought came with a pedigree. I took a look at his sheep—a castrated old ram with curled horns. It had been recently sheared, but not professionally, evident from the unevenly scissored patches and a few spots where the skin had been nicked. A sad, scrawny old ram with a terrible haircut that might have been remotely presentable had it been favoured with a full coat. Attracted by the short fleece, Jiaojiao reached out to touch the animal and startled it into a leap. The unexpected movement caused the fellow to stumble and jerked the lead out of his hand, freeing the animal to meander up to the queue of sellers and their animals, the rope dragging on the ground behind it. The fellow ran after it, taking big strides and swinging his arms wildly as he tried to step on the moving rope, but missed every time. It almost looked as if he was putting on an act for the crowd. Every time he bent over to grab the rope, it slipped out of range. By now, his clumsy, comical performance had everyone in stitches. Including me.

‘Elder Brother,’ Jiaojiao said with a laugh, ‘who is that man?’

‘A fool, but a funny one,’ I said.