Xiaolu Guo - A Concise Chinese English Dictionary for Lovers

Man on doorsteps looks at me and asks in English, “Would you like a cup of coffee before you start walking again?”

“Oh. Is that convenient for you, to make a cup of coffee?”

He smiles. “It’s no problem. I’ve already made a pot. So I just need to fetch a cup for you.”

He goes back inside of house. Quite dark inside.

We sit on doorsteps and drink a very bitter coffee without milk. I dare not ask him about milk, thinking maybe Dutch man doesn’t use milk.

“I am Peter. And you?”

“Zhuang Xiao Qiao…Well, just call me Z, if you want.”

“Z?” He laughs. “That’s a strange name.”

In England, people tell me if somebody says something “strange” means they don’t like it. So I don’t answer him.

Then he asks me:

“Are you Japanese? Or Philippino? Or maybe Vietnamese? Or Thailandese?”

I a little annoyed: “Why I couldn’t be a Chinese?”

“Oh, are you?” he says, and looks at me meaningfully.

His smile reminds me of you. A bit different. He wears a black leather jacket.

“Do you like plants?” he asks me, because my eyes were still on the wisteria.

“Yes, I like those vines, wisteria. It is originally from China,” I say.

“Oh, really? I didn’t know that.”

He starts to look at the plants as well.

“My father told me that wisteria is very long-lived,” I say. “Some vines surviving 50 years. They climb the trees and they can kill the trees.”

“You know a lot about plants.” He looks at me: “So why are you running around the world?”

“I don’t know.”

“ China is far away from here. And you don’t have anybody travelling with you?”

I nod my head. Not knowing what to say.

People in the street are in a hurry with their bags, they must rush back to have dinner with their family. Everywhere people live in the same way.

“And are you going to the train station now?”

“Yes.”

“Where are you going?”

“ Berlin.”

“ Berlin. A nice city. Have you been there before?”

“No.”

“ Berlin is cool.”

But I don’t want to know about Berlin, I think only of my home . So I ask, “Do you live in this house? Is this your home?”

“Well, not exactly my home. But I rent it.”

“Can I ask what do you do here?”

“Me? I just came back from another country. Cuba. I was there for ten years.”

Cuba? Why Cuba? Live there for ten years as a Dutch? Is he also a Communist like Joris Ivens?

I start to watch him, instead of watching the people in the street.

His eyes meet my eyes.

I look up his home. It is a beautiful old house.

“Don’t you want to change your ticket? Then you could stay with me for a bit until you want to go.” He looks at me sincerely. He is very serious, I think.

I shake my head. I put my empty coffee cup on the stone step. I look at my rocksack in front of me. I stand up and ready to go. But suddenly my tears come out without me noticing.

The man is surprised. He doesn’t know what to say. He gives me his hand and lets me hold it. I hold his hand, tightly. I don’t know him, I don’t know him, I tell myself.

Now the big clock on platform shows 20:08. There are seven minutes left. Sky is pink outside. Waiting and feeling lonely. Now there is no time I can go back to the centre of city.

A big train station is a bleak place. This station is bigger than any station in London. Waterloo Station, King Cross Station are just too normal compare with this one. Travel alone, makes me feel sad when I see all these couples hold each other’s hand and wait patiently.

A floating dust, that must be how God see a little human drifting on the Earth.

I feel difficult without you. I become language handicapped. I got so many problems to understand this world around me. I need you.

Holding the ticket to Berlin, but I don’t feel like to go. There is no one I can meet in Berlin, and there is nothing I know about Germany. I just want go back to London, to my lover.

Home is everything. Home is not sex but also about it. Home is not a delicious meal but is also about it. Home is not a lighted bedroom but is also about it. Home is not a hot bath in the winter but it is also about it.

The speaker on the platform renounces something loudly. It is 20:11. The train will leave in four minutes. I look around and ready to get on train. Suddenly, somebody is running towards me. It’s him. The man offered me coffee in front of his doorsteps. He is running on the platform, and he is running towards me. I am stepping into the carriage, so I drop my bags on the floor and come out the train again. He stops right in front of me, breathless. We stare at each other. I hug him tightly and he hugs me tightly. I bury my head into his arms. I see my tears wet his black leather jacket. The smell of the leather jacket is strange, but somehow so familiar.

I am crying: “I don’t want to go…I feel so lonely.”

He hugs me, even tighter.

“You don’t have to go.”

“But I have to go,” I say.

The bell rings. The train starts to move. When his back disappears off the platform, I dry my tears. It is so strange. I don’t know what has been happened on me, but something has happened. Now it is over. It is over. I am leaving Amsterdam. There is no way to return. I know I am on a journey to collect the bricks to build my life. I just need to be strong. No crying baby anymore. I pull down the windows, and sit down on my seat.

Berlin is the capital and largest city of Germany in the northeast part of the country; formerly divided into East Berlin and West Berlin, the city was reunified in 1990.

“The size of China is almost the size of the whole Europe,” my geography teacher told us in middle school. He drawed a map of China on blackboard, a rooster, with two foot, one foot is Taiwan, another foot is Hainan. Then he drawed a map of Soviet on top of China. He said: “This is Soviet. Only Soviet and America are bigger than China. But China has the biggest population in the world.”

I often think of what he said, and think of how at school we were so proud of being Chinese.

It seems that I can’t stop to keep meeting new people. When I was in London, I only know you, and only talk to you. After left London to Paris, I was still in old habit and didn’t even talk to a dog in Paris. English told that French are arrogant they don’t like speak English. So I didn’t try talk to anybody in France. But that’s good for me. I don’t even need to remember how to speak Chinese there. After Paris, I tired of museums. No more dead people.

Opposite my seat a young man in his black coat and red scarf is reading newspaper. It is of course foreign language newspaper. And I don’t know the writing of that language at all.

Young man in black coat with red scarf stops reading the paper, and gives my presence a glance then back to his paper. But very soon he stops his reading and looks at the views outside of the window. I look at the window as well. There are no any views. Only the dark night, the night on no name fields. The window reflects my face, and my face observes his face.

Only him and me in this small carriage.

“ Berlin?” he asks.

“Yes, Berlin,” I say.

We start to talk, slowly, bits by bits, here and there. His English speaking accent not easy understand.

“My name is Klaus.”

“OK. Klaus,” I say.

He waits, then he asks: “What is your name?”

“It is difficult to pronounce.”

“OK.” He looks at me, seriously.

“I am from China, originally,” I say. I think I should explain before he asks.

“Originally?” he repeats.

“OK, I have lived in London for several months.”