Rewriting Stella

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Rewriting Stella Page 15

by Tuttle, Dan;


  predicting where the floods hit. Most fertile

  producing regions lack the depth of sluice

  required to drain the torrents that arrive.

  Crops die. If lucky, families still survive.”

  136.

  The Chairman looked across the room to see

  if PhDs in Sci-Tech Ministry

  agreed with bleak assessment nominee

  from Land just gave. “Yes, Chair, we too foresee

  more difficulty in predicting floods.”

  “And let us not forget that cities lay

  right in the path of water, silt, and mud

  and thus must fund walls keeping them at bay,”

  old Housing added in, stress lines around

  his worn eyes boring deeply into face.

  Then Finance nodded his assent, “We’re bound

  to grow our infrastructure spend apace

  with that uncertainty. Our budget share’s

  increasing year on year.” Foreign Affairs

  137.

  sunk lower in his chair, “We’ll face a storm

  in all the Western press if we move now.

  ‘Another million people’s lives deformed,

  so urban wealthy can face fewer brown-

  outs’, it would read. Three Gorges Dam was hard,

  and we built that ’fore foreign coverage peaked.”

  “With due respect, we’d all best disregard

  what other nations think. We’re oft critiqued

  by people on the sidelines who can’t know

  the trade-offs that we face within this room.

  You’ve shown them that we’ll interfere with no

  internal matters elsewhere. Let’s assume

  they’ll give us the same courtesy. Our trade

  alone’s enough to calm their stump tirades.”

  138.

  Retort was worded deftly, with respect.

  Still, disagreement slowed replying tongues.

  “I’d like to know,” filled Chair in, “what effects

  on brownout rates will be.” They knew he swung

  with what the numbers said, true engineer.

  “Our baseline’s at completion eight years out:

  four days per month of rationing is feared.”

  “Thirteen-point-three percent or thereabout

  of lost productive time,” worked out the Chair.

  “With this in operation, we’ll reduce

  that down to half day monthly.” “Everywhere?”

  “For Sichuan,” said man made to look obtuse

  for failing to include that in report.

  “Now tell me what the plan is to transport

  139.

  the million farmers on the valley floor.”

  “We want to make a pension fund for all

  and give them roughly what they made before,

  and also build some housing so the sprawl

  in nearby towns and cities is controlled.

  They’ll move in waves as flats are built and bought.

  Town commerce we expect to boost twofold

  with all those pensions spent in single spot.”

  “They’ll need it,” countered Agriculture, “since

  the prices of most staple goods will rise.

  So in addition to the dissidents

  you’ll have townsfolk complaining ’bout supplies.

  To wipe out such a huge productive tract

  has sizable statewide food price impact.”

  140.

  “You need not worry, Chairman, of protests.

  I’ll have the force to keep the peace, and plan

  well in advance to verify no jests

  that castigate the state can breach our ban.”

  Security, to none’s surprise, looked smug.

  Unlike the other Ministries, it could

  dispatch whatever kind of state-backed thugs

  it needed to enforce what it thought good.

  “The media concerns me not a bit,

  you’ve mostly proven that you’re able to

  deal with disquiet in electorate.

  We’ve covered power and floods and food, but you,

  Environmental colleague, you’ve said not

  a word’s dissent.” (All feared that he’d been bought).

  141.

  Like rain accumulates, a silence grew

  into a separate entity in room,

  exerting power. He had till now eschewed

  the chance to take the microphone. “A bloom

  will always sprout once fire has passed. This case

  is hardly different. Yes, we’re sad to lose

  such land. But there are plans to interlace

  the crafted shoreline with some docks to cruise,

  to rent a kayak or canoe, to tour

  around and savor nature as we’ve shaped

  it. Less is this about a loss endured,

  and more about envisioned new landscape.”

  A dozen bobble nods turned men to mimes,

  so Chair adjourned discussions for the time.

  CHAPTER 10

  142.

  At dinner, huíguōròu caused pleasant wave

  among the Tanzanian houseguests. They

  back home for meat of any kind oft craved,

  its treat had price reserved for holiday.

  The mother asked quite perfunctorily

  if Stel enjoyed the dishes that she’d made,

  while serving her, like one chunk more will be

  noshed proof assent was not a masquerade.

  They gobbled it delightedly, with rice.

  The father watched, his eating slow. “You’re fast

  already,” satisfied that his advice

  on chopstick use was used. “You’re overcast

  tonight,” Stel boldly noted, having seen

  him shirk from holding court at meal. His queen

  143.

  stole glance at him. He caught his swiveled head,

  and reined in plain reaction of surprise.

  Asserting so directly was unbred

  from Chinese culture long ago. “The wise,”

  he counseled, “surely never aim so straight,

  but rather tack across the wind until

  they’ve circumspectly sailed tact’s twisted strait

  toward port that has the goal they want fulfilled.”

  He paused for full effect, then shoulders slumped

  and second sigh suggested he’d forgive

  the trespass of a foreigner. “I’m stumped.

  I’ve one decision likely to outlive

  me, be my legacy. Yet I’m not sure

  how much I trust that what they’re selling’s pure.”

  144.

  That mildest mental smarting stunned Stel’s need

  to ask another question. Abu’d caught

  a favorite term of his, and took the lead:

  “They’re crucial, legacies. Or get forgot.”

  “Hmm. Nevermind,” the now-flush man replied,

  a forearm sweep dislodging napkins from

  the table. Fallen trash ’round every side

  of dining table was eyesore Stel numbed

  herself to, cryptic luxury of waste.

  Why tidy sundry rubbish minuscule

  on table? Best to batch it in one place.

  Ab thought about excusing self for school.

  With drops of fast-slurped soup still on her lip,

  Stel also then retired to sistership.

  145.

  Recipient of reprimanding, Stel

  felt shamed, self-righteous in two equal parts.

  Back in the room with Ai, she failed to quell

  disgruntlement frustrating tired-out heart.

  “I’m understanding nothing! What’s allowed,

  what’s not, why kids are so competitive…”

  She liked her walks and dinners, which were how

  she learned abou
t the place she’d come to live.

  With this, each one was ruined, one by Ai

  and one by Jiang, and neither felt Stel’s fault.

  Recalling no days past disqualified

  by cultural transgressions, her default

  was to cast blame on present cast. (It’s tough

  to see one’s own outsiderness in stuff.)

  146.

  Ai kept her head in textbook as Stel spun,

  integral integrals were left to do

  now that derived derivatives were done

  and Ai was on page twelve of forty-two.

  Stel watched her roommate’s focus, flashbacks struck

  to Tanzanian times she’d planned escape,

  To work so hard to get here, then get stuck

  in hamster wheel? she thought. Best to have scraped

  by back at home. “Ai, you’ve reflex routine

  from home to school to home, where homework’s long

  enough to make you drink tea for caffeine!

  You’re thirteen! Hasn’t something gone quite wrong

  to turn your childhood freedom into trance?

  It’s like you’ve never given play a chance.”

  147.

  “I think I also nothing understand,”

  said Ai, her right hand shutting textbook. “You

  four weeks before said in your old homeland

  that people have no monies. Here we do.”

  She swung her chair to face. “My father say

  that is because we study hard for math

  and science from first school, and that free play

  is for the toddlers. Not for kids.” That path

  Stel’d seen well-treaded during supper talk.

  Stel steamed. She partly blamed herself in that

  she couldn’t tell which tale was poppycock:

  that juvenescence in the state’s format

  would drive the engines churning out more jobs,

  or simply crinkle humans down to cogs.

  148.

  “I get it, Ai. Each person’s part of ‘we’.

  That comes through clearly in the way you speak.

  Where I come from it’s also family

  that makes decisions for you. Trying to eke

  past poverty with powd’ry soil is tough.

  You have to come together, take good care

  of elders, cousin-brothers. Not enough

  community means if your crops are bare,

  you’ll starve that season. What was different for

  my childhood’s that I lacked that base support,

  no parents or relations to restore

  stability when crisis hit. When short,

  I did without. I’m lucky that I’m here.

  I know that. Still, here’s differently severe.

  149.

  At home I found a thing I wanted lots.

  It filled the time between the daily chores.”

  She reached down, petted BLING. “We found these spots

  nearby to go and climb, explore outdoors.

  Acacia trees, savannas, forest on

  the outskirts of our local peaks were game.

  It meant that half our homework was foregone,

  success was body’s learning. We became

  upgraded per own plans by time we slept,

  my dusk self more like me than when dawn broke.

  But here it feels like everything except

  our dinner time is yet another yoke.

  Here, every day is last one’s copycat.

  I want to be a person, not a stat.”

  150.

  She’d worked herself into a tizzy, paused,

  then gained momentum in the fall back down.

  Continuing, Stel said, “We really caused

  some things to happen; tried to help our town!

  Our teacher’d lost a golden ring. Those climbs

  we took on so to train ourselves to solve

  what we had thought was actually a crime,

  a theft. Then it turned out to not involve

  a criminal at all! Well, not that part,

  at least. Her husband poacher stole some eggs

  from some rare bird, a big one, each like art.

  It injured him, and yet he still bootlegged

  them through the middlemen in town. Jerks pay

  a lot to own what nature free displays.”

  151.

  Her monologue brought forth a tangled knot

  of memories, joys, regrets from how she chose

  that night to give back Gumi’s gold jackpot

  despite misogyny owner disclosed.

  Here Stel sat with another woman who

  faced different pressures, though to still conform,

  and bent her sense of self toward others’ view

  of how she should behave, and others’ norms.

  Ai lacked the same gift sitting in her hand,

  an artifact to launch her on own way.

  Stel wondered, had she kept it as spite planned,

  if she’d be freer. Youth’s naïveté

  chose ‘right’. Now vocalizing Gumi’s wrongs

  made Stel wish ring in hand where it belongs.

  152.

  Ai’s stare made Stel unsure if words shared sank

  in; language gaps oft caused chats to seesaw.

  “It seem impossible,” Ai said, the swank

  of Stella’s story struck her. “What you saw

  is like the Journey West, one of our four

  great novels.” She looked over at the wall,

  at grassland poster on the closet door,

  and said, “Your story is like that, a ‘tall

  tale’ is, I think, right word. They happen in

  the places far away of city. Not

  a can-imagine thing. Small kids here win

  school competitions, tests. It is what got

  Chinese to growth and jobs.” “The Chinese, sure.

  But where’s the Ai in that? It’s premature

  153.

  to say your life is bound to turn out just

  the way society expects it to.

  Competing at this rate means you’ll combust

  before you ever find what to pursue.”

  “I know what to pursue. It is the good

  of home place, build it up more,” Ai explained,

  “first, engineer. If very good, I could

  enroll in Tsinghua.” “What if unconstrained?

  How do you know that engineering’s where

  you’ll find your love?” “Choice not existing, Stel.

  I get good money, then can maybe care

  for parents, have my family.” “No, rebel

  a little! I had nothing till I found

  my independent self,” Stel stroked her hound

  154.

  to calm again. “You’re right,” Ai said, “than me,

  you had much less. No parent and no friend.”

  “You have no friends now,” Stel said flaccidly.

  “Ha! Here you miss so much,” Ai did contend,

  “we talk, QQ, like SMS. We each

  to other offering support. You look

  for what you know. You think that it has reach

  here. Maybe you can’t see.” Had Stel mistook

  reality through blue-tinged glasses? Sure,

  the students that she knew back home obsessed

  sometimes about their grades too. But they were

  less categorically so plagued, so stressed.

  Or were they? Did she really comprehend

  what built belonging ’pon which folks depend?

  155.

  She’d soured at stench of conflict in the air,

  and stormed a bit when Ai’d claimed she was wrong

  about her observation. She compared

  this country’s ways with what she’d known lifelong,

  experience and eyes and mind were all

 
the tools she had to craft perspectives from.

  A want for peace caused her to reach for small

  anthology beside her bed. Succumb

  to swirling thoughts of nature, pleasant swoon

  to poems that freed esprit from city’s pull.

  Its spirit leans like a thin hook, read “Moon”,

  or opens round like Han-loom fans, eyefuls

  were dreamed. Whose slender shadow’s nature is

  to be full—Abu popped to mind. It’s his

  156.

  approach to life this poem described. How strange,

  that classic China threaded long ago

  the link between the moon’s endless phase change

  and how human ambition’s to outgrow

  our born-form size. Its closing line was: seen

  from everywhere in human world. She saw

  Abu as moon, directing figurines,

  conducting constellations. Image gnawed

  at her, this conjured hidden power it claimed.

  Of course she wanted him to reach his dreams.

  But something felt still empty in this fame.

  As Ai said, who was she to claim esteem’s

  obtained in one same way for everyone?

  Was knowing selves quite ever fully done?

  157.

  An only-partly satisfying sleep

  expectedly brought forth another day.

  Stel stayed composed, avoiding slip toward weep,

  but raggedness pervaded vertebrae.

  Per yesterday’s agreement, she arrived

  back at the courtyard tree to meet the boy

  who sought an English partner, a contrived

  transactional camaraderie. BLING toyed

  with sticks on ground, and snapped his jaws at bugs,

  on constant prowl around the premises,

  preferred to being kept as housebound slug.

  The boy walked up. “Hello!” (The genesis

  of language partnership.) “Um… how are you?”

  he asked, as textbooks all instructed to.

  158.

  “I’m fine, and you?” Stel said, suppressing laugh

  at awkwardness rote language forced them toward.

  “I’m fine,” he said, “my name is Qin,” his half

  of scripted conversation she abhorred.

  “And what is your?” “It’s ‘what is yours?’ And mine

  is Stella.” “I from China. Where is yours?”

  Stel guessed that he learned quickly from the line,

  despite its incorrectness. Reassured

  this might be useful use of time, she eased.

  “I come from Tanzania.” “Where is that?”

  “In Africa. What is it in Chinese?”

  “Fēizhōu. Nǐ shìgè Fēizhōu rén,” voice flat

  on neighbor syllables in high first tone.

  Reminded how hard tones are, Stella groaned.

 

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