by Ian Hamilton
Uncle turned to the soldier sitting next to him. “You look like you’ve done this before,” he said.
“This is the second time today, and yesterday we made three trips. You people are nuisances,” he said.
“What do you mean by ‘you people’?” Uncle asked.
The soldier dug the butt of his gun into Uncle’s side. “I think you should keep quiet.”
The truck started up and lurched forward, causing several of the men to slip from the benches and land on the floor. Four guns were aimed at them as they struggled to their feet and retook their seats. Uncle closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Where the hell is Fong? Where is Peng?
The truck groaned and creaked as it made its way through Shenzhen. Uncle could see a little through the opening between the tailgate and the roof. After about twenty minutes there were fewer buildings, and ten minutes later he saw glimpses of countryside. The roads deteriorated as they went along, and it became increasingly difficult to stay on the bench. Some of the men held onto their neighbours to help stabilize themselves.
After about half an hour of being tossed around, the road improved and the ride became smoother. Uncle looked out, but all he could see was trees and fields. The truck stuttered to a stop and then made a left turn along a paved road. A few minutes later Uncle saw a steel Quonset hut, then another, and then they were in the middle of an area that seemed full of them. The truck began to slow and finally came to a halt. No one inside moved. Uncle thought the soldiers looked bored and guessed this was part of a familiar routine. Then, without warning, the tailgate clattered down.
The two soldiers sitting closest to the gate stood, jumped out of the truck, and joined a cluster of six other soldiers standing ten metres away. A sergeant stepped towards the truck. “I want you to exit this vehicle one at a time,” he said loudly. “After you do, you will move immediately to the right and stand there to await further instructions.”
Uncle looked at the man seated directly across from him. “Do you want to go first or will I?” Uncle asked.
“You go,” the man said, his voice trembling as if he expected something dreadful to happen.
“That’s fine,” Uncle said, rising and taking two steps to his left before jumping onto the ground.
“Over there,” the sergeant said, pointing his rifle towards a Quonset hut.
The windowless half-cylinder building sat on a bed of gravel. Made of galvanized steel, it was perhaps five metres high in the middle, ten metres wide, and about thirty metres in length. On its double doors were painted the words immigration processing.
As the other men gradually joined him, Uncle tried to make sense of his situation. The sign on the Quonset hut at least provided a clue. It seemed that the fact he had been born in China could now be an issue, when it hadn’t been on previous border crossings. But why hadn’t his Hong Kong passport been enough to establish his credentials?
While Uncle was pondering these questions, the door opened and an immigration officer appeared. He looked at the group of men, shook his head, and said to the sergeant, “Is this the last load for today?”
“I hope so.”
“Bring them in,” the officer sighed.
The sergeant nodded. “Go through the door in single file,” he said to the men. “Once you’re inside, take a seat on a bench.”
“Why do I have to do this again? I did it at the train station. Besides, they took my papers there and didn’t give them back,” one of the men said.
“Shut up about your papers. You’re here to answer questions, not ask them. Get moving,” the sergeant said.
Uncle walked towards the door, which was flanked by two soldiers. He entered the hut and blinked. It was badly lit and he could barely see to the far end. He took several tentative steps and felt gravel under his feet.
“Take the seats on the left,” the immigration officer yelled.
Uncle’s eyes began to adjust, and as he looked in that direction he saw two rows of benches. There were two other rows on the right, and one of them was occupied by seven men. Straight ahead were four desks occupied by immigration officers. Men stood in front of the desks, and behind every desk was an armed soldier. Behind the benches on both sides were other rows of soldiers. Uncle walked to the bench and sat. A few moments later, he was joined by the other men from the truck.
He could hear some of the immigration officers asking questions of the men who stood in front of them. Their answers were muffled, but Uncle could tell from their lowered heads and slumped shoulders that it wasn’t going well for them. The officer farthest from Uncle said something sharply and then slammed a stamp onto a piece of paper. The legs of the man in front of him buckled and he fell to his knees. The officer turned and spoke to the soldiers behind him. They moved quickly to the man’s side, grabbed him under the arms, and hoisted him to his feet.
“This is a mistake,” the man howled.
“Don’t make us drag you out of here,” the soldier said to him.
The eyes of every man who had been on Uncle’s truck were fixed on the terrified man as the soldiers half-walked and half-dragged him from the hut.
“This doesn’t look good,” said the man seated next to Uncle.
When the soldiers and the man had left the hut, the immigration officer shouted, “Woo Jun.” A large man rose from the bench across from Uncle and lumbered towards the desk.
On it went for another fifteen minutes, until that bench was empty. There weren’t any more scenes involving men being dragged from the hut, but there weren’t any happy faces either. When the opposite bench was clear, the captain who had accompanied them from the station entered the hut, carrying a file folder. He approached the immigration officers and gave the folder to the first in line.
“Those must be our documents,” Uncle said.
The immigration officer glanced quickly through the folder’s contents, took out a small pile of paper, and passed the folder to the officer sitting next to him. He repeated the process, as did the next man.
Uncle drew a deep breath, wondering which officer had his permit and how long he would have to wait before his name was called. He tried not to feel anxious, but his lack of control over the situation gnawed at him. In the past twenty years since he’d left China, he couldn’t remember feeling as helpless. Where the hell was Peng?
“Yao Ban,” an immigration officer yelled.
As a man three seats down from Uncle got to his feet, sharp noises rang out. They came from outside the hut, and although they didn’t seem close, they were loud enough to be distinct. The man whose name had been called froze. “Were those gunshots?” he asked Uncle.
“I don’t know,” Uncle said, although he was sure enough that they were.
“Yao Ban, don’t keep me waiting,” the immigration officer said. But then something caught his eye and he jumped to his feet and immediately stood at attention. The other officers followed his example. Uncle turned to look towards the entrance. Colonel Liu Leji was standing there.
Liu strode towards the desks. “I want the papers for Chow Tung. He’s coming with me.”
( 12 )
Uncle left the hut with Liu, neither man saying a word until they were outside.
“Get into my jeep. We’ll ride together back to Shenzhen,” Liu said.
“Thank you for this,” Uncle said. “Though I have to say I expected to see Peng and not you.”
“Peng phoned me. Luckily we connected, because he wouldn’t have been any use to you here.”
“I see,” Uncle said, and then stopped and looked at the rows of huts stretching in all directions. “What is this here? Why so many huts?”
“The PLA needs accommodation, and the immigration department, and some of my customs people. This camp is a temporary solution. We’re building more permanent quarters.”
Uncle climbed into the jeep, surpr
ised not to see someone behind the wheel. “I thought a man in your position would have a driver,” Uncle said.
“I do, but not today — at least, not for this trip.”
Uncle glanced at Liu. In the daylight he looked even younger than he had at the restaurant after the garment factory ceremony. He was in his mid-thirties, Uncle guessed, and carried himself with the easy confidence of a man who hadn’t encountered much resistance or hardship in his life. He also wondered if Liu’s long, thick moustache was an attempt to add gravitas to his otherwise youthful appearance. “Again, I need to stress how much I appreciate your intervention,” Uncle said. “Although I have to say it’s a bit surprising. I wouldn’t have thought you’d remember who I am, let alone take time out of your day to help.”
“I remember you well enough. You have a distinctive air about you,” Liu said. “But there’s no need to go on about that. Coming here wasn’t particularly difficult for me to do, nor was getting you released. You shouldn’t have been detained in the first place.”
“Which leads me to ask why I was.”
The jeep lurched forward along a gravel road. Liu changed gears rather awkwardly, and he didn’t answer Uncle until the vehicle was in fourth gear and moving smoothly. “We’ve had an enormous influx of people trying to get into Shenzhen over the past few weeks,” Liu said. “There are jobs here that are steadier and better paying than those for hundreds of kilometres around. Word has spread. But the thing is, we can’t allow everyone to come here. We can’t let things get out of control, so my colleague who runs the immigration division decided to put his foot down.”
“But surely you need labour. Those new factories, apartment buildings, office towers won’t build themselves, and who’s going to work and live in them when they’re built?”
“Of course we need workers, but if we let everyone into the zone who wants to come, we’ll be overrun. So we’ve put restrictions into place. Anyone who wants to work in the zone needs a special permit that they have to get in their hometown. That’s been the case for a while, but we weren’t enforcing it as stringently as we should have been. Now we are, and nearly all the men you got caught up with today don’t have the proper permits. The fact that you were born in China was a red flag for the immigration officer at the train station,” Liu said, and then paused. “Those officers are dedicated and do their best to apply the regulations, but many of them lack subtlety when it comes to exercising judgement. And truthfully, we’d rather they apply the regulations as bluntly as possible than try to interpret them too finely.”
“But I have a home-visit permit — ”
“Which says you were born in China, so you’ll have to forgive us for laying claim to you — however briefly — as a Chinese citizen,” Liu said. “Although in ten years or so, when Hong Kong is returned to us, you can be a Chinese citizen again.”
Uncle thought about disputing that but knew this wasn’t the best time to get into a political discussion. “Tell me, what’s going to happen to those other men?” he asked instead.
“They’ll be shipped back to where they came from and told not to try it again or they’ll face prison time.”
“All of them will be returned?”
Liu turned to him. “What are you trying to say?”
“When I was in the hut, I saw a man being dragged out by two members of the PLA. A short while later I heard gunshots.”
“Not everyone trying to get into Shenzhen has the sole objective of finding work.”
“Meaning?”
“Some people have a past that they’re trying to escape, and Shenzhen is still a favourite departure point.”
“To get to Hong Kong?”
“Yes.”
“And when they don’t make it and the past catches up to them, they’re shot?”
“It’s cheaper and more efficient than sending them back to get shot in their hometown,” Liu said. He shook his head as if aware how raw that sounded. “At least, that’s what the PLA officers tell me. The decision about what to do with those men rests completely with them.”
“It doesn’t sound to me as if you disagree.”
“Whether I do or don’t doesn’t matter,” Liu said. “I have enough on my plate managing customs. And besides, the PLA has no interest in my opinions about how they conduct their business.”
Uncle turned and looked out the jeep’s window. The huts were now well behind them and the countryside seemed more familiar. Just as he was thinking that, he saw a cluster of buildings ahead and realized it was Ming’s garment factories. He had never driven past them before, so he’d had no idea what existed beyond them. He wondered if Fong or Ming knew that such a large military installation was in their backyard. “Are you going to drop me off at the factory?” he asked Liu.
“If you wish, but I was thinking maybe it’s time that you and I had a chat,” Liu said. “After meeting you at the restaurant with Peng, I had expected to see you again before now.”
Is this a setup? Uncle thought immediately. Did he arrange to have me stopped at the train station? “I haven’t been back to Shenzhen since then,” he said.
“That explains it, but now that you’re here we shouldn’t waste the opportunity,” Liu said. “There’s a restaurant close to my office that I frequent. You must be hungry after your ordeal.”
“That sounds just fine,” Uncle said, sensing that the invitation was more of an order than a request. “But if you don’t mind, I’d like to stop at the factory for a few minutes to let my people know I’m okay.”
“Sure, we can do that,” Liu said.
A few minutes later, Liu made a right turn onto the Ming Garment property. He parked in front of the entrance to Factory Number One. “I’ll be right back,” Uncle said as he exited the jeep.
Fong and Ming weren’t in the old factory but Uncle found them at the new one, watching a production line spit out T-shirts bearing the Ferrari logo. He approached them from behind and tapped Fong on the shoulder. Fong turned, grinned, and threw his arms around Uncle.
“Take it easy. I’m all right,” Uncle said, uncomfortable with the display of emotion.
“Did Peng come to get you?” Fong asked as he disentangled himself.
“No, it was Liu, the customs director. He’s outside waiting for me in his jeep. We’re going to have a meeting in town.”
Fong’s smile disappeared. “He has a reputation for being a hard case. What does he want?”
“Nothing I can’t handle.”
“Of course not. I wasn’t suggesting otherwise; I’ve just been worried.”
Uncle looked at his watch. “It is almost four o’clock. Meet me at the train station at seven. If I’m not there, wait for me at the ticket counter.”
“Okay, boss.”
Uncle nodded and said to Ming, “I like the look of those T-shirts. We should have a good market for them.”
“This is just basic stuff. We’ll really show you something when we’ve worked out all the kinks in this machinery,” said Ming.
“I’m looking forward to that,” Uncle said. “Now I really need to get going. I can’t keep the customs director waiting.”
Liu was smoking by the side of the jeep when Uncle left the factory. Uncle reached into his jacket pocket for a pack of Marlboros and his black crackle lighter. He lit a cigarette and took some deep drags as he walked over to Liu.
“We can go now. I told my man Fong to meet me at the train station at seven. Will that give us enough time to talk?”
“That will be more than sufficient.”
Uncle climbed back into the jeep, and after some noisy gear changes they made their way back to the road in the direction of Shenzhen. Both men continued to smoke rather than talk, which suited Uncle because he was still trying to figure out what Liu wanted from him.
As they reached the outskirts of the city, Liu broke the
silence. “When was it you left China?”
“Nineteen fifty-nine.”
“Yes, now I remember, you told me that at the restaurant. That was during the Great Leap Forward.”
“Or, as they called it in my village, the Years of Slow Death.”
“I detect anger in your voice.”
Uncle shrugged and thought, What’s the worst that can come from being honest? “My father’s family had farmed the same small plot of land for over two hundred years. No one became wealthy, but he and his ancestors could feed their families. That changed in 1958, when my father was forced to hand over his farm to a village commune run by the local party secretary. A year later my grandmother died of starvation, quickly followed by my father, mother, and sister. I lost my entire family to the famine created by Mao’s policies.”
“The policies weren’t inherently bad,” Liu said carefully. “It could be argued that they were badly implemented.”
“Bad policies or policies badly implemented, it doesn’t make any difference. I still lost my entire family because of them.”
“It was a challenging time.”
“Not having anything to eat and watching your family die is more than a challenge.”
Liu flicked a hand in the air as if shooing away a fly. “There’s no point in talking about things that happened long ago and can’t be undone,” he said. “Besides, you left it behind. You made it to Hong Kong. You survived, and obviously you have thrived.”
