An Ocean Apart, a World Away

by Lensey Namioka

  On Sunday, I was invited as usual for dinner at the Pettigrews’. I arrived shortly after noon at their house, looking forward to the warmth of the family and a boisterous welcome from the two boys.

  When the front door opened, Mrs. Pettigrew stood before me with a broad grin on her face. “We have a big surprise for you, Sheila!”

  In the living room, I found Mr. Pettigrew talking to a stranger. Then I took another look and received a stunning shock. It wasn’t a stranger. It was Baoshu.

  When I had seen him last, he had been an exhausted, ragged rickshaw man with a straw hat over his head. The only thing I managed to say was, “Are the police still after you?”

  Baoshu laughed. Recovering from my shock, I took a good look at him. His hair was neatly cut, and he was wearing a Western suit. He looked quite at home in it.

  Mrs. Pettigrew looked puzzled. “My dear,” Mr. Pettigrew said to his wife, “the last time I saw this young man was on a train, and he was being rather rude to a Big Nose sharing his compartment. Now it seems that he’s a suave diplomat, representing the Manchu government in exile.”

  “Is this true?” I asked Baoshu. “This isn’t just another one of your disguises?”

  He smiled. “It’s my real identity, believe it or not. I’m actually working for the Manchu government, now in residence in Japan. Since my father was an imperial official before the revolution and my mother is Manchu, it was natural for them to appoint me.”

  Mrs. Pettigrew became impatient with the exchange, which was in Chinese. “Let’s go in to dinner. The food will be getting cold.”

  We sat down at the table, joined by the two Pettigrew boys. For a while the conversation was about winter sports in Ithaca. Baoshu’s English was heavily accented, but he spoke it well enough to ask the boys about skiing, something he had never tried. They went on to talk about ice skating on Beebe Lake, and Baoshu described his own skating experiences on the lake in Beijing’s Beihai Park.

  After dessert the boys went off to see some friends, and Mrs. Pettigrew went to the kitchen to clean up. As usual I offered to help, and as usual she refused. “I’ve got a lot more practice now,” I reassured her. “After helping out at my friend’s restaurant, I’ve learned to wash dishes without breaking or chipping them.”

  “No, my dear, I don’t need your help,” she said. Then she winked. “Go talk to your friend. I had no idea you were hiding such a glamorous beau!”

  I joined Mr. Pettigrew and Baoshu in the living room, where they were discussing the possibility of bringing back the emperor. “Do you really think you have a chance?” Mr. Pettigrew asked. “I have the feeling that the time is past for an imperial restoration. In addition to the warlords, there are various groups with growing support, such as the Kuomintang, the Communists, and others.”

  “You may be right,” admitted Baoshu. He did not look discouraged, however. “What I hear discussed among the exiles is the possibility of forming an independent country of Manchuria.”

  “If the Manchus form an independent country, so will the Mongols, the Tibetans, various Muslim peoples, and all the other minorities!” I cried indignantly. “China will be broken up into pieces, just as it was during the Warring States Period. There would be endless fighting, and our country would bleed to death!”

  “That’s exactly what’s happening in the Balkans,” said Mr. Pettigrew. He looked sharply at Baoshu. “You don’t seem displeased at the prospect of endless fighting.”

  “But we have endless fighting right now,” Baoshu pointed out. “It’s time for stability again.”

  I studied him. There was a glitter in his eyes, a hunger for excitement. Stability might be boring for someone like him. Mr. Pettigrew thought so, too. “You know, young man, I don’t believe you’re cut out to be a diplomat. At heart you’re really an adventurer!”

  Baoshu laughed. “You’re probably right,” he said, apparently taking Mr. Pettigrew’s remark as a compliment.

  “Why did you really come to this country?” I asked him. “Did you think you’d find support here for the idea of an independent Manchuria?”

  He nodded. “You’d be surprised how many Americans would like that. We’re also finding that the Japanese are strongly in favor of an independent Manchuria ruled by Pu Yi, the last Qing dynasty emperor.”

  “Many people prefer to see China weak and divided,” murmured Mr. Pettigrew. “A strong and united China would seem too threatening.”

  “Is that what you want, Baoshu?” I demanded. “To see China weak and divided? Or do you consider yourself a Manchu and not Chinese at all?”

  Mrs. Pettigrew entered the living room, carrying a tray with cups of coffee. “My, my, such serious faces!” She turned to her husband. “George, I’m sure you’re boring our guests with all your political talk.”

  She distributed the coffee and passed the cream and sugar around. Our conversation switched to English, and Mrs. Pettigrew asked Baoshu what other places in America he had visited.

  “New York City and Washington, D.C., chiefly,” he replied. “And of course I had to visit Ithaca, knowing that Miss Zhang is attending school here. I remembered that Professor Pettigrew was from Cornell, and that’s why I found my way to your house.”

  “How did you know I was attending school here?” I asked.

  He smiled. “Oh, I have my sources.”

  “I’m sure where there’s a will, there’s a way,” Mrs. Pettigrew said archly.

  After finishing his dessert and coffee, Baoshu thanked his hostess and rose to take his leave. “It was very kind of you to invite me,” he said to Mr. Pettigrew. He grinned and added, “Especially after I was so rude to you on the train.”

  He turned to me. “It’s a nice sunny day for a walk. We have some things to talk over,Yanyan.”

  He was right. There were still things that had to be said.

  Outside, I automatically led the way down the path toward Cascadilla Gorge. In the bright sunlight, the snowy mounds on either side of the path dazzled the eyes. Baoshu strode along as if he enjoyed the squeaky feel of crunching down on the snow. He was a northerner, and reveled in the cold and ice.

  We stopped just before we reached the edge of the gorge. “You’ve lost a lot of weight,” Baoshu said, examining me.

  “You mean I’m no longer a juicy morsel?” I said before I could stop myself.

  He smiled. “You’re still the same old Yanyan, after all. I’m glad.”

  We were in danger of falling into our old relationship, the one we had in that Shanghai alley. I pulled myself together. “No, Baoshu, I’m not the same old Yanyan. I’m grown up now.”

  He was still smiling. “I hope this doesn’t mean you’ve lost your taste for taking risks.”

  “No, but I’m not taking risks for the sake of taking risks,” I said. “I’ll do it only for something I believe in.”

  Baoshu’s face also became serious. “I want you to leave Ithaca and come with me,Yanyan.”

  “I’ve already told you that I can’t,” I said. “There is no place for me in your world.”

  “But there is! There will be an imperial court again, and as my wife you will have rank and honor.”

  I shook my head. “Can you really see me as one of the court ladies? I can’t sit still, and my voice is too loud. I would die of boredom within a week.”

  “Then come with me for the sake of adventure!” he said. His eyes were bright. “I promise that you won’t be bored. We’ll have many dangers and obstacles to face. Doesn’t that tempt you?”

  Again I shook my head. “Not even the prospect of digging out more bullets. Don’t you see, Baoshu, adventures are for children. I’m an adult now, and I want to become a doctor. Here at Cornell I have a chance to get the training I need.”

  “Need? But I need you,Yanyan! Come with me!”

  “No, I can’t,” I whispered.

  Baoshu took a step closer.

  “She has already said she can’t,” said L.H., stepping forth. He had been
standing out of sight around the bend. Wearing a thick winter coat, he still looked like a stooped, undernourished scholar from a Chinese opera.

  “Go away,” said Baoshu, sparing L.H. only a brief, contemptuous glance.

  “Only if you leave Sheila alone,” said L.H.

  Baoshu started to laugh. “Who is Sheila?” He turned to look at me and laughed again. “Do you really answer to the ridiculous name of Sheila?”

  I began to feel angry. I hated the name Sheila, but that was for me to decide. I resented having Baoshu decide for me what was ridiculous and what was not. “The name Sheila is good enough for my friends,” I said between my teeth.

  “We’ve wasted enough time,” Baoshu said impatiently, and reached out for me. “Let’s go,Yanyan.”

  “I won’t let you take her,” said L.H.

  Baoshu turned slowly, and for the first time he took a good look at L.H. “Are you proposing to stop me?”

  Huddled inside his coat, L.H. looked cold. “Yes.”

  I suddenly realized that we were standing at the edge of the gorge. Baoshu realized the same thing. “You know,” he drawled, “if you get in my way, I can easily toss you into the gorge.”

  “No, you can’t,” said L.H.

  “Why not?” asked Baoshu. He sounded genuinely curious.

  L.H. pointed to me. “Because if you do, she will despise you for the rest of her life.”

  Baoshu stared. For the first time, he appeared uncertain as he looked from L.H. and back to me. A chunk of ice fell from a tree branch and dropped into the gorge. I heard the sound of it hitting bottom, a long way down.

  “Come with me,Yanyan,” Baoshu said once more.

  “No,” I said for the last time.

  Baoshu seemed to swell with rage. As he stepped forward, L.H. placed himself in front of me, barring the way.

  The two of them were standing so close that they shared the foggy white breath between their faces.

  I truly believe that if L.H. had used the word hate instead of despise, then Baoshu might have carried out his threat. But L.H. had understood Baoshu’s character, and he knew that contempt was the one thing Baoshu could not tolerate.

  Something inside Baoshu seemed to collapse. The bright anger on his face dimmed. Slowly he turned and started to walk away, but after two steps, he stopped and looked back at me. “I’m not giving up,Yanyan,” he said. I couldn’t tell whether I heard hope or despair in his voice.

  Baoshu’s crunching steps died away. That sound would haunt me for a long, long time. Suddenly, my legs gave away under me and I sank down on the snow. I found that I was weeping. “I never knew that growing up could be so painful,” I sobbed.

  After a while I heard L.H.’s voice. “What I like about you is that you always do the unexpected.”

  I tried to wipe my cheeks, but the mixture of tears and mucus made a messy smear. “What didn’t you expect? That I would grow up?”

  “No, I didn’t expect you to cry,” he replied. “I knew that you had already grown up.”

  I tried to struggle to my feet, and L.H. reached down to give me a hand. “When d-did I g-grow up?” I asked. My throat was scraped raw from crying, and it hurt to talk.

  “When you admitted that you had been too rash to take that physics course but declared that you would keep on with it next semester.” He smiled. “It takes courage to grow up.”

  “It took courage for you to step in front of Baoshu,” I said. “He was not making an idle threat about tossing you into the gorge.”

  “I knew it was not an idle threat,” L.H. said. “But some things are worth the risk.”

  I began to shiver uncontrollably. L.H. unbuttoned his coat and wrapped it around both of us. I had to lean on him for support, because my legs were still weak.

  But the support wouldn’t always be one-sided. I had saved L.H. from the bully football players, and in the future he might accept my help again. Baoshu, on the other hand, would always insist on being the strong one.

  The image of Baoshu had lodged in my chest like a bullet. L.H. had helped with its extraction, and the operation had been excruciating. But now that the bullet was out, the healing could begin.

  The warmth I shared with L.H. finally stopped my shivering, and we began to climb back together from the edge of the gorge.

  A Note on the Manchus, Manchuria, and Manchukuo

  The Manchus are a non-Chinese people from the northeastern region of China called Manchuria, which now occupies the provinces of Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang. The Manchu language is related to Mongolian and others of the Turkic family.

  In the middle of the seventeenth century, the Ming dynasty of China had become corrupt and incompetent, and the country was torn by rebellions. The Manchus, aided by some Chinese rebels disgusted by the Ming regime, seized the opportunity to launch an invasion of China.

  The conquest of China by the Manchus was successful, and in 1644 they occupied Beijing and set up a new dynasty called Qing. The Manchus compelled all Chinese men to adopt the Manchu hairstyle of a shaved forehead with a long pigtail in the back. Manchu women did not bind their feet, and the new rulers tried, unsuccessfully, to make Chinese women abandon this ancient practice.

  The early Qing emperors, notably Kangxi and Qianlong, were vigorous and able. During their reigns, China enjoyed a long period of prosperity and stability. But as with other dynasties, the later emperors became indolent and decadent. Power fell into the hands of eunuchs, dowager empresses, and scheming courtiers.

  During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, China suffered a series of humiliating defeats at the hands of foreign powers, most notably during the Opium Wars, the Taiping Rebellion, and the Boxer Rebellion. Britain, America, France, Germany, Russia, and Japan tried to carve up China, as they had done with Africa and much of southeast Asia.

  In 1911, the Manchu Qing dynasty was finally toppled and a republic set up, although it was a republic mostly in name only. For some twenty years, China remained torn apart by factions, with warlords ruling some of the territories almost like independent kings. Gradually, two dominant groups emerged: the Kuomintang, later called the Nationalists, and the Communists.

  Japan became a force in Manchuria and wanted to exploit its rich natural resources. In 1932, the Japanese set up the puppet state of Manchukuo, with the deposed Manchu emperor, Pu Yi, as its head. In 1937, Japan began its invasion of the whole of China.

  With the defeat of Japan in the Second World War, China regained its sovereignty. After the Communists took control of the country in 1949, the three provinces of Manchuria became an integral part of the People’s Republic of China.

  Although there are few pure Manchus left, some vestiges of the long Manchu rule can still be seen. Before the Manchu Qing dynasty, Chinese men and women wore robes open in front and held together with a wide sash, somewhat like a kimono. The slinky gown with slits, high collar, and buttons down one side is of Manchu origin. Called a cheongsam by the Cantonese and by foreigners, it is still called qi pao, “Manchu gown,” by most mainland Chinese.

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  Published by

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  a division of Random House, Inc.

  New York

  Copyright © 2002 by Lensey Namioka


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  December 2003

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  eISBN: 978-0-307-43309-1

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