The next morning, Youcai gave me a grand breakfast: soymilk, sesame cakes, fried dough sticks, spicy soup and pickled vegetables. Then I went to register at the college. And after registering, I was finally assigned a bed in the city.
One room between three people, and one bed was mine.
Every city has its unique characteristics, and its own smell.
Had I caught the smell of this city? In the wind, in the air, wasn't there a bit of sand? I thought so.
This is a city on the Yellow River, and old memories of the River are stored in that sandy smell.
I had previously studied this city on the plains very carefully. Although it has good transport, it is still in the hinterland of the Central Plains, so the pace of life is naturally a bit slower than in first-tier cities, always a beat behind. Life in the slow lane means people hang around with their contacts more, and relationships and connections are a little more complicated. Connections here are composed of work units. In the day work units are the spirits of the city, and each person lives in their own unit. At night the lights become the spirits. They pull crowds together, and give people direction. Without lights the city would die. I was so glad I had a work unit.
When I had just arrived in the city, I asked many people, is there something written on my face?
My colleagues laughed at me and said no, no. But why did even vendors selling breakfast on the street look me up and down like that, saying "New here?" How come I was new here? Why couldn't I be an urbanite? I'm a university teacher. I've got a residence permit here, I've transferred my organisation membership, I've got a work unit, what more do I need to do?
When I first arrived I had a year's probationary period as an assistant tutor. My work ethic was excellent. I was always the first to arrive, fetch water, scrub the floor and wipe the desks. At night I was the last to leave. When I passed people I nodded, and I bowed and smiled to my seniors. Once when I was walking on the campus, an old professor suddenly turned around and said to me, "Beanie, those cardboard boxes are mine … Oh. Are you new?" I was very frustrated. How had he mistaken me for "Beanie" ? Why did I look new? Was my skin too dark, like a villager? I went back to my room and looked in the mirror to see if I looked like a newcomer. What was "new" about me?
I have to admit, I'm a wolf. I have a beastly heart hidden inside me. I'm a wolf in sheep's clothing. I'd smuggled myself into the city, but now I had to very carefully play the part of the sheep. I knew that academics are all hedgehogs—you have to keep your distance. You can't get too close or be too oily. You can't let them see the saliva dripping from your teeth when you smile. When you pass them, give a little nod, subtle as if they were an old friend, cordial, never tiresome. And this has to be practised.
I am naturally sensitive, because I was brought up on the whole grains of the fields and the milk of a hundred housewives. To integrate into the city, I started to continuously correct myself. I noticed I walked faster than most people, like I was always in a rush. Perhaps this contributed to my air of "newness" and immaturity. I had to slow down and exhibit an air of calm composure. But I couldn't be too slow, which would look like dawdling, and the college gatekeeper would stop me and ask who I was looking for. And I had to find two appropriate books to carry under my arm, and fix my eyes in front of me, looking ahead but not at anything in particular. In the evenings I walked back and forth alone on the campus, trying to develop a walk that was leisurely …
Before I officially became a wolf in sheep's clothing, I also needed to find some appropriate "packaging" . "Packaging" was a new word that no one else used back then. I was the first to discover its usage in everyday life. So when I got my first paycheck, I bought myself some new clothes. I bought them at the wholesale market near the train station. Most were fake brands, but nobody could tell. Then, when I walked on the campus, or on the street, I was much smoother and more relaxed. Nobody said I was new anymore. This was even though I still had nothing but one bed in the city.
I started reading voraciously, and spent all my free time holed up in the library. The eighties were an age of reading. I read all the latest books, both Chinese and foreign, from history, literature, philosophy and psychology, to biographies of great men from all over the world: Hegel, Shakespeare, Hitler, Nixon, Pompidou, and Tanaka Kakuei. I read whoever I could get my hands on, and I took notes. These were my weapons. I knew that in a university, it is very hard to get by without learning. And I knew that to deal with urbanites, I needed to have new words ready to roll off my tongue.
At the back of the college was a building called Chaoyang House. It sat in the north and faced the south, and had brilliant natural sunlight. Its roof and eaves were covered with old-style cylindrical tiles, and its walls were painted red in the classical style. The columns in front of the veranda were a beautiful combination of Chinese and Western styles, and the mahogany floorboards of the corridors exemplified understated elegance and sturdy dignity. In front of the house were two geometrical flowerbeds and a row of lilac trees, and the vermillion walls were hung with creeping red vines. Only professors could live in that house. Every apartment had three bedrooms. Sometimes a housekeeper wearing red plastic flip-flops would come out of the corridors, clack-clack-clack, with a grocery bag over her shoulder … that house was the goal I was struggling towards.
My opportunity came. An associate professor suddenly fell ill just before he was meant to take a class. The Head of the Department, Old Wei, hastily sought me out, to step in as a substitute and save the day. "What should I teach?" I asked.
