Blue Gold (6 page)

 

After lunch
, Laiping and Fen scurried to find Building 3. They had to show their ID tags to a security guard before they were allowed to enter, then they followed hundreds of other new employees into a space that was even bigger than the cafeteria, with tables running in rows along the entire length of the massive room. Everything was white—the walls, the linoleum floor, the tables—giving Laiping the sense she was entering a huge, open hospital.

A foreman shouted for the newcomers to find a work station. Fen pulled Laiping with her to two free spots along one of the tables, where they stood awaiting further instructions. On one wall, Laiping saw a huge portrait of an important-looking man with a confident smile. He was Chinese, but he seemed Western—maybe because of the expensive-looking suit and tie he was wearing, and because of the smile. Posters on the wall beside the portrait proclaimed,
Take pride in your work!
and
Duty leads to prosperity!

Once all of the new workers were settled, a woman in a business suit entered, accompanied by fifty or more men and women in white smocks and caps—just like the ones the girl in the poster back home was wearing.

“I'll bet they're going to give us more rules,” said Fen.

The woman in the suit took a microphone from a stand. “Hello, and welcome!” she said, smiling so that all her teeth showed—her voice echoing around the hall. “We are happy you are here, and we hope that you are happy, too.”

The woman cupped her hand around her ear, waiting for a reply. Laiping was startled when hundreds of new employees—including Fen—obliged her in unison with a resounding, “Yes, we are happy!”

“You have had the good fortune to be hired by the most successful company in China. Almost half a million people work at this location alone, and this is just one of many factory complexes around the world. You owe your jobs to this man,” she said, sweeping her arm toward the giant portrait on the wall. “Mr. Steve Chen is the founder and chief executive officer of this company. He is like a father, and you are like his children—many, many children he looks after and cares about. Let's hear it for Mr. Chen, who is giving you prosperity and a future you could never have dreamed of!”

A loud cheer welled up. Laiping joined in, even though she had never heard of Mr. Chen. “Mr. Chen has provided for your every need, from good food to comfortable beds. He has even built a movie theater and swimming pool for you to enjoy!”

The workers cheered, Laiping included. The woman with the microphone let them applaud for a bit, then motioned for them to be quiet. Her tone turned serious.

“Mr. Chen is very kind to his employees, but in return for his kindness he expects something from us.”

Fen leaned into Laiping. “Here come the rules! I told you so!”

Laiping wished Fen would keep quiet and pay attention to what was being said.

“First, he expects hard work.” The woman's voice echoed off the walls.

“More like slave labour,” Fen chimed in.

Laiping edged away from her slightly, wanting to listen to the woman instead of Fen's smart remarks.

“Second, he expects quality work and quality products.”

“Then give us quality food!” countered Fen.

Laiping noticed several people around them glancing at Fen. A foreman standing nearby shot her a warning look, holding his finger to his mouth—but Fen didn't see him.

The speaker's expression darkened; her tone became dire. “Thirdly,” she said, “Mr. Chen expects loyalty. The products we make are secret, the very latest technology. Should they fall into the wrong hands before they reach market, those responsible will be punished for humiliating Mr. Chen, and for putting everyone's prosperity at risk.”

A hush had fallen over the training hall, but Fen couldn't resist whispering into Laiping's ear, “Who would be that stupid?”

Suddenly, a hand locked around Fen's arm. The foreman swiftly and quietly marched her out of the hall. Laiping watched them, alarmed. But then she noticed that no one else had even turned her head, and decided it would be smart to pretend, like the rest of them, that nothing had happened. The woman in the business suit was jolly and smiling again.

“Let us care for each other to build a wonderful future!” she proclaimed.

Everyone applauded, including Laiping, but she barely listened to the rest of what the lady had to say. What if Fen never comes back? she worried. Fen might have been loud and a liar, but other than Min she was the only person Laiping knew in all of Shenzhen.

 

IT TURNED OUT
that the men and women in white smocks were instructors who were there to teach the new workers how to do their jobs. Laiping's instructor was Mr. Huang, who told the half-dozen workers lined along their section of table, “You will be trained to work in the mobile phone factory. Specifically, you will learn to solder capacitors onto printed circuit boards.”

Laiping experienced a moment of panic. She had no idea what a capacitor or a circuit board was, or what “to solder” meant. But her anxiety lessened a little when Fen returned to the hall and took her place beside her. Laiping tried to welcome her back with a small smile, but Fen—pale and serious now—kept her eyes on the instructor.

Mr. Huang had the group gather around him while he demonstrated how to use tweezers to pick up a tiny flat square with a geometric pattern on it from one bin, which turned out to be a circuit board, and a far tinier component from a second bin, which was the capacitor.

“The tantalum capacitor is an essential part of the cell phone,” explained Mr. Huang. “Tantalum powder is made from columbite-tantalite, or coltan, a special mineral that stores energy and releases it quickly, with very little energy loss. Tantalum powder is what allows high-quality electronics to become smaller and smaller in size. But if the capacitor is not secured perfectly to the circuit board, the mobile phone won't work properly and the company's customers will be unhappy. Mr. Chen's reputation will suffer!”

Using tweezers, he carefully placed the capacitor onto a designated spot on the circuit board, stepping back so that each of them in turn could examine where he had positioned it. Next, he picked up a small pointed tool with an electrical cord in one hand and a thin strand of metal in the other.

“This is the soldering iron and solder,” he said. “You will touch the hot tip of the soldering iron to the place where the capacitor meets the circuit board to heat them, then you will use the iron to melt the solder, like this.” Mr. Huang touched the iron to the strand of metal until it liquefied and coated the tip of the iron. “Be careful not to get too much or too little solder,” he said, applying the molten tip of the iron to the circuit board with a quick, deft motion, “Or the joint will not function properly.” Mr. Huang lifted the iron away from the board. “There!” he pronounced. “Now you try!”

For the next four hours, Laiping and Fen tried their hardest to solder capacitors onto circuit boards. Laiping went hot with embarrassment whenever Mr. Huang checked her work. The first time, the instructor was able to break the capacitor off the board with the slightest tweak of the tweezers—“The joint is weak,” declared Mr. Huang. “The board and capacitor weren't hot enough when you applied the solder”—only to complain during his next inspection that Laiping had applied too much.

Laiping's fingertips were burned from the soldering iron. Her neck and shoulders ached from being hunched over the work table, and her legs were stiff from standing. But she was pleased when at the end of the day Mr. Huang held up one of her circuit boards to the group as an example of good workmanship.

“That's enough for today,” he announced. “Be back here at eight o'clock tomorrow morning. By the end of the week, we expect you to be ready to move onto the factory floor.”

Fen was unusually quiet as she and Laiping found their way from the Training Center to Dormitory 2, where they had been assigned.

“What happened when that foreman took you away?” asked Laiping. Fen threw her a hostile look, just as she had done that morning in line at the employment office when Laiping asked about her father. “Sorry,” said Laiping, realizing she was causing Fen to lose more face than she already had.

With that, Fen softened a little. “He just yelled at me,” she said sullenly. “In my mother's factory, the bosses yell at the workers all the time. Sometimes she works every day of the week, for twelve hours. I don't want her life. I want to make something of myself, to be more than just an ordinary worker.”

Again Laiping wondered what happened to Fen's father, but she knew better than to ask. She tried to change the subject.

“What are those nets?” she asked as they approached their dormitory. There was broad webbing surrounding the building, raised two storeys off the ground.

Fen threw Laiping a wary look. “You don't know?”

“Know what?” replied Laiping, Fen's tone making her feel stupid.

“Never mind.”

“Tell me,” replied Laiping. She had to know these things, so people would stop calling her a country hick.

Fen dropped her voice so the girls around them going in and out of the dorm couldn't hear. “They're to catch people who jump.”

Laiping was confused. “Why would people jump? From where?”

Fen rolled her eyes and kept her voice low. “Didn't your cousin tell you anything?”

“Tell me what?”

“That workers have killed themselves, or tried to.”

Laiping went cold. “Why?”

“I guess you'll find out, won't you?” answered Fen.

While Fen went inside, Laiping lagged behind.
With good jobs and movie theaters and swimming pools,
she thought,
why would anyone want to kill herself?
Then she remembered what the guy in the blue hoodie had said to her.
There are things you need to know.

Laiping followed Fen into the building with a nagging sense that there was another lesson to be learned here. She just wasn't certain what it was.

NIGHTTIME WAS THE WORST IN NYARUGUSU
, when there was nothing but mud walls and the old sacks they used to cover the doorway to separate the family from rats and thieves. But the terrors Sylvie feared most were in her jumbled dreams—the soldier on top of her, Mama screaming from the bedroom, Papa's face when the bullets hit. This night, like so many others, she woke in a cold sweat, her heart racing. She could see nothing, but she heard Mama muttering and fretting in her sleep and could only guess at what nightmares she was reliving. Sylvie dozed fitfully for the rest of the night, until at last dawn framed the sacks in the doorway with soft light.

But the mat where Olivier usually slept was empty. He hadn't been home in two days—the last time Sylvie had seen him was in the marketplace, when she'd watched him take a call on his mobile phone.

Mama stirred and sat up. “Has he come back?” she asked.

“No,” said Sylvie.

“You must have said something to keep him away, you and that temper of yours.”

Without replying, Sylvie got up and took the lid off the cooking pot, encouraged to see that bugs and rats hadn't gotten into the cold porridge she'd saved for their breakfast. Pascal and Lucie were soon awake and scooping the porridge from the pot with their fingers, while Mama continued to blame Sylvie for Olivier's absence—“What did you say to him? You must have said something!” Sylvie gave Pascal a warning glance to stay silent about Kayembe.

“Olivier doesn't listen to me, no matter what I say,” Sylvie told her, yawning.

She was tired from lack of sleep—too tired to care that her mother seemed to take pleasure in accusing her. But to Sylvie's surprise, Mama's eyes suddenly filled with tears. Through everything they had endured, Sylvie had rarely seen her cry.

“We're just women and children!” she wailed. “With Patrice gone, Olivier is the man of the family. What will become of us without him?”

Sylvie wasn't sure which were worse, the days when Mama forgot that Papa was dead, or the days when she remembered. She looked at her mother sitting up on the sleeping mat, head in her hands, her thin shoulders heaving with each sob. Married Congolese women took pride in wrapping their hair in a colorful cloth, but Mama hadn't bothered in months. Her hair sprung in clumps all over her head, as chaotic as the brain inside. Sylvie knew she should try to comfort her. But the truth was that Mama's weakness made her angry. She wanted to shout,
Haven't I provided for the family by working at the clinic?
Me—not Olivier!
Instead she promised, “I'll try to find him.”

 

PASCAL WAS GLOOMY
as he and Sylvie walked to school.

“Olivier is never coming back,” he said. “Why should he, when he can make money working for Mr. Kayembe?”

“Because family comes first,” Sylvie replied.