一地鸡毛 (6 page)

Back home from work that evening, he finds the child's cold seems to have worsened. Her nose is blocked and she keeps coughing. Her temperature has also risen. He knows that it all has to do with the childminder's mischief today. But he doesn't dare to tell his wife. If he does, a mighty uproar will be inevitable. His wife, however, looks happy. She doesn't even care that the child's illness has worsened. He doesn't know why. She is sitting on the edge of the bed, deep in thought. There must be some good news for her to have such an expression. Peering into the kitchen, he is not surprised to see his wife has brought home some sausage. That is not all, either. There is a bottle of "Yanjing" brand beer, no doubt for him. He loved beer when he was single. After they got married, he gradually stopped. Why drink it at the cost of over one yuan a bottle? Granted that money is not to be worried about, but who would be in the mood to drink it? Ignorant of his wife's thoughts today, Young Lin goes into the inner room and asks: "Hey, what's happened to you today?"

His wife just chuckles at him.

"What are you giggling for? Tell me."

His wife answers: "Well, Young Lin, let me tell you.

The problem about my work is solved!"

He is taken aback. "What? Solved? Did you go to the unit in Qiansanmen again? Has the head of personnel agreed?"

His wife shakes her head.

He asks again: "Have you found another unit to go to?"

His wife shakes her head again.

He can't help feeling disappointed: "Then what's been solved?"

His wife replies: "I'll stay in this unit."

Young Lin asks: "Why? Have you developed some feelings towards the unit? Aren't you worried about the overcrowded buses any more?"

The wife says, "Feelings are out of the question but soon I won't have to catch the public bus. The head of our unit announced that a shuttle bus will run past here from September onwards. So you see, I can get to the unit by the shuttle bus in forty minutes, and it won't be necessary to catch the overcrowded public buses. It will be the unit's special bus with seats available during the trip. Isn't it even better than going to Qiansanmen on the crowded underground? Young Lin, I have sorted myself out. If the shuttle bus runs this route in September, I won't try to get a transfer. It is true that my present unit is not good, with lots of complicated relationships; but who can be sure that relations at Qiansanmen are good? Just look at the head of personnel there! You've convinced me:  'All crows are black.' I will stick to my unit as long as the shuttle bus runs. I'll just drift along, turning a blind eye to things. So I can say that my work problem is solved, can't I?"

At his wife's explanation, Young Lin is also happy. It has been a major family issue which they have constantly worried about and often been at odds. Now at long last it is settled. Although the solution is actually based on a lack of solution, his wife's mind will be set at rest and she'll no longer worry about it. The causes of her agitation will be removed, which in turn will ensure there are no more conflicts about it at home. The problem has been solved so easily in such a simple way, it seems. Relying on themselves, Young Lin and his wife have asked for favours and presented gifts only to find themselves repeatedly being foiled at every turn. In the end, a shuttle bus dispatched by the unit solves everything easily. Young Lin, like his wife, is cheerful:

"That's great. Since the problem no longer exists you won't stir up trouble for me in the future, will you?"

His wife replies: "Yes, it no longer exists." Then she pretends to rebuke him: "Who has been stirring up trouble but you? How can you blame me when you can't even find a solution yourself? Didn't I solve it all by myself in the end? Let's just wait for September."

Young Lin agrees: "That's right. You've solved it yourself.

Let's just look forward to September."

They are all in a good mood. The child's illness is under control. They have beer at dinner. After the child and the childminder have gone to sleep, they enjoy themselves once more, again full of passion. Afterwards, they both feel embarrassed. They did it yesterday and today too. It's been a long time since they did it so frequently. Then, caressing each other they chat again about September. September is really a lucky month, the wife's work problem will be solved, and the child will be able to go to a nursery, so the childminder can go saving the family a large sum of money. They look forward to the future, to the happy days September will bring them, and they discuss what they'll spend the money they save on. Then the wife raises doubts as to whether they should let the child stay at home another year before going to nursery because she'll still be too young. In this case they should keep the childminder on till next year. Recalling the childminder's ill-doing this morning, Young Lin exclaims: "No! It must be this year, for the child's sake. Get rid of her as soon as possible."

The wife has not been on good terms with the nanny. Hearing Young Lin's words, the wife is quite glad and gives Young Lin a kiss. Then she falls asleep soon.

5

It is September now. Two events are expected to take place in September. First, the shuttle bus starts running, and second, the child will begin nursery and so the childminder will be dismissed. The first is smoothly realized. On September 1, the route is served with a regular bus from the unit. At once, Young Lin's wife is much more relaxed. She no longer needs to go to work so early in the morning. In the past, she had to get up at six, otherwise she would be late for work. Now, she can sleep an extra hour and get up at seven. By 7:20 she is washed and dressed and can get on the shuttle bus at the gate without hurrying. There are seats on the bus, so she is not so tired. She can also get home earlier. Before, she came back by the light of the moon. But now, she finishes at five in the afternoon and is home by 5:40. She can have a rest before preparing dinner. At first she had been happy about the shuttle bus because she thought it showed the concern of her work unit's head for his staff, but later she found out this was not the case. Rather than kind concern, the reason was that a sister-in-law of the head had recently moved to the district and he had been pressurized by his wife to arrange a shuttle bus for her sister's convenience. When she heard this, Young Lin's wife was disheartened. She felt the value of the shuttle bus service had fallen and her happiness had been based on wrong assumptions. Returning home, she told her husband about it. He also felt awkward and rather humiliated—but not as humiliated as he had felt by the refusal of the personnel department head at Qiansanmen. So he tries to soothe his wife: "At all events, you can enjoy the shuttle bus, which is good. Don't worry about the cause of it, be it good or bad."

His wife grumbles: "At first I thought every commuter had an equal right to the shuttle bus and it showed that our head cared for us. Who would have believed it was because of his sister-in-law? I'll have to think of her every time I use the bus, won't I?"

He answers: "There's no way out! It's clear—you wouldn't have been able to enjoy the bus without that sister-in-law!"

His wife says: "I feel awkward, like a second-class citizen, when riding that bus."

He reproaches her: "You are still as naive as when you first graduated from university; What do you mean by second-class citizen? It's not that bad. Let me just ask you this: Isn't it better than a crowded public bus, even if it is associated with the head's sister-in-law?"

His wife admits: "Well, it is."

He continues: "Besides, it is not just you benefiting from this special relationship. Let me ask you again: Isn't the shuttle bus full of people every day?"

His wife answers: "Oh yes, it's always full. It's no credit to any of us!"

He rejoins: "No one else seems to be as principled as you are. Very well, then, you can go by public transport. Also, didn't you once try to curry favour for a job transfer? You were even stopped from entering the corridor with the present you were trying to bribe people with."

His wife counters: "I just want to have a little grumble, but you've kept babbling on. I suppose what you've just said is true. Under these circumstances, what use is strength of character? No damn use at all so I'll simply enjoy the shuttle bus each day without thinking more about it."

Young Lin claps his hands: "That's it!" His wife then starts being happy.

But the second event is not as smooth. Finding a nursery for their child is not easy. There is no nursery in Young Lin's work unit, and while there is one at his wife's place of work, it is too far from home for a small child to travel each day. So they must find one closer. There are quite a few nurseries around—one of them is run by another work unit, one by the district government, one by a street committee, one by a neighbourhood committee and a private nursery run by several old women. The best is run by the work unit, for it has qualified pre-school teachers on the staff. The others are poorly-run. They lead the children in files along the streets and that is all. The worst is the one run by the old women who got together to earn money as their main motive. The child's eduction is an issue which concerns the next generation, so Young Lin's wife regards it as even more important than her own job transfer. She pressurizes him to apply to the nursery run by the other work unit, adding that the second choice should be the one run by the district government. The rest will not be taken into consideration at all.

At first, Young Lin underestimated the difficulties. He thought it would be easy to find a nursery for the child—she needs only to stay there for two years before leaving for primary school—not a big problem. But he had learned from his past experience of making rash promises and later being nagged at by his wife when he failed to realise them. So he just said:

"Let me go and talk it over with the people concerned. I'm not in any leading position. Who knows whether they'll take any notice of me. You can't make too many rigid conditions on the place we want to send her to!"

Their neighbour opposite, the "Indian" woman, also has a child about the same age as theirs, and Young Lin's wife hears that they have found a place for their child, in just the one they wanted, the one run by the other work unit. In the light of this, his wife says to him: "Why can't I make conditions? I have to! That nursery is the only one we want. Their child will go to that one, so ours must go there as well. Don't bother with the nursery run by the district government."

Thus the job of getting his daughter into nursery school falls to Young Lin, and he finds it more difficult than arranging his wife's job transfer. First of all he investigates the situation. The nursery of the other unit is really well-run, winning municipal awards for years. Some leading members of the district government send their grandchildren to this nursery even though their own nursery has spaces. This work unit nursery, however, imposes strict limits on admission numbers. Without powerful influence it would be impossible to get a child into it. The admission forms are in the hands of the nursery principal. No form will be released unless written instructions are issued by the head of a bureau or an even higher authority of the unit. Young Lin racks his brains trying to remember any of his former classmates in Beijing who has some influence with this unit, but cannot think of one.

A man will try anything when he is desperate. Failing to find anyone who can help him, he suddenly thinks of the old man who repairs bicycles at their gate. Young Lin is a frequent customer there. He always addresses the old man as "Grandpa" and the two of them are very close. When he has no money on him, he can have his bike repaired first and pay for it later. During a casual chat Young Lin has learned that the old man's daughter works as a nurse in a nearby nursery. Could that be the one run by the other work unit? Thinking of this possibility, he becomes excited. He gets on his bicycle, and goes off to the bicycle repairman right away. If the daughter is working in that nursery, she can provide an opening by giving him some inside information, even though she is just an ordinary nurse. The old man is very warm-hearted and straightforward. After Young Lin's explanation, he makes promises on behalf of his daughter, saying that all he needs to do is to ask and it will be done,
for sure. However the nursery his daughter works for is not the one run by the other unit, but by the neighbourhood committee. Young Lin feels disheartened. He reports the situation to his wife when she returns home. She first blames him for not having useful connections, and then suggests: "Let's prepare a generous gift costing about seventy or eighty
yuan
for the nursery principal and see whether that works or not. How does the 'Indian' child opposite get admitted? The father doesn't appear to have any special ability, so they must have given gifts!"

Shaking his hand, Young Lin says: "We haven't even met the principal yet. We know nothing about her. How can we offer her anything? Have you forgotten our humiliation when we tried to give a present to the head in charge of personnel?"

His wife flares up: "You haven't any influence; you can't give gifts. What can you do?"

Young Lin replies: "We can use the nursery where the bicycle repairman's daughter works. Let it go at that! What does education mean to a three-year-old child? Shaoshan was a poor village, but it produced the late Chairman Mao! It is the child herself that really matters!"

His wife gets more angry and says that he can't be so irresponsible towards their child. If the child stays with the repairman's daughter, she would only know how to repair bikes when she grows up. "Young Lin, you have not even met the principal yet. How can you be so sure that our child will not be admitted?" Those words encourage him and he plucks up courage and decides to go to see the principal immediately, with no intermediate person and without taking any gift. He plans to explain his difficulty to the principal and see if he can win the principal's sympathy. On his way, Young Lin tries to comfort himself: in China things are complicated. A total stranger may get things done without any gift. Even if you have some influence or acquaintances, sometimes the things may get complicated. People might feel envious of others and the things turn out to be unsussessful. What's the matter with a stranger? Chances are a stranger may feel sympathetic to you. Isn't there any kind person in the world? Perhaps here you can meet one. However, he realizes his thoughts are all too naive when he meets the principal.

The principal is an elderly woman, over fifty years old. She is kind, but her reply is a clear-cut refusal. This nursery does not take in any children outside the work unit, she says. They do not even have enough places for the unit's children. Will the unit's employees keep quiet if they admit children outside the unit? But, she adds, there may be exceptions. The nursery is going to have capital construction but has not got a quota. If he can help them acquire one, his child can be admitted.