ELOPING TO ZHUHAI
Eloping to Zhuhai
By Yuan Changming
After a whole night of chatting and lovemaking, you got up at about ten o’clock the next morning. For a rich brunch, Hua hired a driver to take you two to Daoxiang Village, one of the most famous restaurants in Zhuhai. You told her that as of today, she should begin to pay for all costs she may incur with the funds your mother transferred to Hua’s WeChat Pay account one day before you left Jingzhou. You had made this special arrangement not only because, as a short-term foreign visitor, you couldn’t open any WeChat Pay or Ali Pay accounts in China, but also because you didn’t want to “eat soft rice,” a folk catchphrase referring to the shameful practice of a man spending a woman’s money. More importantly, if she footed the bill each time you ventured outside, you would look more like a married couple in public, since people expected wives to be the money-holder in every Chinese household.
In Daoxiang Village, you had a highly nutritious “pigeon feast,” namely, five pigeons cooked and served in many different ways. To most Chinese, pigeons were nourishing and rejuvenating, with some even saying that “one pigeon equals five chickens.” Though you were quite skeptical about its health effects, you hoped that consuming it could give you enough energy to make love with Hua day and night.
When you returned to her condo suite in Fuhua Square, one of the oldest and wealthiest neighborhoods in the city, you had sex on her big sofa, rather than taking a nap in her bed. To spend your time together in a more meaningful way, Hua proposed a visit to Zhuhai Grand Theatre located in a distant small isle. You agreed, but to avoid running into acquaintances or relatives, you two didn’t set off until after supper.
By the time you arrived at Yeli Isle, there were already numerous local visitors and foreign tourists. Constructed in the shape of two huge seashells, the theatrical complex looked magnificent as all colorful lights began to be turned on. Walking around at a leisurely pace, you were enchanted by the whole dream-like night view. To you, the theatre was a masterful artwork, as unique and beautiful as any other similar architectural building, like the Sydney Opera House or Canada Place. With its bio-geological connectivity to the South China Sea, the theatre offered a rich symbolic meaning. What kind of pearl could I find if I stepped inside the shell? you thought aloud.
About half an hour later, Hua led you on a short walk towards the famous Zhuhai Fishing Girl, an 8.7-meter-tall granite statue standing at the scenic Fragrant Burner Bay. When you came close to the islet, you saw an elegantly postured girl wearing a gillnet on her shoulders like a fancy shawl, with a large brilliant pearl held high in her hand. She had a warm, tender smile on her face, greeting every guest approaching her.
“There must be a story or legend about her,” you said excitedly.
Hua laughed, “You’re telling me! There’re at least three different versions that people have kept telling and retelling here.”
“Just tell me the one you find most intriguing.”
Hua recounted her favorite tale, in which the fishing girl was the youngest and most beautiful daughter of King Dragon of the vast South China Sea. Tired of her life as a princess in the Dragon Palace, the girl, named Zhu, decided one day to come out of the sea with her sisters and pay a visit to the human world. Attracted by the songs and laughs from the coastal village, Zhu refused to return to her marine world, and she quickly fell in love with a young fisherman called Hai. Knowing of her earth-bound romance, her admirer Cangjiao, a hornless but scaled dragon in the Dragon Palace, transformed into a wounded dwarf to present himself to Hai. To take advantage of the fisherman’s kindness, Cangjiao pleaded with Hai to treat his faked wound. He told the young man that he only needed to take off Zhu’s bracelet and grind it into medical powder to heal him. Unknowing that the bracelet functioned as her tether to the human world, Hai complied without hesitance, only to realize that his action was killing Zhu. To save Zhu’s life, Hai went to the wise Elder of Nine Zhou, who advised him to go on a perilous journey to a dangerous island to find the life-restoring Grass. After trudging through various unforgiving scenes, Hai eventually found the grass, feeding the plant his blood to keep it alive until his return. Upon recovery, Zhu began to explore anew, eventually finding a huge pearl on the beach that she often frequented. To show their gratitude, Zhu—meaning “pearl” in Chinese—and Hai—meaning “sea”—gave the pearl to the Elder during their wedding ceremony.
“What a fascinating love story!” you exclaimed.
“What makes you say that?” Hua asked.
“Well, for one thing, the story tells us how Zhu and Hai enter into matrimony to form a new life after defeating the evil forces and overcoming all the obstacles. For another, it mysteriously anticipates Zhuhai as a coastal city, a major urban area which has become one of the cleanest, most livable, and most beautiful cities in China.”
“Yeah, except that the weather is too hot and humid. We gotta take a shower at least once a day. And without air-conditioning, no one can live here nowadays.”
“That’s true, but no city is perfect, isn’t it?”
While you felt happy for Hua to have been living in Zhuhai for nearly four decades, you were reminded of Auguste Rodin’s bronze sculpture The Thinker. Though the Chinese sculptor of the fishing girl was far less known and influential than his French counterpart, his artwork was just as “thoughtful” and immortal. If The Thinker represented the poetic-philosophical tradition in Western culture, the fishing girl captured the most fundamental element in Chinese folk culture. You meant to have a further discussion with Hua along this line, but she had rather left the stone pedestal for another long walk along the Lovers’ Road beside the seawall.
“It’s too narrow and too crowded here,” she complained.
To prepare for the walk, you bought a bottle and two ice creams, both for Hua, who had once mentioned that she enjoyed ice cream very much.
“That’s very sweet of you,” she gasped. “You still remember!”
Hearing her appreciative remark, you told her that you remembered everything special about her. For example, her favorite color was purple, her favorite dish was shredded pork fried with hot pepper, her favorite actor was Jin Dong, and her favorite fruit was cherries. Interestingly, she and your wife shared many similar tastes, habits, and tendencies.
As you meandered along, you reached out to hold Hua’s hand, but she shook off your grasp. Instead, she locked her arm in yours, replicating an action young couples did.
“Are you not afraid to be seen by acquaintances now?” you asked.
“Not in such darkness,” Hua replied.
“But why not let me hold your hand?”
“Wouldn’t we stick out like a sore thumb if we just hold each other’s hand on this Lovers’ Road?”
“I see. How many times have you walked with a man here?”
“Only two.”
“When was the last time? With whom?”
“With Dan, but that was more than thirty years ago when we newly moved to Zhuhai. This road didn’t exist then, so we walked on the seawall instead.”
The fact that you were the only man she had ever walked along this Lovers’ Road made you feel not smug, but fortunate for your extramarital relationship. If you had known that she never really loved you as you had always believed, you would never have tried to see her in 2019 after forty-two years of separation, nor would you have begun to share with her your life experiences since then. By the same token, if you had never written and let her read the second part of your Last Love Letters, she would never have developed any tender feelings for you, nor would you have written and published so much poetry for her. Without that initial misunderstanding, you wouldn’t even have dared to show any of your most deeply hidden feelings toward her.
“Why not?” Hua asked after she heard your explanation.
To partly answer Hua’s question, you went on to tell her that by the time you reencountered her in 2019, you had come to terms with yourself in every sense. As a real monk would put it, you were then old enough to gain all the insights into human relationships and see through the entire world of red dust. This belief was heightened after you did a lot of meditation, retrospection, and hard thinking as a Taoist hermit in recent years. Aged 62, you were then not interested in developing a sexual relationship with any woman other than your wife. Doing so also meant making an effort to find a lover or soulmate at the risk of getting hurt emotionally. So conscious of your own sentimentality and vulnerability, you would never have endangered your emotional well-being in such an unnecessary and hopeless situation.
“Above all,” you said, “I knew enough not to bring myself bitterness and humiliation, especially when I realized how traditionally-minded you are, and how happy you have been with your matrimony.”
“But now both of us have lost our moral integrity in old age.”
“To me, this loss is my greatest gain in life.”
“How so?”
“You see, not every human being has a chance to love someone so deeply as I do you; not everyone can enjoy love with all their heart and soul in the way I can, and not every human being has a complete soul to begin with, but I have you to complete mine.”
“You’re sweet-talking me again, but I love to hear it anyway.”
When you got home, Hua insisted on you sleeping in a different room for the night, saying that you needed to take a really good break. Otherwise, you would overdraft whatever was still left over in your sexuality and become really worried about your E.D. problem. “Besides, both of us are too tired for sex after a long walk,” she added.
Before hitting the bed, you took a joint shower with Hua as if to re-enact what Zhu and Hai would do at the backstage of Zhuhai Grand Theatre.
