Chinese Stories in English
Selections from Authornet (page 5)
Unless otherwise noted, Stories printed in 2016 China Annual Flash Fiction 2016
《中国年度微型小说 – 作家网选编》. Translated from the webpages cited below.
1. Grandma's Honor 3. An Awkward Cell Phone 5. Mountaintop
2. Treasures 4. The Director's Fish 6. Evidence
1. Grandma's Honor (奶奶的荣耀)
Huang Keting (黄克庭)
It was autumn. The sun hadn’t gone down yet, but the cold was already oppressive. Because of the famine, people had closed their doors and retired early to reduce consumption, and my family was no exception. The door to our home had been closed before the sky turned black. The lights had been turned off and all eight in the family had gone to bed.
Suddenly someone banged on the door. "Auntie... Auntie... Open the door, open the door... Auntie...." The whole family heard it. The whole family knew it was Richie Zhu.
Richie, the son of my grandmother's sister, lived in a small mountain village about twenty miles from our home. He hadn’t yet turned sixteen, but his parents had fallen ill and passed away five months earlier due to the famine, leaving him an orphan. His farm work was questionable because he’d been born with a weak constitution. Farmers all worked together in communes at the time, and because of his inability to work hard, Richie earned a quarter less work points than other adults. Therefore, he only received three quarters of the rations distributed to others.
Richie had come to the door again, and everyone knew he’d come to beg for food. My family steeled their hearts completely this time. No one got up to open the door no matter how loudly he yelled or how hard he knocked on the door. Everyone pretended not to hear, enduring it until the middle of the night. He finally stopped pounding on door after three hours. When people deliberately ignore you, you should have the self-awareness to -- go home.
The whole family finally breathed a sigh of relief when the pounding stopped. Everyone quietly went back to sleep. But the next morning, when Grandma opened the door, she got the shock of her life.
Good Lord! Richie hadn’t left at all. He was still sitting on the threshold outside the gate. He’d only stopped shouting because he was exhausted, and he knew that yelling was useless.
Grandma’s heart softened and she started crying. She held Richie's cold hands in both of hers and silently brought him into the house, and sat him down in the living room. First she gave him a bowl of hot water, then she shed more tears. After vacillating a bit, she got some rice from the rice barrel and cooked it for him.
There were only two pounds, three ounces of rice left in the barrel. A bamboo measuring tube inside the barrel held exactly one pound of rice when full. Grandma held the bamboo tube in one hand and, with the other, scooped rice into the tube to measure it out. Every time she scooped up a handful of rice it was as though she were scooping out her own heart -- after all, this rice had to feed a family of eight people! Nevertheless, she kept scooping rice from the barrel and into the bamboo tube.
As the rice in the barrel kept decreasing and the rice in the tube increased, the hand Grandma was using to scoop the rice grew heavier and heavier. She looked at the rice in the barrel and the rice in the bamboo tube, and reluctantly put some of it back into the barrel. Then she looked into the bamboo tube and decided it held too little, so she scooped more rice into it.... She went back and forth like that five or six times before finally making up her mind. She took a full pound of rice from the barrel and cooked it.
She personally brought the first bowl of rice to the table and handed it to Richie. It was accompanied on the table by only two other dishes -- a plate of salted radish and a plate of moldy greens. She told Richie: "The big ones go to the production team to start the morning’s work, and the little ones go out looking for wild vegetables. I have a lot of things to do here at home, like cooking breakfast for the family and cutting back the hogweed. There’s no one to keep you company while you eat. Dish up more for yourself, and don't be polite. Eat your fill." Because of the lack of firewood during the famine, Grandma had had to follow the adage, "Don’t burn a single grain", just like today's rice cookers.
Grandma noticed Richie sitting quietly after she finished the housework. "No one’s keeping you company while you to eat,” she told him politely. “Dish up more for yourself, and don't be polite. Eat your fill." Unexpectedly, Richie kept sitting quietly. At first, she didn't ask herself why, but she eventually learned the reason when she took the lid off the pot she’d used to cook the rice. It turned out that Richie’d eaten the entire pound of rice she’d cooked -- "the pot was so clean it didn't have to be washed."
Richie left our home that same day. Before leaving, he knelt down in front of Grandma and said three prayers to thank her. He told her, "I’m willing to die now that I’ve had that rice to eat." Less than ten days later, we got the news that Richie had starved to death.
Grandma cried a lot when the bad news came, but she wasn’t entirely sad. Later she often said, "It’s a good thing I let Richie eat a pound of rice that day. Otherwise, how could I face my sister after I die!"
Twenty years later, Grandma was in critical condition. Toward the end, she took my father’s hand and said, “My life’s been very ordinary. Never done anything that people would talk about. I’m very gratified about one thing, though -- that day I let Richie eat a pound of rice." Before she died she told father, “When the going gets really tough, think about people who have it even worse than you.”
The sun and moon shuttle back and forth, but time speeds by like an arrow. Grandma would be a hundred years old this year if she were still alive. Although she departed this world thirty years ago, the villagers haven’t forgotten her. This year, Richie’s friends and relatives decided to publish a village chronicle. After getting recommendations from the public, the village’s government and Party committees studied the matter and concluded that the first issue should include Grandma's story. This is an honor for Grandma, and also an honor for us.
The village director let me read the first draft of the chronicle. That’s how I found out what she’d done. It described Grandma's "cooking a pound of rice for Richie", as well as her decision to "have her biological son (my father) drop out of school to support her adopted child (my uncle) in college." According to my uncle, any results of his education should be credited to my father’s goodwill, even though it was Grandma who didn’t let him finish grade school.
My father has been a farmer his entire life. But every time someone mentions my grandmother, he always looks proud.
Selected from Authornet, page 78.
Translated from金华新闻网. Also available here.
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2. Treasures (宝贝)
Sun Quanpeng (孙全鹏)
Old Zhang’s calligraphy and painting business, which he’d set up away from home, had been quite successful recently. Once he turned sixty, though, he missed his old village more and more. Who wouldn’t? So he sold his calligraphy and paintings and took his money and his wife back to his hometown, General’s Temple, where he spent his days in leisure. He had money, and he often had a little drink with his wife. He also talked with people in the town about his experiences in the calligraphy and painting business. It was a very pleasant life.
One day he saw a twenty-something young man wearing a tattered hat peddling an Eight Treasures Ink Pad. Few people paid any attention to him. The young man held up a treasure box from the Water Caltrop line and claimed, "I inherited this ink pad from my ancestors. It’ll never fade when you use it to imprint a seal on calligraphy or a painting. Come and have a look. See the quality color and smell the delicate fragrance. It’s definitely worth the money."
Old Zhang walked over and took the box in his hand. He opened it and instantly smelled the fragrance. He looked at the texture of the ink and, at a glance, based on his years of experience, concluded it was indeed a treasure. He fingered the box over and over again while he thought. He didn't want to pay too much, so he made a lowball offer. The young man turned him down.
An old man in his sixties ran over and the young man took off running. The old man snatched the Eight Treasures Ink Pad and asserted, "This is a family treasure."
"Your family? What do you mean?" Old Zhang stared at the treasure in the old man's hand.
"Don't get upset. I'm Multiple Sun, the father of the young man who just ran away. He’s a disappointment. He stole his old man’s treasure to sell.... "
Old Zhang felt sad and regretful. The treasure he’d just had in his hands was lost. He would’ve bought it at once if he’d known. He felt dispirited, a lost soul. He adored the Eight Treasures Ink Pad and couldn’t get it out of his mind. He’d once spent a lot of money on a painting with a famous name stamped on it, but when the seal faded, the painting lost all its value and he lost a lot of money.
Because of that sort of thing, everyone wanted to use long-lasting ink that wouldn’t fade, namely, Eight Treasures Ink. But the production process was long lost and not much of the ink was left in the world. He’d never expected to find it that day. He wanted the treasure, but what could he do? Fortunately, Old Sun invited him to his home, and Old Zhang happily agreed.
Old Zhang thought Old Sun wasn’t a bad guy and he should be polite to him. One day he invited his fellow art lover to his home to admire his own treasures. Old Sun saw a flower and bird painting from the mid-Qing Dynasty among Old Zhang’s possessions. There were ten differently shaped birds in the painting, some flying, some standing, some chirping and some silent, all in simple colors with good texture. Old Sun liked flower and bird paintings and was ready to buy this one. "Name your price," he said.
"To tell you the truth,” Old Zhang replied, “I sold off my treasures when I retired. This is the only valuable thing I have left, and it’s priceless. If you want it, you’ll have to trade your Eight Treasures Ink Pad for it."
Old Sun wouldn’t go for it. He shook his head “no”.
Since Old Sun turned down his offer to trade, Old Zhang quietly rolled up the painting and walked into a back room. He put the painting away under a big cabinet in the west room of the main hall. Old Sun surreptitiously memorized the painting’s location.
Early the next morning, news came from the Sun family: "Our Eight Treasure Ink Pad is gone!" Then another message came in saying, “The Zhang family’s flower and bird painting has also been lost!” The town of General’s Temple was in an uproar. Who’d stolen these two treasures?
Old Zhang wasn’t agitated, however. He acted as if losing his treasure was nothing. His wife, on the other hand, was so down in the dumps that she died from melancholy. Old Zhang was the only one left at home from then on. He and Old Sun, when they had nothing else to do, would often discuss who stole the treasures and what could be done about it. Over time, the two became close friends.
Old Zhang fell seriously ill a few years later. He had no relatives, and his only friend was Old Sun. As he lay dying, Old Zhang called Old Sun to his bedside and whispered, "I have a treasure to give you." He pointed to one brick in the wall behind the cabinet. Old Sun went over and took it out from the wall. There was a painting behind it. He unrolled it -- it was the flower and bird painting he’d wanted.
"I'm going to die anyway, and I can't take it with me, so I'll just give it to you," Old Zhang said. He barely had strength to say the words.
"Didn't your flower and bird painting get stolen?" Old Sun was puzzled.
"Yes, a painting was stolen. It was all my fault for being too greedy. I kept thinking about your Eight Treasure Ink Pad, so I stole it from you," Old Zhang sighed. He pointed under the bed and continued, "Heaven has eyes. That night, a thief broke into my house and stole a flower and bird painting. However, people in my business always have a trick up their sleeves. I’d put a fake painting in a conspicuous place. It got stolen, but who cares? It's a fake...."
Old Sun was speechless. His heart skipped a beat.
"After I stole the Eight Treasures Ink Pad from your house, I've always felt guilty and never opened it once. I'm sorry. I became a thief. People should obey their conscience.... But I apologize and give it back to you now." Old Zhang's breath was getting weaker and weaker.
Old Sun didn't speak for a long time, then suddenly words spewed forth like crazy. "Brother Zhang, I also did wrong. From the moment you returned here to your hometown, I’ve been plotting against you step by step. First, I had my son entice you with the Eight Treasures Ink Pad, and then I invited you to my home. I thought you’d trust me and let me see your flower and bird painting. I stole it from your home. I was itching to get it, so I went to your home in the dark and found the painting under the big cabinet...." Old Sun kept slapping his own head as he spoke.
Both men were silent for a while.
"The Eight Treasure Ink Pad you stole was also fake. I replaced the real one with a fake to prevent it from being stolen. I didn't expect you’d steal it. You kept it as a treasure while I was unscrupulous. Now I have both treasures, but I’ve lost the most precious thing -- my dearest friend." Old Sun started to cry.
Old Zhang didn’t respond. Old Sun looked carefully and found that his friend had breathed his last a long time before.
Selected from Authornet, page 114.
Chinese text available here. Translated from小小说 大世界 here.
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3. An Awkward Cell Phone (尴尬的手机)
Wei Dongxia (魏东侠)
Winsome Hou held the worthless phone in her hand like a grenade that was about to explode. The lunch break was slipping away minute by minute and she still hadn't discovered where her own phone was hiding. She felt stuffy even in the large bedroom. She turned around in confusion, then subconsciously checked the worthless phone to make sure it was turned off. She sighed and continued spinning around.
The worthless phone belonged to Luxuriant Chu. Winsome didn't have her own phone. She’d lost it on a weekend trip with Luxuriant and her best friends. After that Luxuriant took photos of her with this useless phone. She was scrolling through the photos and happened to find one of Luxuriant and Brightness Huang with their arms around each other. Her heart tightened and she asked Luxuriant about it. She hadn't expected her to admit it so coyly.
Everyone in their unit knew Brightness was pursuing Winsome, but she hadn't been successful in two years of trying. No wonder she hadn't made any moves recently -- It seems she’d boarded a different flight. To be honest, Winsome didn’t really like Brightness. She was too ladylike and her handwriting was dogshit. But it was good to have someone around all the time.
Winsome had felt lost for some reason and begun to be distracted. So much so that when Luxuriant suggested they visit Butterfly House, she said no. While she sat alone on the steps waiting for Luxuriant, she casually took a piece of bread from her bag and chewed big mouthfuls of it.
That was probably when she lost the Samsung phone she’d just bought. It happened to drop onto the steps as she tore at the bread with both hands. Then Luxuriant came out and flaunted pictures of the butterflies on her phone. She pulled her up and they left while she was still showing off. Half an hour later Winsome cried "Oh, no", but by then someone had already got her phone and turned it off.
Luxuriant suggested that they have the security guard on duty make an announcement, just in case the person returned it. Winsome replied coldly: "If he planned to return the phone, he wouldn't have turned it off. "
Luxuriant also planned to visit two other scenic spots. She always looked so innocent. Winsome sincerely hoped that she wasn’t pretending but suspected she was.
That’s how Winsome lost her cell phone. When she thought about it, she’d lost a person as well. She went home upset and angry.
When Winsome got to the office on Monday, she saw Brightness making coffee for Luxuriant. Brightness usually only made coffee for her. Brightness blushed and said, "You’re here." Winsome didn't say anything. She just sat there waiting, but she never got the cup of hot coffee she was used to.
What made her even more unhappy was that Luxuriant had been humming a little tune the whole morning. She was all smiles no matter who she talked to. Should she turn a blind eye to Luxuriant’s behavior? It felt like her lungs were going to explode.
Maybe it was Heaven’s will, but just before the lunch break, Winsome found a phone in the toilet. She was unsure who it belonged to, so she slid her finger across it to take a look. She was surprised to find that it was Luxuriant's, but didn’t ask herself why she was surprised. She turned the phone off right away and hid it in her pocket. The toilet was supposed to be for their unit, but it faced the street and outsiders often came in and out, so Luxuriant wouldn’t suspect her of taking it.
She didn't care for Luxuriant's phone at all, just like she didn't care for Brightness, but this was an opportunity to take revenge. She felt embarrassed about losing her phone and she wanted Luxuriant to get a taste of it. Who told her to.... Bottom line, someone had picked up her phone and not returned it, she wouldn’t return someone else's phone that she found. But then Winsome thought of a word -- stealing -- and her heart skipped a beat.
Would this be considered stealing? She’d clearly just happened to find it. Why would anyone think it was stealing?
The office was in an uproar when she got back to work that afternoon. Everyone was talking about Luxuriant's lost phone. Luxuriant was more distressed than most and kept shouting, "All my contacts, lost! And my photos and videos, too! From now on, whenever I find a phone, no matter how nice it is, I’ll return it to the owner. It's too bothersome! We’re in the same boat, Winsome."
Someone recommended, "Go renew your SIM card or they’ll steal your number." Someone else advised, "Change your WeChat and QQ passwords ASAP. And keep an eye on your money."
Everyone was talking at once. Brightness came over and said, "Lux, I saw your phone was on its last legs, so I bought you a new one. I was going to give it to you on your birthday a few days from now, but it turns out to come in handy right now." She stuffed the latest iPhone into Luxuriant's hand while she spoke. There was a burst of warm applause, and Winsome felt like everyone had slapped her in the face.
Luxuriant blushed happily and said, "Thank you."
Brightness touched Luxuriant's head, "Silly! Don't be in a hurry to renew your SIM card. I've tried, but your phone is always turned off. I guess you only turn it on at night, right? I sent a text message to your old phone. If whoever has it is willing to send us your photos, I’ll give him five hundred yuan. If you replace your SIM card, he’ll never see my text, and he won’t be able to return those beautiful moments to us." Another round of warm applause.
Winsome was quite unhappy. She wanted to throw Luxuriant's phone into the trash when she got home from work. Screw you guys and your moments!
She regretted not sending a text to whoever had found her lost phone. Then she got to wondering what Brightness had said in her text message. She calmed her heartbeat and turned on Luxuriant's phone.
There were seven unread text messages on the phone.
She almost fainted after reading the first one, not knowing whether she was ashamed or excited. It read,
“Hello Ms. Chu, I’m the security guard at the scenic spot. I’ve found the Samsung phone that you cried about and begged me to find for your friend....”
So now the question was, what should she do with Luxuriant's phone?
Selected from Authornet, page 174.
Chinese text available here. Translated from李春林每月点评 here.
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4. The Director's Fish (局长的鱼)
Ocean (大海)
The director handed Young Huang an envelope before they ate. “Thanks for the fishing gear you bought me that time,” he said. “It’s a really good set. Makes me as powerful as a tiger with wings. The fish come to my hook in droves!”
Time is like a butcher's knife. It had made one cut after another in the director's face, until he looked like an old man. The sudden realization that he was getting old hit him when he was fifty-seven. He knew that, according to convention, he’d be relegated to the "second line " and become a deputy researcher in less than a year. He seemed to be in good health, though, and had begun preparing for his retirement whether he knew it or not.
His colleagues told him, “Your handwriting is beautiful, Director. If you practice more, you could become a great calligrapher after you retire!”
The director smiled but thought to himself, “I don't know how to use a computer, so I usually make corrections with a fountain pen. What's all the fuss about handwriting?”
His colleagues could talk all they wanted, but only Young Huang knew that the director didn’t just like to eat fish. He also had a hobby: catching them. He never mentioned his hobby in front of his colleagues -- maybe he was afraid it would have an untoward impact if they knew.
Young Huang was their office’s deputy director, responsible for handling the unit’s secretarial work. He often had to submit documents to the director for review after hours, and had to go to the director's home or other places to find him, so naturally he came to know the director's hobby. Especially during the past six months, several weekends when Young Huang brought urgent documents to him, he found the director shirtless and dark-skinned, sitting on a small fishing bench. He’d give Young Huang a fish every time he finished dealing with the documents.
In the middle of the year, the Municipal Party Organizing Committee issued an order reassigning the head of the unit's economic section. That left the economic section’s head position vacant. The Committee announced, in strict accordance with the organization's regulations, that anyone who met the conditions for promotion could apply to compete for the position. Young Huang, who’d worked as the office’s deputy director for five years, had majored in regional economics in college. He wanted to compete for this position but knew that there were as many as six colleagues who met the requirements. These days cadre promotion was increasingly more open, fair, and just, so, as the saying goes, he’d have to “fight through five passes and slay six generals”!
Young Huang had an idea after he put in his application. He thought of the director's hobby, so he took a day off and went to a high-end fishing mall in a neighboring city. He spent five thousand yuan to buy a set of top-grade fishing gear.
He brought the newly purchased fishing gear with him one weekend and knocked on the director's door. He told the director he’d brought the equipment as a gift for him. The director wanted to refuse, but he thought about it and didn't voice his objection. Young Huang struck while the iron was hot. He said, "Director, how about I go with you to try it out?"
The director was itching to try the fishing gear, so he said okay. He took the new equipment and went to the river with Young Huang. Since it was the best gear, the result was naturally extraordinary. The new gear Young Huang had bought worked to a tee, and the director caught a wild river carp weighing seven pounds.
That night, the director was so excited that he cooked the carp himself. He incorporated it into several dishes, each with its own unique flavor. He and Young Huang ate the fish and had a few drinks at the director’s home. When the director’s face was red and his ears hot from the liquor, he grasped Young Huang’s shoulder and began talking about the past.
“Do you know why I like to eat fish?” he asked.
Young Huang said, “No, I don’t.”
“Because I’m the son of a fisherman. I was born on a boat and grew up eating fish. If I didn’t like fish, what else would I eat?”
Young Huang looked at the director's swarthy face, not quite understanding. The director continued, “Do you know why I like fishing?”
“I don’t know.”
“Since I spent my childhood on a fishing boat with a bamboo pole, what else would I love if not fishing?”
Young Huang looked at the director's sturdy arms and nodded. At that moment, he really just wanted to know about the competition for the promotion, but he hesitated to speak.
The director interrupted Young Huang’s thoughts. "Let's not talk about anything else. We both have a lamp in our hearts as big as a fish's bladder. We’re really lit!" He gestured with his hands to show the shape of a fish.
Young Huang didn't know whether to laugh or cry, but when he heard the director in his cups keep calling them brothers, he began to feel confident and drank a few more cups himself.
The competition proceeded. Young Huang stood out in the public speeches, interviews, defenses, leadership evaluations and democratic assessments. When the proposed appointments were publicly announced, he ended up as the head of the Economics Section. He sighed and felt a little relieved when he held the appointment notice in his hand. “It’s a good thing I bought that set of fishing gear that time. Wool grows on a sheep’s body, and investment produces a proportional benefit. I think it was worth it!”
It wasn’t long before the city held an open selection for deputy town and district leader. Young Huang took the opportunity to apply and once again prevailed in several rounds of fierce competition. The organization recommended his appointment as deputy mayor of a town.
He was about to take up his new post, and on the eve of his departure, the director caught a big fish and invited him to his home to eat it. He said it was a farewell party for him.
That was when the director handed Young Huang the envelope mentioned earlier. “Thanks for the fishing gear you bought me that time,” he said. “It’s a really good set. Makes me as powerful as a tiger with wings. The fish come to my hook in droves!”
Young Huang was speechless when he opened the envelope. It contained a thick stack of banknotes, a full five thousand yuan! The director said, “I’ve worked right up to this day. I don’t make a lot of money -- more than most but not as much as some -- but I have enough and I’m content with my lot in life. If I took this stuff from you for nothing, I couldn’t sleep at night. I’m afraid I wouldn’t even be able to catch any fish!”
Young Huang trembled a little. "You helped me a lot in the last competition, Director. I wouldn’t have been able to defeat the other competitors without you!"
The director laughed. “Not so. You did it all on your own. I didn’t say anything to anyone, and I can’t accept your thanks.”
While Young Huang was still speechless, the director took him by the shoulder and said earnestly, "You’re a leader now, and I believe you’ll face many temptations in the future. I invited you to my home for a fish dinner today to tell you something. I dealt with the malpractice for you during your first year as a leader, but you’ll have to face the unhealthy practices during the rest of your time in office on your own. If you don’t, once the contagion gets started, you won’t be able to stop it. Life is a long journey. I hope to spend my time fishing happily after I retire, and I hope you’ll be able to come to my house to eat fish without feeling too stressed."
The director brought several plates of delicious fish dishes to the table as soon as he finished speaking. The steamed fish on the plate was long, full-bodied and beautiful beyond comparison. It shone under the light with a flesh-colored glow strong enough to hurt Young Huang's eyes. When Young Huang put down his chopsticks and raised his cup to make a toast, his eyes were already blurred with tears.
Selected from Authornet, page 218. Chinese text available here. Translated from here.
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5. Mountaintop (山頭)
Zhu Hongna (朱红娜)
The greatest treasure in Mr. Hao’s life was a beautifully framed, 24- inch color photo. Hung on a wall in his empty and dilapidated house, it was eye-catching and beautiful, adding infinite brilliance to the entire home. He’d carefully dust it every day to keep it spotless. Whenever he saw the photo, he felt his blood boil and his heart surge.
Who’d have done otherwise? People in the whole village, town and county all envied Mr. Hao. Everyone had seen the mayor on TV, but how many people had ever met him? The mayor had received Mr. Hao in person and awarded him a plaque.
Five years ago, when the mayor was promoted from deputy mayor to his current position, he regarded education as his top priority. He launched a large-scale "search for the best teacher in the metropolitan area". Mr. Hao had lingered in Elegant Village in the remote mountains for more than thirty years before he was suddenly "dug up” like gold that had been stashed in a far corner -- Bright, shiny gold, and the mayor's eyes lit up when he saw him.
In fact, Mr. Hao couldn’t have left the mountains, no matter how much he might’ve wanted to. The reason he couldn’t leave wasn’t because his legs were bad, but because he had a high school diploma. When Elegant Village’s previous teacher retired, the school became an unattended wilderness. Students who should have been sitting well-behaved in class ran all around the hills and fields like roosters released from their cages. Mr. Hao, as a high school graduate, was pushed and dragged to the podium by the village party secretary. Thus “Teacher Hao” was born.
At first, when his peers left the village to find work, he wanted to go with them without even saying goodbye. His students’ familiar and tender little faces stuck to him like magnets, though, making him unable to move. He was still single when his peers’ children became his students. The village party secretary persuaded a girl in the village who suffered from the consequences of polio to marry him. On his wedding night, he ran to the hill behind the school and sat there until dawn, crying.
From then on, Mr. Hao treated the school as his home and the students as his children. Whole batches of students left the mountains for a better life after graduation. Only Mr. Hao stayed behind to accompany the dwindling number of students. Eventually only two students remained in the school.
Mr. Hao never thought that one day he’d walk out of the mountains and into the city to meet the mayor. When the mayor personally presented the big red plaque to him, Mr. Hao's hands shook so much that he almost dropped the plaque. The flashing lights and cameras made him dizzy, but the mayor's friendly smile made him feel warm. The next day, the newspaper published a large photo of the mayor presenting him with the plaque on the front page. He spent the equivalent of half a month's salary to enlarge and frame the photo, and hung it on the most conspicuous wall in his house.
A few days later, Mr. Hao received a document from the County Education Bureau. The document’s title was: Notice on the Appointment of Comrade Citizen Min as Principal of Elegant Village Primary School.
Over the next month or so, Teacher Hao had to give a report at a Meeting to Review Events in All Towns and Villages in the County. Elegant Village Primary School was closed down, so Mr. Hao had to give make-up lessons to the remaining two students on the weekends.
After he was received by the mayor, Mr. Hao watched the news at the same time every day. When he saw the mayor on TV looking energetic, he felt as excited as if he were on TV himself. Whenever he met someone, he’d tell them how much the mayor valued education, how kind he was to people and so on.... He used all the adjectives he could think of to describe how good a person the mayor was.
One day, a long time since he’d last seen the mayor on TV, Mr. Hao sat down to watch the news at the usual time. He was shocked when the TV reported that the mayor had been subjected to Shanggui, or "Dual Track Admonishment", on charges of corruption. Mr. Hao felt a sharp pain in his chest and fell to the floor beside the TV.
Mr. Hao was like an angry lion when he woke up. He jumped to his feet, tore the photo from the wall, held it high and threw it forcefully to the floor. "Bang", the exquisite frame broke into pieces, but Mr. Hao still wasn’t satisfied. He picked up the broken pieces right away, along with the glossy photo, and threw them onto the fire. His tears glistened in the firelight.
He received another document from the County Education Bureau a few days later. The title of this document was: Notice on the Removal of Citizen Hao from the Position of Principal of Elegant Village Primary School. That night he once again ran to the hill behind the school and sat there until dawn, crying.
Selected from Authornet, page 251.
Translated from 壹读 here, also available here.
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Bonus Selection from Stories Magazine Compilation #145
《故事会合订本145》上海文化出版社
6. Evidence (证据)
Li Xiaofeng (金孝风)
A girl named Winsome started work at Strong's company a short time ago. She was quite pretty, and Strong couldn’t get her out of his mind.
One night he couldn't fall asleep because he was thinking about Winsome. His wife, Fragrant, was sound asleep and snoring, which made him mad. He pushed her and complained, "You keep snoring. Can't you let me get some sleep?"
Still half asleep, Fragrant said, "You’re the one snoring." Then she fell back to sleep.
Strong was furious and thought, “I'll record your snoring and we’ll see what you have to say!” He picked up his phone and turned on the recording function.
Fragrant abruptly turned over and stopped snoring just as Strong was about to press the record icon. He got even angrier and thought, “I can't sleep anyway, and I bet I'll get another chance.” Sure enough, Fragrant started snoring again after a while. Strong opened his phone and pressed the record icon, but his wife's snoring disappeared again after only a few seconds.
Strong tossed and turned, semi-conscious, for more than half an hour. When he finally felt sleepy, he put his phone on the nightstand and pressed the record button. “I’ll record you all night long,” he said to himself. I don’t believe I won’t catch your prolonged snoring. We’ll see how you quibble when the time comes.” He gradually fell asleep.
He saw his phone was still recording when he woke up in the morning. He pressed the stop button right away.
Fragrant also woke up then. Strong looked at her and asked, smiling wickedly, "You want to hear a wonderful tune?"
She glared at him. "What do you mean?” she asked. “You're not recording, are you?"
Strong laughed. "Yeah, you have nothing to say now, do you?" He tapped the play icon.
They listened, then suddenly both of them screamed at the same time! They heard Strong’s voice coming from the phone, mumbling in his sleep, "Winsome, I like you so much…."
Chinese text at Stories Magazine Compilation #145 p. 304. Also available here.