Factory Girls_ From Village to City in a Changing China - Chang, Leslie T_ [20]
I certainly would not ignore my health for the sake of thinness or saving money. After all, what is the point of doing migrant work? Can it be that it is just to earn this bit of money?!
Soon after she came to the city, Chunming began to keep a diary. In notebooks with pastel-pink covers she described life in the factory, the tyranny of the timekeepers, and the rare moments of leisure that were given over to gossip, snacks, and crushes on boys. You must record every day the things you have seen, heard, felt, and thought, she wrote. In this way, you can not only raise your writing standards but also see the traces of your own growing up. In these same pages, she plotted her escape from this world through a relentless program of self-improvement: reading novels, practicing her handwriting, and learning to speak—both to erase her Hunan accent and to master Cantonese, the language of the factory bosses. Her greatest fear was of getting stuck where she was. Time was Chunming’s enemy, reminding her that another day had passed and she had not yet achieved her goals. But time was also her friend, because she was still young.
The diary entries were often undated and out of order. Chunming wrote quickly, describing her days, drafting letters to her parents, copying inspirational slogans and song lyrics, and goading herself to work harder. Sometimes her sentences marched in diagonal formation across two pages, growing until each character was an inch high. Inside her head she was shouting.
I HAVE NO TIME TO BE UNHAPPY BECAUSE THERE ARE TOO MANY THINGS I WANT TO DO.
“TIME IS LIFE”
WE CAN BE ORDINARY BUT WE MUST NOT BE VULGAR.—WU CHUNMING
RIGHT NOW I HAVE NOTHING. MY ONLY CAPITAL IS THAT I AM STILL YOUNG.
It is almost one o’clock! I cannot bear to put down this issue of Migrant Worker but I must work at seven tonight again. I might as well go to sleep.
Ai! I truly hate that there is too little time. Every day I work for twelve hours; in the remaining twelve hours I must eat, shower, wash my clothes, and sleep. How much time is there left to read? Working on the night shift, time is even more fragmented: After I get off work and eat, I must wait an hour to shower. I sleep in the afternoon until six and then must get up. Dinner is another hour wasted . . . I read at night until midnight; that leaves not even six hours for sleep. There is one hour left for other things.
I HAVE BEEN DEFEATED, DEFEATED
CAN IT REALLY BE THAT ON THIS ROAD OF LIFE I AM DESTINED TO BE DEFEATED?
I DON’T BELIEVE IT
I ABSOLUTELY DON’T BELIEVE IT
Wu Chunming, you cannot go on living every day like this! Think about it: You have already been at this factory an entire half year, but what have you really gained? You know that to do migrant work in the plastic molds department for your whole life does not have any prospects, so you want to job-hop and find a satisfactory job. First you must learn to speak Cantonese. Why are you so useless? Are you truly so stupid?
Why can’t you learn the things other people learn?
You are also a person, Wu Chunming. Can it be that you are a useless thing?
You have already had more than two months but made no progress in Cantonese. Do you remember your goal when you entered this factory was to learn Cantonese? If you cannot learn Cantonese in this year, then you are a dumb pig, a dumb ox, and you need not do migrant work in Guangdong anymore. With this two or three hundred yuan a month, you would be better off at home.
March 23
Ai, there are really too many things I want to do, and too little time. Some people say they are annoyed to death, hai! Other people are annoyed, but I have no time to be annoyed.
One, I must exercise my body. To be fat is not acceptable.
Two, I must read a lot and practice my writing, so that I can live happily and richly.
Three, I must learn to speak