Mao's Last Dancer - Li Cunxin [40]
Everyone was excited. The school bus took us on a shopping trip to Beijing to buy presents for our families. I bought one yuan worth of sweets and kept the rest, three whole yuan, to take back to my family.
The last two days before going home seemed excruciatingly long. I was terrified that I’d be called up by Director Wang about my poor grades, so I avoided our political heads at all times. But on the final day, I accidentally bumped right into the very person I’d been trying to avoid.
“Ni hao, Director Wang.” My face blushed. My heart thumped.
“Ni hao, Cunxin. Are you looking forward to seeing your family?”
I nodded, petrified. “Here it comes,” I thought.
“Have a safe trip!” He smiled at me and walked on.
What about my poor grades? What about expelling me? I was so relieved. Now I could think only of seeing my parents and brothers.
On the way to the Beijing train station, my heart raced faster than the wheels of the bus. A political head and two teachers escorted us, and again, the grandness of the station and the number of people rushing about amazed me. We fought our way onto the train and settled in our seats. A siren sounded. The train slowly moved off. My heart was already in Qingdao with my family.
Then suddenly I remembered my report card. I imagined how humiliating it would be for my family. It would be the most reputation-damaging, face-losing event in the Li family’s entire history! How could I tell my parents that I hated dancing? It was all too confusing. I told myself to worry about it later. I was so tired that I fell into a deep sleep and didn’t wake up until three stops before Qingdao Station.
It was still dark outside when we arrived but dawn wasn’t far off. My second brother was to meet me at Cangkou Station, one stop before Qingdao, because it was closer to our commune. As the train pulled into the station I saw Cunyuan standing among a crowd of people under the dim light. I shot my head out of the train window. “Erga! Erga!” I called excitedly. “Second brother! Second brother!”
He saw me then and started to run alongside the train. “It’s so good to see you!” he shouted. That joyful image of Cunyuan running by the train would remain with me always.
My dia had walked to work that morning so that Cunyuan could pick me up on his bike. Our ride home together took nearly an hour. I sat on the carrier seat with my legs dangling on either side, my bag hanging over one shoulder.
“How are you?” Cunyuan asked as he pedaled.
“Fine, I’m happy to be home!” I replied.
“Tell me, what is Beijing like?”
I told him about the wide, paved streets and the grand buildings. I told him of the Forbidden City and, of course, glorious Tiananmen Square.
Cunyuan was enthralled. He would occasionally ask for more details, so I told him about the polluted air, the vast number of vehicles, bikes, and the hundreds of thousands of people. When I told him about the food we had, he said, “You’re making my mouth water!” Then he was silent for a few minutes as though he needed time to imagine what eating such good food would be like.
“Did you meet Chairman and Madame Mao?” he asked eventually.
“Madame Mao came to our school and spoke to us!”
“Oh, you are lucky indeed!” he murmured.
I knew he was envious and would have loved to have had the same opportunities. Trying to make him feel better, I told him about the blocked toilets, my dislike of some of the teachers, and my homesickness.
He laughed at me for making such an issue about the toilets. “Surely they are better than our hole in the ground at home. That doesn’t even have a roof!”
“Worse, much worse! More people pooping!” I replied, and he laughed. Then he asked, more seriously, “Why do you hate your teachers?”
“They are mean and some shout at us all the time.”
“Have you ever heard of the saying that bitter medicine isn’t necessarily bad and sweet medicine isn’t always good for you? Surely if you were good, they would have no reason to shout at you,” he said.
“I’m no good at dancing. I can’t concentrate