I felt only total exhaustion as soon as the plane soared into the air. The past few months had worn me out and even up to the last seconds before the plane took off I feared that the Chinese government might still change its mind and I would be dragged off the plane and back to Beijing for ever.
The thought of never being allowed out of China again was terrifying. I so desperately wanted a freedom of expression and thought which I couldn't have in China. I so desperately wanted to conquer the ballet world. And here was my chance. Now I wouldn't have to dance for Mao's communist ideals. Now I could dance for myself, my parents, my teachers and my friends back in China. The communist influence was fading fast.
Janie Parker, one of the principal dancers of the Houston Ballet, picked me up from Houston Airport. I'd briefly met Janie towards the end of the summer school three months before and I remembered her sunny personality. I was so happy to see her again.
Janie drove me back to Ben's place through perfect autumn weather. I thought of the filthy, dusty Beijing air and I opened the car window to let the fresh, clean Houston air gust against my face, my long permed hair flying wildly in the wind. For a second I thought this was not real. I wasn't meant to be back here again.
I took a deep breath. My spirit felt free.
I was to stay for twelve months but even then I knew that America the second time around would be a totally different experience. My beliefs were now completely altered after my experience with the Ministry of Culture and after having the time to think about what I'd seen in the West. Now I knew, with absolute certainty, that I had been manipulated by Chairman Mao's communist propaganda for many years. My personal contribution to communism had never been important. I was just one of over one billion other Chinese people used as a political puppet and I felt deeply betrayed.
My first month back at the Houston Ballet Academy was a trial- and-error time-I kept discovering and experimenting with new things. Ben continued to let me stay with him and I continued my relentless pursuit of both English and dancing. I carried my list of new English words with me everywhere. But there were also the classes and rehearsals during the day and keeping up with Ben's busy social schedule in the evenings too. So soaking in the bath or sitting on the toilet remained the best times for me to memorise new English words. I tried to record something in my diary at least every other day, first in Chinese, but then as I increased my English vocabulary, my diary became fifty per cent Chinese, thirty per cent English and the rest was French ballet terminology.
Ben started rehearsals for Nutcracker soon after I arrived back in Houston. Ben's Nutcracker was completely different from the Baryshnikov version I'd seen on the video back in China but I immediately fell in love with it. It had the freedom of expression I'd been longing for. I did two solo roles, both requiring only straightforward dancing and no acting but I was so thankful to be in it: it was my first ballet with the company dancers.
It was through Nutcracker that I first noticed Lori Langlinais. She was in her early twenties, a talented dancer and a beautiful girl, full of life. Her contagious laugh reminded me of my niang's. We quickly became good friends, she treating me like a little brother and I regarding her as a big sister even though we had huge difficulties communicating with each other in those early weeks. We used to call each other "Big Ballerina" and "Big Ballerino".
Within those first few weeks I made many new friends, including Keith Lelliott, another dancer who was staying at Ben's place, and principal dancer Suzanne Longley. With Christmas now approaching, one of Ben's friends who had become my friend too, Preston Frazier, bought me a children's book about Christmas. With the help of my dictionary and some of the pictures I worked out that on Christmas Eve this long silverbearded man called Santa Claus would ride on a sled pulled by nine reindeer, all with very strange names. I remembered the one called Rudolph, because of Rudolf Nureyev, but what was even stranger was that Santa Claus went down people's chimneys and put presents in children's stockings! Sounds like a capitalist version of Lei Feng, I thought, the humble soldier Mao had promoted in China as one of his model communists. This must surely be Western propaganda. And what was even more amusing was that Jesus was born to a virgin. How bizarre!
Most of what I learnt about Christmas, however, was to do with shopping. With my limited scholarship money I bought a few presents for my American friends when Ben took me to the famous Galleria shopping mall just three days before Christmas. There was a mass of people there, all gone mad over shopping. Everyone carried enormous numbers of bags and pushed their way around the crowded mall. Christmas trees were everywhere-bells, ribbons, wreaths and all. It was incredible! But most incredible of all was the money. Ben spent nearly five thousand dollars on presents in only a couple of hours. My father's salary for sixty- five years! My father's entire lifetime of back-breaking work. My family could live on this amount for over half a century. Ben had spent it on presents in one day alone. It was incomprehensible. It was shocking. I thought of my family and felt sick. How could there be such disparity in the world?
The Christmas Day party at Ben's house was a mega-event as well, with over forty friends, dancers and students. Ben had at least one present for every person there. I even received presents from Santa Claus, left in my very own Christmas stocking hanging by the mirror in Ben's living room. Ben didn't have a fireplace though, so I wondered how on earth Santa had got in. But secretly, deep in my heart, I wished I could exchange even just a few of those presents for cash and give the money to my family instead. So many years of my father's earnings seemed tied up in those presents.
Ben's Christmas food was a feast too. A huge sizzling turkey, a big shining ham, trays and trays of roasted potatoes, cakes and puddings. I refused to guess how much he would have spent-it was simply too agonising. I kept telling myself to enjoy it but all I could think of was dried yams and my family's survival.
So many things like this in America shocked me. One day as I was being driven home by Ben's friend Richard I noticed that he was wearing a sports jacket which looked very smart. But it had patched elbows-and yet he drove a Mercedes. Only the poor wear patched clothes, I said to him. He thought this was very funny. Then he asked me what I would like to do most in America. I told him I would like to be able to drive a car, so he pulled over.
"Come on, you drive," he said.
"I don't know how!"
"Just push on the pedal and watch the road. Easy," he said. I got into the driver's seat, nervously pushed on the pedal and the car immediately accelerated. The speed took me by complete surprise, so I pushed my foot down harder. I froze. Richard made a desperate grab for the steering wheel and slid one of his legs over to the brake. We were inches away from what appeared to be a very large ditch. "Oh, dear me, my heart is hot!" was all I could say.
My second driving experience was at Disneyland, this time in a golf cart. Dorio, another principal dancer, asked me to give it a try. Easier than driving a Mercedes, I thought. But I was wrong. I pressed the accelerator and the cart started to move very slowly because we were going uphill. Dorio kept telling me to push my foot all the way down, so I did, but once we got over the top of the hill we quickly gathered speed and before I knew it, this time we really were stuck in a ditch, right between two huge trees. Perhaps, said Dorio politely, he would teach me how to drive properly another time.
After Christmas, when we'd finished the Nutcracker performances, Ben took me and some other dancers to a beach house in LaPorte, about an hour and a half from Houston, to celebrate the new year of 1980. It was a wonderful party. Ben made a delicious roast beef. Champagne flowed all night and we wished each other xin nian kuai le, Happy New Year. People made New Year resolutions, such as losing weight and so on.
But after much celebration, much food, champagne and wonderful company, I just wanted to escape for a little while. So with champagne glass in hand I quietly left my American friends, slipped out of the house unnoticed and strode along the beach, thinking only of my niang, my dia, my brothers and my friends back home. I wondered what they were doing just then. I wondered if they were thinking of me. I wondered what their next year would bring. I hoped, for all of them, that it would at least bring more food to eat.
The summer school that year attracted even more students than the one I'd attended the previous year. My friend Zhang Weiqiang received permission from the Ministry of Culture to come back for that summer school too, plus three more students from the Beijing Dance Academy. I was so happy to see some of my friends again and thrilled that they'd also had the opportunity to come to the West.
During this second summer school I met an eighteen-year-old girl from Florida called Elizabeth Mackey. At first I didn't notice her because there were so many people in each class, but then she sat right next to me during floor exercises. I felt self- conscious sitting so close. She wore her long hair loose and I noticed the subtle smell of her perfume, the sound of her breathing.
Throughout the summer school Elizabeth and I kept bumping into each other. Whenever our eyes met my heart beat faster. I wanted to get close to her but I kept telling myself, "Don't be silly. Elizabeth is a nice girl. She looks at everyone this way. Remember the Bandit's unrequited love? Concentrate on your dancing. You are not worthy of such a beautiful girl."
I had other things to concentrate on then too. Ben called me one day and said, "Li, Billy has just injured his back. Would you like to replace him and dance with Suzanne Longley tonight?"
"Me? Dance with Suzanne? Really?" My heart leapt. Billy was a principal dancer in the company. He and Suzanne were guest artists that night, dancing Ben's pas de deux in the Houston Grand Opera's Die Fledermaus in an outdoor theatre.
"But I don't know steps!" I shouted into the phone.
"I'll teach you. Hurry up, we'll wait for you."
I threw my practice clothes into my dance bag with shaking hands and ran all the way to the studio. It took me just over three hours to learn every step of the grand pas de deux and we didn't finish until late that afternoon. We barely had time to eat before going to the theatre for our stage rehearsal at 6.30 p.m. I had never been so nervous in my life.
"Li, are you feeling all right about doing this performance?" Ben asked. "Because you can still say no."
"Yes, I like perform it!" I replied eagerly.
"Are you nervous?" asked Suzanne.
"No, not nervous," I lied.
I wasn't just nervous. I was petrified. What if I forget the choreography? What if the audience boos? Will they throw objects at me? Do Americans do that? Cunxin, just remember to breathe and let the music help you. And whatever you do, don't let Suzanne fall to the ground.
As the introduction music for our pas de deux was played, Suzanne looked at me with a radiant smile. I forced a smile back. This is it, I thought. The test of your seven years training under Madame Mao. Remember your parents. Remember Teacher Xiao. Remember the Bandit and the Chinese people.
Suzanne and I charged onto the stage. My calves didn't cramp. I didn't forget any choreography. I was too nervous to know how well I danced but Suzanne gave me the biggest hug after the performance and the audience screamed and yelled.
Ben read me the reviews the next day: America had discovered a new star, from China of all places, they said.
To celebrate, I was taken out to dinner after the second performance. So many well-wishers wanted to talk to me that it took me for ever to finish my meal. The waiter kept asking me, with a pleasant smile, "Are you done, sir?" How nice, I thought, feeling rather proud. He's asking me if I'm a dancer. Even this waiter had watched my performance.
After my success with Suzanne, there seemed to be a magnet drawing me back to the academy. Secretly I was hoping to get a glimpse of Elizabeth. But hardly anyone was there because it was holiday time. Then, to my great surprise, as I passed a small studio, I saw Elizabeth practising alone.
"Hello," she smiled and with my heart racing I timidly entered the studio. "I thought you had gone away with Ben for a holiday," she said. "Where did you go?"
"Something called gufton."
"You mean Galveston?" she asked.
"Yes, yes, Gulfston!" I shouted excitedly.
She giggled. "Why are you back here?"
"I have lumps."
"Lumps?" she frowned.
"Yes, lumps. Look."
She burst into laughter. "It's called a rash."
"Oh," I murmured.
"Do you want me to take you anywhere? I have a car."
"No, thank you." I replied politely. Then, suddenly I said, "Yes! I want go Chinatown, see Bruce Lee movie! You can take me?"
Elizabeth was eighteen then. I was nervous and excited, walking out of the academy with her. I was afraid someone might see us together and tell Ben, but I tried to look calm and casual.
We went into a Chinese café across the street from the cinema, the kind with small square tables and plastic tablecloths. For the first time in my life I found myself sitting opposite a girl, alone, of my age, a girl I liked. She looked so beautiful.
"You can call me Liz if you want. What about you? What do your friends call you?" she asked.
"Cunxin," I replied.
"It's so pretty," she said.
"It mean keep my innocent heart," I said.
"Cunxin, Cunxin, it's so beautiful," she murmured. "How old are you?"
"Nineteen," I replied.
"I'm eighteen. How many brothers and sisters do you have?" she asked.
"Sex brothers," I replied.
"Six, not sex," she laughed.
"Oh, I can't hear they are different. What sex mean?"
"Maybe I can explain it to you later."
I could sense she was uncomfortable. "English hard. In English, you say go, goes, gone. In Chinese we say will go, go and go yesterday, he go, she go, you go, I go and we all go."
She burst into laughter.
"Really!" I said. "English, change verb all the time. Is hard for Chinese person."
"But you're doing very well," she said. "We'd better go or we'll be late for the movie."
There were not that many people in the cinema and I found it hard to concentrate with Elizabeth sitting next to me. I wanted to know her better but I doubted Elizabeth would show me any special interest. So I was surprised when, after the movie, she agreed to have dinner with me.
We went to a small, cheap Chinese restaurant. We asked each other many questions and although we had difficulty understanding each other we managed, and we enjoyed being with each other. I ordered some authentic Chinese food-pig's intestines and sea slugs. That would impress her, I thought, but she seemed to have a rather small appetite. Still, I started to relax, and by the end of the evening I felt sad to part with her.
Before we approached Ben's apartment I told her to stop the car because I didn't want the security guard to see us. If he told Ben that I was having a relationship with an American, Ben would be placed in a very difficult situation. He'd have to tell the Chinese consulate and I would be sent straight back to China.
Elizabeth stopped her car one block away from Ben's complex. "When can we see each other again?"
"Don't know," I replied. I reached out and we touched hands. I felt her breath. I felt hot blood rushing through each vein. I don't know how long we kissed but the headlights of a passing car interrupted us. This was happening too fast. I needed time to think. So I quickly said goodbye and got out of her car.
"You'll call me, won't you?" she asked.
I nodded and walked back to Ben's apartment.
Elizabeth became my first lover. I felt liberated. I couldn't believe I could make love to a beautiful woman and that she could be mine. I felt a great sense of responsibility for Elizabeth, and great pride too. But I knew our secret relationship was dangerous and the only person I could think of to share my secret with was Lori. She'd sometimes tried to persuade me to stay in America but I had always said no. She felt sorry for me, having to go back to China.
A few weeks later, one Sunday, Lori invited me to her house for a barbecue. I met her husband Delworth, a Texas oil entrepreneur who chewed tobacco and drank bourbon. I told them how much I liked Elizabeth and the sorrow I felt about returning to China. I didn't expect them to do anything about it but they took this matter to heart straightaway. Delworth called the University of Texas and asked if they could recommend a good immigration lawyer. They suggested a man called Charles Foster.
The following day Lori and Delworth took me to Charles Foster's office in downtown Houston.
Charles Foster said he had read about me in the newspaper. He said I could qualify for a green card on my own artistic merits. He also mentioned that the Chinese government recognised international marriage laws.
I remember feeling unsure, not about my love for Elizabeth, but Charles seemed very young to be so successful and I didn't really understand everything he'd said about the law anyway.
Lori and Delworth tried to explain more but I left that first meeting still very confused. I loved Elizabeth. And I couldn't go back to China and survive in a world with no freedom. Not any more. But China was where my parents were, where my family and my friends lived. I could still contribute an enormous amount to Chinese ballet.
It was then that I realised I was torn between two possible lives. I didn't know what I was going to do.
I had been in Houston for eleven months but my secret relationship with Elizabeth was only a few weeks old. Still, I had to keep focused on my work.
I'd been rehearsing the Le Corsaire pas de deux one day with Suzanne, experimenting with a new, one-handed lift, when just before the end of our rehearsal there was a jerk in my shoulder joint and a sharp pain shot through my right arm. I caught Suzanne with my left hand on the way down, but stars flashed before my eyes and for a few minutes I couldn't feel anything but intense pain.
Ben and Suzanne were immediately concerned. I went to the dancers' lounge and put an icepack on my shoulder joint. I knew I had dislocated it, and probably torn some tendons and muscles too, but I didn't want to see a doctor. I didn't want Ben to think it was serious. He might take me out of the ballet.
My shoulder was swollen for days and I covered it up by wearing long-sleeved shirts. I couldn't do lifts properly and had to make different excuses. Then I developed severe tendonitis in my left Achilles tendon and a shin-splint in my right leg. I knew I was overworking myself and I knew that by continuing to practise I might make my injuries worse. But I also knew I needed to work harder if I was ever to reach the standard of Baryshnikov and Vasiliev. There was no way I was going to let injury slow me down now.
Ben had also choreographed a circle of six consecutive double assemblé or double turns in the air, for my solo in Le Corsaire. I could barely do one well, let alone six. Every time my feet pushed off from the floor my body would twist in the air like a barbecued shrimp. "There is no point getting yourself injured," Ben said. "If it doesn't work, let's change it."
"No, Ben! Please, give me few days," I begged, despite the pain of the injuries. I was angry with myself for not being able to do what Ben had in mind but there was a weekend coming up and I knew I could use it to practise. I borrowed one of the dancer's keys for our studio and locked myself in for two whole days, practising each movement and analysing them in absolute detail- the angle of my leap, the timing, weight distribution, speed- everything. At times the pain was excruciating but I remembered Teacher Xiao's mangoes. I yearned to taste each layer. I practised over and over and over and fell many times, but then I thought of the bow-shooter and how he'd persevered, and I practised again and again and again.
I made the breakthrough late on Sunday afternoon. The angle and the speed of my first leg was the key.
I was elated. I truly believed, now, that nothing was impossible.
Le Corsaire was a huge success. My double assemblé and the difficult lifts worked beautifully. The audience demanded an encore. I didn't understand what an encore was then and I wasn't prepared, and the stagehands had already started to change the scenery for the next ballet. But then, quite unexpectedly, Ben came on stage with a microphone in hand. He stood in front of the curtain and made an announcement: he now had the Chinese government's permission for me to stay in Houston longer and had promoted me to a soloist position with the Houston Ballet.
This must be a dream, I thought. Senior Consul Zhang Zongshu from the Chinese consulate was in the audience that evening. He was very proud: I had brought glory to the Chinese people, he said, and he would do anything in his power to make sure my stay was extended. His report to the Chinese government would be most positive. In the end the Chinese government gave me permission to stay for an extra five months and the dancers' union agreed to allow my promotion.
From then on in Houston I was a sort of celebrity. It was very strange. I was stopped by people in restaurants, shops, streets and even parking lots. But despite this instant stardom I knew I would have to work hard-I knew I couldn't lose sight of my aim. My injuries gradually got better but nothing else changed. Zhang and I continued to stay with Ben and I continued to meet Elizabeth in secret. I became increasingly frustrated at not being able to see Elizabeth more but I also felt guilty. I felt like I was betraying Ben and China, both at once. I wished I hadn't allowed myself to fall in love with her. Living with both desire and guilt was becoming suffocating but I had no choice. Anyone I told would be placed in a very dangerous situation with the Chinese government. I couldn't bear to put my family and friends in such a position. My only option was to stay quiet.
Soon it was April 1981 and I had less than a month to go before returning to China. The Houston Ballet's first major tour to New York was coming up and both Zhang and I would perform.
I was the second cast for the lonely, arrogant prince in John Cranko's The Lady and the Fool. I had never even heard of this ballet before but one week before the performance in New York, out of the blue, Ben asked me to do a full rehearsal with the first-cast dancers. I was stunned. I thought it must be a mistake.
The prince's first entrance was in the middle of a high-society ball. I had to enter at the far-back centre stage and come down some steps with people on both sides of the stage standing back in silence and admiration. But walking down those steps was like walking on hot coals for me. Everything felt unnatural and awkward.
"Li, you're too sweet and too nice," Ben said and stopped the pianist. "Go back and do it again. I want more arrogance."
I was shaking with embarrassment. I was twenty and I still had no idea what an arrogant prince would feel like. But Ben made me repeat it over and over again, and by the time he went on with the rest of the rehearsal my practice clothes were soaked with sweat.
But it paid off. My inhibitions went. I eventually enjoyed portraying this arrogant prince, a prince who would have been considered evil in communist China. And here I was, portraying him with pride. I had made a fundamental shift in my dancing. The two weeks in New York allowed me to really taste that city. I fell in love with it. Everywhere I went I made new friends. New York was full of artists. So many wonderful classes to choose from. It seemed that ballet teachers and dancers were everywhere, even choreographers. One day when I was taking a class at the School of American Ballet, I bumped into George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins, two of the most highly regarded American choreographers in the world. The famous Danish teacher Stanley Williams taught class that day and many dancers from the New York City Ballet, including one of their stars Peter Martins, were in that class. For me, a peasant boy from Qingdao, it was amazing.
Another day, I remember peering into the American Ballet Theater's studio and seeing Baryshnikov doing a barre. I couldn't believe my eyes! This was the man I had admired for so long! But how little he was! How could such great dancing coming from such a small body? Then the following day, in the same studio, there was Natalia Makarova sitting on the floor doing her stretches. And a day later I found myself standing on the same barre as Gelsey Kirkland, the very same Sugarplum Fairy who danced brilliantly with Baryshnikov in that Nutcracker video I'd watched in China. I would never forget her quality. Every movement was performed to perfection, every detail demonstrated with precision. I was meeting people and experiencing things that I had only dreamt about in China. It was magical and New York was the focus.
During the two weeks I was in New York, Elizabeth and I communicated through just one secret phone call. I missed her the whole time. My feelings about leaving her and going back to China became unbearable. Duty towards my motherland, responsibility for my family, the desire for Western freedom-I thought I had made up my mind to go back to China but now I was wavering. What does China have to offer you? The Red Detachment of Women? The dance world is yours to explore and conquer here. You have a beautiful American girl who loves you dearly. What more do you want? Don't go back. But then I thought of my parents, my brothers, my friends back in China. What about Teacher Xiao and Teacher Zhang? What about Ben and his relationship with China? You will destroy them all if you stay. And they have done so much for you.
It was in this confused, guilt-ridden state of mind that I returned to Houston, with only three days left before returning to China. Zhang and I spent the morning shopping for presents for friends and family back in China and that afternoon I met Elizabeth two blocks away from Ben's apartment.
"I missed you!" she said, and immediately sensed my unease.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing wrong," I replied, but my heart was screaming. "Let's go to Chinatown and see a movie."
First we went to a gift shop where I bought Preston Frazier a decorative Chinese plate as a farewell present. Then I bought Elizabeth a Chinese jade ring. "For our friendship," I said.
She looked at me tenderly. "Thank you," she replied.
In the dark of the movie theatre a Taiwanese film with English subtitles had already started. Forget about the movie, go to her apartment, a voice inside me said. No, you can't do that! Be strong or you will wallow in a greater mess, another voice replied.
Half an hour after the movie finished we were lying on the bed in Elizabeth 's one-bedroom rented apartment, once more immersed in our passionate love. This was too much. You love her. Stay.
I called Lori. It was late afternoon. "Hi, Big Ballerina," I said. "I and Elizabeth, come talk with you?" I asked.
"Li, the Big Ballerino! Sure, when do you want to come?"
"Now okay?" I asked.
"Now? Okay," she replied.
Lori's apartment was half a block away from Elizabeth 's and we were there in no time. "I want marry Elizabeth!" I said to Lori and Delworth as soon as we walked in.
Lori gave Elizabeth and me a passionate hug. She was nearly in tears, she was so happy. Then she became more serious. "Have you told Ben yet?" she asked.
"No. I don't know how or when. He wouldn't like. He will kill me and Elizabeth when he find out, because he love China too much."
"Who cares about that," Delworth barged in. "Let's have a wedding party!"
"In two days I go back China. No time for wedding," I said.
"Well, you could get married in a courthouse. It will only take a couple of hours. Delworth and I can be your witnesses," Lori suggested.
So at ten the next morning Elizabeth and I made our vows as husband and wife in the Harris County Courthouse, with Lori and Delworth by our sides. Elizabeth quickly kissed me, and Lori and Delworth clapped.
After we signed the marriage documents the four of us walked out of the courthouse into a beautiful April day. I'm married. I've married Elizabeth, I thought. And then immediately, what have I done to Ben?
"When are you going to tell Ben?" Elizabeth asked.
"Don't know. Not today. Big party tonight! Maybe tomorrow," I replied. Ben and the company had planned a farewell party for Zhang and I for our second-last night in America.
"We'll have our first night together tomorrow then. I can't wait," she said.
"Ben will be very angry. I don't know what he will do." I felt disoriented. I couldn't stop thinking of what I had done-I had done something behind Ben's back. Once more, happiness was overshadowed by guilt.
"Don't be afraid. We have each other," said Elizabeth. "You can dance anywhere. We can dance in Florida together, they will love you there!"
"Yes, we have each other," I repeated.
We did. We had each other. But neither of us knew how important that would be, only the very next day.
There were over a hundred dancers and friends at the farewell party for Zhang and me that night, held in the main dance studio.
Elizabeth was there too. Everyone brought us presents and wished Zhang and me happiness. I felt like screaming, I'm married! I won't be going back to China tomorrow! Take your presents back! But I couldn't. Instead I put on a pleasant face, thanked everyone for their kindness and continued the deception.
Elizabeth and I had our first dance together that night. "This is our wedding dance," she whispered. "Are you happy?"
I nodded but I felt uncomfortable with Zhang and me being the centre of attention. Lori and Delworth were there too, and the four of us pretended nothing special had happened. Lori's present to me that night was a badge. It said "Don't let the turkeys get you down". It showed a turkey standing on a pile of turkey shit with other turkeys standing threateningly around him. I didn't really understand it but I pinned it to my shirt all the same.
The following morning, the day before I was to return to China, I called Elizabeth at Delworth's as soon as Ben and Zhang had gone out. Elizabeth, Delworth and Lori arrived and loaded up my belongings. Then we went up to Lori's apartment to make the phone call I dreaded most.
"Hello?" Ben answered.
"Ben, I want tell you something," I said straightaway. "I'm married. I'm not go back to China."
Silence.
Eventually, "No, Li, you didn't. Who?"
"Elizabeth Mackey," I replied.
" Elizabeth? You can't be married!" he was virtually shouting now. "You are going back to China! Tomorrow!"
"Ben, listen. I love Elizabeth, she is my wife. I take her to China later when I have money, but not tomorrow," I said.
"Li, I can't believe this! You are destroying everybody's lives. I won't ever be allowed back to China!"
My heart was torn by his words. I knew it was true. I alone would be responsible for creating so much pain for others. I knew Ben had been negotiating with the Chinese government to take some dancers to China -now his plans would be ruined. But I felt like I was being swept up into a whirlpool and only fate could determine the outcome. I wanted to worry about Ben and his plans but I couldn't.
Ben changed to a more persuasive, softer tone. "Oh, Li, why are you doing this? China is where you belong. You are Chinese. You can't stay here! You don't even know Elizabeth!"
"I love Elizabeth, we are married. We are happy…"
"You are not married, don't be stupid!" he interrupted angrily. "Where did you marry?"
I felt our conversation was going nowhere. "Ben, I go now."
"Li, where are you?" he asked urgently.
But it was no use going on. I hung up and buried my head in my hands.
Elizabeth, Lori and Delworth looked very concerned. "What did he say?" Lori asked.
I tried to repeat everything that Ben had said but everyone was becoming emotional by now. I knew one thing for sure. There wouldn't be a future for me at the Houston Ballet. It broke my heart. It was like waiting to be executed. The only comfort was Elizabeth 's love and Lori and Delworth's friendship.
The phone rang.
It was Ben.
"No, Li's not here," Delworth answered.
"Can I speak to Lori?" Ben asked.
"She is not here either," and Delworth hung up.
Another five minutes passed.
Then a loud knock at the door. It was Clare Duncan. "Hello, Delworth. Can I have a word with Li?"
"Li's not here," Delworth repeated.
"Are you sure?" Clare inquired.
"Do I look like a liar?"
Clare left.
Another five minutes.
The phone rang again.
"Delworth, stop it, I know Li is there!" said Ben. "Clare saw his luggage in your car." He paused. "She's let the air out of your tyres. Li's situation is serious. I need to speak to him urgently."
Delworth gave me the phone.
"Ohh… Li!" Ben started to sob. "I'm finished! I've lost everything! Consul Zhang at the consulate thinks I've masterminded this whole thing. They think it's all my fault. You have ruined everything! I'll never be allowed back to China now!"
"I'm sorry, Ben. What you want me say?" I asked.
"I want you to say that this is all a mistake and that you will go back to China. Nothing will change if you go back now. I have spoken to Consul Zhang. You'll still be a hero if you go back to China now. You'll still be allowed to come back."
"If you want live in China, you go," I said.
"Li, the least you can do for me is explain all this to the consulate! Tell them I had nothing to do with it. Can you do this for me?"
"Yes, I will," I replied.
"Then I'll tell Consul Zhang that you will meet them at the consulate," he said and hung up.
"I don't think you should go," Elizabeth said and Lori agreed.
"Already, I say yes to Ben. I don't want change my mind, I will go." I was determined.
"I think we should call Charles Foster," Delworth said, and I knew this was the most sensible idea.
Charles was surprised to hear from me at first, because I hadn't spoken to him since our last and only meeting twelve weeks earlier. He congratulated me on our marriage but when I told him that Ben had asked me to go to the Chinese consulate he strongly advised against it. "The consulate is considered Chinese territory. Better meet them on neutral ground, like at a restaurant."
"Is dangerous to meet in consulate?" I asked nervously.
"Yes, it could be dangerous," he replied.
I quickly called Ben back and told him I wanted to meet the Chinese officials at a restaurant instead.
"Li, if you want to change places, you call them."
So I did. I called Consul Zhang and he sounded surprisingly calm and pleasant. "Cunxin, we're family, we understand what you did and why you did it. I only want to have a little chat with you.
No more than five minutes. Then you will be free to go and enjoy your happy life with your bride."
So Delworth drove Lori, Elizabeth and I to the Chinese consulate on Montrose Boulevard. When we arrived Charles was already there at the consulate gate and as soon as we entered the big metal door clanged shut behind us.
My heart sank. I should have listened to Charles. I felt like a prisoner of China already.
We were taken to a meeting room where Ben, Clare Duncan and Jack, the Houston Ballet's company lawyer, were already waiting. Consul Zhang was there, and his wife who was the translator, and several other consulate officials. The only one missing was the consul general himself.
I was surprised to see my friend Zhang there too. He looked tense and upset, and when our eyes briefly met he quickly turned away.
It was about six in the evening by now. Ben, Clare and Jack were all dressed in their evening wear ready for another farewell party at Louisa's house that night.
I looked around the room. I had been in this meeting room before, when I'd had to report to the consulate on weekends. It was a big square room with black-and-white Chinese landscapes and calligraphy on the walls. There were some sofas and chairs in the middle of the room and some extra chairs added for extra people. I still had Lori's "Don't let the turkeys get you down" badge on my jacket.
The atmosphere was tense. The Chinese host gestured for Elizabeth and me to sit. The consulate officials seemed relaxed and friendly but Ben was clearly furious. He wouldn't even look at me.
We were offered tea and soft drinks and there was a lot of small talk about China and the improving relationship between the two countries. Charles and I were perplexed: nobody was talking about why we were there at all! The officials seemed very content for everyone just to have a good time. I was perspiring and shivering. I was very scared. I could not stand the suspense much longer.
Then one of the officials asked Charles and Jack to speak with him, alone, in a room down the hall. I wanted Charles to stay but he gave me a reassuring look, and he told me later he'd thought it made sense anyway since he was effectively my attorney and
Jack was the attorney acting on behalf of the Houston Ballet. They would engage in some serious talk about my situation and spare the rest of us from all the legal unpleasantries.
But it didn't seem like that to those of us left in the room. It seemed as though the consulate officials were deliberately keeping the conversation going, trying to distract us, while they gradually eliminated my friends from the room.
People disappeared one by one and each time a friend left I squeezed Elizabeth 's hand tighter and tighter. It wasn't long before only Clare, Zhang, Elizabeth, myself and two officials were left in the room.
Eventually Consul Zhang asked everyone, except me, to go to another room. He wanted a private conversation.
Elizabeth refused.
We begged Clare and Zhang to stay with us, but the two officials simply shoved Clare and Zhang out the door.
Then four security guards stormed in, heading straight for Elizabeth and me.
We screamed.
Clare and Zhang looked back and screamed too.
The building echoed. It took only a few seconds for the four Chinese guards to separate me from Elizabeth. I tried to kick them away but I was completely helpless against those highly trained guards. They quickly grabbed my arms and legs, carried me to the top floor and locked me into a small room, only big enough for two single beds and a small chest of drawers.
I was struggling to breathe. I was scared. Truly scared.
In the meantime, downstairs, Charles Foster realised what was happening. He demanded to see his client.
From then on, Charles said later, the atmosphere changed completely. In a very loud and strident voice the consulate official ordered Charles to sit. He was on Chinese territory and he was expected to follow orders. The two employees who were serving drinks dropped their trays and assumed a defensive stance. They blocked the door. Charles charged forwards but was pushed and shoved as he tried to get through. He could hear my voice yelling from above, "Help, they are taking me! Help, they are taking me!" By the time Charles and Jack got back to the main room everyone was there, except me.
From my room on the top floor I could hear the guards talking outside the door. "Could have killed that bastard!" said one of them. I was terrified. I remembered the executions I had witnessed as a child during the Cultural Revolution and I saw my own death flash in front of my eyes. I felt desperately alone. Nobody could save me that night. It was just a matter of time before they stuck a gun to my head or forced me back to China where I would suffer an unbearably slow, humiliating death in the cruellest prison in the land.
I tried to think about my niang and her sweet laughter. I tried to think about my dia and his humble stories. I tried to think about Elizabeth, the smell of her perfume. I remembered the Bandit and our blood brothers' poem, but I couldn't hold on to any one comforting thread.
I looked out the tiny window and down at a pool on the ground floor. It was too far to jump. Escape was impossible. Death here, at least, would be simpler and quicker than the suffering and humiliation of a Chinese prison.
The door opened. Consul Zhang came into the room. He sat in front of me on the other bed and attempted a smile, but he seemed very sad. He looked straight into my eyes, like a chess player trying to figure out a strategy. I wanted to turn away but I thought this would suggest to him that I was wavering, so I forced back a smile.
We sat there just looking at each other. I was perspiring profusely. I couldn't stand this silence. If I sat there any longer my heart would simply explode. I had to do something! What to say to Consul Zhang? What was there to say? I knew the outcome would be the same: I was scum, a defector, the most hated traitor of all.
Consul Zhang finally broke the silence. "Cunxin, what have you done?" he said calmly.
There seemed so many different ways to answer but I knew none of my answers would satisfy him. "Nothing," I replied.
"Do you understand what you have done?" he asked, this time with more urgency.
"Yes, I love Elizabeth and I married her. Is this against the law?" I replied.
"Yes! What you have done is against your government's wishes and it's illegal in China! You're a Chinese citizen! Your government doesn't recognise your marriage. And you're too young to know what love is."
"Consul Zhang, my lawyer Mr Foster told me that China does recognise international marriage law. I'm married here in America and American law should be observed. As to my love for Elizabeth, it's a personal matter. I won't discuss it with you."
He was incensed. "Do you think a foreigner could really love a Chinese? The foreigners will use you, abuse you, and dump you like a piece of trash!"
"How do you know what it is like to be loved by a foreigner?" I snapped back.
For a second he wasn't sure what to say. "Have you seen any marriages between Chinese and Americans?"
I couldn't think of any.
"It's not too late to change your mind. You can just tell Elizabeth that you have made a mistake and you want to walk away from it." It was as though he was encouraging me to do something immensely heroic.
"No," I said, "I don't want to divorce Elizabeth. I want to spend the rest of my life with her."
"We are not talking of divorce. As far as we are concerned you were never married. We don't and won't recognise your marriage as legitimate. You don't decide what you're going to do with your life, the Communist Party does! You're a Chinese citizen. You follow Chinese laws, not American laws."
By now I was angry. "If you think Mr Foster has informed me wrongly, let's ask him now," I said.
Consul Zhang looked perplexed. "Mr Foster and your friends have left. They are disgusted with what you have done! You are alone. They are no friends of yours. We're your friends. Everything will be forgiven if you go back to China as planned. You will be loved and respected by all your people!"
I didn't believe for a moment what Consul Zhang said about my friends. But I did think they must have been thrown out of the consulate and that the Chinese government would promise me anything to get me back to China.
There was a knock on the door and Consul Zhang left for a brief discussion with another man. I could hear whispers but I couldn't make out what they were saying. Then Consul Zhang came back. He was trying hard to control his anger. "I want you to think about what we have just discussed and I'll come back soon."
I felt a sense of relief when he closed the door. I needed to regroup, to gather my courage. I felt exhausted but I knew this was only the beginning of a long and nerve-racking night.
A few minutes later the door opened again. This time one of the vice-consuls general entered. He was an older, slightly taller man, and he spoke with a heavy southern-Chinese accent. He was very friendly and offered me something to drink. I politely refused. So he began to try to convince me to go back to China, listing all the benefits there would be for my family. "Think of your parents and all your brothers back home! How proud of you they must have been! You don't want to let them down. You don't want to create any problem for them, do you?"
This was my greatest fear. If anything terrible happened to my family because of what I had done I would never forgive myself. But there was no reason to involve my family! The Chinese government was responsible for my education, not my parents.
"I left my family when I was eleven. I have nothing to do with them and they have nothing to do with me," I tried. I couldn't implicate my family in all of this. My family had no idea what I'd done.
"You're the property of China," the vice-consul general continued. "We have given you everything. We have the power to do anything that we want with you. We don't want to lose our star dancer! You simply have to listen to what we say. It is for your own good. The party knows what's good for you. Have faith in the party. Have you forgotten what the party has done for you? Have you forgotten what you have sworn in front of the Communist Youth Party flag?"
I remembered the years and years of lies about the West. I thought of Minister Wang who had refused to see me about my return to America. I thought of my lack of freedom in China, the desperate poverty which they had made sound so rich and glorious. "I don't want to talk about the party," I said.
"You don't expect the party will listen to you! Do you? The party listens to no one! Everyone listens to the party! Who helped you to get married? Is it Ben?" he asked suddenly.
"No. I made my own decision."
"Tell me the truth!" he raised his voice. "We already have the facts. Don't underestimate your government! Is it Ben? Someone in the American government? Someone in the Taiwanese government?"
Under different circumstances I would have burst into laughter. What he was suggesting was completely ludicrous. "No one has helped me. Would I have come to the consulate if I had a political agenda to hide or if the Americans or the Taiwanese had helped me? Would they have advised me to come tonight?" I asked.
"It's not for you to ask me questions! I'm asking you! Who helped you?"
"Nobody helped me. Didn't you hear me? I won't answer any more of your questions," I replied angrily.
The conversation with the vice-consul general went on for another half an hour, but I spoke little. Then another consulate official replaced him for another half an hour of interrogation and persuasion. It was like musical chairs. Every half an hour another official would take over the interrogation. Each left without any progress. In a strange way, after the initial fear and despair, I felt calmer as time went on. What do I have to fear if I'm about to lose my life? I thought.
A couple of times during the interrogations I touched the scar on my arm, the one I received as a baby, the one that caused so much anxiety for my parents and which had now become a symbol of my niang's love. When I touched it I could feel her love. It gave me comfort. It gave me courage. It reminded me of where I came from and where I wanted to be.
I didn't regret what I had done. In a strange way I felt at peace with myself. Elizabeth was my first love. Our marriage was not a marriage of convenience. I knew I could have stayed in America by qualifying on my own artistic merits. Charles had told me this at our very first meeting. But still I felt a strong sense of sorrow for my parents. I hadn't even sent them a single dollar yet.
I felt the tears pushing upwards through my throat. My poor dear niang. She had suffered enough hardship already. I thought of her wrinkled face and the sorrow she would feel if she never saw me again. Oh, how much I loved her! She was the most innocent and loving niang on this earth. She had given me everything, yet I had nothing to give her in return. Would my niang ever recover from her despair at losing one of her beloved sons? This would surely kill her.
I thought too of my teachers who had invested so much of their time and effort in me, hoping that I would one day put Chinese ballet on the world map. Their hopes would be dashed. I would never see them again. But I was determined not to allow the consulate officials to see my tears or to sense my weakness.
Downstairs, in the main room, everyone was shaken. The consulate officials changed their approach and went back to their pleasantries again, offering everyone drinks and engaging in idle conversation. Charles told me later that he'd sat there, bewildered, but at last he could stand it no longer. "Wait a minute, my client was just dragged out of here and I don't know about the rest of you but I am not leaving until you have released him! You are in violation of US law!"
"I don't understand, Mr Foster," Consul Zhang spoke up with genuine surprise. "You just told us that you strongly supported good US-Sino relations."
"Yes, I did and I do," Charles replied.
"Well, what is good for China and for the United States is for Li to return to China. If he does not, US-Sino relations will be harmed. So will the Houston Ballet and their planned tour to the People's Republic of China."
Charles responded. "While we all may agree with you about what's good for US-China relations, there's one problem with what you say. In the US, Li gets to make that decision."
They then proceeded to have lengthy, almost philosophical conversations about individual rights versus group rights. Charles later said he'd almost enjoyed it, except for the fact that he was concerned about my safety. He was working on the assumption that they would hold me through the night and then take me to the airport and fly me out of America the following morning.
But Ben and my friends would not leave the consulate without me. They refused to leave. So the consulate officials turned the lights out. The free tea, soft drinks and crackers were withdrawn. Only the use of the bathrooms was allowed.
About twenty minutes later the officials came back into the room. Kind and polite persuasion changed to cold, threatening words.
Ben and my friends continued to resist.
By now, rumours about my detention at the consulate had started to spread to Louisa's party. By 10.30 p.m. they suspected something terrible had happened. Two people in particular wanted to find out the truth: Anne Holmes and Carl Cunningham were dance critics for the Houston Chronicle and the Houston Post. They'd planned to interview me that night, but as time dragged on and I was still missing they eventually enlisted the help of some Houston Ballet board members and discovered that I was being held at the consulate against my will.
Hours had passed. People were beginning to gather at the side entrance to the consulate. Charles was asked by Consul Zhang to go and deal with them. That was ironic, he thought: the small crowd included a few newspaper reporters and the Chinese officials seemed to be putting an unusual amount of faith in him, asking him to talk with the press.
Anne and Carl, the two dance critics, were amongst the small crowd gathering outside. Charles could only say to them that there was a discussion going on inside and they were about to resolve the situation. He believed that if he told them the truth it would make the situation even more inflammatory.
He went back inside. "Look, there are members of the press out there and they are not going to go away," he told the Chinese officials. "They are going to make this into a big story." But to Charles's surprise the Chinese officials kept on insisting that, as a lawyer, he should know how to control the press. Charles laughed. This was America, he explained several times. In America even lawyers could not control the press.
At one o'clock in the morning, after many hours of interrogation, I was collapsing with hunger and exhaustion. My head was throbbing. I couldn't think any more. I hadn't had anything to eat since breakfast the previous morning. I asked one of the consulars for something to eat. I didn't care if they put something terrible in my food like sleeping pills or poison. I just needed food.
They found me some leftover fried rice and a Tsingtao beer, a bittersweet offering-it reminded me of my parents back home. At least I would taste something from my home town before I left this world, I thought.
After my fried rice and beer they wanted to resume the interrogation. I told them that my brain couldn't take any more. Please, just leave me alone, and if they wanted to kill me they should do it now. I had made up my mind. I wasn't going back to China.
To my surprise they agreed to stop their interrogation and they assigned one of the guards to sleep in the room and keep an eye on me. I thought I'd just feign sleep, so I pretended to snore. But the guard simply told me to stop it and we both twisted and turned all night.
About the same time, Charles had his final discussion with Anne and Carl outside the consulate. They wanted to know all the details. They knew this was a front-page story. Charles asked them to withhold writing anything until the matter was resolved. They said they appreciated that, but they had a greater duty to the public and they had deadlines to meet. Charles went back inside and asked to use the telephone. First he rang Federal Judge Woodrow Seals, a feisty old guy who had been appointed by President John F. Kennedy.
"Charles, this better be good," he said. It was about two in the morning by now.
Charles briefly explained the emergency and Judge Seals told him that he would meet him at the federal courthouse at 6 a.m. along with the Chief Justice of the Southern District of Texas, John Singleton. Charles then called his legal assistant to help draw up the documents.
Then, unknown to the consulate officials, Charles made another crucial call. He rang the US State Department. He asked to speak to the duty officer for China. He said this was a critical matter. The US government should act. Charles related the story of Simas Kudirka, a Lithuanian seaman who had been on board a Soviet trawler which was suspected of spying in US waters in the early 1970//s. Kudirka had jumped from the deck of the Soviet vessel onto the deck of the US Coast Guard vessel. Soviet sailors forcibly removed him and a long investigation followed. Everyone in the Coast Guard chain of command who had allowed Kudirka's removal was court-martialled.
Kudirka eventually ended up in America. Charles had hosted him in Houston. He knew the US State Department had internal regulations about the forcible repatriation of foreign nationals, particularly when it came to communist countries. He knew he'd said enough.
The Chinese officials at this point became suspicious and told Charles that he could no longer use their phones. In any event, he knew he had to leave the consulate to help draft the legal documents. There were only a few hours left until morning and he wanted to speed things along.
After Charles left the consulate the Chinese officials had had enough. They demanded all the Westerners follow Charles and leave the consulate at once. But everyone was determined. They refused to leave until they saw me safe and sound. This irritated the Chinese hosts even more. They cut the phone off and turned off the lights once more.
When Charles left the consulate the morning papers were already out on the streets. Charles was shocked to see the headlines. "Chinese Consulate Holding Eight Americans Hostage." He returned to his office, then went to the federal courthouse with the finished legal documents, ready for signature.
Federal Judge Woodrow Seals and Chief Justice John Singleton were there as arranged. "Charles," said Singleton bluntly, "I hope you know what you are doing because I don't. I have no idea whether I have the authority to enjoin a consulate officer of a sovereign country."
"Well," Charles replied, "there's not much time, so we just have to try our best."
Once the documents were signed, Charles rang Chase Untermeyer, executive assistant to the then Vice-President George Bush. Charles cited the Kudirka story again and said this was a critical matter. "Chase," he said, "Vice-President Bush's wife Barbara is a trustee of the Houston Ballet. The vice-president should know the Chinese consulate is holding a Houston Ballet dancer, Li Cunxin, against his will." Charles knew the vice- president would take appropriate action.
Chase in turn immediately contacted Vice-President Bush who had Chase call James Lilly who was then the Asia specialist on the National Security Council and was later to become the US ambassador to China.
Charles then returned to the consulate with a federal marshall to serve both orders, one ordering the consul general to produce me and the other enjoining the consul general from removing me from the country. The handful of people waiting outside had grown and they were mostly press. One man, looking very much like Clark Kent with pad and pencil in hand, walked up to Charles and whispered in his ear. He was FBI. "The consulate is surrounded," he said. "We have the floor plans. There is no way they can take Li out."
Charles knocked on the door of the consulate, with the US marshall, trying to serve the court orders. "Go away," said an official, "there is no one here."
For the rest of the day Charles went to and from the consulate but he was not allowed back in. He received many phone calls both from the federal court and from Washington. FBI numbers outside the consulate began to grow.
Charles then received another call. It was from James Lilly in the White House. President Reagan was inquiring about the status of the case. Then the State Department called and asked Charles to go back to the consulate and tell them to reconnect their phones. The Chinese embassy was trying to contact them to give them instructions.
Charles returned to the consulate around 4 p.m. and by five o'clock he was again in a room by himself talking to Consul Zhang. Consul Zhang was almost in tears. He asked Charles again, did he have to release me? "Yes. The problem won't go away. If you don't release Li, it will only get worse."
The crowd outside now numbered around two hundred. All the major networks were there, television cameras in the back of flatbed trucks, cameras over the heads of the crowd, and the parking lot of Walgreen's drugstore next door had been turned into a mini-TV studio. In my room at the top of the consulate, I was, of course, completely unaware of these developments.
Soon after 5 p.m. Consul Zhang returned to my room. "Cunxin, for your own good, and for the last time, I'm going to ask you: will you go back to China?"
Here is the turning point of my life, I thought. I was prepared for the worst. "No, I won't go back. Do whatever you like with me."
He looked at me long and hard. Finally he said sadly, "I'm sorry you have chosen this road. I still believe you will regret it later. I'm sad we have lost you to America. You're now a man without a country and a people. But I want to warn you, there are many reporters outside. What you say to them now or in the future will have a direct effect on you and your family back in China. You should consider seriously anything you say or do. We will be watching you."
I could hardly believe what I had heard. I was going to be free.
All of sudden, I felt only compassion towards Consul Zhang. I understood that he only represented the government's desires, what was best for China and the Communist Party. But, unlike me, he had to go back and he would probably never manage to get out again. He had been kind to me the whole time I was in Houston. "I'm sorry, Consul Zhang," I said sincerely.
He looked at me with a barely detectable hint of empathy and led me downstairs to Elizabeth and Charles.
I kissed and hugged Elizabeth and told her that I loved her. I hugged and thanked Charles for saving my life. He was a man of great integrity. I couldn't have found a better human being-he had risked his reputation to save me.
I didn't want to say anything to the reporters but Charles knew they wouldn't leave me alone until I did. So at 5.30 p.m. in front of a sea of microphones, flashing lights and cameras, with Elizabeth by my side, I managed a few simple words: "I am very happy to be able to stay with my wife and in America. I would like to do nice things for China and American art in the future."
All I could see was a mass of people and endless flashing lights. I could hear the clicking sounds of cameras and reporters shouted questions at me from every direction. I held Elizabeth 's hand tight. I could not think any more. I wanted to get away.
At first some of the reporters' cars followed us, trying for an exclusive. But Delworth drove his BMW very fast and managed to lose all the cars except one. That car followed us through every red light. Finally Delworth had had enough. He pulled over and took a gun from the glove compartment. I was weary of drama by that stage. I imagined another headline in the newspapers: Chinese defector in shooting incident.
But then two men got out of the other car and approached us. They flashed their FBI badges. "Mr Cooksin, the FBI would like to take you and your wife to a safe house for your protection. You are in a dangerous situation. The US government has an obligation to make sure you are safe. The Chinese government may well choose to retaliate. Do you understand?"
I shook my head. "What's safe house?" I asked.
The FBI man smiled. "It's a comfortable house in a secret location guarded by the FBI. There will be someone to serve you twenty-four hours a day. It's as safe as the White House. You'll like it."
"Thank you, but I don't want go to safe house. I have my freedom now. Please, leave me alone," I replied.
"You're taking a big chance," the FBI man warned.
"I know, but I cannot live my life in fear."
The FBI man handed me a telephone number to call if I found myself in any kind of danger. "Just a precautionary measure," he said. "The FBI will have trailers on you until we feel it is safe enough."
"No, I don't want you follow me," I said.
He smiled again. "Don't worry, you won't even notice."
And, true to his word, if they did have someone trail me in those next few months, not once did I notice.
After my release from the consulate my story was flashed all over the TV networks, the newspapers and the radio stations. I received a flood of requests- Hollywood movie offers, books, TV, radio and newspaper interviews, magazine story offers and job offers from ballet companies all over the world. There were even offers in the Chinese newspapers that promised me lavish overseas holidays to my choice of destination. Yes, well, I thought-any destination as long as it's in China.
The only offer I accepted was an interview on "Good Morning America". I wanted to explain my situation once and for all, to correct any false stories. I didn't want my reputation as a defector to overshadow my reputation as a dancer.
Elizabeth 's mother had flown to Houston from Florida as soon as she'd heard that her daughter and new son-in-law were locked up at the Chinese consulate. Now it was all over, Elizabeth and her mother and I were planning to drive to Florida to start our new lives together there. We didn't really know what we were going to do. We were simply shell-shocked.
On the morning we were to leave, Ben called. "Li, I've spoken to the Chinese consulate. They're not objecting to you working with the Houston Ballet and the dancers' union has also given their permission. So I would still like to offer you that soloist contract."
I was overjoyed. I thought Ben would hate me for ever! I thought I'd never work with him again.
"What about you and China?" I asked. I still felt immense guilt.
"I don't know, the consulate is very cold towards me. You were the last person they ever suspected of defecting. There's nothing more that I can do to convince them that I wasn't involved."
"Will you ever forgive me?" I asked.
"Yes, yes, I can. I wouldn't offer you a contract if I couldn't forgive you," he replied.
So Elizabeth and I abandoned our Florida plan for the time being and I immediately joined the rehearsals for Ben's new creation of Peer Gynt. I was so happy. Everyone welcomed me back with open arms.
But even so, I didn't know another soul in America outside Houston. My English was still very poor and now I was cut off from my own family. Elizabeth and I had only her one-bedroom apartment until the lease expired a few months later.
We eventually rented a two-bedroom fourplex, close to the ballet studios, as our first real home together. It was a run-down place with a noisy, inefficient air-conditioner and no mosquito screens on the windows. But we were happy.
Lori and Delworth continued to love and care for Elizabeth and me. They often cooked for us: Delworth even attempted a Chinese stir-fry once. He used a lot of oyster sauce. After that I cooked some of my niang's dishes for them and Delworth didn't try to cook Chinese for me again. Instead he stuck to American culture, taking me to cowboy bars and nightclubs and generally treating me like a little brother. We had such good times together.
It took a while for Ben to feel comfortable with me again after the consulate incident. But now that I was a permanent member of the company he started to give me more soloist and principal roles. My dancing continued to improve. A few months after my defection, Ben cast me in the technically challenging Don Quixote pas de deux for a national tour.
So it wasn't until Christmas that Elizabeth and I finally drove to Florida for our first holiday since our marriage. We stayed with her mother in West Palm Beach and I met her father and his second wife.
I was sad to discover that Elizabeth 's parents were divorced. Elizabeth had grown up in a comfortable, middle-class family. Her father had a small printing business and her mother was a receptionist at the West Palm Beach Ballet School. It was worlds apart from the kind of life I had known.
But although I had Elizabeth 's love, my job with the Houston Ballet and my precious freedom, I couldn't shake off a nagging dark shadow across my heart. I began to have nightmares. My family and I were being shot against a wall, just like the people from my commune back home. I would shout violently and wake up sweating and find Elizabeth leaning over me saying, "It's all right. It's all right."
I feared for my family and friends back in China. I feared the worst. I hated myself for putting my loved ones in danger. The pain to even imagine that I would never see them again! Everywhere I was reminded of my family. The good food that I ate every day in America would remind me of my family's struggle for survival. Seeing Elizabeth 's mother reminded me of my niang. Tears would flood my eyes. Seeing children playing in the parks would remind me of my own childhood and all the games I used to play with my friends and brothers. And when the rain came, I thought of my family and wondered if they still rushed around to collect the flakes of dried yams from the rooftops before they got wet. I was homesick and guilt-stricken and, without me realising it, Elizabeth became the victim of my emotional suffering. My only escape was to dance.
Throughout this time I made enormous progress with my dancing and Elizabeth worked hard as a scholarship student. But Ben never considered her a top prospect and she gradually became disillusioned. She was convinced Ben didn't like her because she had married me. She was torn between her own dance career and mine.
I felt so very sorry. Elizabeth was such a courageous girl. She was strong-minded and gregarious. We saw ourselves as Romeo and Juliet but we were convinced our story would have a happy ending. Yet no matter how hard we tried, life's intricacies always seemed to make our relationship worse. We avoided talking about the problem. We were afraid of hurting each other. I was still struggling to understand American culture, selfishly immersed in my own dancing world, arguing over unimportant things like unpaid bills and unwashed dishes.
One day, after a hard day's rehearsal, I walked into a dark apartment. "Hello, Liz?" I called out. No answer. She must be out, I thought. I turned on the lights-the dishes were still piled up in the sink after breakfast as usual. Anger started to simmer inside me. I looked to see if she had left me any messages and I found none. I took a beer from the fridge and sat on a cheap folding chair and felt sorry for myself. Where is my wife? Where is my dinner? Why didn't she leave me a message? Why didn't she wash the dishes, with all the time she has during the day? Hunger made me feel angrier. I broke a couple of eggs into a bowl and was about to make fried rice when I noticed the rice was still sitting in a pot on the stove. I'd told Elizabeth to put it in the fridge so it would keep longer. Should I wait for her perhaps? Yes, of course. According to my family tradition, the family meal together was a sacred time. I should keep this tradition going.
I waited for over an hour. I started to worry. Maybe she'd had an accident. I picked up the phone and called Keith, the British boy who'd stayed at Ben's place and who was a close friend of Elizabeth 's at the time. No answer. Please don't let anything happen to Liz, I prayed. I paced around our apartment with my heart hanging in the air.
Elizabeth eventually came home, in a happy mood, around nine o'clock. "Hello, my darling, have you had your dinner yet?" she said.
My anger flared up immediately. "Where you been?"
"I went out with some friends and we had something to eat together. Why are you so angry?" she asked.
"Why I am angry? Look at these, dirty dishes in sink, like pigs' home, rice out on stove. No dinner, no message. I'm worried, hungry and angry!"
"Oh, you want me to cook for you? Is that what you're angry about? Let me tell you, you didn't marry a cook! I hate cooking!"
"I work all day and come home, see dirt everywhere! You want me cook, clean, wash at seven o'clock? You have many more hours free, what you do?"
"You don't understand, do you? I want to dance, not cook! Dancing is something I've wanted to do since I was a little girl. It's the only thing I want to do. Your career is going from strength to strength and you are happy with your leading roles. You go to sleep with sweet dreams. What about me?" she said, and by now she was in tears.
In my anger I could see nothing of my own selfishness. Sweet dreams? Had she forgotten my nightmares so quickly? She had no idea what I was going through. "In night, I think of my family in China…" but I couldn't go on. How could I express all my sorrow and guilt? "You don't understand!" I said finally.
"We don't understand each other!" she shouted.
We were still fuming the next morning. I'd gone out the evening before to walk off my anger and Elizabeth had been asleep when I'd returned. My anger gradually gave in to remorse but we didn't speak for days.
That was the beginning of the end of our marriage. I wanted Elizabeth and Ben to get along. I hoped that he might accept her into the company. But eventually it was too agonising for her to socialise with Ben and she was convinced that as long as he was the artistic director of the Houston Ballet she would have no chance of getting a contract. I tried to teach her some of my techniques but with our close relationship and my poor English, our coaching sessions always ended in frustration. Our happiest moments were when we would dance together in our living room. I wished that I could give her this kind of happiness all the time, but I could see she was suffocating and I didn't know how to help. I encouraged her to continue her dancing career with other companies, but she thought I was pushing her away. She eventually tried the San Francisco Ballet and several other companies but no contracts were offered. She came back to Houston between tries and over the months we communicated with each other less and less.
About a year after we married, she was finally accepted as a dancer by a small contemporary dance company in Oklahoma. She immediately started work. She was excited at last. She loved her new dancing opportunities. She loved performing. She was happy and alive.
Then one evening she phoned me from Oklahoma. "Li, I want a divorce."
I was shocked but not totally surprised. "If this is what you want, okay," I murmured sadly.
"I'll be back to get my stuff soon," she said shakily. "I'm sorry, Li, I really loved you."
I didn't blame Elizabeth for our failed marriage. I blamed myself. I had let Elizabeth down. I had failed as a husband. I didn't understand love in Western culture and I shrank back into my own protective cocoon, withdrawing from many of my friends. I felt hopeless. I doubted that a marriage between East and West could ever work. Hadn't Consul Zhang told me this, that night at the consulate? What could I have done to have saved our marriage? We loved each other. We had each other, and now we had lost each other. I blamed fate. Fate had pulled a dirty trick on me. I thought of my parents' successful marriage and felt only more grief and shame.
Now there was no way back. I had no home to go to now, so I poured myself into my dance even more. Ballet was the only thing
I knew how to do. It was my salvation as I tried to survive on my own in the Western world.
After our divorce, to help me pay my rent, I shared an apartment with another student for that first year. The second year I moved into a one-bedroom unit and I finally had my own space.
By now it was May 1982, the year I would go to London for the very first time. Ben had choreographed a pas de deux using Vivaldi's Four Seasons and he had especially created it for Janie Parker and me to perform at the Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet gala.
Janie had joined the Houston Ballet in 1976. She'd fallen in love with Ben's choreography and artistry and, despite the outrage of George Balanchine and the artistic director of her company in Geneva, she'd followed Ben to Houston.
Janie had the most beautiful long legs and pretty feet. When she stood on pointe her legs seemed to stretch on and on. She was very lyrical in her dancing and, like me, she loved the romantic ballets.
This was going to be our first partnership and I was very apprehensive. She was one of the top two principal dancers of the Houston Ballet. In reality I was a little too short for her when she stood on pointe, but I made sure that I was strong enough and went through a physical strengthening program to make absolutely certain.
I couldn't wait to get to London. I longed to see it. London, Paris, Washington DC -the symbolic capitals of the Western world. I had seen some pictures of London but to be there in person, to experience the mood of this great city, would be awesome.
Like my first experience of America, I was shocked with what I saw in London. I'd guessed that the Chinese government would probably have lied to us about England too, but I was still overawed by its wealth and prosperity. The grandness of Buckingham Palace made me gasp with wonder. Where was the tragic poverty, the depressingly dark, unhappy London I had been told of in China? Britain should have made China look like heaven, but to my horror, it was the reverse.
It drizzled sporadically for the entire time we were in London but when the sun peeped out it was gloriously beautiful. The flowers in the meticulously maintained gardens, the café tables along the pathways, the wide busy streets. If only I could stay longer and enjoy all this! But our schedule was gruelling, and we spent most of our time in the hotel and the theatre. I did manage to see Piccadilly Circus, the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace and I marvelled at the glorious detail of Big Ben and Parliament House. The history fascinated me. Ben even introduced me to rich clotted cream for afternoon tea one day, and I remember sitting there in that café and thinking of the London Festival Ballet dancing in Beijing that time in 1979, so long ago now, it seemed.
Back in Houston, before my defection, Ben had been negotiating with the Chinese government to take some Houston Ballet dancers to China. This was one of Ben's great dreams, but after my defection everyone including Ben thought this possibility was dashed. But to everyone's surprise the Chinese Government allowed Ben to proceed with his plan. The Houston Ballet dancers were paired with the Chinese dancers and it was all a great success. As I had expected I wasn't allowed to go, nor would I have dared to return.
Ben's relationship with China mended after that trip and I was happy for him for that, but I still worried about the possible implications my defection might have had on my family and for several years I didn't write or call them, fearing I would get them into further trouble. When I eventually did dare to write, I received no reply and this just added even more worry to my already heavy heart.
It was now eighteen months since my defection and the Houston Ballet was to do a six-week tour through Europe: Italy, Switzerland, France, Spain, Luxembourg and Monaco. It would be my first look at the Continent.
I loved the places we performed at. Epernay was one of them: our impresario had booked us there for two performances and we were warned that the stage was small, uneven and raked.
During the afternoon rehearsal it became apparent that the stage was far too small to accommodate the entire cast of Etude. Ben had to take some dancers out of a couple of the larger scenes. I was one of the principals and had to find the smoothest part of the stage on which to perform my difficult turns. After the rehearsal, Ben gathered all the dancers together. "I know we are in the city where the best champagnes are made, but I hope you are disciplined and responsible enough not to drink any before the show," Ben warned.
The audience enthusiastically received our performance. But I did see a few wobbly legs that night. Maybe it was the raked stage, maybe it was the champagne, but right after the performance the British consul general, a distant cousin of Ben's, provided the whole company with Möet amp; Chandon and Taittinger, passed around in flowery handpainted glasses. It was consumed like water and the party lasted into the early hours of the following morning.
From Epernay we travelled to Nice, with its beautiful Mediterranean beaches and turquoise water, where I would brunch in a beach café and watch the boats passing back and forth. I visited the Matisse and Chagall collections and at night dined with the dancers and friends from the ballet, tasting red wines I had never even imagined and eating superb cuisine in even the smallest and shabbiest of cafés.
While touring in Italy we had a few days free. I went to Florence with three of my Houston Ballet friends. I was awe-struck by Florence. Endless monuments and sculptures, the history of the Medici family, masterpieces by Michelangelo, Brunelleschi, Donatello, Masaccio, the Piazza del Duomo and Piazza della Signoria. I was like a kid in a candy store. I was so excited that I missed my lunch appointment with my friends and my hotel check-out time, and had to rush to the train station to catch my train to Venice.
Venice was the place all of us were eager to visit. A friend had once told me that "to discover romance and beauty in Venice one must walk and walk". Well, at least that's what I thought she'd said. So I walked and walked, from one historical site to another. I stood there, in total amazement at the striking of the bell in the Torre dell'Orologio, at the incredible paintings, at the rich Venetian colours. This was romance and beauty in its ultimate form, I thought. I saw decay everywhere, part of the true beauty of Venice and its rich history. But this ancient city also made me sad-I thought of China and all that had been destroyed during the Cultural Revolution.
In the middle of all this glamour, I remembered, as always, my family and friends back in China. How I wished I could share this food with them! How I wanted to show them what I saw! But for them I knew the Western world and its affluence would remain completely out of reach.
After my failed marriage and that first amazing trip to Europe, my dance career moved rapidly forward. Ben's choreographic and teaching talents were immense-he became my mentor and I concentrated on my dancing with all my energy. I breathed ballet, I craved ballet. The freedom I now had allowed me to do anything I wanted to in America.
I was always surprised to hear others say I had a very strict work ethic though, because for me dancing was fun. I wanted to practise during our fifteen-minute breaks-I could not allow such precious time to be wasted. I couldn't believe there were so many public holidays in America. And why were the studios shut on the weekend? We never had so many holidays in China. Other than going home for the Chinese New Year, the only holidays we had were 1 October for the birth of communist China and 1 May which was dedicated to the workers of the world. Otherwise it was the strict routine of the Beijing Dance Academy, day after day after day.
Here in America I had freedom. But I knew I had paid a huge price for it. I had lost my niang, my dia, my brothers, my friends and my country, for ever. Self-doubt often overwhelmed me. I was completely cut off from the first eighteen years of my life. Many times I wanted my niang to hold me but I didn't even know if she was still alive.
I would have loved just to have heard their voices once again. In some ways, although I had escaped the communist cell, I had, in so many other ways, stepped right into a cell of another kind-a world of homesickness and heartache, of pain that was palpable, of sickness that was real. When I was alone, tears would fog my vision and drop like rain whenever I thought of my beloved niang.
Gradually, over the months and years, I learned to store my grief inside and it flooded my heart with sorrow. I would remember my family's voices, their word-finding games, how we would pass food from one family member to another because there was never enough for all of us. I wondered, was my dia still telling his stories? How is my second brother? Did he marry the girl Big Aunt had introduced to him? Is he at peace with his life? How was the Bandit? The Chongs? Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu? I missed my dia's stories. I missed making kites with him. I longed for my niang's warmth, her heartbeat, her love. At these moments, the distant memories of dried yams never seemed quite so bad.
And another thing concerned me-I didn't want to be like most of the Chinese people living in Houston, mixing only with other Chinese. I didn't want to be always on the fringe. So I tried to read books in English. My first was a book called Black Beauty. It was a Christmas present. An animal story, I thought. For children. Easy enough. But then, it was so hard! So many new words I didn't know. I turned to my dictionary and wrote down the meaning of each word in the book as I went. That killed the continuity of the story for me, but still I cried when Beauty lost his mother, just like I had. By the time I'd finished reading it, my tiny detailed notes covered each and every page of the novel.
I tried to fit in by dating American girls too. Once, I dated a young girl and we went to a wedding together. She asked me if I wanted some coke.
"No," I answered, "I don't like Coke, I am a beer drinker."
"I didn't mean Coca-Cola, I meant cocaine."
I had heard about cocaine. I'd heard it was bad. "No, thank you," I replied.
Then a friend of hers asked me if I wanted a smoke.
"I hate the taste of cigarettes," I said.
He laughed. "I wasn't offering you a cigarette, I was offering you some grass."
I was totally lost by then. Sounded like those horrible dried squash leaves I'd tried with my childhood friends back in China. But everyone assured me it would make me feel good, so I gave one of their grass cigarettes a try. Ten minutes later I didn't feel any different. So I tried another.
A few minutes later I felt like a hammer was pounding inside my head. Unhappiness overwhelmed me. My parents, my brothers, the Bandit, my friends, my failed marriage, the defection-all flooded into my mind. I was trapped. I had to go home. I don't remember which road I took or how I got there but I do remember lying on my bed at one in the morning, alone with those painful thoughts. My head felt like someone had driven a long nail into it. Every joint of my body ached. I don't know what time I finally fell asleep but when I opened the door the next morning, there was the girl I'd dated. Her face was red. She could hardly stand. The thought of what I'd just experienced made my head ache more, and I ended our relationship there and then.
All the way through rehearsal the following day, I thought I would lose my balance and fall at any moment. I was in a dreamland. Words just came out of my mouth without me thinking.
I performed the role of the jester in Cinderella at that night's dress rehearsal. All I could remember was the applause afterwards. Ben said it was the best solo I had ever done. Could I do it exactly like that on opening night? he asked. Repeat that? Of course I couldn't repeat what I'd done! I hadn't the slightest idea how I'd done it in the first place! That was the last time I would try anything that looked like dried squash leaves.
Aside from the drugs though, I did want to experiment with nearly everything the Western world had to offer. I discovered country and western movies, especially the John Wayne ones. I liked the courage he portrayed. I also liked movies such as Star Trek and the 007 films. I went to operas, symphonies, pop concerts and plays. Through Ben I met some extraordinary people -people including Liza Minnelli, Cleo Laine, Gregory Peck, Frank Sinatra and John Denver. I even went to discos, but I wasn't too fond of them. Still, I was like a bird let out of its cage and I could fly in any direction I chose.
But I never lost my love for ballet. The Houston Ballet was my home now. The dancers were my family. I treasured each day and each performance as though it were my last. I looked to Ben for constant guidance and inspiration, and found it.
That year, I heard China was sending its first ever delegation to compete in the International Ballet Competition in Japan. I asked Ben if I could go to the competition and represent China. Ben refused. Our performance schedule was too busy.
Later I asked Ben if I could enter the American International Ballet Competition in Jackson, Mississippi, the equivalent of the Olympics for ballet dancers. I wanted to get a sense of how my dancing stood up to international standards. And I told Ben I wanted to represent China. I owed China my loyalty as a Chinese dancer, or at least I owed my ballet teachers in China that loyalty.
Ben felt it would be good exposure for the Houston Ballet, so he entered four of his dancers, including me, into the competition. I proudly registered as a Chinese citizen: it would be my way of returning something to all my teachers, especially Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu for all they had given me in dance. This time, I wanted to make both Ben and China proud.
Over seventy competitors from all over the world would compete. As a soloist I would have to perform six solos and we only had three weeks to prepare. I was inspired. To work with Ben so closely was a pleasure and I didn't really care whether I won anything or not.
But at the registration desk on the first day of the competition, the Chinese delegation rejected me. I was a Chinese defector. They no longer recognised me as a Chinese citizen, whether I held a Chinese passport or not. Even worse, my former teachers and classmates from China were told by the Chinese government not to communicate with me. I had been so excited to see them, but now I was considered their enemy.
I was devastated. I wanted to go back to Houston at once, but the president of the organising committee told Ben that he would be happy for me to represent America even though I wasn't an American citizen. I gratefully accepted, but I had to hold back my tears as my former teachers, classmates and friends, including Zhang Weiqiang, all avoided me during the course of the competition. I knew that they would have no choice but to follow orders from their government. Still, it didn't help my agony of sadness. Sometimes I would hear people call me "that bastard defector" or "that heartless turtle". I pretended not to hear, but privately I sobbed. I wished I hadn't come to the competition. How naïve had I been, wanting to represent China? I would wake up at night with tears in my eyes.
During the first round of the competition I simply couldn't concentrate. I fell on my hands in my final solo, the Bluebird from Sleeping Beauty, and I only barely qualified through to the second round. I knew I had danced terribly. "Did you see him fall on his arse?" I heard some of the Chinese teachers say, and they laughed.
The second round of the competition required two contemporary solos. But by now I had a swollen right knee, a cricked neck, an injured left hamstring and the derision of my Chinese colleagues to cope with. I only had two days to recoup my mental and physical strength. I shrank into sorrow and suffered the pain alone. The rehearsals didn't go well at all and Ben and my Houston Ballet colleagues noticed. I desperately searched for some strength from within. I kept asking myself, do you want to swap places with your classmates from China? I thought of the fable of the frog, deep in the well, longing to get out. I began to realise that only one person could determine the result of the competition and that was me.
The second round went much better and I started to get my confidence back. But then, just before the third and final round, one of the Chinese competitors, Lin Jianwei from Shanghai, suddenly disappeared from the competition. Nobody could find him. Rumours began-perhaps I had helped him defect. My situation with the Chinese turned from bad to worse. Then some FBI agents approached me. They said the situation had become extremely serious. Five Chinese officials from the embassy in Washington were on their way to the competition. They recommended I leave as soon as possible.
"No, I won't leave," I said to Ben. "If I leave they will have more reason to think that I have helped in the defection."
"Li, this is serious!" Ben said.
"No, I will not leave. I will finish the competition!"
So, for the rest of the competition, either Ben or one of my Houston Ballet colleagues stayed with me the whole time. We moved out of the university complex and into a hotel. We used secret codes when opening our hotel room doors and it was very intense.
In the middle of the third round of the competition one of the five officials from the Chinese embassy in Washington requested a meeting with me. It was Wang Zicheng, the former head of the Educational Bureau from the Ministry of Culture in China. He asked me if I'd helped Lin to defect. I said I had nothing to do with Lin's defection, and I felt he believed me.
To my great surprise, and despite the defection drama, I finished the competition with a silver medal. No gold was awarded to the male dancers because the judges could not agree on who should receive it. The best prize China received was Zhang Weiqiang's bronze, Ben received the gold for best choreography and Janie also received a gold medal.
I was happy, not just for myself but for Chinese ballet too, because deep down in my heart, I knew that without people like Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu I would never have achieved this award. I dedicated my medal to Teacher Xiao. He was the one who had borne the brunt of the blame for my defection, who I learnt much later had seen intense political attacks on the Beijing Dance Academy after I'd left. Yet Teacher Xiao had never lost faith in me. He had told me: the strength of your parents' character is in you. You can help your parents by becoming the best dancer you can.
I knew Teacher Xiao would have been happy and excited about my medal, but he'd also have to hide his pride. I was a defector and an enemy.
A few days after the end of the competition, the suspense surrounding Lin Jianwei's disappearance ended. Lin had sought political asylum with the help of a ballet teacher in Fort Worth. I was clean. And, secretly, I was pleased that this star from the Shanghai Ballet had followed in my footsteps. Part of me did feel sad for China, losing two of their dancers in just over a year, but the pursuit of our artistic dreams was paramount. When would the time come when we wouldn't need to defect to be able to work in the West? How long would this political and artistic suppression last? I had no answers. I wouldn't live long enough to see such freedom for China, I thought.
With the prize money from that ballet competition I put a downpayment on my very first house. It was in a cheap and historic Houston suburb called The Heights, five minutes away from the theatre district and ten minutes from the Houston Ballet studios.
I didn't know anything about termites then.
The house hadn't been renovated since the 1940//s and it still had cheap wood-veneer panelling and old smelly, worn-out lime- green carpet. There was one small air-conditioner in the living room, which had leaked and caused severe water damage to the supporting wooden beams. The roof shingles needed replacing, the foundation blocks were damaged by termites and the house leaned noticeably to one side. The wiring was exposed, the water pipes were rusted, there were leaking sewer pipes, cockroaches, mice… it was a disaster.
But I didn't care. I had purchased my first house. I had realised the capitalist dream. Suddenly a Chinese peasant boy and a former communist Red Guard had become a landowner in the Western world! I was amazed at how easily I had done it.
My fellow dancers at the Houston Ballet helped me with my renovations and my house soon became a sort of dancers' meeting place during their free times. The whole house was turned upside down with renovations.
In hindsight it would have been easier and cheaper for me to have torn down the whole building and start all over again. I hadn't the slightest idea about wooden houses-my parents' house in China was built of stone and brick. But still I was very proud of my own house and I loved entertaining my friends in it. Ben jokingly remarked to other people, "Communists make the best capitalists." I even got my driver's licence and bought my first car that year, a second-hand Toyota. I felt a great sense of achievement about it all, but still I kept thinking about my family, the commune, the primitive house they were living in. What would my parents think about my own house? My own car? My Western wealth? I felt guilty for having so much.
After one year of being a soloist, Ben promoted me into the principal ranks. Gradually my reputation as a dancer spread both in America and internationally. My dancing career had gone beyond my wildest dreams, but still I was not satisfied. I knew I could improve even more-with the freedom I now had, anything was possible. I was the luckiest person in the world. Except of course for my only sadness, the one dark shadow which remained in my heart: that I could never see my parents again.
But then, in the middle of 1983, I met Mary McKendry.
I was performing with the Houston Ballet on a six-week tour through Europe. In London we performed at the Sadler's Wells Theatre, and this time we were there for nearly two weeks. On one of our few free nights before the performance, Ben urged us all to see this Australian-born ballerina he'd seen perform with the London Festival Ballet. Ben rarely praised dancers from other companies: he always put his own dancers on a higher pedestal, but he had worked with Mary on several of his ballets and knew she was quite extraordinary. Out of curiosity I went to see her dance the lead in Ben's Four Last Songs. I was so impressed. I went back again the next night to see her in Cinderella. She was different from other dancers. There was a distinctive quality there, rare, lyrical and beautiful, with an intensity and commitment that transfixed me. I fell in love with her artistry immediately.
"Is there any chance of inviting Mary to join the Houston Ballet?" I asked Ben the next day. "She is such a wonderful dancer."
"I don't think she would leave London for Houston," Ben replied.
The following day, when we were rehearsing Etude on stage, I saw Mary rush into the theatre, her dark hair flying wildly around her face. She found a seat and sat quietly in the audience to watch our rehearsals.
I sneaked over to her during the first available break. "Hello, I'm Li," I said. "You must be Mary McKendry."
She nodded.
"I really enjoyed your performances!" I said enthusiastically.
"Thanks," she said briefly, then quickly turned her attention to the dancing.
I felt disappointed. I had wanted a longer conversation than that, but she didn't seem interested in talking to me.
I crept back onto the stage with my pride hurt. I had always been shy with girls and had problems communicating with them. But I didn't get another opportunity to talk to Mary again before we left to go back to Houston. I often thought of Mary and her dancing after that but I wouldn't meet her again for another eighteen months.
After we got back to Houston, we began working on our major ballet for the year, Sleeping Beauty. Through Ben's Royal Ballet connections he had established a very special friendship with Margot Fonteyn. She had danced in some of Ben's earlier ballets and had tremendous respect for him, and Ben had periodically invited her to Houston for special coaching sessions or for special opening night performances. Now she was coming to Houston again. I had loved and respected Margot so much ever since I had seen her in those videos in my Beijing Dance Academy days. I couldn't believe I would actually meet her.
Margot was an elegant lady. Her every mannerism represented grace. At Ben's place for dinner one night, she asked me about my family back in China. She was fond of the Chinese people and told me she had lived in Shanghai for quite a few years while she was a young girl.
"Did you like Shanghai?" I asked.
"Very much. I have a lot of fond memories. It was called the Paris of Asia then, and it was a place full of energy. But it's so different now," she said sadly.
That night, after my brief conversation with Margot about China, I lay in bed and tossed and turned. What Margot had said about China had stirred huge waves of emotion within me. I couldn't stop myself from thinking about my family and friends back in China. Special memories pushed their way back into my mind, and overwhelmed me once more with an ocean of sadness. I had made my career a success. I should be happy, but I wasn't. I wanted my niang, I wanted to hear her voice, I wanted to feel her love. This dream had slipped further and further away over the years. Now I felt despair beyond description. The hope of ever seeing my beloved ones again seemed gone. But how could I give up hope! I could never forget my niang's love, her strength of character. And my dia-the hardworking man with few words. My six brothers, my aunts and uncles. I could never forget my home.
The following year we took Swan Lake to the Kennedy Center in Washington DC. Two days before our opening night performance, Barbara Bush invited Ben and me to the White House before our busy schedule began at the theatre that morning. We met Barbara in one of the smaller White House reception rooms. Pastries, tea and coffee were already waiting.
"Hello Ben, so nice to see you! Li, how nice it is to see you again." She opened her arms and gave us both a hug. She was still the happy, warm person that I remembered from my first meeting with her five years before. Nothing had changed, except that she now treated me like an old friend.
"Li, I keep hearing all about your wonderful achievements with your dancing and I'm so happy that things have worked out for you," she said.
"Thank you, thank you and George for all you have done for me," I said.
"Oh, Li, we did nothing, really." She turned to Ben. "Tell me, Ben, how are all your China adventures going?"
"It's great, I love China. The Chinese people are so sincere. They pay me tremendous respect. I always feel re-energised when I go there," Ben replied. "It has changed a lot. Since Deng Xiaoping came along people seem to be happier. They have more freedom now. He has done an amazing job."
Then Barbara asked me what I thought of China 's new direction. She caught me by surprise. I hesitated, and looked at Ben.
"Li hasn't been allowed back," Ben said, coming to my rescue. "I know he misses his family. I hope that one day he will be allowed to see them."
Barbara frowned and looked thoughtful. "Which city in China do you come from, Li?"
" Qingdao, where the beer is from."
"Nice beer and nice city," she smiled, and then turned the conversation to other things.
Before we left, Barbara showed us around the White House and I felt honoured and privileged to be given such a tour. I was surprised, though, to see how simple the interior decorations were. This was the centre of American power, the centre of world power. Where was the grandeur? The lavish palace of political might? Compared to Chairman Mao's monument in Tiananmen Square, the White House seemed very simple indeed.
Forty-five minutes later, Ben and I hugged Barbara goodbye and raced back to the theatre for our rehearsals. But I was deeply touched by my visit to the White House and by this elegant, kind-hearted, approachable lady. I thought of the Minister for Culture in China -the comparison was ridiculous.
Two days later, at our Swan Lake performance, Vice-President George Bush and Barbara Bush invited the Chinese ambassador and the cultural attaché, Wang Zicheng, to be their guests. I was performing the prince, the same role that had so eluded me back in China. I felt like a prince and danced like a prince now. I approached the role from within. Gone were my peasant inhibitions and inadequacies. I didn't need to perm my hair to make me feel more princely, and I felt a wonderful rapport from the audience.
After the performance, the Bushes came on stage to congratulate us. Mr Bush stopped in front of me. "Ni hao, Li. Congratulations. You were wonderful tonight," and he introduced the Chinese ambassador and Wang Zicheng, who had briefed Zhang Weiqiang and me at the Ministry of Culture in Beijing before our first trip to the US, and again at the Jackson Ballet Competition.
"We're old friends. Hello, Cunxin!" he shook my hands excitedly. "Congratulations, you have made us proud tonight! Would you have time to come to the embassy tomorrow, for tea in the morning?" he asked.
I was so surprised by his praise. I was even more surprised at the invitation. "Yes, I would love to come," I said.
Ben accompanied me to the Chinese embassy the next morning because I was too scared to go there by myself, given my last experience at the consulate in Houston. We were welcomed and congratulated by Wang Zicheng and he proudly showed us the reviews of our performance in the Washington Post. He congratulated me for my contribution to the ballet profession and for adding glory to the Chinese people. Then he told me something else. He told me that he had favourably reviewed my situation, and that Vice-President Bush had intervened on my behalf with regard to my parents. He said that the possibility of my going back to China was still remote, but that he would instead try to obtain the Chinese government's approval for my parents to come to America for a brief visit. He made no promises.
I knew Barbara Bush would have been the one who had told her husband of my homesickness and longing to see my family. I was deeply touched. I could never repay her for such generosity and kindness.
Knowing China though, the process of trying to get my parents here could take many years. I held little hope. Wang Zicheng was simply trying to pay Mr Bush some lip service and trying to shut me up. I thanked him, but didn't think he could ever deliver. So as time went on, the hope of seeing my parents after five long years gradually faded from my heart.
But I was wrong. A few months later I received a letter from Wang Zicheng. He had indeed obtained the Chinese government's permission for my parents to leave China for a visit to the United States.
I held the letter in my hand and tears streamed down my face. I was shaking with joy.
I stayed home and cried. I didn't know how long I cried for and I didn't care. I just wanted to be alone to enjoy this overwhelming happiness.
Those tears washed out six long, unbearable years of sadness and grief. I wanted to stand on top of New York 's twin towers and yell out, let the entire world know how happy and how lucky I was.
I had no idea what my parents would look like after six years of hard, hard living. That night, trembling with excitement, I dialled my old village phone number. "Hello, can I speak to Li Tingfang, please?"
"Who is calling?"
"Li Cunxin, his sixth son," I replied.
I could tell the man on the other end was hesitating. I was afraid he would hang up, so I quickly added, "I have the central government's permission for my parents to come and visit me in America."
"Wait a minute," he said. I could hear him talking to another man in the background and then I heard a voice shout over the village's loudspeaker, "Li Tingfang! Li Tingfang! Phone call from America!"
I could hardly control my joy. My heart sang. Five minutes felt like five hours. I was anxious beyond description. I had a Tsingtao beer in my other hand and took a big gulp, but my hands were shaking uncontrollably.
Then I heard the sound of rapid footsteps. "I go first!" Then, "All right! All right! Hurry up!" Then I heard my second brother Cunyuan shouting into the phone. "Cunxin!"
"Erga…" My throat choked with tears.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
"Never better!" I managed to reply.
"Dia and Niang are coming to the phone! Your brothers are all here, except our big brother. He is still in Tibet…"
Before Cunyuan could finish, suddenly my third brother Cunmao's voice interrupted.
"Ni hao, Cunxin!"
"I'm so happy to be able to hear your voice. How are my fourth uncle and aunt?" I asked.
"They're good, but they're getting old," he replied.
"Please tell them that I love them and miss them," I said.
"I will." Cunmao handed the phone to my fourth brother, who then passed it on to my fifth brother and finally to my youngest brother.
"Jing Tring!"
"Where are you?" he asked.
Before I could answer him, I heard my fifth brother saying in the background. "What a stupid question! Where do you think he is? In America."
"I'm in Houston, in my house," I replied.
"What time is it there?" he asked.
"Seven-thirty in the evening," I replied.
"Oh, we are on different times!" he said unbelievingly.
I heard more of my brothers' laughter in the background. "Sixth brother, we all miss you so much! We are so happy you are alive!" he said.
"Jing Tring, I miss you all too…"
I was about to go on, but then another voice spoke urgently into the phone. "Jing Hao!"
I was overjoyed. I couldn't speak.
It was my niang. At last.
"Jing Hao, Jing Hao?" she kept asking, over and over again.
"Niang…"
"Is it really you, my sixth son…?" Her voice choked and she started to sob. "Ohh, my son!" she sighed. "I never thought this day would come before I leave this world. How happy I am. Gods have mercy. I can die peacefully now," she murmured.
"Niang, I have the central government's permission for you and Dia to come to America! We will see each other soon!"
"Jing Hao, please don't talk of such false hope…"
"But Niang, it is true! I have the permission letter in my hand! Now! You can start to apply for your passports!"
"Ohh… Ohh… Jing Hao said we can go to America to see him!" she said to the rest of the family, and I heard a roar of cheers in the background. Then she added, "Jing Hao, your dia wants to talk to you."
"Niang… before you go, I just want to tell you… I love you," I said.
This was the first time that I'd ever told her that. How many times I'd wished I'd said it to her before I'd left China.
There was a silence.
Then all I heard was the sound of my niang's quiet sobbing.
It took several months for my parents to obtain their passports, but once they did, the US visa was quickly granted. Charles Foster helped with all their applications, the US State Department was already well informed about my situation, and knowing the vice-president of the United States was a very helpful way of speeding things up.
While all this was going on I had to prepare for the Japan International Ballet Competition in Osaka. After my success in Jackson, Ben encouraged me to enter with one of the rising stars of the Houston Ballet, Martha Butler, who was only seventeen. At first I had reservations about Ben's selection: I thought Martha was too young and inexperienced to perform in such a high- pressure competition. But once again I was proven wrong…
Apart from my brief stop at the Tokyo airport to change planes on my first trip to America, this was my first experience of Japan. Once again I was confronted with a prosperous and industrial country but because of limited studio space in the host city of Osaka we had to take a fast train every day, for over an hour, to Kyoto for rehearsals.
Kyoto was one of the most beautiful and peaceful cities I'd ever seen: Buddhist temples, beautifully maintained gardens, the meditative rock gardens with their musical sounds, dripping water, bamboo and tranquillity. And the food-so delicately beautiful, like small artworks. The sushi was almost too pretty to eat. Some of the Japanese traditions reminded me of the Chinese customs that I had grown up with. I remembered too my dia talking about the Japanese occupation of Qingdao during the Second World War. Here in Kyoto I was so close to China, to my family and my friends only three hours away, yet still I felt so distant. Nothing would change, I thought. I would never be allowed to return to my homeland again.
Martha and I were placed twenty-sixth after the first round of the competition. I thought this was amazing, considering Martha had never performed in this kind of professional environment before: she hadn't even performed a full classical pas de deux in her entire life. She was so nervous that she kept her mouth open the whole time she was on stage. One of the judges said she looked like a goldfish.
In the second round we performed a contemporary work Ben had choreographed for us. I had to carry Martha in my arms, with her body sadly curled up. We were searching and struggling for a way out, but were pulled back by a powerful, invisible force everywhere we went. After all our hopes of survival had been crushed, we finally ended our performance with a slow, death- like movement, both of us entwined together. All through our performance I pretended that I was carrying the last beloved survivor of my family after our village back home in China had been destroyed. No home to go back to and no loved ones left. All we had was each other. Sometimes my thoughts were too painful for me and I prayed that my family back home would never suffer the same fate as the fate we danced that night.
Martha's standard improved on a daily basis for those two weeks at the competition. She was a fast learner, with great mental strength and beautiful physicality. I knew she would one day become a wonderful artist and to our astonishment we were awarded a silver medal by the international jury. Ben again received the medal for best choreography. It was a great feeling, to receive such an honour. We had danced against competitors from the Bolshoi, the Kirov and the Paris Opèra Ballet: we learned so much from them and Martha and I had formed a close partnership.
After our return from Japan, Martha and I went straight into rehearsals for Nutcracker. I'd been told by Ben that my parents would be arriving in about a month's time, so one evening Preston and Richard came over to help me begin to get my house ready.
"What's all this?" Richard yelled, pointing at a pile of stuff in the middle of my living room: there was some timber, a spare toilet seat, some tiles, bags of cement, and tools…
"They are my treasures. They are very useful," I replied.
"I know they are useful, but are you going to use them before your parents come?"
"I'm not sure," I replied.
Richard rolled his eyes. "Out, out, throw them all out!" he shouted. Richard and Preston went through each item in that pile and chucked out almost all of my "treasures". Then they organised a working party of dancers, stage-hands, an electrician, carpenter and plumber, even some board members. They painted, cleaned, fixed… and by the end of the week my house was transformed. There wasn't even any sawdust left on the windowsills. But they hadn't finished yet-Richard lent me two bamboo plants in huge flowerpots. Ben bought a pair of antique Mandarin chairs and Preston gave me an antique Mandarin skirt which he'd had framed by the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. By the end of it all my house looked like a million dollars.
Ben and Preston had taken over the arrangement of my parents' travel too. They wanted me to leave everything to them: just concentrate on Nutcracker. So I did.
A couple of days before my parents' arrival, I went crazy with shopping. I bought so many different kinds of food, all the rare and precious things we could never dream of having in China when I grew up: eggs, tree fungus, dried mushrooms, seafood, pork, chicken, rice, even Tsingtao beer and the best rice wine called Maotai which, in China, was only available to high government officials. I bought fruit-apples, pears, oranges, bananas, grapes and a whole watermelon and stacked them into two big plates on the dining table. My small fridge was overflowing. I also bought a futon bed for my parents to sleep on because I was concerned they wouldn't be able to sleep on a bouncy Western mattress after so many years of sleeping on a hard earth bed. I bought them thick cotton shirts and sweaters too. I was beside myself with excitement. I wanted to buy them everything the Western world had to offer. I knew they would be blown away by what they were about to see.
The final rehearsals for Nutcracker would usually have taken an enormous physical toll, but not this time. I had so much energy.
My feet were light. I was filled with music and colour, and my heart blossomed like a lotus flower. Just thinking about my parents would bring tears to my eyes, but now they were tears of happiness and joy.
I wanted this opening night performance to be magic, not only for the general public, but also for my parents. This would be the first time they would see me dance, the first time they would see a live performance, and I would be dancing the prince. The anticipation was agonising. And, at the back of my mind, I was still afraid that the Chinese government might change its mind at the last minute and prevent my parents' coming.
For several nights I lay in bed, eyes wide open, thinking about my dia and my niang. I wasn't sure what they would think. Would they like America? Would they handle the culture shock and be able to enjoy their time here? And how would they cope while I was working?
18 December, 1984. The day my parents were due to arrive. I spent the entire day in the studio and theatre. I had to concentrate on the performance. It was the only thing that helped my anxiety. Eventually I ran out of things to practise, so I started my makeup early that afternoon. My makeup brush was very unsteady, my hands trembled and I could hear my heart thumping loudly. Everything felt strange and new. I tried to concentrate but it was impossible to chase away the images of my parents, brothers and all the people I loved back home.
The last thing I had to do to finish my makeup was to spray some silver glitter into my hair, to suggest snowflakes. As my dresser helped me put my jacket on, I glanced at myself in the mirror and wondered what my parents would think of all of this. They were coming from another world.
I went on stage and felt the intense heat of the spotlights. How would my parents react to these bright lights, to the thousands of people clapping in the audience? I wondered, would they be proud of me?
It was time for the performance to begin. My lips felt dry and I was breathing fast. As the time ticked away, my anxiety and nervousness rose. "Why aren't we starting? What's wrong?" I asked the stage manager.
"Nothing. We're just delaying the performance by a few minutes- people are stuck in traffic," the stage manager replied.
The truth was, however, that my parents' plane was an hour late. By the time they arrived it was about twenty minutes past curtain-up and I was a nervous wreck. They'd been met at the airport by my friend Betty Lou and escorted by police car through the rush-hour traffic.
Word spread quickly through the audience about my parents' arrival. Houstonians were well aware of my story, so when my parents were finally ushered into the theatre the whole audience burst into applause.
My poor niang! My poor dia! They had never been away from Qingdao before. They had just had their first car ride, train ride and airplane experience all in one day, and now here they were, suddenly faced with the blinding lights of a grand theatre and a sea of people applauding them.
"Six years! Six long years!" my niang kept saying. "Finally I'm going to see my son. My heart is so hot, it burns with joy and pride!"
I was told of my parents' arrival only moments before the applause erupted from the audience. My whole being burst with happiness. I wanted to soar into the air. I wanted to cry. I wanted to see them then, at that very moment, but the performance was about to start and I knew I would have to wait.
The audience was ecstatic. People applauded even when I just came on stage. They too wanted me to dance well, to dance for my parents.
My partners were Janie Parker and Suzanne Longley that night and they shared my excitement. Ben's pas de deux were challenging, some of the lifts were difficult and often created problems for us in rehearsals. But not that night. Everything was seamless. The lifts felt light, the partnering effortless: I felt my partners' every subtle movement and they felt mine. My nerves were there, yet under control, and they became my endless source of energy. My leaps were high: I was flying like a bird, gliding through the open sky. If the music had allowed it, I would have leapt into the air all night. There was no hard work, only sheer joy.
The audience seemed totally captivated. I could taste the excitement. All the hopping up and down stairs, the pirouetting in the candlelight, the torn hamstrings and the painful injuries of the past twelve years-it all felt worthwhile that night. When the curtain came down at the end of Act One, I knew I had completed one of my best performances-and I had done it in front of my parents. The dream I had once been too afraid to dream had come true.
During intermission, Ben brought my niang and my dia backstage.
It was six years since I had set eyes on them. They wore Mao's suits buttoned all the way up to their necks, my niang in grey and my dia in dark blue. They looked so proper, so stiff. My memories of them didn't match. They looked older too, especially my niang. Her black hair had turned to grey and the many years of harsh living had obviously taken their toll. Her face was more wrinkled and now she wore a pair of black-rimmed oversized glasses.
The three of us, in tears, simply hugged each other tight. Nobody spoke for a long time. My niang took her handkerchief out and it was already soaked with tears. "Don't cry! Don't cry! It's all right now!" she kept saying.
I wanted that moment to linger on and on and on. I had longed for her comfort for so many years.
By the time I went back to my dressing-room to change for the second act, nearly all my makeup had been wiped off by my niang's handkerchief. I didn't care. I had felt my niang's adoring love and tender touch once more.
After the performance, my niang and my dia came backstage again. They watched people congratulate me and I could see the pride in my parents' eyes.
Finally, my dia, the man of few words, could contain himself no longer. "Why didn't you wear any pants?" he said. He had never seen anyone wearing tights before.
Ben and some of my other friends had wanted to arrange a big party in honour of my parents that night but I wanted to spend that first night alone with them, in my own house.
My parents felt on top of the world as we drove back to my own place, in my own car. They couldn't believe their eyes when they saw where I lived.
"Is this your house?" my niang asked in utter disbelief.
I nodded.
"This is a palace!" my dia gasped.
I cooked a couple of my niang's favourite recipes for dinner that night, and afterwards we sat around the dining table with a pot of their favourite jasmine tea. We talked and talked. Sadly, I discovered that my niang had developed diabetes and a weak heart condition. Her incredible eyesight had also deserted her. My dia, however, was still as strong as an ox, despite being hard of hearing.
So many years of missed events to catch up on, so many beloved memories. I wanted to know it all, everything about each one of my brothers, their families, their lives. All my brothers except Jing Tring were married by now. I was an uncle: I had nieces and a nephew. My parents told me Deng Xiaoping had done wonders for the Chinese economy. "If it weren't for Deng
Xiaoping's open-door policy, our lives would still be in ruins," my niang said. She told me how their living standards had improved, how my brothers were each allowed to buy a small piece of land, cheaply, from the commune, to build their own houses on.
My parents told me how scared they had been when someone in the commune had heard about my defection. They'd heard it on the Voice of America on a short-wave radio. China has really changed, I thought. No one had a radio, let alone a short-wave one, in the village when I grew up, not even while I was in Beijing.
The people in our village had told my parents that I had turned my back on China. Some officials had paid a special visit to my family two days after my defection. My dia had been at work that day. "Do you know what your son has done?" an official howled at my niang. "Your son has defected from his motherland for the filthy America! You, as his mother, should be ashamed, bringing up such a bastard!"
But the officials had underestimated my niang. "How could you blame me?" she replied angrily. "You, the government, took my innocent son away! From the age of eleven you were responsible for his upbringing! Now, you are asking me what have I done? You have lost my son. You are responsible!"
The officials were speechless. "You will hear from us again," was all they said.
My parents had lived in constant fear and despair ever since then. They had been prepared to go to prison and lose everything they had to defend my honour. Some of my relatives and friends had distanced themselves from my family, for fear of being implicated in my defection, but the officials never contacted my family again.
"Your niang developed nightmares after your defection," my dia added. "If there were any loud noises at night, she would be terrified. For many nights she sobbed and sobbed."
"My heart would have bled to death if it weren't for my desire to see you again!" my niang cried. "So many times I prayed to see you one more time. Now I can finally close my eyes and die in peace. My dream has come true! I am the happiest person on earth!"
"Dia, what about you?" I asked.
"I had to be strong," he said. "But I was scared of losing one of my sons, a son we are proud of!"
This was the first time he'd ever actually said he was proud of me. I knew it wasn't easy for him to say and my heart was light and happy.
"Your dia lost so much weight during that time!" my niang continued. "His face was as long as his own shadow. Only sadness and agony. He spoke even less. Can you imagine your dia speaking less than usual! He let more noise out from his bottom end than from his top!" she laughed.
My niang then told me of a dream she'd had, one that kept recurring for years and years. Just before I'd been accepted by the Beijing Dance Academy, in late 1971, she'd dreamt of a huge crowd, gathered in a cloud-like mist. Through the mist she could see many gorgeous dancers, like goddesses, dancing in the sky. Rainbows were their costumes and the shining stars were the light. She told me that her dream had come true tonight, watching me dance. She had flown by airplane up to the ninth heaven. She'd seen the goddess-like dancing of the Houston Ballet. Her heart had been filled with pride and happiness. Now she could die in peace.
"What you did on stage looked very difficult," my dia said. "I was dizzy just watching you spin! I couldn't believe you were still standing afterwards."
We talked and talked. So many questions, questions that had been stored in our hearts for so many years. "How many times your dia and I questioned ourselves," my niang confessed. "Did we do the right thing, letting you go to Beijing at such a young age? I cried for days after your first letter. For days and days. When you said you had to wash your own clothes, I thought, what have I done?! Why did I encourage you to go? You were only eleven! We grieved for years. I knew you were homesick. I knew you tried hard to hide it. And I knew you would be even more homesick if we told you how we felt."
I began to tell them then how devastating my homesickness had been in those first two dreadful years at the Beijing Dance Academy. How hopeless I'd felt about my dancing. How afraid I was of being sent back home and bringing shame to the Li family. How I'd hidden in the weeping willow trees. And how, many times, I had clutched onto my niang's quilt and sobbed myself to sleep.
"How did you recover from this?" my dia asked.
"Remember the pen you gave me?"
My dia laughed. "That was the only way I knew how to encourage you to study hard, to reach your potential. I'm sorry if I hurt your pride."
"No, I'm grateful. Grateful for what you have done for me. I only wish I still had that pen. I lost it, on tour, during my first year with the Houston Ballet. I loved that pen."
"Do you still have the quilt I made you?" my niang asked.
"After my defection the academy officials burnt it along with all my other belongings."
My niang just sighed, but there was enormous sadness in that one short sound.
I told them many things that night. I told them about my marriage to Elizabeth. I told them about Ben and what happened the night of my defection, and their jaws dropped with shock. They spoke not a single word until I had finished my story.
Then they asked me about Elizabeth, but there was no judgement in my parents' words. " Elizabeth must be a courageous girl to marry a Chinese boy so young," my niang said simply. "There is a god who has looked after you and steered the course of your life. You are a fortunate boy."
That night, with my parents sleeping just a few metres away, I tucked myself under the blankets and slept like a baby. No more nightmares now.
Later that week, Ben invited my parents and me to his house for dinner one night. My good friend Betty Lou, who'd picked my parents up from the airport, would also be there.
That evening at Ben's, as soon as Betty Lou and I kissed each other on the cheek, she handed me a folded piece of paper. At first I thought it was either another review about our Nutcracker performance or a news article about my parents' visit to America.
The letter had been written on Christmas Eve. In the top right- hand corner I saw the emblem of the United States of America and the vice-presidential title underneath.
Dear Betty Lou, Thanks for making me aware that Li Cunxin's parents, Li Ting Fong and Fung Rei Ching, were planning to apply for visitors' visas at our embassy in Beijing. I contacted officials at the Department of State and asked them to ask our embassy in Beijing if Mr Li's parents has applied for their visas. I was pleased to hear that their visas were issued on December 13. I hope that they have a safe journey and enjoy their visit with their son. With warmest wishes, Sincerely yours, George Bush
Tears blurred my vision. My hands shook. I gave Betty Lou an enormous hug. I couldn't believe she had asked for help from the vice-president himself. I couldn't believe the vice-president would actually take the time to inquire about a personal affair of mine. I thought of the Minister for Culture in China. In China I wasn't worth one minute of his time.
I told my parents about the letter. They too were speechless. "Zhi, zhi, zhi…" was all my niang could say and she shook her head in disbelief. "Be serious, Jing Hao! An American vice- president inquiring about two Chinese peasants?"
My dia also shook his head and smiled in agreement with my niang. "Jing Hao is kidding. George who?"
I nodded my head and pointed at Betty Lou.
She smiled and nodded back.
Eventually it sank in. The vice-president! Of America! My parents rushed to Betty Lou and they too hugged her tight.
While I was at work over the next few weeks, my parents were often taken out to see the sights of Houston by some of my friends. Or they simply enjoyed staying home. My niang continued to sew, even though her eyesight was poor, and she cooked most of the meals while my dia cleaned and fixed things around the house. They had great fun gardening too. I had a large backyard and they ended up planting over fifty roses. They weeded and watered them every day without fail. Never in their lives had they even imagined the luxury of being able to plant flowers.
My parents were forever grateful to Ben for what he had done for me. One day my parents invited Ben over for dumplings and much to my niang's utter astonishment Ben showed up with a top- of-the-range Singer sewing machine. Just for her! She was deeply moved by such generosity and thoughtfulness. But she was too scared to touch it. Eventually she was persuaded to give it a try and she began to practise, following the instructions carefully. But she nearly fed her fingers into the machine instead. "I'm no good at this modern stuff. It took me a lifetime to learn how to sew. It will take me another lifetime to learn how to use this machine." But my niang did eventually take the sewing machine back with her to China -and gave it to one of her daughters-in- law.
My parents simply couldn't get over so many things about living in America: the fact that people had hot water in every home, that I had a dishwasher, washing machine and dryer. But still my niang insisted on washing everything by hand. She had hot running water, after all. What more could she want? Hot water was everything! One of my parents' most favourite things to do was to help each other wash their backs in the bath. And my dia spent a lot of time crawling in the attic or under the house inspecting the plumbing, the hot-water heater, the central heating, the air- conditioning units: he was like an awe-struck child.
The refrigerator was another fascination and my dia and niang were surprised at how long food could be kept fresh. My niang had to shop for food almost every day in China, but here shopping was completely different. "There is more Chinese food here than in China!" she said, aghast. "Many of these ingredients I can't even get in China at all!"
One weekend I took my parents to Macy's department store. "If this isn't heaven, I don't know what is!" my niang gasped. So many clothes to choose from! So much of everything everywhere! We stepped onto an escalator and she nearly lost her balance. Moving stairs!
The three weeks of my parents' stay were disappearing fast. I watched their reactions to America and re-lived some of my own reactions from when I'd arrived in America five years earlier. What a shock these three weeks were for them. They would reflect on this trip for many days, weeks, months, even years after they returned to our village in China.
I didn't want them to go back. I simply hadn't had enough time with them.
For their last few days in America I took them to Charles Foster's condominium, an elegant high-rise in Galveston about forty-five minutes from Houston. The condominium was part of a five-star hotel and the hotel staff serviced Charles' apartment. My parents felt so guilty having the hotel people do all the work that my niang and dia made their own bed every morning instead. The staff thought no one ever slept in it. And my parents would go to one of the local piers and buy fish or shrimp from the fishing boats and we'd cook them ourselves in the apartment.
Two days before my parents' departure another friend of mine kindly let us use his lakeside townhouse too, and to get around the complex my parents had to drive golf carts-the same kind I'd crashed into the ditch in Disneyland. At first I drove them to show them how, but my dia was quick to learn. He'd been working with trucks for so many years back in China, after all, so he was a natural driver. Even my niang reluctantly agreed to have a go. We spent only two days there but on the last day when I woke up I found both my parents gone. When I looked out of the window I saw each of them driving a golf cart and chasing each other around like children playing tiggy. They laughed and giggled and laughed and giggled and it was one of the happiest moments in their lives.
My parents were in constant shock during their stay in America, but they took everything calmly, storing it in their memories so they could savour it all when they returned home to China. They had never expected to see such prosperity. They had never expected such kindness from the people of another country.
I gave my parents some money before they left, so they could at least improve their lifestyle when they went back to our village. For all my brothers, sisters-in-law, nieces, my nephew, relatives and friends, I bought gifts. There was something for everyone, no matter how big or small. By the time they were ready to leave, my parents had many suitcases full of gifts: watches for my brothers, clothes for my sisters-in-law, picture books and nylon skipping ropes for the children, mugs and T-shirts with the Houston skyline on them for friends and relatives, a couple of bottles of Maotai for my grandfather and oldest uncle, and Ben's sewing machine too. "We left China poor, but will return so rich!" my niang exclaimed on their last night in America. "I don't mean the material things. It's the richness I feel in my heart. How well you're doing here and how much you're loved and respected! We will savour this trip for the rest of our lives. We're truly fortunate."
"Do you still remember the story about the frog in the well?" my dia asked all of a sudden.
I nodded. I remembered.
"Thank you for showing us what is outside our well. If it weren't for you I would die an ignorant man. We may be going back to our well but at least we've experienced the kind of life that Deng Xiaoping might lead us to in China one day. Now we will carry only fond memories and all the goodwill of your American friends home with us," he said.
We talked way past midnight. We were so afraid that some important things might be left unsaid. The uncertainty of whether we would ever see each other again weighed heavily on our minds. It was during our conversation that night that I suddenly realised my dia had become quite talkative.
I took them out to the airport the following day.
"I don't know when we will see each other again," I said, close to tears.
"But now we have seen you and met your friends we can lay all our worries to rest," my niang reassured me. "We will go home feeling happy about your life here in America. I only wish you'll be allowed to see your brothers again one day. They all miss you."
"I don't know if I'll ever be allowed to go back home."
"With Deng Xiaoping's open-door policy," my dia added, "you never know. Who could have imagined that we would be allowed to come here?"
"I will miss you," I said to him.
My niang hugged me tight. I felt her warmth, her love.
Finally I watched them disappear behind the customs checkpoint. I stood there for a long while afterwards, just staring at the wall.
After my parents' visit to America I could telephone them in China and write to them, freely, without fear of reprisal, and I could send them money too. But I was still not allowed to go back. There was a considerable amount of resentment among Chinese government officials for what had happened that night at the consulate in April 1981. But at least I had seen my parents and the heavy weight of sadness had lifted from me.
Now it was back to ballet and another competition was coming up, this time in Moscow in June. I knew there was a lot of politics involved in these competitions and my experiences in China had made me wary of going to Russia. But Russia had always had a certain allure ever since I'd watched so many brilliant Russian dancers in those videos back at the Beijing Dance Academy. I longed to go there. I was not a US citizen, however, and the Russian government had problems with me, a Chinese defector to the US who still held a Chinese passport and who wanted to represent America. The Russian government hated defectors with a passion. They had lost some of their best dancers to the West that way-Nureyev, Baryshnikov, Makarova and others too.
Faced with a dilemma, Ben and Charles started a massive campaign to lobby both Congress and the Senate to pass a special resolution, to change my status and allow me US citizenship a year ahead of the usual qualifying time.
The task was huge. To me it was inconceivable. Only rarely in American history had this been achieved before, mostly for Olympic competitors. Charles thought we had a chance though, because we had the George Bush connection, so we lobbied on the grounds of a possible gold medal at the Moscow International Ballet Competition. Americans love gold medals of any sort, even ballet ones, and I received many, many letters of support. Time was critical though, given the bureaucratic process. Charles contacted congressmen, senators, anyone and everyone who had any political connection at all and we eventually gathered enough support to have the bill passed by the immigration sub-committee of Congress. But we ran out of time to get the necessary approval in the Senate. Fortunately, however, the American International
Ballet Competition Association persisted and eventually the Russian authorities relented. They would allow me to represent the US. Ben and the Houston Ballet's pianist would go with me and before long I was on my way to Moscow.
I was of course aware that the people of the Soviet Union were still living behind the Iron Curtain, but nevertheless, once there I was surprised at just how much the Russian people were starved of freedom. It was worse than I had imagined. The fear of the KGB seemed to be on everyone's minds.
One day I went to Red Square to see Lenin's preserved body, not because I was interested in him as a communist forefather or anything, but just like the other tourists I went out of curiosity. By then I had totally abandoned my old communist beliefs.
I entered the mausoleum, following all the other tourists in single file. As we descended into the depths of the tomb, I noticed the polished black-and-red granite that covered the floor, the walls and the ceiling. It was awesome. Guards everywhere stood motionless, as though we didn't exist. And there was Lenin, lying in his sealed glass coffin. A ghostly white figure. He didn't even look real. He was so small: how surprising that just this one small man could have such an impact on the world. His communist ideals formed the background I grew up on and his influence was felt in nearly every corner of the earth. I looked at him and remembered Chairman Mao. I had seen Chairman Mao's preserved body in its glass coffin once also, on a trip organised by the Beijing Dance Academy, and I remembered thinking he looked pretty ugly. But Lenin's distorted face was even worse. I thought of my na-na, displayed in her coffin in the middle of her living room, when I was just eight years old.
I was surprised to see how many similarities there were between China and Russia. The harsh lifestyle, the lack of food, the drabness of people's dress, the discrepancy between the official exchange rate and the black market. The food at restaurants was limited too. I'd had Chicken Kiev in America on a couple of occasions and I thought, since this was Russia, Chicken Kiev would have to be much better here-like having Peking Duck in China. But I was terribly disappointed. It was nothing like what I'd had in America. The only thing that wasn't disappointing was the marvellous Russian caviar. I smeared it over toast, I ate it all the time. To me it was inexpensive but for the Russians it was nothing but an extravagance.
For the competition in Moscow we competed on the historic Bolshoi stage. It was huge, but it was also raked. When I jumped up the stage it felt like I was pushing uphill. When I did my turns my weight fell towards the audience. Becoming accustomed to this type of stage takes two to three weeks but this entire competition only ran for two weeks. American stages were all flat. Most European stages were raked but the Bolshoi was famous for its very steep rake and it proved disastrous for me. Two minutes before the curtain went up on my first round, I slipped just as I was taking off for a grand jeté. My body crashed to the floor and I landed hard on my back. Stars flashed in front of my eyes. A sharp pain travelled down my neck and lower back. I knew at once that I had a serious injury, but when I thought about the huge efforts Ben and the Houstonians had put into getting me to Moscow, I knew I had to continue. I couldn't possibly let them down.
I tried to regroup. I tried to concentrate. But before I could really assess my injury, I was called to places. The performance was about to begin.
My legs felt weak, especially when I pushed off for jumps, and my turns were wobbly. I heard the music but my mind could think only of the pain in my neck and back. All I can remember was trying to get this first solo over with. How I wished I'd had some painkillers with me. But I'd left my anti-inflammatory pills at my hotel, and anyway, I doubted there was enough time for the medication to work. The Giselle solo went like a blur and before I knew it I was on stage for my second solo-from the Coppelia wedding scene.
I got through the first round but in the second round my back worsened. I went to see a Russian doctor. He said I just had a muscle spasm-it would go away with some massage. But it didn't. I'd had muscle spasms before. This wasn't like anything I had ever experienced. I couldn't even tie my shoelaces. I tried to remember the pain of my torn hamstrings during my Beijing Opera Movement classes back in China. I tried to remember that at least here I had the freedom to choose whether I would perform or not. Here I could simply stop the competition, pack up and go back to America.
Because of the injury Ben had to modify my classical solo for the second round. It was so simplified that the judges must have thought I was deliberately avoiding the difficult steps. However, for my contemporary solo, I had never received so many curtain calls in my entire dance career. But then the Russian judges complained that this ballet was politically motivated. It was anti-communist, they said. Ben and I were astounded.
By the time I finished the second round I was having trouble even getting up from my bed in the mornings. The pain had started to travel down my legs and the heavy-duty painkillers I was taking did nothing but make me drowsy and my muscles numb. I challenged myself to finish, despite my injuries, but decided this was going to be my last ballet competition. I'd had enough of the politics and dramas and, although the medals gave me some international recognition, they would never make me a better dancer or a better human being.
There were other things to worry about during that competition too. Disturbing things. During the course of that week both Ben's room and my room were trashed. Some of Ben's belongings went missing and my alarm clock had been smashed to pieces. I remember feeling uncomfortable, unsafe. It was as though we were being watched.
Then, just as the competition ended, the Russian authorities asked to check the entry visa in my passport. They said there might be problems. The US delegation said they thought it would be safer for me to go with them to Leningrad and leave Russia from there rather than from Moscow.
I was happy to go home via Leningrad. Leningrad was where the Kirov Ballet and the Vaganova Ballet School were based, so I would have the opportunity of visiting the Mariinsky Theatre where the Kirov Ballet performed and of visiting the Vaganova Ballet School. I remember watching the Kirov Ballet perform Sleeping Beauty and I remember paying homage to the inventor of my ballet training method, the great Vaganova Ballet School. I was eternally grateful for that wonderful training.
In the end I received a bronze medal from that Moscow competition. The judges normally sign all the certificates before they are handed out, but when I received my competition certificate it was unsigned. I could not help but think about the Russians and their hatred of defectors and I knew that, in their eyes, I was no different.
By the time I left Russia my back had completely seized up and the pain was increasing. But as soon as I returned to Houston two things happened. Janie Parker and I went to Chile to perform in a gala, which was already scheduled, even though my back was getting worse by the day. And Mary McKendry from the London Festival Ballet came to join the Houston Ballet as a principal dancer.
"Jeano, is it true that Mary McKendry is coming?" I asked our general manager eagerly.
"Yes, a real coup," he replied, beaming. "Make sure you treat her well. We can't afford to lose her."
After Janie and I returned from Chile I met Mary again in class the following morning. She and I immediately started to rehearse the leading roles in Sleeping Beauty. It had been eighteen months since I'd met her in London. I was so happy that Ben had paired us together. But I wasn't sure whether my back would hold up.
I didn't know what to make of Mary at first. She struck me as brutally honest in her opinions-and in her dancing. She was a perfectionist, like I was.
One movement we had to rehearse in that first week was a sequence of three "fish dives", where Mary had to do a double turn on one pointe and then I would pick her up by her waist and she would dive forwards and finish with her face inches away from the floor, both of her legs high in the air. It was one of my favourite movements to practise and perform.
My back pain, however, prevented me from rehearsing this with Mary. She urged me to see a doctor. But I didn't want to: I didn't want to lose my first opportunity to dance with her. So we continued to work together for another week but by then the pain was excruciating and after a CT scan the doctors informed me that I had two, possibly three, herniated disks in my lower back.
The doctors immediately ordered me to stop dancing. Bed rest only, for as long as it took my injury to heal. Otherwise, they said, I might have to have surgery, with less than a fifty per cent success rate.
I was devastated. I had lost my first opportunity to work with Mary, and frighteningly, I faced the possibility of never being able to dance again.
That night I lay in my bed and thought of all that this might mean to my life. Ballet was all I knew, all I had known since the age of eleven. It was my passion, my identity. How could I, once again, be left on my own with an unknown future? Now I was the soaring bird suddenly shot down. I was a caged tiger once more. My frustration and despair were enormous.
I knew the only way for me to recover was to be as disciplined and dedicated with my rehabilitation as I had been with my dancing. So I taught myself to meditate. I taught myself to control my frustration and pain. I had no choice but to overcome it.
I wouldn't let my insecurity overwhelm me but during this time I missed my niang dreadfully. I didn't want my parents to worry about me, so I didn't tell them about my injury. Instead I asked them to apply for visas and come to America for a second time.
Mary visited me during that period, even though she didn't really know me very well. It was then that she asked me if I had books to read. She loved reading and was appalled when I said I read very little. I told her about my reading experience with Black Beauty.
"Read something shorter and easier to start with! Don't worry about what each word means exactly. It's hard even for Western people to understand every word. English is a difficult language. Just try to get the story, even if you have to guess to start with. You'll get so much pleasure out of reading, I promise!"
So for nearly three months, friends and fans brought me food, videotapes-and books. I took Mary's advice. I just started to read short things: newspaper articles and short storybooks. Then I tried longer books: Romeo and Juliet was one of my favourites. I even attempted The Hobbit, though I found the language in both these books hard to comprehend. But still I found it fascinating, and I especially loved Tolkien's extraordinary characters.
So Mary introduced me to literature and once I started reading I couldn't stop, couldn't believe the stories I had been missing out on. I worked hard at keeping my mental focus over those three months as I was lying on my bed. I had a secret plan-the Houston Ballet was going to perform in New York City in October. That was less than four months away. Ben and my doctors doubted I would make it back by then. But I never lost hope. I had acupuncture treatments, homeopathy, Chinese herbal medicines, and a wonderful masseur who Mary called "Mad Charles" and who worked with me constantly. He kept telling me that I would make it back to the stage, but the strengthening program seemed slow and painful and many times I had my doubts.
Eventually, however, my injuries gradually started to mend. The disk herniation never went away completely but the strengthening program helped me build stronger abdominal and back muscles to support it and I had to do continual exercises to keep the injury in check.
But finally I had made it back to the stage.
Mary and I were back dancing together again and we quickly became good friends. We trusted each other's tastes in dancing and each other's opinions in other aspects of life too.
After a rehearsal one day, Mary invited me to her apartment for dinner. I arrived with a six-pack of beer in hand just as Mary was in the middle of making spaghetti carbonara.
"Can I help?" I offered.
"No, thank you! Just relax! Enjoy your beer. All is under control!" she replied a little too cheerily.
I peered into the kitchen-and saw total chaos. There was a huge pot on the stove full of spaghetti which was all glued together. There was so much of it. Enough to serve at least ten people, I thought.
"How many are coming for dinner?" I asked casually.
"Oh, just the two of us!"
I laughed. "It looks like you have enough food here to feed all of Mao's army."
When the dinner was served the spaghetti was a lump and the sauce was very bland.
"How did you learn to cook?" I asked.
"I can't cook! I'm hopeless in the kitchen! Can't you tell? My mother is a good cook but I never paid any attention while she was cooking. I'm sorry this is a bit gluey. It's my first attempt at carbonara sauce," Mary said apologetically.
"Still tastes good though," I said, trying to comfort her.
"Would you like more? There's plenty left!"
"I know," I replied. We looked at each other and burst into laughter. We laughed and laughed. Her first attempt to impress me with her cooking had definitely failed the test for a perfect Chinese wife. But her efforts and her honesty won me over completely and I liked her even more after that disastrous carbonara.
My parents didn't come back to America until February of 1986, four months after our New York tour I'd worked so hard to recover for. By then my relationship with Mary had gone beyond just being friends. Her love of literature had become a major influence on me and I loved her open-mindedness and her curiosity. She constantly searched for new knowledge, not only in dance but in all aspects of life, and her tremendous inner strength and high principles seemed to be a match for my stubbornness. Mary could put me back in my place and set me straight any time.
We stayed together at each other's places often by now. However, we decided that to avoid any unnecessary shock Mary shouldn't stay overnight with me once my parents were here. Traditional Chinese marriage values couldn't possibly allow us to sleep together without being married. My parents would never approve.
Charles Foster got my parents a six-month visa this time. They were just as thrilled to see me and, though it still took them a while to get over their culture shock, they were much more familiar with America this time around and enjoyed every bit of it. Their kindness and their love of life made them the centre of attention among my friends. They were so well liked, and I was going to have them with me for the whole six months.
After a performance one night I brought Mary home to have dinner with us. My niang cooked some of my favourite dumplings. It was almost midnight by the time we finished dinner and before my parents went to bed my niang stopped and said, "Jing Hao, tell Mary, don't go home tonight, it's too late."
"But we only have two beds. Where is she going to sleep?" I asked innocently.
"You're a man now, do I have to tell you where she should sleep?"
"You don't mind if we sleep in the same bed?" I asked, red-faced.
"As long as you love each other, we don't care what you do," she replied. My niang looked at Mary. Then she whispered to me, "Of course we would prefer you to marry a Chinese girl who can look after you and cook for you like a Chinese wife could, but we know that we are old fashioned. I can tell there is something special between you," she paused. "We made a mess of arranging your second brother's marriage. We will not interfere again."
Then my niang turned to Mary who was just about to leave. "Mary, don't go home tonight, it's too late," my niang said to her in Chinese.
Before I could translate for her, I saw Mary's face. She had understood.
My parents' liberal thinking surprised me greatly that night. I knew they liked Mary but I also knew that deep down they would have strong reservations about their son marrying another Western person, especially after my failed marriage with Elizabeth. Still, they left the matter entirely to my own judgement.
But even I wasn't completely sure whether Mary and I could cross our cultural boundaries successfully. Memories of my marriage with Elizabeth haunted me often. But then, Mary was like no other woman I had ever met. She had an unusual understanding of Eastern culture. She had the most generous spirit. She endlessly bombarded me with questions about my childhood, my family, about China and especially about my life at the Beijing Dance Academy. I asked about her family and childhood too, and about Australia in general. I had learned about Australia in our geography classes back at the academy and was always puzzled that such a huge country like Australia only had a population the same size as Shanghai 's. It was almost inconceivable.
Mary had been in Houston for nearly a year by now. Our friendship grew stronger all the time and my parents liked her more and more. Mary even began buying me clothes. "Do you like this?" she asked one day when we were out shopping, and she pulled a shirt off the rack.
"No, no, don't be ridiculous! I'll never wear this! It's too… colourful," I said, horrified. The shirt was a mess of gaudy colours and hectic patterns, way too loud for me.
"No, you will look so handsome in it! Let's try it on," she said enthusiastically.
I put the shirt on and looked at myself in the mirror. I gasped.
"There, you look like a colourful artist now," Mary continued. "I knew you would look beautiful with a bit of colour. It's done. The shirt is yours."
I continued to study myself in the mirror. Gradually I got over the shock. The longer I lingered the more I liked it. Maybe she was right. A bit of colour did suit me. But there were so many colours and patterns! Compared to what I wore in China -the Mao jacket, the plain colours-this is very daring, I said to myself.
A couple of days later Mary and I were invited to a post- performance dinner party. I decided to be brave and wear the shirt.
"Where did you get this shirt? It looks great!" Ben said.
"Mary bought it for me," I replied proudly.
That shirt became my favourite thing to wear. Later I even wore it to the White House to meet Vice-President and Barbara Bush.
Mary and I had formed a rapport, a chemistry, but we both knew that getting involved with someone within the same profession was going to be difficult. A dancer's life was hard enough. Two dancers together would be impossible, especially two ambitious principal dancers like us. But there seemed to be a certain force drawing us closer all the time. I knew she was fond of me and I knew she was special. I quietly wondered if I loved her but still I wasn't sure.
Ben had paired Mary and I together for the leading roles in Peer Gynt at around this time. I vividly remember rehearsing a scene one day: Peer had been informed by Solveig's little sister Helga that his mother was dying. Peer was torn between going back to his mother or staying with his beloved Solveig. Mary and I had to do this romantic, agonising pas de deux together just before we parted on stage. There was a long phrase of beautiful, intensely sad music. Mary and I looked at each other and kissed each other goodbye.
At that moment, we both had tears in our eyes. We stood there and looked at each other. We had no sense of time. We both knew, instantly. Our destiny together was inevitable.
After that fateful moment I decided I would ask Mary to marry me. In fact I decided many times after that, but every time I managed to talk myself out of it. In the end I felt like I was fighting against an irresistible force.
One day not long after our Peer Gynt rehearsal I was guest performing with the Pittsburgh Ballet in Giselle and I knew that
Mary was having dinner with my parents back in Houston that night. I spoke to my parents over the phone, and made sure everything was all right. "Mary is looking after us. She is such a nice girl!" my niang told me.
Then I spoke to Mary. "How is everything in Houston?" I asked.
"Fine, your parents are adorable! I've just bought them some Chinese cabbage and pork and they have made me some delicious dumplings!"
"Mary, I miss you. I want to ask you something…" My heart thumped as I spoke. I was so nervous and so hopelessly backward in trying to find the appropriate words. I just wanted to say, "Will you marry me?" but I was too scared. What if she said no?
My fumbling continued, my voice shaking. "Mary, you are such a special person in my heart and the most beautiful person in the world. I feel that you are a much better human being than I am. Sometimes I don't feel that I deserve you. Would you still love me the same when I have a long silver beard at the end of my life?"
"Li." Mary sounded impatient. "What are you trying to say?" I knew she was thinking, for god's sake just get on with it! "Are you trying to tell me that you want to spend the rest of your life with me?"
"Yes! Do you think we can be happy together, for the rest of our lives?" I still couldn't say what I wanted to say.
"Li," she said matter-of-factly, "you are the dearest person in my life. I will love you until I die. Of course we can be happy together for the rest of our lives."
Asking Mary to marry me was the hardest, the bravest and the luckiest thing I had ever done in my life. My heart soared into the air. Now I had found my soul mate. My niang was ecstatic. Even my dia was happy, though his reaction wasn't quite as spontaneous as my niang's.
Mary told her parents about our engagement immediately, and of course they were happy, but being Catholics they were somewhat uneasy about their daughter not being able to have a traditional wedding because of my previous divorce. So one of my friends, who was also Catholic, set up a meeting for me with a priest, Father Monaghan.
Father Monaghan was a chubby, friendly person. He wore a pair of spectacles and a priest's robe. I hesitated in front of this rather ordinary-looking man-he didn't look like a messenger of God to me. "Nice to meet you, Father Mon…" I struggled with the pronunciation.
"Monaghan," he said helpfully. "Tell me about your problems."
I told him everything-my failed marriage with Elizabeth, my defection story, which he knew well enough already, my love for Mary, her parents' sincere wish that their daughter could be married in the Catholic Church.
"Does Mary love you as much as you love her?" he asked.
"Yes," I replied.
"Do you believe in any religion?" he asked.
"No, I was never allowed to believe in any religion. Except Mao's communism," I replied.
"Do you believe in God?" he asked seriously.
This was the first time anyone had asked me this and I had never given it much thought. I remembered looking up into the sky as a child and imagining the gods above, whoever they might be. I remembered flying my kite back home in my village and imagining my secret communication channel up to the gods, saying my prayers and sending up my secret wishes. I thought of every turning point in my life and I knew I'd felt a great force guiding me, but I could never put a finger on what that was.
"Yes, I do believe there is a god," I finally replied.
Then Father Monaghan said, "I'm going to ask you the last and most serious question of all. I want you to take your time to consider this."
I started to feel nervous. "To be able to marry Mary you have to become a Catholic. Are you prepared to adopt the Catholic religion as your only religion for the rest of your life?"
I sat there like a statue. Communism had been my religion for over eighteen years. Ever since I'd turned my back on it I hadn't questioned myself about other religious beliefs. I had no idea what kind of differences there were between other religions. Perhaps Catholicism was like communism, I thought. But as long as I believed in God, the one God for all people in the whole world, then surely Mary and I would be able to share the same religion. So I agreed there and then to become a Catholic.
Both Mary and her parents were overwhelmed with this news. Mary's mother couldn't figure out how on earth Father Monaghan would get the Catholic Church to agree to have my first marriage annulled. But Father Monaghan assured us that because my communist background had denied me any religious freedom, our marriage within the Catholic Church would be perfectly possible.
I was supposed to have five religious education sessions with
Father Monaghan and I was given a Bible to read. I still had such difficulty understanding how Jesus could possibly have been born to a virgin. "How do we know that Jesus wasn't Joseph's child?" I asked Father Monaghan. But Father Monaghan was very patient and after just three lessons I was baptised, at the age of twenty- six. It was 1987 and our marriage date was set for October.
Two nights before our wedding, I learnt all about the tradition of the bachelor's party. I was reassured by my friends that this was one tradition that we simply had to have.
That same night I was invited to a lavish black-tie party in honour of the beautiful and glamorous Isabella Rossellini, daughter of Ingrid Bergman. But first my friends took me to an Irish pub. They gave me vodka. They all drank water, but I thought they were drinking vodka too. By the time we got to Isabella's party, my head was spinning.
Then it was on to our final stop, a men's club. We were ushered to a private VIP room. During the course of the evening, twenty- dollar, fifty-dollar, sometimes one hundred-dollar notes, were exchanged as the men were entertained by topless dancers. This was the western version of the Chinese wedding's "chaos night", I thought. Mary's brother Matthew who was with me was horrified. By one o'clock in the morning, I was exhausted and told my friends that I'd had enough of the wiggly topless dancers and I just needed to go home. But I was too drunk to drive.
"I'll drive you home!" my friend John volunteered.
"No, I will. I'm not drunk," said Matthew. But all the way home he forgot he wasn't in Australia still, and he habitually drove on the wrong side of the road.
Mary's mother was so worried about our bachelor's party. She nearly called the police to see if there were any reports of dead Chinese and Australians in any car accidents that night.
By the time of our wedding Mary and I had bought a new house with a large front yard that we could use for our wedding reception. Since my parents had just left America -they'd arrived more than six months ago-none of my family members could be there, but we had invited over fifty of our friends. How I wished my parents could be present too.
We decided to have our wedding in the little Catholic chapel where I had been baptised. The wedding rehearsals were like getting ready for a major performance. But the wedding ceremony itself was no ordinary performance: it was the defining moment of our lives.
With Charles Foster standing by my side as my best man, I nervously waited for the sound of the music that would signal Mary's entrance into the chapel. Then I saw her, the princess of my life being led down the aisle by her brother Matthew. I had feelings in my heart like never before. For a brief moment I thought I was in another time altogether. For a brief moment I could see only the image of a young and innocent eighteen-yearold Chinese girl, way back in 1946, being carried with her entourage towards her future husband's village. But then suddenly that image vanished and I saw in its place Mary's beautiful, loving face.
We went to Acapulco for our honeymoon and shared the most intimate time of our lives together. The more we understood each other the closer we grew.
But our marriage didn't change our commitment to our dance and although we loved to dance with each other we respected Ben's artistic decisions too. As the Houston Ballet's reputation spread, more and more choreographers came and staged their works and we continued to progress and develop as artists. Christopher Bruce came with his Ghost Dances, a beautiful work choreographed to South American music. I learnt so much from him. His choreography was breathtaking. He even created a new work especially for Mary and me, called Guatama Buddha.
Another British choreographer, Ronald Hynd, the choreographer of The Sanguine Fan which the London Festival Ballet performed in China back in 1979, came to Houston to do a full-length version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. The whole company was abuzz with this new creation. There was a lot of speculation about who would be chosen for the title roles of the Hunchback and the gypsy girl Esmeralda. Ronnie Hynd walked around the studios for days watching classes and rehearsals before making his final decision. When the casting sheet went up, Mary was Esmeralda and I was the Hunchback.
The whole choreographic process for The Hunchback was fascinating and Ronnie's theatrical skills allowed me to perform a role that was totally different from my usual princely roles. There wasn't much dancing and Mary and I didn't dance together as partners, but it was a great acting experience for me, and in the end Mary stole the show.
Glen Tetley was another choreographer I loved working with, and he was arguably one of the most highly respected modern ballet choreographers in the world. His legendary pursuit of excellence and his moderate temperament made dancers work beyond their usual physical limitations. He came to stage one of his most technically challenging ballets, Le Sacre du Printemps or The Rite of Spring. Even Baryshnikov had found it a challenge, I was told.
Glen came into the studio in the middle of our class one day and sat by the mirror with his friend Scott. I watched as Glen's eyes darted around while he whispered to Scott, who scribbled down some notes in a notepad. I was nervous. I wanted so much for him to like me and choose me to be in his work.
To my joy, I was his first cast for the lead in Le Sacre du Printemps. When I walked into the studio on the first day of rehearsals I was shaking with excitement. I couldn't believe I was going to work with one of the world's most creative choreographers. But from the start of that rehearsal I knew this was going to be one of the most challenging times of my career. Glen was certainly demanding. Nothing escaped his experienced eye. Every subtle detail had to be right. He expected total concentration and total dedication. Sometimes, when a dancer didn't give one hundred per cent, he would stop them in the middle of their dance and simply say, "Okay, that was a warm-up. Now let's do it again for real." There were no protests, no screaming or yelling, only recognition of his high expectations.
I had several physically difficult solos in this ballet and they required enormous stamina. Glen understood exactly what it would take. Many times, after hours of endless jumping and turning under Glen's strict and watchful eye, I felt there was not another breath left in me. Every muscle in my body was wasted with fatigue and my back injury still gave me problems. Often I just wanted to lie down on the floor and die. But then, just as I felt I was at the end of my physical capabilities, he'd say, "Let's do it again for the road."
Is he mad? I would scream inside. But I knew I had to start these solos again with whatever was left inside me. No one complained. We knew that without this kind of work our stamina would not improve.
Sometimes during the rehearsals, when Glen would ask me to do it for "the last time", I would feel sick from extreme exhaustion, but somehow Glen kept pushing me beyond my physical boundaries. I discovered those rare moments when the power of the music took over. It was refreshing, almost spiritual. By the time of the performance, I felt full of energy, ready to explode on stage.
Then came Romeo and Juliet. Ben had planned to choreograph a new version for the Houston Ballet to be staged at the newly completed Wortham Center in Houston. It would be one of the most lavish and expensive productions in Houston Ballet history. Both scenery and costumes would be designed by David Walker, the famous ballet and opera designer from The Royal Ballet in England. Everything was going to be made in London and shipped to Houston. Ben had chosen Janie Parker and me as his first cast and Mary was paired with Kenneth McCombie as second cast.
I loved the story of Romeo and Juliet and the Prokofiev score but the rehearsals were gruelling. Ben often threw out certain sections of his choreography, even though we had been rehearsing for days, and then he'd start all over again. We'd try many, many different ways of doing a particular lift, of partnering, jumping or performing turns, over and over, until Ben would finally shout, "That's it! I like that." It was a tough schedule: there were detours, setbacks, endless challenges, but our enthusiasm was always sky-high.
But for a ballet which told a story like Romeo and Juliet, I had to gather all my experiences together so I could somehow make the Romeo role more real for myself and for the audience. Some aspects of Romeo's character I found easy to portray, but others were difficult. I read Shakespeare's play over and over and watched as many Romeo and Juliet movies as I could get my hands on. I wanted to create my own version of Romeo, to make it my role. I remembered my feelings towards Her Junfang in that dark room in the Beijing Dance Academy. I remembered my first love Elizabeth, and my love for Mary. I remembered portrayals of love from literature, film, anything that would help me in my creation of Romeo.
The opening night of Romeo and Juliet was one of the biggest events in the history of the Houston Ballet. The air was full of tension. I couldn't make myself calm down. I heard the applause for the conductor. Just listen to the music, I told myself. Just listen to the sound of the music.
That night, from the very first note, I knew I had not only heard the heart and soul of the music but I had felt it as well. I leapt joyously and I lifted my Juliet high in the air. I ran wildly around the stage to celebrate our soaring love. And when Romeo mistakenly believed that Juliet was dead all the sorrow and despair I had ever experienced in my life overwhelmed me. I thought of the years of separation from my parents, of fearing for my life in that small room in the Chinese consulate. I thought of life without Mary, I thought of the greatest sacrifice one could make, to take one's own life for the sake of love. When Juliet finally plunged Romeo's knife into her heart and closed her eyes for ever, there was not a sound from anyone in the entire theatre, only the soul-wrenching music playing to the end. Then suddenly the audience erupted into applause. I didn't want it to end. I'd tasted the delicious feeling of the ultimate performance; the performance of my life. Another moment to treasure for ever.
I was invited as guest artist to dance with a number of companies worldwide after Romeo and Juliet. La Scala in Milan, steeped in history, was one of the most thrilling and inspirational. But along the way I still kept striving for one distinction. I didn't want to be just a technically good dancer: I wanted to be creative, emotionally powerful, artistically mature. I'd made many breakthroughs in my dancing already, and had a number of offers from other companies, but my loyalty was always with Ben and the Houston Ballet and I still often remembered the old Chinese fables, such as the bow-shooter, and drew on them for inspiration. I kept telling myself that I had only tasted the mango skin, not the flesh. I kept reminding myself of the painful leg-limbering exercises that Teacher Gao had made us do all those years before. Constantly I reminded myself of where I had come from-my peasant roots, the starvation, the desperation of being trapped in the deep well, of my Chinese heritage-all this I used as my internal driving force. And as my standard of dancing improved, my ambition of becoming one of the best dancers in the world was never forgotten. I worked even harder. I kept Nureyev, Baryshnikov and Vasiliev always in my mind. I had overcome so many obstacles in my life. Nothing could stop me now.
But no matter how successful I would become as a dancer, there was always one last unfulfilled dream. So, in early 1988, with Mary holding my hand, I went back to the Chinese consulate in Houston.
It was still in the same building where I had been detained, nearly seven years earlier. This time I was there to ask the Chinese government's permission to allow me back into China to visit my family. To go home. I wasn't sure what kind of reaction I would receive.
The entrance to the consulate was now much grander. A big round emblem of the People's Republic of China had been erected high above the gate. Once inside we were warmly greeted by the cultural consul Mr Tang, who led us to a meeting room and offered us some Chinese tea. He didn't have any idea that this room was the very same room where Charles, Elizabeth and I had been detained back in April 1981.
I was nervous and uncomfortable sitting there. Images from that night seven years before flashed through my mind. I felt claustrophobic. My heart began to race.
Mary sensed my apprehension and gently reached for my hand and held it tight. Almost exactly like what Elizabeth had done on that dreadful night.
Consul Tang was easy-going and friendly but, even so, I wasn't sure what to make of him. Should I trust him? I'd walked into a trap here before. I didn't want that kind of nightmare again. I guessed that he would have been well informed of my past, but Consul Tang didn't mention that. Instead he began to tell us how the Chinese now had more freedom and a much higher living standard under Deng Xiaoping. He emphasised that China today had an open-door policy towards the rest of the world. It had been nearly nine years since I'd left China. Things had changed.
"Cunxin," he said, "I've read your file and I know quite a bit of your past. We want to forget what has happened, but there still could be considerable opposition within the Chinese government to your return to China. But I will try my best to help you because I believe that what you have achieved in the last nine years has only added glory to the image of the Chinese people. I hope Beijing will grant you permission, but I can't guarantee that they will."
I left the consulate feeling vaguely optimistic, but the waiting over the next few weeks was unbearable. A month passed. No word from the consulate. I called Consul Tang.
"Nothing yet. I'm sorry," he responded.
With each passing day my hopes became dimmer.
Two months later I had just about given up hope altogether when, after a rehearsal one day, I found a message in my pigeonhole at the studios: "Please call Consul Tang at the Chinese consulate."
With a trembling hand I dialled his number and prepared myself for bad news.
"Cunxin! Congratulations! You have been granted permission to go back to China. You and your wife can come to the consulate any time to apply for your visas."
At last. I was going home.
Mary and I had to finish our May performances in Houston before we could depart for China. Two months more of waiting. By the time we were ready to leave we had five suitcases full of gifts and had organised to send two refrigerators on ahead for my family back home. Mary couldn't quite understand the gift-buying frenzy. In her mind, giving them money would have been far better. But for me, the gifts were part of the Chinese tradition I was accustomed to.
The thought of seeing every one of my brothers, my uncles, aunties and friends from my childhood, and especially my friends in Beijing -the Bandit, Teacher Xiao, Chong Xiongjun and Fengtian -made me overwhelmingly restless. These loved ones had only existed in my dreams for the past nine years. Now, each passing day seemed like a month. I grew impatient. I tried meditation to distract me from my obsessive longing, but I simply couldn't wait a day longer.
I usually had no trouble sleeping on planes but the trip home to China was different. There seemed to be a spring in my eyelids and every time I tried to close them they just popped right open again.
Even though I'd already told Mary so much about everyone who was important to me in China, she wanted to know more, always more. She asked me so many questions and she was just as excited as I was. We had so little sleep on that trip. But we didn't feel tired. We lived on adrenalin and excitement.
Beijing Airport, 3 June 1988. It was around seven in the evening when we landed. It was summertime and the weather was warm. My blood brother the Bandit and my violinist friend Fengtian were to meet us. And there they were, waiting in the crowd outside the baggage carousel. I rushed towards them, each of us with eyes full of tears, arms outstretched ready to shake hands, which was the correct thing to do for Chinese people in public. But instead, in a split second, I pulled them towards me and we hugged and hugged, sobbing on each other's shoulders.
"It's been a long time," the Bandit finally murmured.
I said nothing, only hugged him tighter.
I wanted to say so much, but no words could describe my joy. I had imagined this moment over and over, incessantly, for the last nine years.
The airport in Beijing was the same one that I'd left from in 1979. But now it was much grander, with a massive extension. By the time we hauled our luggage onto the minibus it was nearly 10 p.m., but the place was still crowded and there were long lines of taxis busily loading people in and out. Things had changed, I thought. When I'd left, air travel was well out of the reach for most Chinese and a taxi was a rare sight indeed.
Our minibus sped onto a dimly lit road towards a hotel in the city where the Bandit had booked a room for us. We talked non- stop. So many questions to ask each other. It was impossible to cram the past nine years into the two hours of this minibus trip. The only times the conversation paused was for me to translate for Mary.
Mary looked on in amazement all through the trip. She was speechless. This reunion. The long-lost friendship. She couldn't believe how much love there was between the Bandit and me.
By now both the Bandit and Fengtian had married. The Bandit's wife Marji was a manager in a foreign joint-venture four-star hotel. She spoke fluent English, so she could translate for Mary too. Fengtian's wife Jiping was a Chinese folk dance teacher at the Beijing Dance Academy. On that bus trip to our hotel, Marji, Jiping and Mary immediately became good friends.
But just before we arrived at our hotel, the Bandit told me something else. Something unsettling. The Chinese secret police wanted to see me.
Not again, I thought to myself. But they were already waiting for me when we arrived at the hotel. Two men and a woman. They wanted to talk to me, alone, but Mary refused to leave me. She said she couldn't understand Chinese anyway, so what difference would it make? That wasn't entirely true: by then Mary could speak and understand some Chinese, but the officials didn't know that so they relented and let her stay.
The Chinese secret police asked me a lot of questions, mainly about the defection in 1981. They asked me again if there was any Taiwanese or American government involvement. There were two conflicting reports, they said, from the consulate in Houston and from the embassy in Washington. They wanted to know which was closer to the truth. They were very polite and I never really felt in danger, but they did say that, for my safety, they would provide me with discreet protection. I knew what that meant. They were going to keep an eye on me.
Mary and I stayed in Beijing at first and spent every minute with my friends. The Bandit told me all that had happened since I'd left: he was now a soloist at the Central Ballet of China. Both Fengtian and Chong Xiongjun had been selected by the Song and Dance Company of China. Chong was married too, to a nice lady who worked at a clothing factory in Beijing. Much had happened. I had been away so long.
So, on the back of the Bandit's and Fengtian's bikes, Mary and I travelled around Beijing. Sometimes we ate at their homes and other times I tried to show Mary some of the small eateries that had existed during my youth, but many places I had once known had either been torn down or had changed ownership as China had gone through rapid change. I was surprised. And impressed. Even though there were signs of prosperity everywhere and the progress I was witnessing far exceeded my expectations, still, the massive number of bicycles, the polluted air and the millions of pedestrians were all so familiar to me. There seemed to be much more freedom. People were happier. The influence of Mao and the grim shadow of the Cultural Revolution had begun to lift. Now Deng Xiaoping's "Get rich is glorious" slogan was on everyone's lips, and was splashed around on enormous billboards everywhere.
We had been in Beijing for a couple of days when I asked the Bandit if I could visit my former teachers at the Beijing Dance Academy. The Bandit was my liaison with the academy officials, but it wasn't until our third day in Beijing that I finally received permission to go.
It was a hot summer morning. Mary and I rode through the narrow backstreets with the Bandit and Fengtian, and I breathed in and savoured the familiar Beijing smells: there seemed to be a food stand on every corner. Street merchants were shouting, everyone trying to compete with each other for attention. By the time we reached the Beijing Dance Academy it was around ten o'clock.
There it was. The small windows of our three-storey sleeping quarters-the building with the blocked toilets, the building where eight of us slept on four-bed bunks in one small room. There was the metal gate, its familiarity immediately triggering vivid memories of the years I spent inside it. The discipline, the 5.30 a.m. wake-up bells, jogging in Taoranting Park, the early-morning exercise sessions, rush hour for the toilets, waiting in line for our food in the canteen, the self-criticisms, the endless political study sessions, the nights when I climbed over this gate after my desperate attempts to see Minister Wang. And I remembered most of all the two people who were instrumental in helping to create the success I now enjoyed: Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu.
Suddenly, before I could go on with my thoughts, I saw them. Both of them-Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu-waiting for me on the other side of the gate.
My heart was full of emotions that I wanted to express, but I couldn't speak a word. Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu opened the gate and rushed towards me.
We could only shake hands and look at each other through tear- filled eyes. It was like a dream. I couldn't think of anything to say: my tears had flooded my brain. So instead I put all my love, gratitude and years of unspoken words into our passionate handshaking. It was only when the Bandit reminded me that I should introduce Mary to them that I was jolted back to the present.
The academy looked exactly the same as when I had left it nine years ago. There was the guardhouse by the gate, and the small sportsground. There were the canteens, the hot-water heater room, the studio building and the ping-pong tables beside it. Everything was there. Nothing had changed, except that the buildings seemed even more run down than I remembered.
Within only a few minutes a small crowd of familiar faces surrounded me. Most were teachers, among them my first ballet teacher Chen Lueng and one of my Chinese folk dance teachers Ma Lixie. They all wanted to talk to me and asked many questions. Eventually Teacher Xiao and Zhang Shu had to remind me that all the other ballet teachers were eagerly waiting for me too, and that we should make our way inside.
We walked into a room full of faces. The teachers of the ballet department had prepared tea for us, with roasted peanuts, sunflower seeds, even some cut-up watermelon. We sat around and talked. Zhang Shu, I discovered, was still the head of the ballet department. I also found out that they knew of some of my achievements and that they were especially impressed by the medals I'd won at the international ballet competitions. We talked and talked. I thanked every one of them for what they'd done for me. I asked what they would like me to do for them while I was there. "Dance for us!" Teacher Xiao said.
People cheered at his suggestion and I understood then how much they wanted me to show them what I'd learnt in the West in the past nine years. I had no dancing gear with me, so Teacher Xiao lent me a pair of tights and some ballet shoes. But they had to keep the teachers from the other dance departments and all the academy students away- China might have changed but in the officials' minds I was still too much of a Western influence.
My audience gathered in front of me, in that old dance studio once more, the same one where I had endlessly practised my pirouettes and had left dents in the wooden floor. I noticed the familiar smell of mildew mixed with sweat and saw again the dust motes floating in the air through the beams of sunlight. It was all still there, in every detail. Here I was, standing in front of my former teachers, nervous to dance in front of those familiar, critical eyes. It felt like my very first exam in my first year at the Beijing Dance Academy. I felt like I was eleven years old again.
I decided to dance the prince solo from Act Three of Swan Lake. There was no music, so I danced while my audience hummed the tune. Without the costumes, the makeup and the music, it felt so bare and disjointed. How I wished I could show them one of Ben's awesome productions. But I could tell from my teachers' eyes that they were proud of what I had achieved in dance-their long- lost son had finally returned.
I also danced one of the solos from Glen Tetley's Le Sacre du Printemps and Christopher Bruce's Ghost Dances while Mary obligingly hummed the tunes. We chatted in between my demonstrations but they asked me so many questions and were so hungry for Western knowledge that after two hours I was exhausted.
"All right, all right, let's not kill Cunxin off!" Teacher Xiao said finally.
We left the old dance studio and went to Teacher Xiao's little apartment in the academy grounds. His wife cooked us a beautiful lunch and we continued to talk and talk. There was so much to catch up on. Teacher Xiao was now the co-head of the choreography department and had been promoted to professor.
"Cunxin, I couldn't tell you how many times I have dreamt about your dancing!" Teacher Xiao said. "I always wondered if I would ever see you dance again before I died. I'm honoured to have been your teacher! You have done Chinese ballet proud, all over the world."
We hugged each other tight. I had been so afraid that I would disappoint him. Teacher Xiao was the person whose opinion mattered most to me. He was the one who had shown me how beautiful ballet could be. He was the one who'd encouraged me to taste the mango. He was my mentor, my friend, the one man to whom I owed so much.
After our lunch, I showed Mary the stairs where I had done my hops and the studios where I had worked and sweated for all those years. She was shocked. Compared to what she was used to the conditions were very primitive. We sat in the dimly lit school theatre where she had watched our performance that time, back in 1979. Our paths had crossed then, in this very place, and now here we were again, sitting on the old splintered wooden seats. I closed my eyes. Into my mind flooded so many memories. My performances of Madame Mao's model ballets. Teacher Xiao's unattainable pirouettes. The theatre full of teachers and students chanting Mao's political slogans…
I don't know how long I sat there dreaming of the past but when I opened my eyes Mary was looking at me intently. "I can't believe this is really where you have come from," she said.
Before leaving Beijing I wanted to host a party at my hotel restaurant for all of my old teachers and classmates. It was a wonderful reunion, but bittersweet as well. There were many happy tears that night. One of the academy officials delivered a speech, welcoming me back to China, and I was urged to respond. I introduced Mary as an exceptional dancer in her own right and went on to say that this was one of the most exciting days of my life. "To be able to see you all is a millet dream come true. How many times I wished to be able to see you all! Sixteen years ago, thanks to Madame Mao, I was selected to join the Beijing Dance Academy. I was just a peasant boy. I knew nothing of ballet. I was homesick, a lost cause. But over those seven years you taught me and cared for me and befriended me. You have given me things I can never repay. I don't know where I would be today without you."
"You would be back in Li Commune!" the Bandit shouted, and there was much laughter.
Yes, I thought, I would be back home in Li Commune, eating dried yams and drinking north-west wind.
The next day Mary and I were on an old prop-driven plane flying to Qingdao.
I was finally going home. I would see all my brothers, their wives and children, after all these years. But I wasn't sure what to expect. What would my village and commune look like now? Would there be as much change there as I had seen in Beijing? How were my uncles, aunts, cousins and all my childhood friends? What would they think of Mary? All my friends in Beijing had adored her, and I wanted my family to feel the same. I wished the plane would fly on just a little bit faster.
Mary understood exactly how I felt. She held my hand the whole way.
As the plane was descending towards Qingdao, Mary said, "Li, take a deep breath and enjoy your family." But still I wondered what she would think of the harsh conditions she was about to encounter.
The landing was rough. Our plane slid towards a simple two- storey building. I looked out the window at my first glimpse of home.
But… where is this? The surroundings seemed familiar, but unfamiliar too. Then suddenly I saw a line of large trees in the distance and I realised with a thud in my heart exactly where we were. This was the old airport, the very same airport where I had dug the half-burnt coal from under the runway when I was a small boy. I remembered being there with my brothers, of being shot at by the army guards, of dropping my basket and spade and running, terrified, for my life. Now the two-storey building stood where the old guardhouse used to be and smooth runways spread out in different directions. The vision from my childhood days vanished in an instant.
All of my brothers, except my fourth brother, were at the airport waiting for us, with their wives and children, over twenty family members in total. I shook hands with all of them. I wanted to hug each one just as I had done with the Bandit and Fengtian but I was afraid that this would embarrass them too much. This was not Beijing. This was just a small country town.
All of my brothers looked older than I remembered. We met all the sisters-in-law, and all the children immediately called Mary and me Sixth Mother and Sixth Father, but Mary attracted the greatest attention. Even strangers at the airport asked my brothers who this Western girl was. "Our sister-in-law!" my brothers proudly replied and they all fought to carry our suitcases.
My family had borrowed two trucks to take us home. Mary was pushed into the front seat of one, next to the driver, and I was pushed into the other, and the rest of the family members piled into the back of each truck.
Along the dusty road on the way to my old village I once again smelled the familiar country air-full of the scent of human waste still used as fertiliser in the fields. Childhood memories returned once more. I loved this distinctive manure smell. It was the smell of my own town, and at long last I knew I was really home.
As our trucks slowly rolled down the old streets, people lit up firecrackers to celebrate my return. All the villagers had come out to greet us, standing on both sides of the streets, waving at us as we passed. Some I recognised, many I couldn't. After nine years, the countless older uncles and aunts, younger uncles and aunts, great-grand-uncles and grand-aunts, grand-nephews and their wives, had all muddled up in my mind, with the exception of a very few. I couldn't even remember what their proper titles were. All I could do was nod my head, smile and repeat "Ni hao," "Ni hao," "Ni hao…"
As soon as my family saw our truck turn into our street, my fourth brother, who had stayed home to help Niang prepare food, lit a long string of firecrackers. More firecrackers! It was just like it was when I was a small boy-the noise, the light, the smoke, the smell of gunpowder and the flying fragments of red paper.
Our trucks stopped and a sea of people gathered around us.
And then, through the crowd, I glimpsed my parents. They were standing by our gate with my fourth uncle and aunt, happy and proud. I rushed to them. I hugged Niang. I shook hands with Dia and Fourth Uncle. Just as I was going to shake my fourth auntie's hand, Niang threw herself at me and hugged me tight. "Oh, my sixth son! I missed you!" she sobbed.
Mary had got down from the other truck by now and immediately people's attention turned to her. As she walked towards me, the villagers parted the way for her, whispering about the colour of her hair, the size of her nose, the pattern of her shirt, the height of her heels. Mary was the first Westerner to come to the village since 1949. She was a sensation.
In the shady courtyard of my old home, a small square wooden table, knee-high, had been placed. Many little wooden folding stools were carefully positioned around it. A big floral teapot and teacups sat in the centre of the table and one of my sisters- in-law began to fill everyone's cups. Plates full of roasted sunflower seeds, peanuts and sorghum sweets were passed around. We popped open the sunflower seeds with our teeth and cracked the peanut shells with our hands. I remembered the sorghum sweets I used to take to Beijing with me. Every object was drenched with memories.
It was late in the afternoon by now. The sun was setting and had painted the sky a beautiful orange colour. I watched Mary-she was surrounded by my sisters-in-law and nieces. They seemed to understand each other without me having to translate for them at all. It was almost as though Mary had always been a part of this family.
Mary and I had brought some American cigarettes and candies and these were passed around and shared. The children feasted on the chewing-gums and sweets, and loved the American skipping ropes that we'd also brought for them. But the thing that excited and astounded everyone was our Polaroid camera. They were beside themselves with amazement. How could their own images, pictures of themselves, come out so quickly! It was thrilling. I was sad to discover, however, that the children in my village no longer seemed to play the simple games from my childhood, such as marbles or one-legged fights. Instead, they were crazy about small Japanese electronic gadgets, just like children in America. I was amazed that these sorts of sophisticated games were available in my village at all. How times had changed.
The children in my family welcomed Mary and me by putting on a singing and dancing show. We cheered and laughed as they each did their little numbers. The younger ones, from two to five years old, did their best trying to keep up. My two-year-old niece was knocked over a few times by the older children, but after a piece of sweet and some encouragement she was participating once more. Then, just before dinner time, many of the villagers returned from their work in the fields and popped their heads through the windows to get a glimpse of Mary and me. I could see they were too embarrassed to come in, so I took Mary outside instead. Within minutes a large crowd had gathered and an old man, whom I accidentally called Great Uncle instead of Great-Grand-Nephew, asked us to dance.
"Yes, please! Dance for us, please!" the crowd urged.
Mary and I looked at their eager faces. We exchanged a glance and Mary nodded.
"Are you sure?" I asked.
She nodded again. "Let's do an arabesque lift from Nutcracker."
So a small space in the middle of the street was cleared for us and the crowd gathered around. I lifted Mary high above my head, then flipped her down into a fish dive. The crowd gasped, then cheered and roared with applause. "Zailai, zailai!" More, more! they demanded.
I picked Mary up with one arm and twirled her around in circles. The villagers screamed with delight.
By the time we went back inside, my niang and my fourth brother had prepared a table full of colourful dishes. It was too hot inside so they set two more tables up in the shady courtyard, so there was one for the men, one for the women and a third for the children. Big bottles of local beer were popped open under the tables and there were many "gan beis" that night. All of my brothers could cook and each of them cooked their favourite dish.
So many questions were asked about our life in the West. My parents had told them something of it, but still they wanted more and hung on our every word. They had little idea, of course, of the ballet world from which Mary and I had come. But they were not celebrating the famous dancer that night. For them, they were just happy that their sixth brother had finally returned. I fitted back into my sixth son position just as though I had never left, nine years earlier. So much had changed, but what endured was love and trust.
My family bombarded Mary with questions. They wanted to seat her at the men's table as a special honour, but she insisted on sitting with the women even though she only spoke very limited Chinese. She told my parents that she just wanted to be treated like everyone else in the family. She wanted no special privileges.
Rather than stay in a hotel, Mary and I had decided to stay with my parents, but I worried that Mary would find it hard living in such poor conditions. There was still no bath or shower and no hot water. The hole-in-the-ground toilet outside was exactly the way I remembered it from my childhood. And although Mary liked Chinese food, I wasn't sure she was really ready for three weeks of it in our village.
But Mary took everything in her stride and everyone loved her. I translated for her as much as I could that night, but when I eventually lost my voice through talking too much she stopped asking me questions.
Then, within days of our arrival, the local police came. They took our passports. We became suspicious, worried. They told us it was for registration purposes. We could only hope that we would get them back before we were due to leave.
Everywhere we went in the commune in those three weeks, people's eyes were fixed on us. They couldn't stop talking about Mary-her hair, the colour of her eyes, her white skin. They watched her every move. Only when she said "Ni hao" to them, did they remember that Mary was a person too and they would burst into laughter.
My parents' house was still much the same as when I had left. Only a few changes signalled to me that now it was nine years on. The pigsty, chicken yard and vegetable patch were gone, replaced by a clean, paved courtyard, but the inside layout of the house was exactly the same. I was disappointed to see that my beloved newspaper on the walls and ceilings had been replaced with bright flowery wallpaper: I would have liked another word- finding game with my brothers. The earth kangs were still there, but now the windows had big panes of glass and there were even electric fans to keep the house cool. Now we wouldn't have to rely on the breeze to blow the mosquitoes away. Small motorised blowers for fire-making replaced my beloved windboxes. There was clearly a huge improvement in my parents' lifestyle. "And it's all because of your financial help," my niang said.
We got to know my six nieces and one nephew while we were there too. There was only one boy amongst my four brothers' children. My parents would have liked more grandsons, but the one-child policy had now been strongly enforced in China. My second brother and fourth brother were the only two of my brothers classified as peasants, so only they were allowed to have a second child if their first wasn't a boy. My other brothers were salaried people and so were considered in the same way as city folk-one child only, regardless of gender.
"But what happens if you do fall pregnant with a second child?" Mary asked.
"The government will force you to have an abortion," one of my sisters-in-law replied. "Even if you run away, they will track you down, force you to have an abortion, and you'll be penalised."
Mary thought it was nothing short of barbaric.
"Mary, can you have six extra boys and give us one each?" another sister-in-law asked, and everyone laughed. Deep inside, however, I knew how they felt. Not producing a son to continue the family line was considered the worst betrayal of your ancestors. I looked at my third brother while he was cooking and I realised that what my parents had done, all those years ago, giving him to my fourth uncle who couldn't have children, was one of the greatest sacrifices they could have made. I looked at my third brother's beautiful daughter, Lulu, then looked at my nephew and my other nieces. I felt sad that they, like most of the next generation of children growing up in China, would have no brothers or sisters. We had survived through generations of dark and impoverished living because of this one strength, because of the unconditional love and unselfish care of each other within our family unit. It was all we'd had.
During our three weeks in Qingdao, Mary and I spent a day each with every one of my brothers' families. We started with my big brother Cuncia, and his wife and son, who lived in a small two- bedroom apartment provided by the Laoshan Post Office where he was now a senior manager.
Cuncia had spent over sixteen years in Tibet, one of many Red Guards who had responded to Mao's calling. He had worked hard and been promoted to the head of the Communist Youth Party in the Tibet Post Office.
It was then that my brother had met and married another native of Shandong Province, and they'd had their son. But then, in 1981, the Chinese government suddenly changed its policy towards Tibet. All Chinese living and working in Tibet were ordered to return to their home province.
Cuncia told us that he had first been promoted to the position of deputy head of the post office in a large county called Jiaoxien. He was loved and respected. But one day, in 1983, he was suddenly called into his boss's office and swiftly demoted. To his utter surprise, one of the opposition party Red Guards had become jealous of his rapid promotion and still held a grudge against him-he had lodged a complaint to the government about an incident where my brother had slapped a party leader during a heated argument at the height of the Cultural Revolution. It was an incident that had happened over twenty-five years earlier.
"I'm only one of millions of victims," my brother explained to Mary. "I am, like so many people in China, still amazed at how badly I was manipulated and betrayed by Mao and the Gang of Four. The Red Guards of yesterday were the epitome of the communist spirit. Now we are searching for answers. We have to live with our injured pride and our lost beliefs."
I felt so much sorrow for Cuncia. I knew what he said was true- he had spent the best part of his youth pursuing nothing but propaganda. But the Cultural Revolution didn't just rob him of his youth, it crushed and destroyed his spirit and his soul. His trust in his society had vanished. Even his sacred family values had been called into question by Mao and the Cultural Revolution.
The brother I became most concerned about, however, was my second brother Cunyuan. He had built himself a two-storey three-bedroom house on commune-provided land, and although his marriage wasn't his choice, he had learned to love and care for his wife and their two daughters.
Then in 1986, so he told us on the night we visited him, he was working for a lumber company and was on one of his business trips to a northern province called Dongbei. He had been walking back to his hotel when he'd found a newborn girl abandoned and crying on the roadside. There was a simple note attached to her blankets: "If my daughter has luck on her side," it read, "she will be rescued by a kind-hearted person who will love her as his or her own child. May the gods bless you-my beloved child, and bless you-the kind-hearted person." It was signed, "The child's mother."
Another abandoned, unwanted baby girl. There are many such stories from China.
Cunyuan brought this little girl home. He and his wife loved and cared for her like one of their own. Now they had three daughters. She grew up to be a beautiful girl, with a sparkling personality, and the Li family adored her. The local government at first refused to recognise her as a legitimate child, but after several years of persistence from my brother and his wife, the county officials finally allowed them to adopt her and register her as a local citizen.
I had asked my second sister-in-law to cook us some typical peasant food that night, such as dried yams and corn bread, for Mary to experience. "Brother, you've been away too long!" Cunyuan said. "Some of the food we used to hate is now back in fashion- like corn bread."
"Even dried yams?" I asked.
"Not dried yams. People feed that stuff to their dogs and even they hate it," he replied quickly.
Mary did try the dried yams that night, but I noticed she mostly ate the dumplings.
After the meal, while Mary was playing with my brother's three girls, I asked Cunyuan to show me the farmland he had been allocated by the commune. But what I really wanted was a chance to be alone with him. I remembered our heart-wrenching conversation, years ago, on the way to the train station. I eagerly wanted to know how he saw life now and I desperately hoped that he was happy.
As we walked I noticed that we were heading in the direction of our na-na's burial place. I felt a rush of shame. I hadn't visited her grave yet and promised myself that I would take Mary there the very next day.
"Here is my land." My second brother pointed to a small area, no bigger than four metres by six.
"Is this it?"
"Yes, this is ours. It is not really even ours. It's on loan from the government." He gestured for me to sit down.
I sat next to him on the edge of his precious land and looked at the layered fields in front of us.
"See those buildings over there?" Cunyuan pointed at rows of newly built ten-storey apartments on the east side of our village. "Some of our land was sold to state-owned companies to build apartments for their employees. I'm afraid I will lose even this land soon." He shook his head.
"Won't they compensate you?" I asked.
"All land belongs to the government. They can take it back any time they want to."
"Is there any kind of central planning?"
"None whatsoever. Soon we will have no land left to farm. We are forced to put our faith, and our future, in the hands of a few government officials. I'm so afraid they will swindle our land away, and our livelihood, all in the name of reform," he replied.
I asked him about his marriage next.
"I love her," Cunyuan said of his wife. "She is a nice person with a kind soul. She's a good wife and a wonderful mother. She wasn't my choice and I have struggled to come to terms with it, but I have learnt to love and care for her, just like I have learnt to accept life as it is." He paused. "Do you remember our dia's story about the frog in the well?" he asked.
I nodded.
"Even though life is better now, I still feel like the unfortunate frog trapped in that deep well," he said. "The only joy in my life is my beautiful children. My wife and I pour all our love into them. We hope they will be better educated and have a happier and better life than ours," he said. "It's a shame that I will never have the privilege to see the world out there. Maybe my children will one day."
At that point we saw Mary and my sister-in-law coming towards us, the children with popsicles in their hands, and we left our discussion at that.
The following morning our dia led all of his sons, his grandchildren and Mary, to our na-na's grave. We carried stacks and stacks of yellowish rice paper with gold bars stamped on it, several boxes of incense and a bottle of water.
I was sad to see that there was not much of the grave left. Years of rain had washed away part of the hump of earth, but my family had prevented the weeds from becoming overgrown. Our dia knelt in front of our na-na's grave and murmured, "Niang, your seventh son is here with all my sons, Jing Hao's wife Mary, and all my grandchildren to give you our love. We've also brought you money, food and drinks." He then kowtowed three times. Cuncia followed him, then my other brothers from eldest to youngest.
When it was my turn, both Mary and I knelt down in front of the grave together. No words could express what I felt. I remembered na-na's kind face, her toothless smile, the way she would hobble around on her bound feet and the sweet, kind deeds she did. I remembered the time I broke six of my niang's precious new plates and she pretended that she'd been the one who had broken them instead. She was still so vivid in my mind, even though it was over nineteen years since she'd died. I kowtowed, and kowtowed, and kowtowed, to make up for the lost years, and Mary followed in turn.
After all the children had finished their kowtows, our dia placed a stack of paper money and eight pieces of incense on top of our na-na's grave. He secured the paper money with a piece of rock so the wind wouldn't blow it away. Then we lit all the paper and incense and our dia poured the bottle of water around the grave. We will never know if her spirit knew we were there, but it satisfied something deep inside me, this tribute to my beloved na-na.
This was also the day Mary and I were to spend with my fourth brother Cunsang and his family. True to his word, as soon as he'd finished his four-year term in the navy, Cunsang had come home and married Zhen Hua. My parents tried in vain to persuade him to serve for longer but he didn't want to be apart from Zhen Hua. Now they were happily married with two children, and living on a small egg farm which they'd started on a piece of rented land up on the Northern Hill. When Mary and I went to visit, he proudly showed us his fifty hens and about a hundred chicks. He cooked us many different chicken and egg dishes-and they were all delicious.
Cunsang's family lived simply and happily. He was so proud of his achievement with this farm. He so desperately wanted to expand it but he had no money. So Mary and I gladly gave him some to help him realise his dream. Cunsang was overwhelmed by this. He couldn't speak for several minutes, just held the money in his shaking hands, and looked from me to Mary and back to me again. Eventually he put his hand on his heart. "Thank you!" he murmured.
The following day, it was my third brother's turn for our visit. Cunmao had married a beautiful girl he'd met at high school and they dearly loved their six-year-old girl, Lulu. They lived in a two-storey house, similar to my second brother's, and by now Cunmao was a successful businessman. He did all kinds of business deals and his wife was an accountant in the Qingdao Carpet Factory. Cunmao had remained a kind and considerate son to his adopted parents-my fourth uncle and aunt. I was relieved.
Cunmao cooked us a table full of food for lunch that day, and after many "gan beis", Fourth Uncle and Aunt went to bed for a rest. When my third sister-in-law and Lulu took Mary for a walk to the village shop, I took the opportunity to quietly ask Cunmao how he was.
"I'm fine," he replied.
"Have you made peace with your adoption?" I asked.
He was surprised and for a while he just looked at me. Then tears slowly gathered in his eyes. "No, I don't think I ever will." He shook his head and wiped the tears from his face. "There always seems to be something missing in my heart. For all these years I've longed to be part of my real family, which is only next door. I wanted to go back, but I couldn't. I will always have to push my sadness far away from my heart and mind. It is a constant battle."
It was only then, after so many years, that I told him I'd overheard his conversation with our niang that day, the day he'd begged her to take him back.
"How did you cope with it for all these years?" I asked.
"It has been hard, sometimes impossible, especially in my teenage years. At times I blamed my real parents for giving me away, other times I blamed my adopted parents for not giving me back, but most of the time I blamed myself."
"Why blame yourself? It's not your fault."
"But I did blame myself. I blamed myself for all the desire and guilt in my heart. I felt bitter that my life and destiny had been decided by two sets of parents, but I loved them all. I could do nothing but be a faithful son to my adopted parents. If I hadn't I would have hurt everyone. I would have torn the Li family apart. What is done is done."
I tried hard to swallow the hot ball of tears in my throat. "Third Brother, I've always loved you like one of my other brothers. We all feel the same way," I said.
He nodded then, and we raised our glasses and drank a toast to happiness.
Mary and I went to visit my fifth brother Cunfar next. He was now married to a lovely lady who loved him dearly. They had no children, but secretly wished for a son.
Cunfar and my fifth sister-in-law took us to a restaurant on the Laoshan mountain, a place I had always wanted to go to, but could never before have afforded. In front of a spectacular view over the blue ocean, we sat and watched the fishermen row their small boats in and out of their sea-farms.
Cunfar told me that he had replaced my dia at the Laoshan Transportation Company when our dia had reached retirement age- that was the rule: one of his children was to replace him at his work and, had I stayed in Qingdao, I would have been the one, not Cunfar. But even as a child, Cunfar had dearly wanted to be the one to replace our dia. He too wanted to get out of the well, and becoming a truck driver or a factory worker was his only way. He loved the transportation business. He worked hard and was quickly promoted to a director's position. Now he was in charge of a large fleet of trucks.
My brother and I exchanged many childhood stories. "Remember the dead champion cricket you kept for me?" I asked.
"How could I ever forget!" he said.
After lunch we all walked along a rocky mountain path towards a small Buddhist temple, an old one built high on a hill, one of the few that had survived the Cultural Revolution. Suddenly, Cunfar and I stopped. "Listen! Did you hear it?" I asked excitedly.
"Yes! But I heard it first!" he shouted.
"No, I heard it first!"
"What is it?" Mary walked up from behind us with my fifth sister- in-law.
"A cricket!" I answered.
My fifth sister-in-law laughed. "You brothers and your crickets, you never change, do you?"
Qingdao, 1988
The time for Mary and me to return to America was fast approaching. But before we left, there was an important event to attend. During our last week in Qingdao, my youngest brother Jing Tring was to marry. His bride was a beautiful woman, the younger sister of one of my close friends from the local school.
It was mid June and a very hot day. Everyone was busy decorating my parents' house for the wedding. Many different shapes and colours of double happiness papers were glued onto the walls, the doors and the windows. Even the chests of drawers were covered with them. Now, instead of using sedan chairs for the bride and groom, my family had hired two cars and decorated them with big red silk flowers and ribbons.
Around eleven o'clock the wedding cars slowly rolled into our narrow street. Cunsang and Cunfar immediately lit up long strings of firecrackers. I was the official photographer, with a video camera in one hand and a stills camera in the other. The groom helped his beautiful bride out of the first car. She was dressed like a Western bride in a long white dress with a lot of frills and a floral veil. She even wore high-heeled shoes. My little brother wore a cream suit with a red silk rose pinned over his heart. A huge crowd of people gathered around and everyone murmured lucky words: "Handsome dragon attracts beautiful pheasant," "Arrival of daughter with many sons to follow," they would say. In this wedding there would be no kowtowing in front of a fire, no stepping over a horse's saddle, no three-day sitting for the bride. But the bride and groom did get a bowl of "widen your heart" noodles and the dates and chestnuts were still tied to their chopsticks, just as they were for my parents so many years before.
The two refrigerators that Mary and I had sent on ahead for my family still hadn't arrived, so there was nowhere to keep the food cool on the wedding day. Everything had to be bought and cooked fresh. Cunmao and Cunfar were the designated chefs and Cunsang was the kitchen hand. Both lunch and dinner receptions were held in my parents' house. The courtyard was crammed with tables and chairs: fifty guests, five tables of ten, and my brothers did all the cooking on one coal burner. Endless dishes were served. It was a feast. And since Mary and I hadn't had our wedding in China, everyone insisted that Mary too should dress up like a bride. Somewhere they found her a Western wedding dress. It was pink and she looked beautiful.
To say everyone had a merry time that day was an understatement. Many of the old traditions might have gone, but excessive drinking was one they'd certainly kept. Guests were falling on their faces from over-drinking. Some of the new traditions helped here, like trying to pick up hard-boiled eggs from a flat plate with a pair of chopsticks. Mary and I, and the bride and groom, had to walk around carrying trays laden with glasses of wine to give to each guest as lucky drinks. Before each of them could take one, they had to say something lucky to us, such as "wishing you a happy life with many sons" or "love each other until the silver beard touches the ground". They were not allowed to repeat other people's lucky wishes or more penalty drinks would be awarded. Trouble was, the more they drank the more likely they were to forget what others had said before. And so it went on.
Suddenly, in the middle of the drinking binge, my big uncle, my niang's eldest brother who was head of the propaganda department for the Qingdao Building Materials Bureau, made a request and everyone cheered him on. He wanted Mary and me to dance. We happily agreed and decided to dance one of our favourites, the second act pas de deux from Giselle. We'd had a few drinks too, but it didn't matter. We just hummed the music and danced while our adoring audience clapped and cheered our every lift and movement. It was one of our most rewarding performances ever.
After our dance, our dia spoke as the father of the groom. I'd had no idea this was part of the new custom. "Welcome, dear relatives and friends," he said. "This is one of the happiest days for the Li family. As you all know, I don't talk much. My wife always takes the words out of my mouth."
His audience laughed and our dia looked over at our niang on the ladies' table. She gave him a happy, loving smile.
Our dia continued. "When I was twenty-one years old, my niang told me that I was to marry a nice girl aged eighteen. I told her, `I don't want to marry anyone, I don't know how to be a husband.` She replied, "All you have to do is love her. She will teach you the rest about life." Little did I know then, but by fate I had married a rare jewel, the most precious jewel I could ever wish for. I treasured and loved her from the time I lifted her veil. I still love her today and will love her for the remainder of my humble life. My niang was right. My wife took care of everything. She taught me everything I needed to know. She made me a better man." He paused. "We have been through tough times together. Sometimes we felt like we couldn't go on, but then some sparks of life reminded us why we should go on. These sparks gave us such pleasure. These sparks are our children. We are fortunate…" Our dia hesitated. He was finding it hard to speak. "We are fortunate to have seven sons," he said, holding back tears. He looked at his fourth brother. They held hands and my dia continued. "We are proud of each and every one of our sons. The fact that you are all still alive today is such a miracle. Each one of you is so fortunate to have survived through those harsh years and now all of you have married nice wives and four of you have your own beautiful children. All I want to say to you today is… love and treasure your wife and children with all your hearts. It doesn't matter what happens in the world around you. As long as you have your family, everything will be all right."
There was silence. I had never heard him speak so much, so eloquently. I quietly went over to the ladies' table and told Mary what the man of few words had just said.
Mary got up. She walked over to our dia and kissed him on his cheek. She raised her wine glass and shouted in her best Shandong dialect, "To Dia, to Niang! Gan bei!"
Everyone stood and raised their glasses high. "Gan bei!" they roared in response. This was the last thing they'd expected from a Western girl.
There were only a few days left now before Mary and I were due to leave Qingdao. Yang Ping, the boy whose arm I'd broken when we were only nine years old, had organised a class reunion in my honour. Over thirty of my old classmates were there. Many childhood stories were retold, some happy, many sad. Teacher Song was there too. She immediately recalled the moment she pointed me out to the auditioning teacher from the Beijing Dance Academy. "Strange how things happen," she said. "I wondered so many times what your life would have been like if I hadn't tapped on that person's shoulder that day. You know, I so very nearly didn't."
Three days before our flight back to Beijing and America, I sat by my niang's side on the kang, watching her sewing furiously. She was making a cotton quilt for Mary and me. We'd told her that there was no more room in our suitcases for a quilt. But, she'd said, to give newlyweds a quilt was a Chinese tradition, and she'd wanted to make me another ever since I'd told her that the officials of the Beijing Dance Academy had burnt my precious quilt. "Jing Hao, I know, for all these years, how much guilt you must have felt for having more than your brothers, how much responsibility you must have felt carrying your entire family's dreams on your shoulders, how much burden you must have put on yourself by realising that you had to succeed. I also know how much you loved your family and how much you wanted to help us. Now you've seen how well your brothers are doing, you should let go of all your worries. You have given all of us so much already. The one thing your brothers will always treasure is what you've done with your life. Your success has given them hope, courage, pride. It will be their inspiration to move forwards. You have no idea how proud of you we all are!" Just then I noticed Mary walk in with my youngest sister-in-law, but when she saw my niang and I engaged in such an intimate conversation she quickly led my sister-in-law out.
"Mary is such a nice girl," my niang went on. "I hope you will treasure her, respect her, for ever. Never take her love for granted. I hope you will love Mary like your dia loved me. We love her! I have no doubt you will make a happy family together."
That afternoon, after my conversation with my niang, Mary suddenly became ill. We suspected food poisoning, so my brothers and I took her to Laoshan Hospital and a doctor prescribed her a drip. There was no room in the hospital for Mary to stay, so the doctor allowed us to take the two bags of drip, the tubes and the needles home with us. My third sister-in-law called a friend who was a nurse in her factory and they helped set the treatment up in our house, hanging the bag from a windowsill while Mary lay on the earth kang, pale-faced, watching the fluid dripping into her blood. I looked at her beautiful, peaceful, sun-darkened face and remembered my dia's words at the wedding, and my niang's that morning.
The treatment soon worked and Mary quickly recovered and was well enough to make the trip back to Beijing. "Mary has become a commune girl," my niang said during our last dinner together. At first my parents had been worried that Mary might not get used to the harsh commune life and wouldn't enjoy her experiences in China. But Mary loved the whole thing, except perhaps the food poisoning and the hole-in-the-ground toilet. She fought to wash the dishes with my sisters-in-law. She became the favourite sixth niang of my nephew and nieces. She even remembered what to call the many uncles, aunties, great-grandnephews and other relatives.
We had only been able to buy one-way tickets to Qingdao. We were told in Beijing that they didn't sell domestic return tickets. So my brothers had to use some personal connections to get us the return tickets back to Beijing. And, just a couple of days before we were to leave, the local police gave us our passports back. We were to take my youngest brother and his bride to the capital with us, for a honeymoon, and they would stay and explore Beijing after we left.
When the final moment came for Mary and I to bid farewell to my niang, my dia, and my brothers, my heart was a twisted knot. It felt just like the first time I'd left for the Beijing Dance Academy sixteen years earlier. Leaving my beloved niang would always be hard. I watched the tears flood down her face. Even the family rock, my dia, tried hard to control his emotions when we finally shook hands in farewell. As our truck pulled away, I saw he too was wiping tears from his face.
It was time to leave China, time to bid another farewell, this time to my little brother Jing Tring, his bride, the Bandit, Teacher Xiao, Fengtian, Chong Xiongjun, and all their wives at Beijing Airport. By now Mary and I were totally incapable of holding back our tears. We were constantly touched by my friends' kindness. All of them would have given us their hearts and more, and by the time we found ourselves sitting on the plane we were both emotionally drained.
I was going home. But I was leaving home too. I was closing a full circle within my heart. I thought of my beloved ones. Now they didn't have to eat any more dried yams. Now they had better food to eat. Now their living standard had improved considerably.
But Mary and I couldn't stop comparing our life in the West to theirs in Qingdao and at times I was again overwhelmed with guilt. Ever since I had been selected for the Beijing Dance Academy, I had felt this guilt, this burden, this sense of responsibility for my family. I wished all of my brothers could have had the opportunities I'd had, but deep in my sad heart I knew it was not to be. I was the one who had to fulfil my niang's, my dia's and my six brothers' dreams. Mary and I had given each of them as much money as we could afford, but I knew that it didn't matter how much I gave them, it would only ever provide them with temporary help. What they needed most was the one thing I couldn't give them-opportunity. Maybe, just maybe, now for the first time in their lives, there was a glimpse of hope under Deng Xiaoping's leadership. I had gone back home and had expected to leave them feeling light and optimistic. Instead I was leaving with a confused heart.
I sat on the plane and watched the thick clouds pass beneath. I had no desire to sleep. I could think only of my family, my family and friends who lived so simply yet made their happiness in their own ways.
Mary was sleeping now. I looked at her kind and peaceful face. I felt truly blessed to have found her, to have her by my side.
I had no idea what would happen next in our lives, but my guilt at leaving my family in China began to be replaced with excitement. The road I had travelled so far had had so many detours. Nothing had been smooth or easy. I knew the road ahead wouldn't be smooth or easy either, but what I could see was possibility. The possibilities of the world were so vast. And no matter what lay ahead or behind, I always had my niang, my dia, my brothers and friends, and Mary as my life-long companion.
I looked out of the aircraft window into the darkening sky. I saw myself as a small boy, running barefoot through the commune fields. I saw myself as a Red Guard, and I saw myself once again as Mao's last dancer endlessly practising in a dim and dusty dance studio in Beijing. I thought of my journey towards the most precious thing I had, my freedom, and of what had always propelled me forwards-my dia's pride and dignity, and my niang's extraordinary courage and unlimited love.