Peach Blossom Pavilion. Mingmei Yip

across my mind – his bloodless face, his emaciated body barely covered by his rags, the way he pathetically kowtowed when given a few coins. Suddenly I thought how lucky I was – housed, fed, clothed in Peach Blossom, for free! I must be living in paradise without knowing it.

      I turned to Fang Rong and tried to lift the corners of my lips as high as the Heavenly Tune rooftop café. ‘Mama, thank you very much.’

      ‘Thank me by behaving like a good girl,’ she grinned, patting my arm affectionately.

      Then she addressed the three of us. ‘If you behave, you’ll have all the nicest clothes, tastiest food, and prettiest hairdos in the world. But if you don’t, you’ll all end up like that little hungry ghost robbing scraps on the street, and eventually being hit by a car. Do you want to be like that little bastard soon to be smashed into ground beef?’

      ‘No!’ we roared collectively.

      ‘Will you behave?!’

      ‘Yes!’ Our high-pitched voices slashed the air, while Mama grinned mysteriously, her face shadowed by the shade of the rickshaw.

       7

       The Jade Stalk and the Golden Gate

      The next day when I woke up in the morning, I felt both happy and sad – happy because of my good life in Peach Blossom, sad because of my recollection of the little boy. His hollow cheeks and protruding eyes clung to my mind like snails. Then I also remembered the foreign devil, and the gaze of his pale blue eyes.

      I took out my pipa and absent-mindedly started to play; my ears filled with the sweet murmurs of the instrument. Then in a moment, tears flooded my eyes. They ran down my cheeks and rained onto the pipa until it seemed to stare back at me with a tear-streaked face. I rocked it against my chest, imagining it to be my little sister who’d faithfully absorbed all my thoughts, feelings, and sadness.

      ‘Ma and Baba,’ I said to the pipa, ‘I miss you both. Wherever you are now, don’t worry about me. I promise you I’ll take very good care of myself. And believe me, I’ll be famous someday, very famous!’

      While I was indulging in my monologue, suddenly I heard noises from outside the door. ‘Guigui? Come!’

      Barely had I finished my sentence when the puppy plunged into my room. I put down the pipa and picked him up. He began to lick my face furiously.

      ‘All right. Enough, you bad boy. Have you been a good baby today?’

      Guigui tilted his fat head, then started to kowtow and shake hands with me.

      ‘Good,’ I smoothed his fur, ‘I know you’re a good baby. Are you hungry? You want some goodies?’

      He performed more kowtows.

      Just when I was about to take him to the kitchen, the bead curtain was swept aside and this time in burst Fang Rong, balancing a big, steaming bowl on a tray between her hands. Her body, held in by her green silk gown, looked like swollen pork dumplings wrapped in greasy lotus leaves. When she moved, the rolls of fat seemed to be starting a revolution under her dress. Her bottom was just the right size for four sisters to play mahjong on. I almost chuckled at the sight.

      Mama cast both me and Guigui a dirty look. ‘Xiang Xiang, take that dog outside!’

      ‘But Mama—’

      ‘I said take him outside. Or you want me to kick him out?’

      I tried to shoo Guigui out, but he protested by thrusting his body against my legs.

      Mama yelled. ‘Just push him out!’

      Reluctantly I did.

      ‘Now close the door and come sit down.’

      After I took my seat, she glanced at my pipa and said, making a great effort to soften her voice, ‘Xiang Xiang, stop practising for a while and have some tonic soup.’

      I was surprised. It was always I who begged her to give me a break from practising the arts. She’d never spared me from labouring, let alone brought me soup.

      ‘Why?’ I asked.

      ‘Why? To celebrate your great day, silly girl.’

      Carefully, she put the tray on the table, then swiftly pulled out a chair. After her big bottom had ensconced itself comfortably, Fang Rong squeezed a huge grin. ‘You’ll soon find out why. Now don’t ask any more questions. Drink this special soup while it’s still hot. When it gets cold, it won’t be nutritious any more.’ She picked up the bowl and sloshed its contents under my nose. A rich aroma wafted into my nostrils. I took a tentative sip.

      ‘It’s very tasty, what kind?’

      ‘Different herbs, lots of vinegar, and the best kind of black chicken. It took Ah Ping a whole day to cook it,’ said Mama; the big grin never left her face.

      She eyed me – like a mother examining her newborn to check for deformities – until I drained the last drop. Then she put the bowl back onto the tray, picked it up, and stepped out of the room. I felt warmth spreading all over my body. It must be the tonic soup taking its effect. But I knew there was a better reason – I was lucky to be living in Peach Blossom Pavilion!

      Just then, to my surprise, Fang Rong burst into the room again, this time throwing several books down on the table. ‘Ha,’ she chuckled, ‘see how absent-minded I was to have forgotten these? Now read them all to prepare yourself for your first guest.’

      ‘What guest?’ I asked, but Mama had already vanished like a whiff of smoke.

      I scanned the titles – Variegated Patterns of the Flowery War; Secret Prescriptions for the Jade Chamber; The Plain Girl’s Classic; Romance of Genuine Cultivation …

      I picked up one of them, flipped the pages, and ran into this:

      When a man and a woman are making love for the first time, their bodies touch and their lips press against each other’s. The man sucks the woman’s lower lip and the woman sucks the man’s upper one. When sucking, they savour each other’s saliva … Then a thousand charms will spread and a hundred sorrows resolve. Now the woman’s left hand should hold the man’s jade stalk. The man will use his right hand to caress the woman’s jade gate. Thus the man will feel the yin energy and his jade stalk will be stirred. It thrusts high toward heaven, like a lonely peak towering toward the milky way. The woman feels the yang energy and her cinnabar crevice will become moist with the liquid flowing downward, like a river coursing from a deep valley. It is now that coupling can take place …

      They savoured each other’s saliva? Aii-ya! With morbid fascination, I continued to read:

      Thrusts, be they deep, shallow, slow, quick, straight, slant, east, west, are all based on different presumptions. Each has its own idiosyncrasies. The slow thrust is similar to a carp caught by a hook. A quick thrust is similar to birds flying against the wind …

      Ha! These thrusts had certainly no comparison with those Baba had demonstrated in martial arts for defence. If someone attacked, what would happen to him if he thrust like ‘a carp caught by a hook’?

      Just when I was on the verge of bursting out laughing at these absurd expressions, the phrase ‘nine ways of moving the jade stalk’ caught my attention:

      It dives in and pulls out, like seagulls playing with waves … It plunges quickly or pokes hard, like a frightened mouse scurrying back into its burrow …

      Then the ‘six ways of penetration’ forced themselves on my eyes:

      First, the jade stalk pushes down, then moves back and forth resembling a saw, like prying open an oyster to get the shiny pearl …

      Puzzled