A Time of Ghosts. Hok-Pang Tang
robber barons as they might better be called, ruled the districts. The entire school staff was invited to a party given by such a local governor. When they arrived, they discovered that it was the pleasure of the host that they play mahjong. Not for fun, but for money. Within a few minutes my mother lost two month’s salary.
After the party she could not hold back the tears. She badly needed the funds she had been compelled to wager. Her tears were noticed and gently dabbed away by the young principal of the school, who also kindly restored her lost money (that he did so by dipping into the school funds may now seem unethical, but in those days such a practice was simply self-defense). The gallant principal was my father-to-be.
Of course they fell in love. For a short time their lives were filled with happiness, though their pockets were nearly empty. The quiet romance of teacher and principal could not go on forever, though. A formal declaration of intent to marry had to be made to the parents. No one in those days could live together without benefit of marriage and remain respectable.
Grandmother was firmly opposed. She was still put out by the jilting of her chosen bridegroom. And now her unpredictable daughter was asking to marry, of all things, a poor school principal who was, moreover, a Han Chinese and not a Manchu! It was all most distressing and frustrating. So Granny decided to put a stop to it.
She called in an astrologer to judge the horoscope of her daughter’s chosen. The verdict was couched in suitably poetic terms: The groom was found to be an “iron broom.” That meant he would be as harmful to my mother as an iron broom would be to a soft wooden floor, and the astrologer further added that if the marriage took place, the bride would die soon after.
But my father, though poor, was clever and not to be outdone. He brought in another astrologer who checked the daughter’s horoscope and discovered that she was a “brass floor” to my father’s “iron broom.” That meant quite simply that she was of strong enough material to be a match for my father.
Granny, for some inexplicable reason, gave in. Perhaps she was tired of fighting, or perhaps she developed a grudging liking for my father when she found he was very skilled at serving her opium (she first thought it meant he was an addict, until she found that he acquired his ability by waiting on his uncle while never taking opium himself).
She initially asked a very high bride price from my father, but finally abandoned that requirement and told the couple they could marry if the wedding were elaborate and expensive enough to permit her to “save face.” My parents beggared themselves selling all their possessions to get money for a spectacular event. And spectacular it appeared, too, when the wedding finally took place amid the bursting of two-story-high strings of firecrackers. Only a few of the spectators realized that the rows of servants bearing wedding gifts were actually friends of my father who were simply playing the part, or that the piles of expensive gifts were borrowed from shops and had to be returned the next day! Even so, the wedding was phenomenally costly.
It had hardly ended when some relatives and friends – unaware of the wedded couple’s reduced circumstances – showed up expecting gifts, now that the groom had become part of so wealthy a family. To avoid them, my parents left the area and went to the city of Tientsin in the North. There they lived in genuine poverty in a fleabag hotel while they looked unsuccessfully for work. One night the hotel caught fire, either accidentally, or more likely because the owner had torched it for the insurance money. Though the young couple escaped with their lives, they lost all but the clothes they were wearing.
In Tientsin lived my father’s brother. He was an exciting man, full of life and the desire to taste its multitude of pleasures. Nature had given him a handsome face, and he used it to attract all the enjoyment life could offer. He was quite wealthy, having been tutor to the son of Sun Yat-Sen, first president of the Chinese Republic. By his own design he never married, but collected women as some men collect fine works of art. He seemed never to miss the simple joys of a family, and one or another beautiful prostitute was always at his side – though prostitute seems far too crude a word for the ravishing courtesans who satisfied his sophisticated tastes.
He should, of course, have helped my father and mother in their need. But he thought they were foolish to have wasted so much money on their marriage. He told my father quite flatly, “You are a man now. You must succeed or fail on your own!” That did not prevent him from providing the young couple with the ordinary hospitality due relatives, and from time to time he eased their aching stomachs with a dinner invitation.
Then there were the casinos. My father was actually a rather accomplished gambler, and no matter how little money the newlyweds had, he seemed always able to come up with a small amount to bet in hope of quickly improving their situation. In doing so, he frequently ran into his brother, who was intently engaged in the same practice, though for entertainment rather than from need.
Through these encounters my father came to know something of the fascinating world in which my uncle lived – a world disconcerting to the conservative mind, a world in which the hidden desires of the heart were made real. One of the most interesting inhabitants was an actor, a quite famous one. His name was Yen Gai Mei. Even today those familiar with Peking Opera will nod in recognition when the name is mentioned.
Peking Opera in those days was a riot of life and color, and its greatest performers were held in an awe like that now accorded movie stars. It was a fairy-tale land of rich costumes and ancient stories interwoven with symbolic movements and the clack of wood, the crash of cymbals, and high falsetto voices that filled the theater with song. In that surreal and strangely beautiful landscape Yen Gai Mei moved with the grace and assurance of a true artist. The audience recognized this, and showered him with acclaim.
My uncle was then involved with a particularly lovely and attentive mistress. Together they frequented the theater where Mei performed. Mei was a man who played women's roles. He did it all perfectly – the enticing movements of the body, the subtle fire in the eyes that tempts and charms at the same time. He had studied the qualities of women so carefully and had distilled their essence so finely that he seemed able to become more of a woman than any example one might encounter in the real world. And so my uncle fell in love with him – and so did my uncle’s mistress. His acting was, after all, a great talent, and she admired talent. And though on the stage Mei was more woman than any woman can be, off the stage he was a handsome and virile man with a masculine personality that played a perfect yang to the yin of his theater presence – and rumor had it that his physical endowment was proportionate to his talent.
I will not try to account for any of this, but will just state what happened. My uncle and his mistress were frequently in the first seats of the theater, and came to know Yen Gai Mei quite well. That is how my father came to know him too, and how he developed a respect for his talent and his personality that brought interesting consequences later in life.
The event that kindled this esteem occurred in dark and troubled times. In 1937 the Japanese, who had been nourished so much in art and culture by my country through the centuries, turned on China like a psychotic son attacking his mother with a knife. The advance was brutal and murderous, and city after city fell into the hands of the invaders.
When Tientsin came under Japanese control, superficially life continued as before. But the Chinese residents knew all too well how many of their countrymen had been slaughtered, and though the frivolous night life continued in the streets of the city, it was tinged with an air of frenzy brought on by a sense of impending doom.
One evening habitués of the Opera were startled to see a group of Japanese officers and soldiers enter the theater. No one argued when they took seats usually occupied by regulars, and the performance began as though nothing had changed.
Yen Gai Mei was unusually superb that evening, perhaps to show the Japanese what a great culture they were disturbing. It would have been better had his performance been at least slightly flawed. As it was, his consummate skill only served to draw the dangerous attention of the head officer to him.
After the opera, word came backstage that Mei was invited to a private party given by the Japanese.