Wild Ginger: A Novel - Hardcover

Anchee Min was born in Shanghai in 1957. At seventeen she was sent to a labor collective, where a talent scout for Madame Mao’s Shanghai Film Studio recruited her to work as a movie actress. She came to the United States in 1984 with the help of actress Joan Chen. Her memoir, Red Azalea, was named one of the New York Times Notable Books of 1994 and was an international bestseller, with rights sold in twenty countries. Her novels Becoming Madame Mao and Empress Orchid were published to critical acclaim and were national bestsellers. Her two other novels, Katherine and Wild Ginger, were published to wonderful reviews and impressive foreign sales.

1
In my memory she has a pair of foreign-colored eyes, the pupils
yellow with a hint of green. They reminded me of a wildcat. She stood
by the classroom door, her face in shadow. Behind her the sun looked
like a giant red lantern. As the sun rose, suddenly the light spilled
out. The beam hit the windows, bounced, and was reflected in her
eyes. It was there, in her eyes, that I saw water in motion, the
bottom of a pond clearly illuminated by the light. The water weeds
swayed gracefully like ancient long-sleeve dancers.
I remember my thought: she"s not Chinese. Then I thought no,
it"s impossible. It must be the sunlight playing tricks on me. She
was just like me, a girl with thick short braids at the side of her
ears. She was in a blue Mao jacket. Her right hand held an abacus.
She wore an old pair of army shoes with her big toes on their way
out. No Red Guard armband on her left arm. I remember my fear from
that instant. It was what connected us — a sign of political
uncertainty. I thought of Hot Pepper, the bully girl, the head of the
Red Guard. She would definitely suspect that the newcomer was a
reactionary.

I remember I began to feel sorry for the newcomer. The same way I
felt for myself. I was rejected for membership in the Red Guard
because I was not from a three-generation-of-labor family. My parents
and grandparents were teachers. It didn"t matter that we were just as
poor. We lived in a converted garage in Shanghai. Eight people in one
room.
Hot Pepper believed in violence. Hitting was part of her
treatment. She said that she had to "pump" the "dirty bourgeois
blood" out of me. The authorities and society encouraged her. People
of my category were considered to have "reactionary dust" in our
thoughts. It was Mao"s teaching that "the dust won"t go away unless
there is a broom." Hot Pepper called herself a "revolutionary broom."
Hot Pepper had a pair of mice eyes and an otterlike body. No
neck. Her bangs were so long that her eyes looked as if they were
behind bars. She wore a Red Guard armband and an extra-large green
military uniform. She was very proud of her uniform because it had
four pockets. Pockets were an indication of rank — the more pockets,
the higher the rank. The uniform was from her uncle, who had served
in the People"s Liberation Army. Hot Pepper also wore two palm-size
ceramic Mao buttons, which were pinned on each side of her chest. The
buttons were peach-colored morning sky with a tiny Mao head in the
middle. From a distance they looked like two breasts with Mao heads
as nipples.
Every morning Hot Pepper led a team to block the school gate.
They were there to examine everyone"s loyalty toward Chairman Mao.
The school"s requirement was that everyone bring the "three-piece
treasure": a Mao button, a Little Red Book (Mao quotations), and, if
you were a Red Guard, an armband. If you forgot, Hot Pepper lined you
up and held you until the bell rang. Sometimes Hot Pepper picked
people at random to quiz them on Mao quotations. She would say the
page number and the person was expected to recite the quotation. If
the person made a mistake, Hot Pepper would decide on a form of
punishment. She would either order him to stand by the gate and read
the quotation aloud one hundred times until he was able to recite it,
or she would order him to clean the school"s restrooms for a week.
Every morning when I got near the gate and saw Hot Pepper"s
shadow, my heart would pound. I could feel my fingers turning cold
and my breath shorten. I made sure I brought all three pieces and
updated all my Mao quotations. Still, Hot Pepper found fault every
time. She would say that I hadn"t made the proper pause at a comma or
at the period. When I did pause she would say that I recited the
paragraph too slowly, that I was trying to cheat.
I was excluded from school activities, including my favorite
sports, table tennis and swimming. It didn"t matter that I was a good
swimmer. Hot Pepper believed that I would betray the country and swim
across the ocean. "She"ll swim as fast as she can, out of the sea,
into the Pacific Ocean, where a Western ship will be waiting. She
will be picked up and sell all our national secrets to the enemy."

It was 1969, the midst of the great movement called the Cultural
Revolution. I was fourteen years old and attended the July First
Elementary School. July 1 was the birthday of the Communist party. I
wasn"t learning much in those years. The Cultural Revolution had
started when I was seven. We had been studying Mao. We were taught to
write our teacher"s name on the ground with brushes and cross the
characters with black ink. We were on the streets parading all the
time. We celebrated Chairman Mao"s every new teaching, copying his
words onto big posters. Fifty-six of us in the class. Fifty-six
posters. We put up the posters on doors and gates around the
neighborhood. It was our mission in life. As a line leader, Hot
Pepper always carried an electric loudspeaker while I, as a line
tail, carried the heavy paste bucket and wet broom.
Once in a while we were shoved back into the classroom. We
were taught basic math in the mornings. In the afternoons, on odd-
numbered days, a guest speaker who had horrible stories about the old
society would be invited from the countryside or a factory. The
entire three-hour speeches demonstrated one thing: without Chairman
Mao we would all be dead. It was effective. We all began to believe
firmly that we were saved and protected by Chairman Mao. We began to
love him. On even-numbered days, we would be assigned to read heroic
stories about soldiers who died defending the country and honoring
Chairman Mao.
My biggest wish was to be old enough to join the People"s
Liberation Army. I couldn"t wait to die in order to prove my loyalty
to Mao. I wanted to go to Vietnam, North Korea, or Albania. I wanted
to fight the enemies like those heroes whose stories I had been
reading.
My mother said that people had too much fire in their bodies.
When I asked why, she lowered her voice and said it was because the
Communist party had banned the worship of the spirits. And this was
how our ancestors showed their anger. Right after hearing my mother"s
words, I started my menstrual cycle. I had no idea what it was. I
thought the fire my mother had described had boiled down into my body.
Since turning twelve I had been feeling uncomfortable with my
body. I was ashamed of my developing chest. It was terrifying. I
wrapped my chest with three layers of cloth plus a tight undershirt.
Even in the summer heat I wore the same shirt, ignoring the skin
rashes. I wondered how other girls were coping. Most of them began to
act hunchbacked. Some girls were proud of themselves because their
chests were as flat as washboards. One day a dozen girls from the
neighboring class sobbed together. It was because boys had threatened
to "marry" them.

We were again learning nothing else except Mao"s teachings on how to
carry on the Cultural Revolution. "The battle between the bourgeoisie
class and the proletarian class has intensified and is taking the
most violent forms." Violence was a part of living then. People
divided themselves into factions according to their backgrounds, and
each faction tried to prove itself Mao"s loyalists. Hot Pepper was
proud because she was born "red." She came from a family of
illiterate miners. Even though I didn"t necessarily belong in the
anti-Maoist category, I was told that I had to earn my right to
breathe. "When I order a reactionary to crawl, you crawl," said Hot
Pepper, "or my umbrella will teach you a lesson."

"Class! We have a new person here," Mrs. Cheng, our teacher, a woman
in her late twenties, announced. Her voice carried a cautious tone. I
noticed that she didn"t say "a new comrade" or "a classmate." She
said "a person." That was another sign. It gave obscurity to the
girl"s background. "She is a transferring student from Number
Nineteen District. Her name is Wild Ginger, pronounced as Wu-Jiang
Pei."
"Wild Ginger?" Hot Pepper"s eyebrows frowned. "What a strange
name!" She began to laugh shrilly. "How do you write it?" The sound
was characteristic of the bully. It gave me goose bumps every time.
"Wu as "Wild," a luxuriant growth of weeds. It is written
with a Grass head on top of the character Nothingness," the newcomer
said, stepping out of the sun"s shadow. There was no fear in her
voice. "Jiang as "Ginger" with a flat tone. You can call me Wild
Ginger."
The class was quiet, actually surprised.
Hot Pepper stood up. "But Wu-Jiang can also be described
as "A wasteland." Correct me if I"m wrong, Mrs. Cheng."
Mrs. Cheng pretended to be deaf.
The girl raised her eyes cautiously.
I blinked in disbelief: the sunlight hadn"t fooled me. The
pupils were yellow-green! I stared. Is she a foreigner? The eyes were
almond shaped, wide apart; they couldn"t have been more Oriental. The
nose had a high bridge, narrow and long, with only a short distance
between her nose and upper lip. The shape of her face was like a
goose egg, and her neck was gracefully long. Her skin color was
lighter then everyone else"s in the room. Except for her gleaming
black-lacquer hair, she could indeed be taken for a foreigner.
"What"s wrong with your eyes? Is it a kind of disease?" Hot
Pepper sat back down and kicked off her shoes.
The girl made no reply, but brushed a strand of hair behind
her ear.
Hot Pepper continued, "This is definitely not a pair of
proletarian"s eyes. Red Guards, be prepared to perform your duty."
The class watched in silence.
My worry for the newcomer increased. Not long ago Hot Pepper
had done this to me. It was my first day too. Hot Pepper wouldn"t let
me into the classroom. She questioned why I was wearing a boy"s
jacket with buttons on the right side instead of the left. I
explained that my family had no money to buy clothes so I wore my
cousin"s hand-me-downs. Hot Pepper laughed and told everyone that she
had found lice in my hair.
People in the class were afraid to stand up to Hot Pepper.
Fear not only tamed them but made them her accomplices. Often, after
Hot Pepper beat someone, that person turned to join Hot Pepper"s
gang. Hot Pepper said that she had learned her way from her uncle,
who was a horse trainer in the army. "The technique is called xia-ma-
wei. It is a warning against insubordination. My uncle once showed me
how it was done with an unruly horse. It was really simple. He gave a
head-on blow at the first encounter. He beat the shit out of the
animal!"
"My name is Wild Ginger." The sound was uncompromising. The
girl looked straight at Hot Pepper. An excitement stirred inside me.
Finally! Someone was standing up to the untouchable bully! I only
wondered how long she would last.
Wild Ginger looked determined. She tilted her chin high when
she spoke.
"Your name doesn"t sound proletarian enough," Hot Pepper
sneered. "Change it! How about Supporter-of-Red?"
"No, thank you."
"Then you are not coming into the class."
"I am not changing my name."
"Are you an anti-Maoist?"
"I am Wild Ginger."
"State your background! Is there an enemy in your family?"
"Who are you to ask me this?"
"I can tell right away that you have an evil background from
your appearance. You have a very reactionary look."
"Mind your own business, please."
"Explain why your pupils are such a strange color!"
The girl paused for a second. "Well, may I ask why you have a
short neck? Show me your neck and I will tell you about my pupils."
The class laughed.

An earsplitting sound came from the loudspeaker hung from the
ceiling. "Ceremony!" the party secretary"s voice from the speaker
yelled.
"Ceremony!" Mrs. Cheng echoed. She was rather relieved by the
interruption. "The Mao Quotation Book on the table. Hurry up,
everyone!"
To the music of "The Red in the East," the class rose.
Mrs. Cheng quickly took Wild Ginger to a vacant bench in the
front row on my right. It was the worst seat. She had to look
sideways in order to see what was written on the board. Wild Ginger
placed her school bag inside the desk drawer and took out her Mao
Quotation Book.
We began to sing "The Red in the East," the slow and clumsy
song that had replaced the national anthem. It was originally shouted
out by a peasant in mid-China. I noticed that Mrs. Cheng"s chest was
wet again. She stood with her milk seeping. Two round spots. The
circles grew bigger and bigger. Her bra underneath the blouse was
soaked and was clearly visible. She had been to the restroom but it
didn"t help. She was not allowed to go home to her newborn.

Hot Pepper strode from her seat to the front of the class to lead the
recitation of quotations. We chanted mindlessly. It would usually
last two hours.
Bored, I stole a glance at Wild Ginger. From where I sat, I
saw her profile. She had amazingly long, thick eyelashes. Her sleeves
had worn edges and her navy blue pants were so worn and washed out
that her knees showed. She sat with her hands constantly scratching
her limbs as if she had a skin disease. Her mouth wasn"t moving in
sync with the rest of the class. After a while she bent down toward
the desk drawer and fumbled with her bag. She dug out Mao"s book and
flipped through the pages. Obviously she hadn"t been following our
reading — she was unable to locate the page we were on.
We were reciting Mao"s Three Famous Essays — "Serve the
People," "In Memory of Norman Bethune," and "The Foolish Man Who
Moved the Mountain." I could tell Wild Ginger was faking. It
surprised me that she was not a bit nervous. She turned the pages
back and forth. Her nails were dirty. The hands were covered with
frostbite.
""When one dies for the people, his worth weighs heavier than
a mountain,"" the recitation continued. Hot Pepper"s eyes brushed
across the room. ""When one dies of any other cause, the weight is
lighter than a feather . . ."" I felt sleepy but reminded myself of
an incident during which a boy was expelled from the school because
he couldn"t stay awake during Mao readings.
"". . . Although we come from different backgrounds, we are
fighting for one purpose. It is to liberate the world, to provide the
poor with food and shelter. We are the true revolutionaries. We live
like a big family where everyone is treated as a brother or sister.
We are learning to be truthful, kind, and caring . . .""
I looked at the Mao portrait on the wall. The Chairman had
kind-looking features. Smiling eyes, glowing cheeks, a round nose,
and a gentle mouth. It was a peaceful face. Hot Pepper once said that
if you stared at Mao"s portrait long enough, the Chairman would come
alive. His eyes would blink and his lips would open. I experimented
with staring, but the man never came alive. I was getting bored
looking at him. But there was nothing else besides the portrait on
the wall in the classroom. A couple of months ago I scribbled in my
notebook during the reciting. Mrs. Cheng stopped me. Later she
explained that she was trying to protect me. Although she didn"t
spell t...