On the Nine-Dragon River
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The bell clanged in the engine's room and siren sounded. The machine's deafening roar stopped and the steamer made for the quay. Passengers moved toward the landing, their bags and baskets blocking aisles. I could see weather-worn store houses squatting silently along the wharf. Some boys crouched on the yellowish bamboo rafts. They were collecting driftwood, I know. On the stone steps of the quay, women were washing their simple household laundry. A group of people were awaiting our boat's arrival. I did not bother to look for any recognizable faces for I had given no notice, and did not expect to see any.

I strolled along a street narrowed with small snack stands on either side, and crowded with pedestrians and bicycles. I passed the noisy marketing place where enormous specimens of fish of all kinds were on sale every day. I came across students of the local secondary school who wore white badges and carried heavy satchels. Some were from classes I once taught, and they stopped and greeted me. Some were so young that I did not know them. They stared at me with wondering eyes, probably taking me for a stranger in a strange land. Did it ever occur to them that I knew almost every street and every alley, and that one or other of their parents might have been my old schoolmates?

I stepped into the alley I lived for 30 years. It was as clean as ever. There seemed to be the same aged grannies sitting and chatting outside their front doors. But there were more youngsters playing around. I thrust my key into the padlock and entered my house. The stairs squeaked and everything was covered with dust. On the balcony, flower-pots scattered around. Weeds grew where roses and jasmine had been abound. I looked round, only cactus were still alive and some new leaves had sprung from last year's chrysanthemum stem. Far down, outside in the street, children's joyous yelling and shouting could be heard. I remembered those long-gone days when I could expect the call of someone whom I was delighted to see but who was now far away. There was not much of a change in the surroundings, but there was little to hold my interest now. This was a house from which life had deserted and warmth extinguished, as with an unattended stove.

Back at the quay again, I was ready to leave. There was no more sorrow or sadness of a parting; there was not even a parting to make. The river was ebbing, the current swift, the water brown. I thought of the blue salty sea that I had lately come to like. But I knew I still loved this plain, prosaic river all the same. I remembered how I could swim to the opposite river bank at the slack tide when the river was so smooth and looked so broad and wide. I saw farmers coming from nearby villages on ferry-boats. I remembered the hills and ponds, the fields and temples which I had frequented as a child, fishing with my homemade rod, and shooting with my handmade catapult. I felt a deep affection and attachment to this native place of mine, with these weather-worn store-houses, peasants and ferry-boats.

When the steamer carried me back to the city I was now dwelling, it was late in the afternoon and it was drizzling. Some of my fellow passengers filled many three-wheelers with their sacks and suitcases, and left with a triumphant air. I had nothing but a satchel and a homely bamboo cap. They had their treasures, in plain view for all to see. But I also had mine. I came from Shima to Xiamen, just as Nine-Dragon River flows and joins the sea. I had my memories that belonged to this riverside town, and that were dear and precious to me. And I had my love and my bliss that had originated from this river, and that had made me a man of unfathomable affluence, which was not known to many.

November 1979

partial hometown
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