“The Incurable Longing” (A Universal Story from The People's Republic of China)

 “The Incurable Longing” (A Universal Story from The People's Republic of China)

An excerpt from Chapter 5: “The East China Sea” from Undress Me in the Temple of Heaven by Susan Jane Gilman, pgs. 91-93

 

Note: The following is a true story that took place in 1986 in The People's Republic of China, just after it opened up to the rest of the World! (Doubly meaningful to me as I taught English in the PRC 1986-87.)

...standing alone by the railing on the outer deck of the ferry, … I could hear hear the swishing against the hull, the leviathan throbs of the engines. … I had no idea where I was heading. None of the maps had Dinghai on them.

I felt a shiver of ecstatic terror. Except for [my other passengers] not a single person in the entire world knew that I was on board a ferry right now, plowing through the darkness in the East China Sea. … I stared at the black water forlornly. In the end, I realized, this was all there ever really was. … The true condition of anyone once you stripped them of their loved ones, their culture, and their passions was just this: Loneliness. An incurable longing. Insecurity. And grief.

Suddenly I started to cry. I felt foolish, but then, who would hear me? Who would even care? I leaned against the railing, feeling pitiful and forsaken. I pulled out a Kleenex and blew my nose unglamorously.

In the distance, a man begins singing. It took a minute for it to register. At first I was certain I was imagining it.

But from across the deck came the thin, fragile, unmistakable words:

Country roads, take me home,

To the place, I belong

West Virginia, Mountain Mama

… A few yards to my left, a slim young Chinese man in a white button-down shirt and Mao pants was pressed up against the railing. His head was thrown back, his eyes closed, his small, tapered hands pressed to his heart.

Take me home, country roads

“Country Roads” had been on of the preeminent songs of my childhood. My whole family sang it in the car when we drove up to Silver Lake—where we went to flee the heat every summer. … It was the song of uncomplicated happiness, of a time when my family was at its best. … It was the song from when I was six years old and felt loved and serene, when I never felt a yearning to be anywhere else. Now, halfway around the world, a young Chinese man just happened to be singing it beside me in the darkness aboard a ferry bound for a hidden recess of the People's Republic of China.

I hear her voice,

in the morning hour she calls me

The radio reminds me of my home far away

He seemed strangely unfazed when I drew up beside him and began singing along. We sang as if it were the most natural duet in the world, as if it had been pre-ordained, the two of us harmonizing without even glancing at each other, just gazing straight ahead at the sea in tandem.

When we finished the last verse, however, we turned and shook each other's hand. … “Oh my God. Do you know what that song means to me? I spent my whole childhood singing it.”

The young man smiled at me glassily. I realized that he had no idea what I was saying. He didn't speak a word of English.

How...had he learned an American folk song? This was 1986. People were still listening to record albums on turntables. … There was no independent television in China, no pop radio, now Western movies, and in some places, no electricity. And yet—John Denver?

Gesturing, I managed to persuade the young man to come with me to find Gunter [my amateur translator].

“Gunter, this man was singing a song from my childhood. Please, “ I begged when we found him. “Ask him how he learned it.”

Gunter translated. The young man's name was Wen. “Wen is saying that he has learned this song a long time ago from his English instructor. But he is saying that his instructor only teaches him the song phonetically. He says he does not know the meaning of the words. He is asking you to explain them, please.”

I had Gunter tell Wen that “Country Roads” is about a man who is far from his mountain home in West Virginia. Everywhere he goes, he misses it and hears its beauty calling to him. He yearns for the country roads to carry him back there.

… Wen looked at both of us sadly. [Then Gunter translated his response.] “He is saying he is understanding the song very well. He is saying in China, many people are being made to work very far away from their homes. He is saying that many people in the world are missing this West Virginia.”

The three of us were quiet for a moment. Some things need no translation at all.