Banished!

3. Young Tao

44 TH REE ~ Young Too 1 Young Tao was born during the Three Years of Famine, when the Taos had no meat to eat. To buy meat you needed coupons. Each person got one coupon a month, and that would buy two ounces of meat. The Taos were a family of four, so they could buy eight ounces of meat per month. They saved up their coupons for young Tao's birth. One day Tao found some one-pound cans of meat in a shop. Each can cost only four two-ounce meat coupons, so they could double their meat ration by buying it in a can. Overjoyed, Tao rushed home, got out the coupons they had put by that month, and bought a can. After that, they did not save up their coupons; they exchanged them for cans of meat, which they put by for young Tao's birth. By the time the baby arrived, they had five cans of meat. The meat was to feed Su Qun, who would be breastfeeding. She would turn the cans of meat into sweet milk for young Tao. But of course five cans of meat were nowhere near enough. So Tao went back to the village on the outskirts of Nanjing where he had worked on land reform in the 1950s and managed to get hold of two swamp eels. Each eel was as thick as a thumb and about a foot long. Tao was over the moon at his luck, and these famine years swamp eels also ended up being converted into breast milk for young Tao to suck in greedily Meeting Tao again reminded the villagers of all the things he had done for them. One winter, the mutual aid team's only ox had died. Tao had given them his watch to sell so they could buy another ox. On leaving, Tao had left behind all his belongings, including an overcoat and an enamel washbasin. After his return to Nanjing, Tao had sponsored a village youth through school and university out of his own wages. Tao and the villagers had stayed in touch since those days. If any of them came to Nanjing for medical treatment , they would stay over at the Taos, unrolling their bed mat on the floor and staying sometimes for as long as a month, depending on the severity of the illness and the treatment they were having. Tao reckoned he had already been rewarded for all he had done for them. He had written a series of short stories based on his brief experience of village life, and these stories had been published. Tao had gained a national reputation and had been able to make a living from writing. So for Tao, a young man from the city, his village experiences had been hugely valuable. It was still vital for him to stay in frequent contact with his village friends so that he could talk to them about farming matters and village affairs. Nevertheless, one day after Tao had come back with the eels, a peasant arrived from the village carrying baskets on a shoulder pole. He walked into number 96 Hongwu Road, climbed to the third floor, and found the Taos' flat. He did not stay long, just put down his load and left. He had brought not just a single cabbage but a shoulder pole's load (about a hundredweight). The Taos were overcome with gratitude. They took out one of the cabbages, cut up half and cooked it, shut their door, and stealthily tucked in. They left the other half on the chopping board in the shared kitchen. About half an hour later, when the Taos had finished eating and went to do the washing up, there was no trace of it. The Taos could hardly make a fuss since they had been careless enough to leave such a precious object lying around. The problem now was not half a cabbage but what to do with a whole load of them. Unless they handled the situation properly , the consequences could be disastrous. They carefully stored the cabbages away Whenever they cooked some, they were extraordinarily careful. Sometimes they crept silently into the kitchen at midnight to cook, terrified of making any noise with the cooker, wok, or bowls. There was no mistaking the smell, however, and the next day hungry neighbors would look them up and down suspiciously For the first year of his life, therefore, it was necessary to raise...