As the audience quieted down some, she went on, "Obviously the English language is meant to discriminate against us and other colored races. Now I can see why so many people from our homeland call themselves Asians,' because they've intuitively sensed that words like 'Chinese,' 'Vietnamese,' and 'Japanese' were coined to diminish them. Therefore we, people from the ' Central Kingdom,' must refuse to be called Chinese, just like the blacks refuse to be called 'niggers.' "
Her tirade made her short of breath. She sat down, her cheeks red and puffy. The audience was puzzled, so most of them remained silent. A few were snickering.
Nan rose and took the microphone. He said, "I don't want to dispute the accuracy of Mei Hong's linguistic research, since I haven't touched the OED for ages. Let me just appeal to your common sense. We're all human beings and should be reasonable. The great poet
Czeslaw Milosz said, 'Human reason is beautiful and invincible,' so let us rely on nothing but our own intelligence. America didn't force us to come here, did it? China is our native land, while America is the land of our children-that's to say, a place of our future. If a war breaks out between China and the United States, how can any one of us here benefit from it?"
"What's your point? Out with it!" a female voice burst out from the back.
"My point is that we must stop stoking animosity and must remember that the authors of this mean book don't speak on our behalf. They're just hate-mongers. We have different interests from them because we don't live in China anymore. We mustn't follow them in railing against the United States blindly."
Mei Hong cried sharply, "That's outside the parameters of my subject."
Her overbearing tone of voice enraged Nan. He exploded, "You haven't returned my soup pot yet! You promised to do that five months ago-why haven't you kept your promise? I can never trust you again. You talk so much about national pride and honor, but why wouldn't you honor your own word? Why can't you be more decent as a human being?" To his surprise, his questions shut her up. Mei Hong dropped her eyes, her face dark. Several people cackled.
Then a young woman stood up and challenged Nan, "Are you a Chinese or not?"
" I was born in China and -"
"Give us a simple yes or no answer!"
"I'm going to be a U.S. citizen. I believe most of you will-"
"Get out of here, you shameless American!" shouted a male voice.
"Let him speak," a man interrupted. "I'm going to be a citizen too."
"Americans out! Americans out!" a few voices cried in unison.
" This is a free country and I have the right of free speech," Nan said.
"We don't want to listen to you." "Yes, get out of here!" "Let him finish." "Achoo!"
"Listen," Nan went on. "You people always talk about your nation, your China, as if every one of you were a kingpin of that country. Has it ever occurred to you that this obsession is dangerous? I mean to let a country dominate an individual's life and outweigh everything else. What's the definition of fascism? Do you know?"
A hush fell over them.
Then someone brought out, "Don't give us another lie."
Nan replied calmly, "The first principle of fascism is to exalt country and race above the individual. If you don't believe me, look it up in Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, the tenth edition. If we don't stop this nonsense of China 's pride, we may end up ruining our own lives here."
"You never cease to amaze me." Mei Hong stood up. "A madman is what you are. Let me tell you, you're also a banana!" She jabbed her finger at Nan. "You always despise China and our language. That's why you've been writing in English and dreaming of becoming another Conrad or Nabokov. Let me tell you, you're just making a buffoon of yourself! Get real-stop fancying yourself a great poet!"
Flustered, Nan felt his throat congesting. But he scrambled to answer, "To write in English is my personal choice. Unlike you, I prefer to be a real individual."
"Yeah, to be a lone wolf," scoffed Mei Hong.
"Exactly!"
That somehow gagged her, and some people giggled. Nan said to the audience, "All I'm saying is that we ought to be decent human beings first, to be fair and upright to others and to ourselves."
The moderator rapped the table with her pen, but nobody took heed of her. "Stop bickering!" she begged, yet more people were jabbering now. The room was in a tumult. Many of the audience stood up, watching or whooping. The three panelists rose too, gathering their materials and about to leave. The scraping of chairs and shuffling of feet filled the room.
A few pairs of eyes were glowering at Nan, who pretended not to notice them. If only he had listened to Pingping and stayed at the restaurant. He shouldn't have come to this pandemonium to seek unhappiness. There was no way to reason with some people in this crowd, to which he felt he no longer belonged. Their ilk had the herd mentality that assumed the fulfillment of one's selfhood depended on the rise and growth of a tribe. Nan wondered whether he should go up to the old historian on the panel and talk with him for a while, but he decided not to. He preferred to stand alone.
22
WHILE Nan was at the meeting, Pingping and Niyan were diligently preparing for the evening. It was Saturday, so they'd be busy after three o'clock. Nan had promised to come back before three-thirty. Pingping took out of the freezer the beef and chicken Nan had cut the previous night and let them thaw. She planned to wrap some egg rolls after putting a new ribbon of paper into the cash register. She hadn't fully recovered from the abortion yet, and though most of her diabetic symptoms were gone, a numbing pain still tightened her lower back from time to time. In the dining room Niyan was chasing a fly with a long plastic swatter. She had been placing silverware and paper napkins on the tables.
As they were working, a shaggy man in a maroon windbreaker came in with a half-empty bottle under his arm. He lurched directly to the counter, plunked beside the cash register the stout amber bottle printed with "Wild Turkey," pulled out a snub-nosed revolver, and hissed at Pingping, "Give me all the dough you have here."
For a moment she was too transfixed to respond. The man said again, "Empty your drawer and give me all the cash!" His reddish beard, so thick that his mouth was invisible, quivered as he spoke, blowing hot, alcoholic fumes on Pingping's face.
Silently she unlocked the register and took out the tray that contained about a dozen singles, four fives, two tens, and some coins. Inside the machine, under the tray, was a sheaf of twenties, more than two hundred dollars, which she always kept in there for emergency use, but she didn't touch it. With trembling hands she placed the tray before the man and said, "We haven't star' yet." Through the corner of her vision she saw Niyan scurrying out the front door. The thought that she was left alone to face the robber petrified her, and she broke into sniffling sobs.
Her crying seemed to startle the man, who grabbed the money and thrust all banknotes into the pocket of his windbreaker but left the coins untouched. "What lousy luck!" he grumbled, his boozy eyes flickering.
"Please go away!" begged Pingping.
"Nope. I'm hungry and want some food."
"We not open yet."
"Don't tell me that!"