By Sha Yexin

Life of Mr.Light

By Sha Yexin

I nthesouthernsuburbsof Chuansha County[1]lives an ordinary but rather fascinating chap.Being that his name,Qiu Guangmian,sounds like the Chinese word for“l(fā)ight”,everyone mistakenly calls him“Mr.Light”.Thus,we will call the hero of our little tale“Light”when telling his story.Mr.Light,now 66 years old,is a man of short stature,but great vigor with a crown of gray hair and a bit of a hunchback.He habitually looks at others with a slightly crooked,squinty gaze, but nonetheless he is a lovely man of forthright character and strong loyalty to his friends.

His Unsocial Youth

Before 1949,Light worked as an apprentice in a restaurant.Once,a policemanwas sent by the Department of Health to inspect the premises.Though the restaurant was clean enough to pass inspection,the crooked corrupt cop threatened to thwart the inspection unless he received a considerable kickback.

Light was so angry that he beat the man senseless.Being a self-trained“expert”in the fighting art of the Tai Chi Fist,he beat the policeman literally within an inch of his life.Light then stole away to hide in a cotton field for the next three days.

After the establishment of People’s Republic of China in 1949,Light became a utility man in the state-owned Chuansha People’s Restaurant.Once, when a Health Department inspector came,being a friend of the restaurant manager,he highly praised the restaurant’s sanitary conditions planning to give the place the“Cleanest Eatery in the County”award.However,our hero, being honest to a fault,did not think it was warranted,so he led the inspector to someinconspicuouslittlenooksand crannies where bits of muck and mire could be found hiding,thus successfully proving his restaurant not to be the cleanest,infuriating his boss in the process.

Light’s candid nature doesn’t imply any intellectual frailty on his part.Actually,he’s really quite a clever fellow and a quick learner too.For example, Lightisquiteadeptatslaughteringchickens.He even attended a chicken-killing competition once.

It was set up like a sports meet.The music of“Athletes March”playing as dozens of competitors in chef uniforms entered the arena,holding a knife in one hand and a live chicken in the other. With the sound of a whistle the games commenced,and all the competitors,except for our hero Light,began hastily lobbing off chicken heads.

“I’ll let the inferior ones have a head start,”mused our hero.

Not until the other competitors had finished their slaughtering and began draining off the blood did Mr.Light begin his work.His high degree of proficiency at the slaughter was on full display as he swiftly and neatly finished all of the routine procedures:the killing,the draining of blood,the defeathering in hot water,the splitting open of the body, and the gutting.Two minutes and fifteen seconds:Mr.Light’s record was beyond compare,as no other competitor had even finished his work.As Light surveyed the scene,with his competition still hastily swinging their knives and posteriors,a wave of pride engulfed him.Light smugly lit himself a fag,and began tossing the knife he’d used to gut chickens up and down high in the air.

Unfortunately for our hero,in traditional Chinese society,arrogance is generally deemed to be a critical defect in a person’s nature.So when it was announced that his crime of foolish pride had lowered him to second place,he was positively crestfallen.Light never saw that one coming.

An Amateur Master

During his two-decade long service at restaurants,Light learned the culinary arts well and could make a wide variety of Chinese dishes.

Once,when travelling to downtown Shanghai,as he strolled along the boulevard,he spied the sign for a restaurant called“The People’s Restaurant”[2]. Itching to compare and contrast this so called“People’s Restaurant”with the one back home in Chuansha,he darted in to have a look.Light skipped the appetizers,the rice and the wine,ordering only a helping of“Shredded Three Delights”.When the dish was served,Light beckoned the manager over.

“What exactly are the“delights”in‘Shredded Three Delights’?”he asked.

“Well sir,they’re shredded pork,ham and bamboo,”answered the manager.

“No,that’s incorrect!”exclaimed Light.

“How is that incorrect?”the manager asked perplexed.

With that,Light gave his explanation.“What’s important is not the ingredients,but the chef’s skills with the knife. The pork,the ham and the bamboo shouldbecutusingdifferenttechniques.”

Light demonstrated for the manager the various ways of cutting in the culinary arts.The manager was thoroughly impressed and thought Light must surely be a famous chef in his own right.

Actually,no matter how good Mr. Light’s cooking skills were–even when the many chefs he taught to cook had themselves won fame–he was stuck as the utility man for the duration of his restaurant career.At last,our hero became so disgruntled that he quit his job.

He went on to cultivate flowers, which he was actually quite good at.So good in fact,that he was not only elected as the vice chairman of the Chuansha Bonsai Association,but also held a Bonsai show in Chuansha County.He was the first person to do such a thing in the history of the county,and the show became breaking news at the time.

From Hot Wok to Hot Criticism

If there was any chance to be a professional chef,“Chairman Light”would still take it with a glad heart of course. After the Chinese government begun to carry out“Open Door Policy”in 1980, which allowed the Chinese to open their own businesses,Mr.Light’s son opened a restaurant and promptly employed his father as the head chef.Light was so happy that he was willing to offer up his services,pro bono.

Light slaved over a hot wok for his son,whilst all around him was played out a symphony of clangs and clunks, bangs and bongs with the spatula and the pot as the instruments of accompaniment.His incomparable culinary skills and terrific work ethic were praised unanimously by customers.Mr.Light finally felt he had really hit his stride.

However,there was still one thing that bothered him:the boss,his own son,never showed even the slightest hint of gratitude.Although it was acceptable to take no salary,as the head honcho was his own flesh and blood after all, but Light would gladly hear a simple“thank you”“good work”or“cheers”now and again.When Mr.Light finally did raise the idea of gratitude,his son replied,“Hey,I thought you wanted nothing in return!”

At that point,Mr.Light had had enough.

“Take this job and shove it!I quit!”he bellowed.

For the next few days Light sat there stewing in his own juices,when suddenly out of the clear blue sky,a flash of inspiration befell him.“Why not write a satirical novel exposing that little ingrate of a son?”he thought.

Although never actually graduated from primary school,Light believed that, through about a decade long stint of consistent self-cultivation and self-study he could make himself over into a great writer.And why not?He reckoned himself as having a fairly rock-solid background in culture,and he had a certain knack for writing poetic couplets.

The prologue to his serial novel condemning his heir,written in classical styling,began like this:

“Forsooth,it is said that,upon the left of Shanghai lies a small village,called Tiesha in ancient times.Now it is called Chuansha.And it came to pass that there was a certain restaurant opened in Chuansha called the Pulong Bistro,whose owner is my very own damned bastard son…”

Light began to pen the first chapter after finishing the prologue.Whilst more words were put down to condemn his son,he himself however,felt the absurdity of the entire writing.He laughed at his own annoyance thinking,“What’s the point of being angry?My son’s not so ungrateful and lacking in filial piety as it seemed.He’s just like me,a chip off the old block.He calls a spade a spade and has difficulty in expressing his gratitude,the same as I did with my father.Why not get away from this annoyance and have a restaurant of my own? I’ll hear as many praises from the boss as I want when the boss is me.”

Light Being the Boss

And with that,our hero had finally made it.He became a restaurateur with a group of former colleagues as waitrons called the“Peach Orchard Restaurant”. His shop was set up right in front of his own residence.

Moreover,Mr.Light’s ambition of becoming a writer was fulfilled in part by writing couplets tocelebratethe opening of his restaurant.Writing couplets(and often giving them as gifts)is a tradition in China,and Light was an oldhand at it.

For example,the couplet he wrote for the taxman:

If a tax collector is incorrupt and honest,

He’d be the happiest though not the wealthiest.

Or the one written to honor a travel agent:

A travel agent needs a smiling face

To get customers coming to his place.

And the one he hung on the door to the commode:

Guests come in such a rush, But leave happily with a flush.

Above are all nice works in their own right,but it’s generally agreed that Mr. Light’s masterpiece was the one he wrote for his own business:

In this orchard of mine,no peach flower will you find;

But nowhere else is better for your friends to be dined.

Mr.Light now has a thriving business.His dishes are universally loved and praised far and wide,not only for their savory flavor but also for their artistry.For example,there is a cold dish in the menu called“Bonsai Mountain,”made from Kalimeris plant,dried tofu strips,potato slices,and walnuts.It looks just like a real lush,green mountain with Bonsai Trees growing atop jade mountain peaks,dotted with limpid pools.It is so positively stunning that one may feel barbaric just ingesting it.

It has become one of Mr.Light’s daily routines to read the guestbook,from which he can always find the praise he so desires.While gladly reading the praises,he would respond at times by adding some comments himself,such as“Yes,I am the best cook of Chuansha County,”or,“I agree with you that my dish of Mandarin Fish is another wonder of the world.Do come next time,and you’ll get a 20 percent discount,”and“Dearest customers,your refined taste makes you bosom friends of mine.”

Recently,Mr.Light has been trying to make his indisputable literary genius widely known.Every week he posts in his restaurant the first line of a couplet, claiming that if anyone can write a satisfactory second line,he or she will enjoy a meal of four dishes and a soup...with a bottle of fine liquor on the house thrown in.Unfortunately our hero is never easily satisfied.Light is always fond of saying with humility,“I am not willing to be the number one poet in Chuansha County,but I have no choice.”

As the narrator of our hero’s story,I can say with all certainty that he is no celebrity,nor even a role model,but I envy him just the same for his wealth of colorful experiences,his unique lifestyle, his epicurean taste,and even his peculiar temperament.Of course I cannot say everybody loves him.But personally,I would give anything to enjoy a lifestyle as much of ease and leisure as he does.

Note:[1]A former county near Shanghai;now a part of Pudong New District, Shanghai.

[2]In the past decades,“People’s Sth.”has been a very common name for public facilities and state-owned business services.Of course,in People’s Republic of China,not only the restaurants belong to the people.

(FromYueshiquyan(Funny Words of Observing the World),China Renmin U-niversity Press.Translation:Wang Xiaoke.Illustration:Du Yueru.)