About a week after we had first moved to Xiangtan, I was wandering along the streets with Taalan, looking for the number-13/14 bus stop. Ruihong had brought us downtown once and expected me to remember everything I needed to know about getting around. We didn't know enough Chinese to even ask directions to the bus. I remember saying "13" to someone on the sidewalk, but the word came out as "30." He was baffled, and rightly so. Anyway, we strayed into a section of town where all the shops were stacked full with large bags of some kind of seed pod or dried fruit. The pods were about an inch-and-a-half long, tough, and slightly shriveled. They had a strong, dark, smoky aroma that pervaded the whole area. At one shop where some seed pods were laid out in a tray, I picked one up. The shopkeeper gestured for me to keep it. Curious, I started to taste it, but the man stopped me by waving his arms and saying sharply, "Bu, bu chi!" Even I could understand what he meant. Thus I can say that I've never tried betelnuts.
In China, betelnuts are called binglang; I don't know the literal translation. The seedpods grow on trees on the tropical island-province of Hainan, far to the south. They are picked, dried, and smoked, and an improbably huge percentage are shipped here to Hunan province. This is the binglang center of China, and binglang is a mainstay of the economy. In small factories, workers slice the binglang lengthwise into halves, remove the center, and package it for sale.
Most of the men in Hunan chew binglang. Young, old, workers, officials — it doesn't seem to matter. Many begin as early as primary school. They will tell you that it gives them energy and a warm feeling that helps to cut the winter chill. They say it's not at all addicting, but of course that's wrong. It's also bad for the gums and stains the teeth.
Anne says that even mothers give binglang to their pre-school children to warm them up. Many of the peasants and workers live in miserable conditions, with no hope of improving their lot. For them, binglang is a cheap high that helps them get through the drudgery of the day. Some brands are stronger than others, and the high can last for hours. In general, the stronger the buzz, the higher the price.
Binglang is commonly offered to guests, and is often served in restaurants when the tea is brought out. Some men who don't chew it actually carry some in their shirt or jacket pocket, so they can offer it when they meet someone. It is considered an act of friendship or courtesy; but it also serves as a subtle bribe. The same can be said for cigarettes. It's standard practice to offer one or more cigarettes, and I have no idea how many men I've insulted by refusing, however politely.
I've heard that more cigarettes are smoked in China than any other country, and my experience makes me a believer. China reminds me of America in the 1950's. Probably 80 percent of the men are regular smokers, and maybe half the women. Young men are especially susceptible to the challenge that you are not a man if you don't smoke. It's impossible to avoid heavy smoke in a restaurant or any public place. Signs prohibit smoking on the public buses, but few are deterred; often the driver is smoking.
Smoking is widespread in the countryside, but my experience is that the city dwellers smoke more heavily. It also is my impression that the magnitude of smoking has increased dramatically in recent years. Every shop offers 10 or 20 different brands. What will happen in 20 years when heart and lung disease and cancer take their toll? What is the health cost today? I doubt that the government has tried seriously to track it. After all, so many people already die from pneumonia or tuberculosis, or from diseases caused by air pollution, inadequate sanitation, or poor working conditions. It may be possible to overlook the health impact of cigarettes today, but not even the Chinese government will be able to ignore it forever. Of course, this problem is not limited to China. Most of the developing world faces the same difficulty.
If you have the impression that I disapprove of both binglang and cigarettes, you're right. I was surprised, therefore, to find out that our good friend Frank owns a binglang factory. He doesn't see much wrong with the practice and says that it provides jobs. The factory is jointly owned with his wife's relatives. About a year ago they moved the factory from an upstairs operation to an old warehouse. One day Frank invited me there to see the osmanthus blooming at his factory.
We took a taxi through an old neighborhood and got out where a gate opens through a long brick wall. A guard greeted us warmly and we walked into the compound. The two osmanthus trees were against the wall of one of the buildings. They weren't very large, only about four inches at the base and maybe 20 feet high, but Frank assured me that the trees grew very slowly. They were covered in tiny, pale-yellow blossoms that bore a faint but pleasant scent. Frank said that when he was a child, two very large trees grew outside his apartment and scented the whole neighborhood in autumn, but the Red Guards had cut them down during the Cultural Revolution. For him, those trees symbolized the beauty and natural innocence of China that had been destroyed.
Frank was justifiably proud of the binglang factory. It didn't look like much from the outside, but it was clean and well lighted within. Frank said I wouldn't find as clean a factory in all of Hunan, and he may be right. The binglang is boiled and laid our on wire racks to dry. Then they are dumped onto long tables, where young women slice the seed pods with a sharp cutting tool and discard the heart. Frank took me back to the lime area. I imagined that they flavored the binglang with lime juice, but it turns out they add mineral lime to the boiling pots. He said that most of the other factories added bad chemicals to their binglang, but that his brand added only lime. In fact, they advertised their brand as the pure and natural variety.
One large room held stacks upon stacks of bags. He usually deals directly with the growers, rather than buying from the downtown shops. Frank said that this room once had been a government storehouse for rice and was specially built to stay dry. The next room was even larger, and it held dozens of bunk beds. This is where all the young women live who work in the factory. Frank makes sure they are well cared for, provides hot water for showers, and feeds them well. He said they had all come from the countryside looking for work. If they hadn't found a regular job, they probably would have ended up in some form of prostitution. Here they have a curfew and are expected to save their money. He said he also paid them much better than at the other factories. He makes little off of the factory because he has chosen to do things the right way and treat people well. He said they made much less than other factory owners, but he was content, and I imagine he sleeps well at night.
We came back into the production area, and I saw where the binglang was vacuum-packed and boxed for distribution. I looked around and, yes, the young women looked happy and healthy, and the working environment was good.
On our way out we passed a carpenter making new drying racks from cheap wood and wire mesh. "That man is a wolf," Frank said. "He has a special appeal to girls from the countryside, and he has taken advantage of a few." "Well, why don't you get rid of him?" "I can't find another carpenter who works so well. You see that big stack of drying racks? He made all of those in one day. I keep him away from the girls as best I can, but two weeks ago there was some trouble with our cook. He found out that the carpenter had been romancing his wife, and he went after the carpenter with his cleaver. The carpenter ran out but the cook chased him. The carpenter grabbed his hammer on the way by and climbed into the top of a tree. The cook couldn't get at the carpenter, so he stood under the tree and waited. The carpenter didn't come down until after dinnertime."
A few weeks later I asked Frank how the carpenter was doing. "I had to let him go," Frank said, shaking his head in regret. "The wolf was just too dangerous."
Anne visited Frank's factory a few months later. He explained how the young women did the slicing and packing, and that a few young men did the heavy work. They were too young to be interested in women, Frank said. He told how he had brought a van-load of boys back from the countryside. The mothers had pushed their sons out of the fields and into the van, in order to secure a job for them. The mothers didn't even let them collect some belongings from their houses, for fear they would be left behind. And so they came, some shirtless, some barefooted, some muddy to their knees. Such is the prospect of a life in the countryside.
— I planned to write this in June 2002, but it was a full year before I actually sat
down to the task.
TL