Big Nose with Cash

While giving my sister Mary moral support and assistance during Hannah’s adoption, I inadvertently committed a few cultural transgressions. I’ll reveal them, going from least to worst, today and tomorrow.

[This is the third post about adopting my niece. To read the first post, click here. To read the previous part, click here.]

The day before the Chinese orphans arrived in Nanjing, the US adoption agency had arranged a field trip to Dr. Sun-Yat Sen’s nearby memorial, set in the Zhong Mountain Scenic Area. The site is spectacular and includes the Zhengqi Pavilion, a museum, and a vast, lush park complete with botanical gardens.

Sun-Yat Sen (1886-1925) studied in Hawaii, earned a western MD, and initiated a proto-democracy in China after the fall of the Qing dysnasty. The site described him as the father of the Chinese Republic, ending 2000 years of feudal monarchy. He promoted nationalism, democracy, and equality. Not included in the memorial’s literature, but generally known: Things grew more complicated with the rise of Chiang-Kai Chek and China revolted and turned to Communist. Sun-Yat Sen’s memorial outside Nanjing, nonetheless, exists as China’s Holy Land for many people world-wide.

First we visited the octagonal museum, which displays sculptures of the great man and compatriots on the first floor. Nanjing in July is much hotter and more humid than I’ve ever experienced in New York City or Chicago. So we wandered upstairs, through the museum’s second floor, which is kept cool to preserve its collections of pearls, gold, and jade.

Unlike museum gift shops in New York, the stuff on sale wasn’t separated from the displays, at least not obviously enough for me. And the art, porcelain and jewelry  there was so exquisite compared to the Chinese items I’ve seen in New York as to make the best of what arrives in our country seem cartoonish.

While Mary studied the gold, a metal that has never interested me for some reason, I marveled at the jade. It appeared in every green imaginable as well as brown, white, lavender, and black. Two women (this should have tipped me off but didn’t) stood in the center of a circular showcase and asked which color I preferred. Some of the green bracelets were gorgeous and I said so. Before knew it, another woman appeared. The threesome used all their strength to fold my hand in half, wrap it in Saran Wrap and slather a special lotion over it. Oddly, I still wasn’t putting it together. Who knows what I fixated on instead?

With their triple strength and much groaning—from these demure Chinese women, not me—they slowly worked a green bracelet onto my wrist.

The straining noises alerted Mary, who rushed over in distress. “Kathleen! What are you doing?”

“They say it looks ‘auspicious’ on me.” But I told her not to worry. If they had squeezed it on; they could squeeze it off. The idea repelled her.

“I guess I’ll have to buy it for you.” I protested; she was being silly. We argued a while and then I acquiesced. She and the women dickered over the price for nearly half an hour and it still cost $200. Five years ago. When US currency still had—currency.

Pure jade must be among the strongest stones. Five years later, the bracelet remains unmarred on my wrist. If it were silver and twice this thick, it would have snapped long ago. I’m famously clumsy, always running, and I fall hard. Yet the bracelet is as beautiful as ever.

After this, Mary chose to stay in the cool museum while Tom and I ran up and down the mausoleum’s 392 steps. About half-way, a cobalt and gold prayer pagoda showed a marble carving of Dr. Sun Yat Sen lying atop a marble coffin far below the viewers. The ceiling tiles high above achieved their own unique art.

All along the steps, vendors sold beaded hats, playing cards, and plastic drinking glasses with blond bathing beauties in bikinis that disappeared.

At the top, outside the tomb, a vendor sold turquoise enamel pins (about the size of two mini-Post-It strips) with Chinese characters spelling Peace to the Whole World. The enamel was thick, bright, and glossy, and the rough backing perfect for a denim jacket. Three cents, the vendor said.

Yes, I knew bartering was required. But I just didn’t have it in me to propose two cents for the pin. The woman was bent, had gray hair, and few teeth. And in my pocket I had a bill that approximated five dollars. So thinking only what great souvenirs the pins would make, I blithely offered her the bill for 20 pins. So what if I was giving her ten times the cost she’d proposed? The pins were worth 25 cents easily.

Unfortunately, my estimation of worth was wrong. The vendor screamed at me. She cursed in Chinese, but—no interpretation need—her words damned me to hell. Howling, the woman shut down her kiosk. She spit and cried and howled and jabbed her finger at me. 

Janice, our guide, hurried to the scene. Now what had I done?

The woman accused me, and Janice took her hand. They walked together in circles, while Janice explained that I had not put a hex on her and her family for 20 years to come.   

Me? A hex? Janice and the poor vendor stopped and took me in, head to toe. How could I, a typical big nose with cash know how to hex anyone? I was profligate and stupid, that’s all.

Still, the vendor remained closed for the day. I didn’t dare see if other vendors were selling the same pin. I didn’t even get to see the tomb. Janice had already called everyone together. We walked down the step 392 steps as a group and got onto the bus.

(Click here to read the conclusion.)