英文小说：A Shadow in Surfers Paradise(49)天堂之影

洋八路

Chapter 49      1/2




‘It is all right, it was only a few hours anyway,’ Bing soothed Jason, who came to Bing’s room early next morning. ‘By the way, why didn’t you go to the restaurant last night?’

‘The factory received an urgent order late in the afternoon, and my boss asked me to stay for it.’

‘I reckon Bob might have known the work would be all finished in time even without you. Actually the shift was completed an hour early,’ Bing was thinking of the one-hour bonus, ‘but Bob is nice to still pay for all the six hours.’

‘He is a nice guy, isn’t he?’

‘Yes. I am just wondering when the next race will be.’

‘Usually once in two or three months,’ Jason replied. ‘You know, Bing, you look too much like a teacher, with your glasses on, and your slim build. The employers of those shops prefer people who appear more like rough and tough labourers.’

‘But I can’t change this, can I? Or taking off my glasses during the interview?’ Bing grinned ruefully.

‘Well, you don’t have to, but you can shape a bit up to that impression, probably by your clothes or the way to talk. Just make yourself look like a person who has done the type of job before. They need experienced people.’

‘I used to do a lot of hard work in my village. I am not averse to hard labour.’

‘Then, why not put those experiences in your resume? Better not list your teaching experience in it. It would only reduce your chance of being considered suitable. And, now that you have had three days of dish washing experience, you need to emphasize this, and even inflate the number of days. Looking for a job is a battle, the first thing is to get yourself a ticket into the field. Trying to put your own foot in the shoes of a restaurant employer, what kind of person do they want? And also, your English is good, why don’t you try Chinatown. They usually need waiters with good English.’

‘Really? So far I have only tried around here,’ a new hope came to light, ‘I may try that, and also how about factory jobs?’

‘I will let you know of the opportunity if it becomes available,’ said Jason, ‘but I think the working hours in a restaurant are more suitable to a new student like you, who could only afford late afternoon and evening. Most factories are located in remote suburbs; the transportation is not as easy as in the case of restaurants.’
...
When Bing got up a while later, he felt fresh enough. The two hours of sleep he had had since he arrived home at five thirty in the morning had done him good. Although his muscles were still sore, they were not as impotently numbed as he had felt during the first two days. The only thing that was worse, as he now realized while washing his face, was the skin of his hands, which grew excessively sensitive to the water and the soap. It was as if his hands had been chafed on a grindstone for a long time, with its skin thinning so much that contact with any liquid, especially soap, burned directly into the flesh. Using gloves in dish-washing was of course an option, but nobody used them, because it would cause slowness and clumsiness. Therefore during the seventeen hours his hands had been either soaked in detergent or half scorched by the heated plates and dishes as they were removed from the washing machine. In fact, two or three times the stack of plates had nearly slipped from his hands, and the sort of horror he had felt left him on the point of collapse.

But still, it was splendid to imagine that, within just three days, he had earned more than half of his equivalent, monthly salary back in China. Compared to what his mother and the other villagers had to labour for their harvest, which was unbelievably meagre if valued in monetary terms, his pain was negligible, next to nothing.

So, based on Jason’s advice, he added in his resume a new, emboldened line of his dish washing experience. He didn’t omit the one about his background as an English teacher, for his better English might still attract the eyes of certain employers. Then with the updated resume, he expanded his endeavour into the restaurants in Chinatown, as well as many other transportation-friendly suburbs. And one week later, he received a call from a restaurant in Richmond that they urgently needed a kitchen hand.

He went, and although he was inexperienced, the desperate owner offered him the job. It was three days a week, five hours from 5pm to 10pm, $8 per hour.

Of course it was busy. Confined in the small kitchen, he had to cut all type of materials, speedily. Hardly prepared for the role, he felt like a hapless swan who has fallen onto a ground full of little, filthy chickens, wondering who and where he is, and how he is supposed to walk and talk. Instead of proactively doing his job, he had to be called and reminded by the cook to take on each of the little tasks: moving this, cleaning that, cutting this, mixing that. When the cook, who was getting more and more impatient if not angry, showed him how to do the variety of things, he must have appeared more like a hypocritical Chinese cadre who had come down to a workplace to conduct a hands-free, puppet-like inspection, except that he was the one being humiliated and degraded. His consciousness of being a person, being a respectable intellectual, was smarting, so hard that he felt that he was the most useless person in the world.

The second day, after a round of self-meditation, self-criticism; after despising the non-proletarian ideology which had been so belittled by Chairman Mao; after scolding the absurd pride instilled somehow into his brain since he had plucked his feet out of the rice-field, he trusted his hands, his body and soul were more readily aligned to the job nature of a Kitchen Hand. As a ‘rough’ hand, he was only dealing with meat, mushrooms, cabbages, tomatoes, potatoes, onions, and everything else of which fineness and exquisiteness for a dish were not so much necessary. Compared to dish-washing, which, by its constant strain and detergent blanching, laid a severe test for one’s skin and muscles, the Kitchen Hand required a greater force of one’s arm; its skill also doubtlessly a level higher. In fact, every time the master cook did the delicate food preparation, such as cutting a turnip or a carrot into the thin and fine, noodle-shaped pieces, Bing was so amazed at his quickness and precision that he honestly desired that one day he would accomplish such excellent mastery with a chopper.
Therefore, though his waist and arms were still sore, he found there was a measure of interest if not passion in his new work. There was only one appalling experience that was when he cut the onions, of which arid pungency was so irritating his eyes that the tears wouldn’t stop streaming. His sight would then be obscured, hindering his productivity; and his glasses being blurred, he had to take them off, wiping them with his hand, or his sleeves, or his pants.   

He worked there nearly three weeks, when he received another call from Chinatown that a kitchen hand was also needed. Although the rate was the same, the new offer was for six days a week, six hours a day, from 4pm to 10pm. The income would double his current amount.

The interview, perhaps benefiting from his mature looking and teacher-like smile and more importantly his new confidence acquired through his recent work experience, was successful. He exulted over the victory and immediately called to resign from his current employer. On the train back to Box Hill, his mind, assisted by his finger drawing on his palm, was calculating again and again the total sum of his upcoming earnings. 6 hours times 6 days times 8 dollars equals $288 a week, then times 4 weeks was $1152 a month, then times exchange rate 6 came up a staggering result of somewhere about 7000 Yuan. Oh, what the hell! This was a number amounting to six months of his salary in China. He knew he was allowed to work only 20 hours a week with his student visa, but he had to survive first, and, among his hard working classmates and roommates, he hadn’t yet heard of anyone being caught by the authority. He would be okay, so long as he could catch up on his studies and not fail any subjects. Otherwise, it would be a real disaster, for the cost incurred repeating a subject was so damned high that a large chunk of his hard-earned currency would be gone, let alone the time that would also be wasted.

But he should not fail; he was once a teacher, as well as many years a student. He must find a balance in handling a number of things.   

Thus, beginning the following Monday, every afternoon after class during the week he made an immediate journey to Chinatown; and every Saturday, after gaining a whole morning of sweet sleep, he went for his afternoon shift. Sunday was the only day he was free of work, which was employed exclusively for doing his assignments.

After two weeks of accommodating to his new pattern of life, the way of juggling his study and work and meals, as well as the rest, collected from both in the bed and on the train, had reached a nice equilibrium. He made phone calls to China, informing his parents and Qiuyan and his sister that he had found a job in Chinatown, what kind of job he didn’t specify, but of which pay he said to be 7000 Yuan equivalent a month. In their responses he sensed the triumph and joy no less than he had expected. This was indeed his only good news since he had landed in Australia.




--To Next Post ---

洋八路

Chapter 49      2/2




Later in the year, he moved to a unit located on Whitehorse Road, just a few blocks away from the one on Bank Street. It had six people in a two-bedroom unit, four boys in one room, two girls in the other. Needless to say, the rooms were much cleaner and better maintained. The weekly rent was $55, five dollars more than his previous rent. Furthermore, each boy agreed to pay five dollar extra to the two girls who would assume the role of housekeeping, and also of cooking on some occasions.   

The six members of the new society were joyful, less stressed and worried, for unlike the new starters who had to struggle through the first phase of putting down roots, all of them had established a life with relatively sufficient income earned one way or another. Almost every Sunday, which was the only day Bing had the chance to have supper at home, was a time of bachelor-style gathering. The two girls would collect the money from their male roommates, and drag at least one of them to go shopping and return home with chicken feet or wings, or beef or lamb at a special price.

Beer was expensive, but it didn’t prevent them from indulging themselves with it once a week. And in respect of the cost share for the beer, Bing had a slight advantage, for he was often rewarded with beer after helping his roommates with their essay assignments.

‘Cheers, Wang Teacher,’ toasted David, from Hangzhou, on a Sunday evening, when Michael was on a night shift and only five of them were around the dinner table. ‘Thank you for your help.’

‘My pleasure,’ Bing said, gleefully, ‘thank you for your VB.’

There were a pack of six bottles of VB. David bought four, two of which were supposed to be his token of thanks to Bing; Joe, who studied in Monash University, bought the other two. The two girls said they didn’t like drinking, but Bing suspected they just wanted to be frugal. When every dollar had to be earned with the wear and tear of one’s own hands, with the soreness so sensational in bones and muscles, the notion of expense was curiously changed and money was given a new judgement of value. The food, the beer, and the chicken feet and wings, everything that needed to be purchased seemed to weigh heavier, becoming more valuable and more measurable in one’s economic eyes. Most Chinese knew a poem by Lishen, a Tang Dynasty poet, which bespoke the hardship of peasants in growing rice.  

‘Hoeing in the height of sun,
Sweat drops into the soil;
Who says the grains on the plate,
Is not each the toil.’

So, with each sip he was having at dinner, he felt the hardship of earning it. Indeed, in the moments of his excitement affected by the beer, he imagined the bending of David’s back, moving the cartons up and down the racks in a supermarket. Suddenly, a feeling of shame intruded into his mind:  how could he enjoy so carelessly and guiltlessly this liquid, a product of David’s labour? A little bit of help he gave them, and ungenerously expected compensation! Ah, since when, and how was he reduced to such meanness?

Impulsively he fished out a fifty dollar note from his wallet, and said to Joe, expansively, ‘Joe, I am very happy today, and want to drink a bit more, can you run down the street and buy two packs of VB for us?’

‘What? Two packs, 12 bottles?’ Joe was wide-eyed, so was David’s. The mouths of the girls were also gaping for explanation.

‘Well, such small bottles,’ his hand was caressing the surface of the short, fat and dark bottle, his eyes frowning, casting a scornful glance at the label, ‘and today I want all of us, including Jessica and Sue, to drink.’

A guffaw broke out; his graciousness and his assuring tone as a teacher had aroused their enthusiasm.

‘Okay, I’ll go.’ Joe rose and turned on his heels and dashed out.

But in a while, Bing through of something. ‘Joe, wait, wait,’ Bing went to the window and called, ‘Joe…’

Joe, who had just slipped out of the building, looked up, ‘What?’

‘Can you also get two bags of peanuts?’

‘All right.’

‘Thanks.’

Joe was in his early twenties, from Beijing, with a thin and short and bony physique as lithe as a cat. In less than fifteen minutes he was back, his hands full, as cheerful as if he had just won a handsome quantity from a poker machine. Bing had heard of the Melbourne Crown Casino, where quite a number of Chinese students were said to have gambled their little resources into wretchedness, becoming no better than a beggar on the street. Some day he would definitely pay a visit to the Crown Casino, but only acting like a discreet tourist, never playing his hard-earned dollars through the ‘Tiger Machine’.   

‘Joe, the peanuts are raw,’ said David, ‘you should have bought the cooked ones.’

‘Really? Sorry, I thought they are ready to eat.’  

‘Easy, let’s fry them in the wok.’ Jessica got up, intending to cook it at once.

‘Wait, Jessica,’ Bing said. ‘Do you know you can also fry the peanuts in a microwave?’

‘Microwave? No, never heard of it.’

‘It is nearly the same, but quicker,’ Bing twisted the cap of a bottle in his hand and sipped and explained, ‘put the peanuts onto a platter, mix them well with oil and salt, and within three minutes of cooking, it will be done.’

However, seeing the uncertainty in her eyes, Bing rose from the chair, and, not forgetting to bring his beer with him, went together with Jessica into the kitchen. There, after putting down his VB on the bench, he took out a platter from the overhead cabinet, and poured the peanuts to fill half full the platter. Then, he sprinkled oil and salt on the top and used a pair of chopsticks to mix the contents until each peanut a thin sheen. This done to his satisfaction, he opened the door of the microwave, and placed the plate into the chamber.   

He set three minutes, pressed the start button; the machine began its job.

He clasped the VB, and drank. Now and again he would peer at the glass door, listen contentedly to the hiss and crackle of the peanuts.  

‘Wang Teacher,’ Jessica, who had been closely studying his cooking skill, found a chance to talk, ‘Where did you learn to fry peanuts this way?’

‘In Jiaoda, when I was in the mood for drinking,’ his voice had a good measure of pride. ‘I don’t like the cold, cooked peanuts purchased from the shop. I prefer the hot ones, just out of the wok. One day an idea came to me that using the microwave might be handy and less time consuming, without the trouble of using a wok,’ he paused to sip the beer. ‘So, I did an experiment like a scientist, working out the amount of oil and salt, as well as the length of cooking time for the best result.’

Just then a loud crackling in the microwave attracted his attention. Like a girl doing window-shopping, he turned to look through the microwave door at the slowly moving plate, his mind digesting the hot flavour of the sizzling nuts.

When he turned back to resume his conversation with Jessica, he caught her thoughtful eyes gazing at him, with a meaning he was inclined to interpret as admiration. Curiously he held her gaze a second longer than the eye contact average between friends. To his amazement, he thought he detected her blush.

The awareness of the brief exchange made her quickly move her eyes from his. And, just in time, the microwave was beeping, perhaps giving them both an excuse to dismiss whatever had just occurred between them.

He opened the door, and for a moment of distraction, forgot the burning temperature of the plate and touched it with his bare hand. He flinched, flinging his fingers with a low cry. Jessica, expressing more than the legitimate share of care to an ordinary roommate, stepped over, extending her hand to hold his with audible concern, ‘Are you burned? Are you okay?’
‘It is all right,’ he withdrew his hand from her, gingerly, not to show the haste of doing so. ‘No big deal, see, no colour or bruise; the contact was less than a second.’

Jessica then used a rag to handle the plate and, followed by Bing, went out of the kitchen to continue their little banquet. As soon as she put down the plate onto the table, David’s impatient fingers set pecking at the peanuts. Immediately Bing warned him, ‘Hang on, David, it is extremely hot. Let it cool for at least a minute.’

‘Hehe, it looks good, smells excellent,’ David’s eagerness was apparent in his eyes.  

Bing sat down, and opened two more bottles, passed one to Jessica, another to Sue, ‘Hehe, today, don’t say the negative.’ In a while, five bottles, as one of the happiest Chinese formalities, collided together into a single clank, loud enough to cheer up all the spirits and even the lingering ghosts if any in the room. It was such a feast of beer in the city of Melbourne. Jessica had finished two; Sue, a very slow drinker had one, and three men equally snatched up all the rest. In absolute terms, the total amount of liquid in five small bottles that each male member had taken was only equivalent to that of three bigger ones in China. But just the same, they enjoyed wonderfully their little intoxication. And Jessica, as if still affected by the minor incident in the kitchen, was coloured even more, and seemed to exercise some vague, covert but pointed expression towards him, either in her words or by wordless eye contact. Bing didn’t believe he had in any way encouraged her in her directed, half-flirting efforts, excepting that he would, politely and plainly, respond to her glance by his glance, to her toast by his toast. But the sober state didn’t last long before he began to wonder if he had already slid into a seductive mood and lost his control over his libido’s exertion, which had been quite rare since he landed in the country.

Jessica, no more than twenty-five, was from Suzhou, where more beautiful women were said to be possibly bred than other parts of China. But she might be an exception; she was not up to the definition of beauty in his mind; he didn’t even think she was better looking than the average; her brows and lips were both too thick. However Jessica had a good skin, unblemished, smooth, youthful, fresh and kissable, especially when she had a colour like that, although she hadn’t seemed to have attracted him at all until this very evening.

Yes, at this moment, she showed her best charm; her eyes seemed to be opening wider, with a spark of light twinkling more frequently. And the lock of her hair on her forehead that she had fondled all the evening was lustrous and slender. People said a woman falling in love was always beautiful. Was it possible Jessica was showing love for him?

‘Well, no…’ the thought of love seemed to scare him a trifle, and he had to absorb a larger amount of beer to guise his romantic musing, which in spite of himself didn’t stop, ‘but she is a girl, face and skin kissable, and she has a pair of breasts, not big, nor small, and she has the… well…’

His fancy had peaked at this very point, yet his physicality had just begun to stir, to stretch harshly in his vault. ‘Oh, such a thing,’ he cursed fervently his stray conscience, wishing to subdue its creepy activity.

Then his fancy, having overcome the first peak, climbed again to the next. He grasped a handful of peanuts, and pondered them for a second in his hands, and then two at a time throwing them into his mouth, that had to be escorted by a mouthful of drink. Neither he looked at the others around the table, nor did he attend to their words.

At its extremity, he moved his legs to relax a man’s desire. At this point of time he looked at Jessica again, checking a moment her features, her eyes, her nose, and her lips, then he dissuaded himself. ‘No, no, this is impossible, I can’t make love with her. She is not the type...’

He then decided to discipline both his soul and body, and thanking paradise, he had succeeded in cooling it substantially, after many mouthfuls of the chill and bitter VB. And towards the end of the banquet, he thought he was sober, callously receiving more of her coquettish exhibition for him.

On Saturday morning of the following week, by chance Bing and Jessica were alone in the unit. Jessica was displaying her charm again, talked to him, asked him in an intimate way about the universal troubles of learning English, and left her door ajar after throwing a meaningful look in his direction. What could he do? There was indeed an urge to jump and lay his body on top of her. But, no, this was ridiculous, this was utterly against his conscientious capital; this was a sort of beast, a sort of condemned infidelity, an absolutely ghastly conduct which would be definitely jeered at by his wife, who had a much better face, much better fingers, long, slender and fantastic. And also - now somehow Vivian was stealing into his mind - how would she laugh at him? What a contempt would her speaking and enchanting eyes throw at him? Ah, you are such a man!



-- End of Chapter 49 --

Gone

呵呵。。好挣扎啊。。

洋八路

Gone 发表于 2014-7-5 00:36
呵呵。。好挣扎啊。。

你希望他们成还是不成？

Gone

呵呵。。斌的思想已经不忠。。事实上的成与不成其实已不重要了。。

洋八路

Gone 发表于 2014-7-6 00:39
呵呵。。斌的思想已经不忠。。事实上的成与不成其实已不重要了。。

说的极是...

不过探讨一下有没有思想不出轨的，思想出轨但行为不出轨的，行为出轨但思想没出轨的，思想和行为都不出轨的....

一个男尤其是女，在听音乐看影视剧，感动了，她为什么感动？有没有一点小幻觉，身如其境，感觉爱和被爱？这个时候她老公在哪里？....;

Gone

前面探讨得问题很好。。不过举的例子走弯路了。。彼时的感动很多时候与爱无关。。或者说与狭义的爱情无关。。。
女人是情感的动物。男人是情欲的动物。所以女人是比男人高级的动物。。呵呵一己之见。。。

大山

洋八路 发表于 2014-7-4 20:22
Chapter 49      2/2

太好了

Plim

感谢分享