Chapter 4 - Ancient Grave in the Mountains

Part 1

Even though it was called Inner Mongolia, it actually wasn't too far away from the Hei Long River. It was pretty close to the border of Mongolia. Most of the civilians here were Han people, and there were very few Mongolians. If you haven't been to Gang Gang Camp, then you'd never understand the hardship of living there. There was a total of six Educated Youths that had been assigned there. Four boys and two girls. When we arrived, we were all dumbfounded. All around us were long stretches of land. There wasn't a single tree in sight. If you walk out of the village, you won't see another person for a hundred miles. 

To top it off, this place didn't even have a decent highway. Much less any electricity. Even oil lamps were considered a privilege reserved for the government officials. Using a flashlight there was equivalent to living in the presidential suite. Those were luxuries we would have never imagined living without back in the city. At the time, we had thought that everywhere in the motherland had buildings with electricity and phone lines.

Back then, everything was a new experience for us. None of us had seen such a vast mountain before. It was also our first time feasting on the many different varieties of food grown there. The mountain nearby was rich and abundant with wild fruits and vegetables and we could fish in the river nearby, so filling our stomachs was never an issue. After we returned to the city, we heard that those who went to Shanxi province to cut in line complained about how truly miserable they were without a whiff of proper food for years. 

The lives of the Educated Youths were not too difficult. As the place heavily depended on the mountain for resources, we didn't have problems with growing many crops. Every summer night, we would take turns to go out to the field, and check up on the crops in fear of them being eaten by the wild animals. There wasn't a night where we didn't require a few people to sleep in the fields.

The amount of the crops grown in the mountain were unlike the wide green curtains found in the Northern China plains. Instead, they were planted all over the place. As long as there was a flat area of land available, there would be crops planted there. Because of this, we had to frequently roam large areas of land at night in order to guard the crops. Tonight happened to be the night where Fatty and I were partnered together. Fatty ended up sleeping in the hut so I went out to survey the area. There didn't seem to any trouble stirring so I decided to go back to sleep. 

Near the hut, I noticed a big round white figure close by. I had to rub my eyes a few times, just to make sure I wasn't seeing things. Unfortunately, it was too dark so I couldn't focus my eyes on the figure. During the time, I didn't believe in ghosts and thought it was some random animal so I picked up a stick, as I planned on chasing it away.

In the complete darkness, the glaringly white pile swayed slightly. Just what was it? It didn't look like an animal at all, but if it wasn't one, then why was it moving? The sky was pitch black and I didn't have a kerosene lamp to light up my surroundings, making it difficult to tell what it was. 

Although ghosts and monsters don't frighten me, the very thought of facing an unknown being still struck fear in my heart. The stick I held in my hand was actually a tree branch I had picked up from the ground. I didn't dare to whirl the stick at it. Instead, I gently poked it. It was very soft and squishy…. Suddenly, I heard Fatty let out a loud cry in the darkness, "Ah…….What the hell? Hu Ba Yi! What are you doing, poking my ass with a tree branch?"

False alarm. Apparently, Fatty had eaten some rotten fruits during the day giving him a stomachache later at night. He squatted to take a dump but his big white butt looked very conspicuous in the dark.

The next morning, Fatty mercilessly dogged me to compensate for scaring him to death. He even proclaimed that I managed to kill off over one million of his brain cells. So I shot back, "Are you even certain that you have that many brain cells in that big head of yours?  We are poor bachelors who received the highest order to come to the countryside to be re-educated by the poor and lower-middle class peasants. How, pray I ask, do you want me to compensate you? As your closest and most intimate war brother, I am informing you in advance that the pair of pants I'm wearing now is what's left of my entire family fortune. Are you implying that you want me to give it up?"

Fatty gave a wide grin and said that I didn't need to go that far. He had found a large hive in an old forest on Tuan Hill and suggested that we break it open and make some honey drinks from it. Not only that, we could even exchange it for rabbit meat from Swallow's father. 

Swallow was a girl whose father was a famous old hunter in the village. At the time, Fatty and I both stayed at her house, the Educated Youth Settlement. Both the father and the daughter frequent the mountains to hunt and would occasionally invite us to feast on game they had caught that day. Being constantly treated by them did make us feel bad, but we were too poor and we didn't have anything of value to pay them back. 

Fatty had discovered a hornet's nest so we agreed to extract the honey and give them to Swallow as a gift. Both of us had impulsive personalities and we were well known as the King of Mischiefs in the entire military. Poking a nest wasn't that much of an issue. We had done deals that were ten times worse than this. 

In fear of getting lost, I borrowed Swallow's hunting dog. It was almost fully grown and raised by Swallow herself. She named it Yellow Chestnut, and couldn't even bear the thought of bringing it hunting. The moment she saw that we wanted to go Tuan Hill to play, she lent her dog to us. 

At a glance, our village wasn't far from Tuan Hill, but since there weren't any roads leading there, we had to walk half a day through uneven terrain to get there. This part of the forest was enormous. The villagers had warned us not to go there in fear of the brown bears that we might encounter. In the village, a man who only had half a face left told us the tale of how he ran into a brown bear once when he was young. Luckily, Swallow and her father arrived in the nick of time, lit a fire and frightened the bear away, saving his life. However, the bear had already taken a huge lick out of the child's face. The bear's tongue was covered with sharp tiny barbs, removing a large portion of his flesh with that lick. There wasn't an eye or an ear to be found on the left side of his face. Even his nose and mouth were askew.  He was already forty years old and couldn't even find a decent wife. Whenever the old people of the village talked of him, they would always shed a few tears. 

Although we were bold, we didn't dare to rashly venture into the primeval forest. When Fatty went out to extract the pine seed oil with the villagers, he found out that the nest was located near the edge of the forest, on a large tree near the small stream.

But what we didn't expect to see was how huge the nest was. The size of the nest was even bigger than all the ones we had poked combined together. From afar, it looked like a calf without legs hanging from the tree, with a dark swarm of giant hornets surrounding it, buzzing loud enough to deafen the ears. 

So I said, "F*ck Fatty, you're cheating me aren't you, is this seriously a nest?  This is a downright hornet atomic bomb. What if it explodes into pieces?" Fatty replied, "Exactly, would I have called you over if it was a normal nest? If it was one, I could have easily taken care of it myself. So what do you think, are you up for it?"

I said, "This isn't a big deal. Our team is pretty much unbeatable. We weren't afraid of the American aircrafts and tanks, much less a couple of small bees! They are all just a bunch of paper tigers! F*ck it, we're definitely feasting on honey today."

Even though we joked about that, we still didn't dare act recklessly. If we made even a tiny mistake, the hornets would rain down and sting us to death. These hornets were huge and without a doubt, poisonous. Just a couple of stings and we'd be as good as dead. Fortunately, as if help had arrived from heaven, there was a river right beside it. I first broke a biscuit in half and fed Yellow Chestnut with one piece and let it run as far as it could. Then, we quickly donned military coats we brought along, put on the hat, tied a scarf around our necks, and slipped on gloves. We also covered the front of our hat with a silk towel that we borrowed from one of the female Educated Youths. After making sure none of our flesh was exposed in the open, Fatty went around and found two hollow reeds in which he gave one to me and kept another for himself. It was so that we could use it for breathing underwater when we jumped into the river to protect ourselves from the hornets' attack later. 

Once we were done, we looked like two bloated bears and we staggered to the base of the tree. In my hands, I held a pile of winter grass and matches to be well-prepared for the situation. Fatty held onto a long pole and counted, "One, two, three." The moment he counted to three, he aggressively poked the area where the nest and the tree bark met. He managed to poke it for about four to five times before the giant nest dropped to the ground with a loud thud. Countless hornets inside immediately fled the nest and formed a dark buzzing mass shrouding the sky over our heads. 

We were adequately prepared and did not need to worry about the hornets attacking. I quickly used the match to light the winter grass on fire, and placed it next to the gap in the nest. The giant hornets fled from the hive and flew around aimlessly the moment the smoke enveloped them. They couldn't make heads or tails of where they were flying. Using soil, Fatty and I built a wall around the dried leaves, to prevent the fire from spreading further. 

Those that were not enveloped by the smoke had already recognized their target, and quickly flew towards us. At that moment, I felt like hailstones were heavily raining down on me. Not daring to stop, I hurriedly ran towards the nearby stream with Fatty.  The stream wasn't deep, only having a depth of less than a meter. We dove to the bottom of the stream, and washed the hornets on our bodies away. I held onto my hat with one hand to prevent it from being lost to the currents. With my free hand, I took out the reed and used it to breathe from underwater.

We waited for a long while before we dared to poke our heads out of the water, only to find the hornets had drowned or passed out from the smoke. There were no longer any dangers. Even though it was midsummer, the stream in the mountain was still icy cold to the point I shivered.  It took me a while and with much difficulty to climb back on shore. While I laid with my back pressed against the rocks trying to catch my breath, I felt an incredible sense of relief as the sunlight over my head warmed my body. 

In the end, Fatty also couldn't take it anymore, so he unsteadily climbed back onto shore. Suddenly, halfway through climbing, he yelped in pain, jerking his arm back to examine it. It was bloody and he had no idea what had cut him. 

Hurriedly, I went down to the middle of the brook to support him. Fatty covered his wound tightly with his hand and said, "Be careful, there's a broken bowl. It fucking cut me."

There wasn't anyone living nearby so why was there a broken bowl? My curiosity raised, I stripped myself naked and dived topless into the stream. My hands felt around underwater and found half of a broken bowl in the place where Fatty got cut. Judging from the pattern and the design of the bowl, it looked like one of the Northern Song Dynasty's blue and white porcelain from my grandfather's collection back then.

My grandfather's antiques and paintings were destroyed by the Red Guards during the Destroy the Four Olds political movement. Never would I imagined that I could find such antique relics lying deep within the old forest. It certainly brought back nostalgia. But unfortunately, these things didn't mean much to me so I raised my hand and flung the broken bowl far into the forest. 

Fatty stripped himself of his wet clothes as well and wrapped the cut on his hand shoddily before jumping into the brook again. We took a bath and later on, dried our clothes, shoes and socks on the cobblestone by the brook. Letting out a yawn, I called for Yellow Chestnut to return.  

The sight of Yellow Chestnut running back came into my view from afar. Its mouth was biting onto a fat grey rabbit. I had no idea how did the unlucky rabbit even ran into Yellow Chestnut and ended up in the hunting dog in-training's mouth. When I saw the wild rabbit, I hugged Yellow Chestnut and rolled around the ground in happiness. It was a great dog, so to reward him, I fed him a big chunk of honey taken from the hive. 

Fatty said, "When we head back, let's get a couple of puppies for ourselves. We can have all the rabbit meat we want everyday."

I replied, "Keep on dreaming. Even if there're a lot of rabbits in the mountain, they couldn't even hold up with your fierce eating habit. Stop talking nonsense. I'm honestly getting a bit hungry. You prepare the rabbit quickly while I'll go and get some branches to make fire with." 

Fatty washed and skinned the rabbit by the brook as I made a bonfire with the bundle of pine branches I found. We glazed the skinned rabbit with a good amount of honey, and roasted it on a rack over the bonfire. Not long after, the fragrant smell of roasted honey rabbit meat filled the air entirely. I sliced the rabbit's head and fed it to the dog and had a great time sharing the remaining rabbit meat in half with Fatty. All those years I had never once eaten such an aromatic meal. I was this close to swallowing my finger as I ate. Although we didn't have any oil and salt to season it with, glazing it with honey and using pine branch to roast it was able to give the meat a more natural and distinctive flavoring. One could never dream of eating such a good food in their entire lifetime if one only lived in the city. The lives of the Educated Youth had always been full of happiness and suffering. Outcasted by society into the remote mountain area, we lost something dear to us and yet at the same time, we also learned a lot of things that couldn't be learnt in the city. Looks like there're things in life that simply cannot be measured by how much one had gained and lost. 

Bloated from the food, we noticed the sky was already getting dark. Our clothes were also almost dried. Each of us stood on both ends of the thick branch which we penetrated the large nest with, and sang a revolutionary song as we proceeded to carry it back to the village. "The sky and the earth are vast~ But they're not as vast as our determination~ Father and mother~ But they're not as affectionate as our communist party~ " It was truly the moment where everyone would sing the victory song amidst the clashes of the golden metal. The only thing that wasn't harmonious was the sound of Yellow Chestnut happily yipping among our loud and vocal singing voice. The atmosphere reminded me of a scene in a horror movie where the ghosts entered the village. 

After returning to the village, we saw that the number of people around had decreased so I asked Swallow, "Swallow, where did your dad and the others go?"

While helping us carry the hive, Swallow answered, "Cha Gan Ha River is flooded and Lin Yang's logs were soaked because of it. The majority went over to help move the logs in the afternoon. Zhi Shu asked me to inform you guys to look after the crops diligently. Don't stir up trouble! They can only come back after seven or eight days."

I always hated hearing others preach to me not to cause any trouble and make it seemed like I am a natural born troublemaker myself. So I retorted to Swallow, "Has Zhi Shu been drinking till he's muddled again? What trouble can we cause? We're good kids of Chairman Mao's." 

Swallow laughed and said you two won't be stirring up any trouble? Ever since Educated Youths like you come here from the city, the hens couldn't even lay eggs in peace anymore. 

The other two male Educated Youths who came with us also went to help out at Lin Yang's. Only the two of us, Fatty and me along with two other female Educated Youths were left behind. We didn't get sent to help out at Lin Yang's because we had went out to play. Feeling very lucky, I pour the honey into jars and managed to fill up about a dozen of them. Swallow had informed us that the remaining honeycomb can be made into a dish and she would be cooking stir-fried venison and honeycomb tonight. 

When Fatty heard the word 'food', he was extremely happy. He said our lives now were similar to celebrating the new year since we just had roast rabbit for lunch and now, we're going to have stir-fried venison and honeycomb for dinner. My saliva almost overflowed from the thought. Swallow asked where did we get the roast rabbit? I told her about what happened and she gasped in surprise. She told us not to fool around anymore as it was dangerous to even roast rabbit meat by the forest since we could easily lure the bears out.  

Gradually, it finally hit us as we listened to what she said. What a close call. We were extremely lucky that the bear was probably fast asleep so it couldn't smell the aroma of the roast meat. While helping Swallow light a fire, I told her about how Fatty's hand got injured by a broken bowl in the stream. Why would a desolated place like that would have a Song Dynasty's blue and white porcelain? 

Swallow said that it wasn't news at all. When the young ladies of their village get married, their family would use a couple of vases and pots as dowry. All of them were actually fished from the river itself. 

The more I listened, the more weird it felt. Antiques could be fished from a river? Swallow showed me the two porcelains she took out from under her bed. "They didn't grow in the river. They were washed over via the currents upstream. The headstreams of the rivers near the village are all located at Lama Gou's Niu Xin Mountain. I heard from the elders that in the mountain, there's a tomb where the Empress Dowager of Liao or Jin Dynasty was buried and a lot of good things were buried with her. A bunch of people went and searched for her tomb but it's always either they couldn't find it or they got lost in Lama Gou and never returned. The forest in Lama Gou is too dense. My father claimed he had seen savages appearing there. Some even said Niu Xin Mountain is haunted. Anyways, nobody dared to venture there anymore. "

Night had fallen as we talked to each other. After Swallow finished preparing the meals, Fatty went to invite the other two female Educated Youths for dinner. In the end, Fatty came running back as soon as he went with one of the female Educated Youths named Wang Juan.