The People’s Republic of Desire

35 City Girls and Country Girls

I go to an impoverished countryside to report on female hygiene and birth control methods. The women I interview talk to me about such exciting topics as rural abortions, improvised tampons, and child abandonment. Let's just say that, upon my return, I have a newfound appreciation for the conveniences of modern city life.

When I get back home, I invite Beibei, Lulu, and CC to my house to catch up over afternoon tea. The trip has opened my eyes to a harsh world beyond the neon lights of Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. I want to talk about everything I have seen – the poverty and the daily struggle for survival of the people in the country. With all of China 's sweeping changes and economic reforms, the suffering of the poor is something that is often overlooked by the more successful city dwellers. Whether city people choose to ignore the poverty of their countrymen or whether they simply don't know about it depends on whom you ask.

Under the pagoda tree in the courtyard of my home, neither Beibei nor Lulu asks about my trip to rural China. They are too busy talking city-girl talk: men, parties, men, bars, men, celebrities, men, men, men.

"There are so many nice Chinese girls that Chinese men can choose from. But girls' choices are so limited. I'd definitely want to be born a man in my next life, or if I can't be that lucky, at least make me a lesbian," Beibei says while drinking her usual Lipton.

Lulu sips the two-thousand-yuan-per-pound oolong tea from Taiwan and sighs dramatically. "We modern girls just don't fit the traditional idea of Chinese women that Chinese men have stuck in their minds. We're too independent, too strong-willed, too well-educated."

"Perhaps China just has a shortage of men," says CC.

I see this as a good opportunity and finally speak out. "No, actually, it's the other way around. Chinese men far outnumber Chinese women – the disproportion is far greater than in most other countries."

"So where are all these men then?" Lulu asks skeptically, but she is unable to hide her enthusiasm.

Apparently, my friends are as naive about the world outside the big cities as I was before my recent trip. I direct the conversation toward my experiences in the countryside. "Many of them are in the countryside."

"Oh, yeah." Beibei nods. "Those peasants need sons to do all the hard labor on the land, and traditionally, girls leave their family to join their husband's family when they are married anyway. Boys earn you money and girls cost you money, so of course everyone wants sons instead of daughters."

Lulu pipes up. "How could I forget about the peasants? China has eight hundred million of them! Everybody here originally came from a peasant family. I guess we city people forget about our roots from time to time. It's too bad!" Lulu speaks half-jokingly, although she senses that they are about to receive a lecture from me about the plight of rural China.

I say, "Although girls do make money for their families in one way: because women are so scarce, the groom has to pay a lot of money to the bride and her family for the wedding. The poorest ones sometimes have to save money until they are in their fifties and they still end up wifeless. Some families have to marry off their daughters in order to get the money to pay for their sons' weddings. In some extreme cases, two brothers have to share the same wife!"

"Polyandry? I read about it from Ma Jian's novella Show the Coating on Your Tongue. I thought it was only practiced in some Tibetan and Nepalese communities," Lulu cuts in. "So unlike us, who can't even find ourselves one man to marry, these peasant women can easily find a husband – or two! Why, it sounds almost too good to be true!"

"Don't be silly," I scold her. "Their lives aren't that easy. Many husbands in the countryside beat their wives. The wives are exploited. Unlike us – without gyms and health clubs to work out in we wouldn't be able to stay fit – they work from dawn to dark. And there are no beauty salons or foot massages to pamper the m at the end of their hard day's work."

"No city girls would want to marry peasants, but city men sometimes are happy to take peasant women as their wives," Beibei says. "I guess they think they are caregivers and good mothers. Remember that famous Harvard-educated scholar from the May Fourth school in the 1920s, Hu Shi? He had so many intellectual female friends, including Pearl S. Buck, but his wife was an illiterate peasant."

"So perhaps China isn't lacking men, it's just short of urban men of high quality. The best ones have all gone overseas to become doctors and engineers. That's why the leftovers – even though they're second-rate – can still afford to be so choosy!" Lulu says.

"Plus, good men can become bad after being in China for too long: They become arrogant and selfish. They get used to the attention they get from women. Look at those returnees and those foreigners who live in China forever! Even the ones who are married are usually still looking," CC adds.

I go on. "One thing that has puzzled me the most about the peasant women is that they look so much older than their actual age. They don't have any kind of makeup or skin care products to help them look beautiful. They even use coarse paper made from cowshit as sanitary pads. But, despite all of that, they tell me that they are happy. The peasant women I talked to were smiling ear to ear when I saw them, even in the harsh conditions in which they were living."

"So why can't we be as happy?" Beibei asks. "We have youth, beauty, money, a good education, nice apartments, cars…"

"Perhaps we don't have the one thing that peasant women do," I say.

"What's that?" everyone asks in unison.

"Innocence," I say.

There is a thoughtful silence for a moment.

Finally, Beibei says, "Where are we going tonight, anyway?"

"I heard there's an MTV party going on at Vic's," says Lulu.

"I don't want to drive tonight," CC says.

All of a sudden, the countryside is put in the background. Nobody wants to talk about it.

"Great," I say, "I'll drive…"