The Girl Who Played Go

38

We have polished our weapons and sorted out our creased uniforms before setting off again. Soon an ancient city looms on the horizon, surrounded by ramparts and with poplar trees lining the moat. Along the route there are Chinese people waving flags of the rising sun. Once we have passed through the main gate, the wealth of the town of A Thousand Winds spreads out before us: an endless expanse of tiled roofs, wide streets swarming with traders and salesmen, the deafening sound of the traffic and appetizing aromas of the restaurants. A colonel from the garrison comes towards us, flanked by lower officers and followed by the town’s mayor, a pudgy Manchurian with a mustache and his attendant representatives of the local bourgeoisie.

We cannot believe our eyes: on the pavement there are about thirty young prostitutes draped in kimonos, laughing, blushing, jostling each other and beckoning us. The shyest among them hide behind their hands as they pass comments about our faces and figures. The bolder ones string together a few words of Japanese: “So good-looking!,” “Come and see me at the Golden Lotus,” “I love you.” Forgetting how tired we are from marching, we look up proudly and take lungfuls of air to puff out our chests.

The barracks are over to the west of town, with barricades and machine guns on the gates, and barbed wire along the tops of the walls. The reserve detachment has lined up in four square formations on the parade ground to greet us.

After the welcoming parade comes the hot meal: in the canteen we hardly wait for the speeches to end before throwing ourselves on the seaweed soup with spicy beef; we fight over the plump carp, the haunches of venison and the pheasant breasts. We gulp down rice balls, marinated vegetables, dofus and raw fish beautifully laid out on dishes.

With my belly distended as a balloon, I am still ruminating on the vanished flavors as I drag myself to my room and collapse on the bed.