CHAPTER SIX: The Prelude of Learning Violin
My hand-copied violin method book Hohmann
After possessed my own violin, I could not stand the excitement, ran straight to Wang Shi Yi’s home. Wang took a glance at my dear ugly baby, burst out into laughter with a sneeze. He made some very unpleasant comment saying my unvarnished treasure “look like a naked woman”, as to my poor Er Hu bow, “No language could be found in the dictionary being good enough to taunt.” Anyone in that situation could tolerate that? I put my baby back to the old case and walked away. Up to the doorway I felt it would be too cheap for him if I escaped like that. I turned back to him, “ You, not a good man.”
Wang laughed even worse, first he faced to the sky, and then bended to his navel. I felt like to jump down from his window if I had a parachute. I opened his door indignantly, “I’m going to tell Lu Ying.”
I said that only to express my madness, unexpectedly it worked. Wang chased me up and dragged me back to his home again. Then he took out a broken violin bow and explained to me with sincerity, “Once my younger brother sat on it. If you can, or find someone who can fix it, I can let you use it for some time. It is a broken violin bow, but would be much better than your Er Hu bow for sure.”
Followed he turned the violin method book “Hohmann” on the music stand back to the first page, taught me a little how to read the scores, in addition showed on the violin for a couple of times. That made me very excited, forgot all the humiliation he gave to me only a short while ago. When I packed up my violin together with his broken bow and walked to the door again, Wang again blocked my way. He took out a crinkled letter from his pocket (looked like the letter had been in his pocket for a long time) and handed over to me mysteriously, “Let’s help each other. Hand it over to her, secretly.”
“Make sure no body sees it.” He shouted to me again from his window.
Next morning I went to see teacher Lao as I remembered he had the violin method Hohmann he once said he could let me borrow it when the time came. What I found out was the method Hohmann was not his property but the property of Ma. “I will talk to Ma again next semester when we are going to buy a new violin.” Lao comforted me.
Nothing more I could do I was about to leave Lao asked me if I would give him a hand to sort out some recording tapes (big tapes) as we still had two hours to go before the rehearsal. The way of doing it was put the tape on a recorder, when the music started Lao would tell me the title of the music as well as the name of the composer. I remember to there is firewood can man Tchaikovsky’s 《 the 《 destiny of the pathetic 》 , Beethoven 》 , Lee 莫斯基－ the section check the 《 Spain fantasia of the section man the 》 .( 《 Spainish fantasy 》 afterwards become me the most favorite hand over to ring one of works) atmosphere
The music went on and on. I forgot the timing. My spirit went to a complete different sphere until teacher Lao turned off the tape recorder and told me, “All these are called ‘no title music’, when we have time we can do more criticizing together later.”
Since then, “to help teacher Lao sort out the tapes” became the best excuse for me to see him often.
Before rehearsal, Lu Ying asked me to look after her schoolbag as usual. I caught an opportunity to pass Wang’s letter to her, secretly. Lu looked excited. Her face turned red when she took over the letter. She even rubbed my hand a little. To avoid a misunderstanding I quickly told her it was not I but my friend Wang Shi Yi wrote the letter to her. Immediately her face turned blue and returned the letter back to me without opening, disappointedly, “From when you have become a postman?”
When Lu was about to walk away from me, she bumped into Captain Lee. (I believe Lee was somewhere observing us all the time.) Lee seized the letter from my hand and quickly opened it, then read very loudly, “If you were the sun, I wish to be the earth, turning round you forever. If you were the Earth, I wish to be the moon, turning round you forever …”
Meanwhile, more and more people came closer to Lee forming a little circle, among them also Ma. Lee looked at everybody, and again more importantly looked at Lu, found Lu not really looked offended, to Lee that was Lu’s tacit consent, therefore he courageously went on his reading, “I think the best would be I become your ballet shoes, let you trample my body whenever you wish…”
Inevitably a huge burst of sneer poured on me after Lee’s performance. Lee waved the letter in the air with great satisfaction and asked,“ Who wants to see more? Who wants to see more?”
When I hesitated if I should take the letter back Lu stretched her little finger towards Lee, the letter was soon in the hand of Lu. Lu looked at me remarked, “A man with courage should be respected.” Lu moved her eyesight to Lee and again remarked, “Unlike some one else.” Then to me again, “ Go to thank him, but also don’t forget to tell him, unfortunately his shoes may be too big for me.”
After that Lu carefully folded the letter, instead of giving back to me she put it into her schoolbag. My subconscious ordered my hand to take her schoolbag as always. But this time, she wouldn’t let me.
As soon as Lu went away, Lee suddenly became unusually friendly to me. He tried to find out from me who that “man with courage” was. His hot attitude looked as if he wanted to form an “ally of anti love rival” with me.
Seeing Lee left me looking for Lu, Ma said to me in a disdained tone, “The same letter I also received before, only the last sentence was ‘I think the best would be I become your violin case, let you lie inside my body whenever you wish…”
After that Ma added her comment to Wang, “That tall is really not a bad person. Not bad at all, only doing silly things sometimes like a big boy.”
Ma’s mouth was talking to me, but eyes were busy looking at somebody something else. Suddenly she intentionally provoked me by grabbing my bamboo flute and ran away.
“Give it back to me at once, otherwise I will call you…” I threatened her with my usual weapon.
“Call me whatever you like, better let everybody hear it.” Ma said as she quickly ran to Lee and Lu’s direction.
I chased her up and caught her before everybody’s eyes, “What are you doing? Are you crazy?” I shouted.
I thought she might be embarrassed or even angry, but on the contrary when she saw Lee, Lu, Chan and all others were watching us, she leaned her body onwards me exaggeratedly, and bit my ear in a core voice, “Mission completed. Good job!”
With Lu’s wide-open eyes, Lee’s wide-open mouth, Chan’s wildly standing hairs Ma returned my flute back to me and slowly walked away with a smile of some kind of satisfaction.
During that day’s rehearsal, I was pushing the rhythm from beginning to end. After the rehearsal, no need for me to look for her Ma was waiting for me outside of the rehearsal room. The place she stood was so obvious as if she wanted others to see us.
“What do you mean by ‘mission’? What mission? What’s the matter with you today? ” I had a million questions to ask but did not know where to start.
“The feeling in my heart, that dancer should have half.” Ma said sourly.
“What do you mean? You mean? You and me?” I felt totally lost.
“From now on you might as well call me Xiao Mao. I mean I only allow you to call me Xiao Mao, temporarily.” She ordered.
“But, but you said you dislike bamboo flute, any kinds of them.” I reminded her.
“You can reform yourself to be a violin player. Can’t you?” She stressed.
Now I review the whole thing I realize that that was the time Ma decided to give up the hope for Lee, therefore she wanted Lu to share part of her broken heart by means of pretending to be my girl friend, at the same time to pass a “stop trying any more” message to Chan Flute, in addition probably having a little taste change by taking me as her new boy friend, temporarily, or as a kind of anesthesia to her lovelorn for the time being.
But my brain was filled of violin and violin only therefore there was no space, no space at all for anything else. That means I could reject Ma easily, but I can’t reject Hohmann, the violin method book she possessed. No, I could not resist her fascination, fascination of possessing the violin method book Hohmann.
I traded my little dignity with the violin method book Hohmann, temporarily. I took the notes home and hand copied it, note by note, line by line, page by page, day by day and month by month. During the athletics lessons at school I pretended I had a stomach aid and hided myself in the classroom to copy the notes. Back home during cooking time I asked Hu MeiMei for help to copy the notes. After supper I occupied the only table at home along for the excuse of copying notes for publicizing Mao’s thoughts. (Father was again away from home being reformed at the 5.7 Cadre School. The rest of the family no body understood what I wan copying, especially as I changed all the titles to revolutionary names, such as. ) Even at late night after my brothers went sleep sometimes I got up again using a flashlight to copy the notes. Hohmann is a duet written for two violins. In practice I only need to copy the notes for one violin, but I did both. That passion and effort, only in the year 1960 I tried to prevent myself from death of starvation by digging Chinese potato roots to eat could compare with. I worked so hard that my hand was water blistered finally I finished my copy of the violin method Hohmann, totally from book one to book five.
Bow issuer
About the broken bow Wang lent to me, I luckily found an acquaintance worked as a car repairman to fixed it for me with a hollow copper tube. Although the bow was very heavy, just as Wang said, “Much better than the Er Hu bow I had.” For the sake of clipping the violin steadily between neck and shoulder, to adopt the same theory of Chinese Gongfu I made myself a sandbag hanging over the scroll of the violin head. To compare with that the over weighted bow became insignificant.
But the prosperity did not last long. One day, when I was tired after a long time hard practice, I put the bow on a bench. Only a few minutes later back from the public toilet, I found my brother Danjin was rubbing his bottom for pain. Before I felt amused I saw my bow stick was divided again into more than two.
“Oh My God!”
Now what? To fight with him I couldn’t win, to scold at him my bow wouldn’t come back together again. Though Danjin hinted he wouldn’t hit back I stood there still, miserably. Seeing me begrudged saying good-bye to the remains of my dear bow, he asked, “How much would it cost to buy a thing like that?” Danjin had no alternative but painfully broke two of his bamboo made dummy cashboxes, in which he saved every day for many years.
When we were busy counting the money coin by coin the younger brother of our mother came to see us from Zunyi, the holy revolutionary site where used to be Mao’s base during the civil war, but then and now still among the poorest places in China. That explains why for him “coming to see us” was less important than “coming to buy some fat pork for frying oil.” By that time, each Chinese head was rationed only 500 grams plant oil per month, if my memory is not mistaken.
For the sake of buying fat pork for uncle, I had to get up at 4 o’clock in dark next morning to line up in the coldness. After 5 hours uncle was very pleased with the fat pork in his hand, but at the same time he regretted that the pork was not as oily as he would like. Likewise he repeated, “I don’t know how to reward you?”
“But I know how you can reward me.” I captured that “once in a lifetime” opportunity and requested, “In fact you don’t have to reward me, just lend me 15 Renminbi.” (At that time 15 Renminbi was one third of his monthly wage) looking at uncle’s frozen facial expression quickly I pleaded how important the money was to me, to put the importance concretely “to buy a violin bow for me now will change my life,” and repeatedly I promised that he would get his money back with a tremendous profit when I grew up. Immediately followed that I handed over a letter, a beg-to-borrow-money letter to him. In the letter I also begged him to keep secrete from my Mom.
Ladies and gentlemen, think of that, a 14 year-old boy could do such a thing, how strong his desire of playing the violin would be!
I did not know whether my uncle was moved by my passion, that’s not important, what important was he gave me the money, although not directly over to my hand, but to the hand of my mother. Mom did not only put the sum to my hand, but also a severe scold. Frankly speaking, not to mention the scolding, even a severe beating would worth the value.
Luckily I bought a nice used violin bow at a second-hand shop with the money. But to my extraordinary bitterness only a few days later when Wang saw my new bow he said to me, “Since you already have your own bow, how about return my broken bow back to me.” When he was told his broken bow was even worse broken, his face turned to be very serious, again and again emphasized the importance of that broken bow of his. To me the meaning was obvious; he wanted my nice new bow to compensate with his old broken bow.
I felt like being cheated and trapped, ran straight to Lu Ying’s home for expressing my fury. But when I got Lu’s home, I happened to see her father being ill severely.
“Why not taken to the hospital?” I asked.
“We just got back from the hospital. The doctor says he is not sure what disease my father is suffering?” Lu Ying said to me with tears.
At that time in China, it was the same case in the whole country, doctors who could really cure diseases were sent out to be labor reformed, the rest remained in the hospitals were those who could not cure diseases.
“Don’t worry, don’t worry, let me think.” I comforted Lu, and then took a 3 kilometers marathon again back to Wang’s home, as I knew Wang’s father was a medical professor.
Wang heard that bad news, revealed his unimaginable excitement, excitement obviously for the chance of a profitable achievement, profitable not for money but for beauty. Together we raced to Lu’s home again. At Lu’s home the way Wang called Lu’s parents as “Lu Mom Lu daddy” made my toothache so badly that as if they would soon fall off. That vinegar flavor proved that I was in fact liked Lu Ying quite a bit. But that was a very critic moment, a moment in no way to fight for a girl.
Wang took an old notebook out from his pocket and wrote down all the details about Lu’s father’s symptom. Then, neglected Wang’s “no thank you” I took marathon again for the fourth time back to Wang’s home with him.
Wang’s father was waiting for us. Heard his son’s report the professor anxiously said Lu’s father might be suffering from a kind of acute inflammation, if not treated in time, the life could be in danger. The professor quickly covered his face with a big hat and carried a most common soldier bag in his shoulder. Together three of us hurried up to Lu’s home, for me the number fifth marathon in one day.
As soon as we arrived at Lu’s home, the professor took some medical instruments out from his solder bag and examined Lu’s father over. Quickly the professor wrote a letter and asked Lu’s family to take the father to a recommended hospital and talk to a specific doctor, at once.
After that the professor reminded me, “Don’t blather to anyone else about today.” Wang explained to me that as his father was supposed to be a knocked-down anti revolutionary scholar the professor did not wish to bring trouble to others for his underground medical activities. That’s why only in darkness the professor saw the patients who shouted to knock him down during the daytime. That also explained why my friend Wang Shi Yi needed a notebook with him all the time.
Just like that, the life of Lu’s father was saved.
A few days later when Lu’s father recovered the working class mother said to her daughter Lu Ying, “Who said your tall friend comes from a bad family? I think his family is very good.”
The mother’s words made Lu Ying blushed with shame. She explained, “His name is Wang, not my friend, but a friend of my school mate Chen. In fact I don’t even know that tall Wang much.”
Lu’s father’s incident moderated the crisis of the bow problem, yet the problem remained unsolved. I checked up almost all musical instrument shops in Changsha hoping to find a bargain. One day I passed the Changsha May-First Cultural Goods Store. The memory of being chased out by that fat man made me nervous. But I encouraged myself to walk in again by the end. To my surprise that 28 Rinminbi violin stayed there still, only the price was reduced to 20 Rinminbi.
With the excitement I decided to use my dear aunt who used to be my closest in the world. I wrote a letter to her, the same letter I wrote to my uncle (Mom’s brother), with the content such as “to buy a violin bow for me now could change my life…you will get your money back with a tremendous profit when I grow up” etc etc etc. Finally I also added the request “to keep it secretly from my parents.”
Two weeks later my aunt came to see me from her hometown Xinhua, “to exploit the working convenience” as she explained.
I took my aunt to the Changsha May-First Cultural Goods Store right away, partly as I was looking forward to meeting that short fat man again. After arrived there, aunt gave me 20 Rinminbi, twice explained that 5 out from the 20 were given by my Uncle Din. I threw the sum on the counter as I dreamed to do so in a long time. The big pity was the short fat man did not show up, only the thin lady present. When I opened the violin case I found the neck of the violin was off from the body. The sells lady argued, “Because of that we reduced the price. Find some one to glue them together, it will be as good as new.”
“No need to find someone, that, I can do myself.” I replied proudly.
I noticed the sells lady tired to avoid my eyesight all the time. Purposely I asked, “You do remember me, don’t you?”
“No, I don’t.” She denied coldly. Seeing me disappointed she changed her tone, “Nowadays what’s good to remember so many things?” She paused, “You are much taller now. You used to come here very often, how could I forget you.”
“That’s very good of you to remember me.” I was half satisfied, “But do me a favor, please send my regard to that fat man and tell him that the ‘child’ have bought the violin.” I spelled that with great pleasure.
“Xiao Gao, You mean my Xiao Gao.” Her voice trembled, “Alright, I’ll forward your greeting to him by the time when I also go there.”
“Go where?” I puzzled.
“He is gone.” She answered in an undertone.
“Gone where?” I asked again loudly.
“Dead, D E A D, dead.” She shouted.
“How?” I was shocked, but did not give up questioning. To put it in a Chinese saying “breaking an earthenware pot to inquire the bottom.”
“Do you have an end? How? Gun fight of course.” She lost control and cried out, “My poor husband did not even take a look at our child…” she lowed her head down and never lifted it up again.
I felt a total emptiness in my brain, quietly left the store with the violin. On my way home, I decided not to hate that short fat man (actually he was shapeless, no longer short or fat) any more. Being frankly I even felt a little sorry for him.
Who said that? “Death concludes everything.”
Back home, I compared the new bow with the second hand bow back and forth; finally decided the second hand bow was a better one. Hence I endured my pain to give the new bow to Wang as compensation. After that heavy burdened being removed I felt much relaxed. From then on, I could play my violin, in peace.
Like That, my Prelude of learning the violin started.
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