Scarring Jasmine-Chapter Thirty Nine Independence

12/05/2024 Thursday 29-42F Windy

The train arrived at Shanghai North Station. Once Jasmine got off the train, she felt lost at once. There were people everywhere: Some carrying luggage passed hurriedly, some sat by the street waiting for their shoes to be shined; some followed others trying to sell small merchandise such as cigarettes or newspapers… Jasmine didn’t know where to go and had nowhere to go. She stopped at a street sign, hesitating; then a young rickshaw puller came to her, asked light-heartedly: “Madam, want a ride? Where are you going?” 

Jasmine’s face flushed; but since it was covered under her veil nobody could see it. “I am sorry I don’t know where to go. I just arrived here. Could you please take me somewhere that I can find a cheap place to live in? I don’t have so much money.” Seeing the puller’s confused look, she added, “But I should have enough to pay your fare.”

The puller grinned, showing his two lines of white teeth: “No problem! I know someone who has cheap rental rooms. Get on, let’s go!”  

Jasmine sat in his rickshaw. He whistled while running on the street, and occasionally called hello to other rickshaw pullers. The streets were busy, crowded with street vendors, passengers, sometimes cars and bicycles as well. Jasmine rolled up her veil and looked around in curiosity from the rickshaw. All her life in the past she hadn’t seen so many people; even during the Lantern Festival in her hometown, the streets weren’t as busy as here. The puller turned his head a bit and asked: “Madam, where did you come from?” 

“Suzhou city.” 

“Suzhou is a good place! Paradise is up in the heaven; Suzhou is down on the earth!” He praised.

After quite a few streets and blocks, the rickshaw turned into a neighborhood where thousands of little clay and brick houses lined up. The puller stopped in front of a white walled house located at a cross street. “Here it is. This household should have cheap flats for rent. You can just walk in and ask! Good luck to you!” Then he called loudly to the door: “Sister Gui, I brought a tenant for you! Hurry!” Jasmine thanked him and paid the fare.

A bunch of beggar kids showed up at the same side of the street. The puller called to them: “You little bandits! All go away! No money for you here!” The kids shushed him with their curling lips. The young man pulled away.

Jasmine was about to walk to the door of that house when suddenly a kid knelt in front of her and used the brick in his hands to hit his own head, from where the blood ran out right away. The kid dropped the brick, stuck out his dirty hands and begged: “Your glorious madam, please be kind enough to give me some money!” Jasmine felt sorry for him; she put the change which she got from the puller in his hands. The kid kowtowed to her then ran away. Before she stepped forward, another kid knelt down, picked up the brick which was left by the first kid, and repeated what he just did then said: “Your glorious madam, please be kind enough to give me some money!” Jasmine was shocked; she had no idea about what else she could do but reach out to her purse again and handed him some coppers. 

“If you keep doing that, more and more little bandits will come and do the same thing to you, until all your money is squeezed out!” Jasmine heard a female’s voice. She followed it and saw a woman in her thirties leaning against the door talking to her. Then that woman pointed her toothpick at the kids, threatening: “You bunch of little wild rabbits, haven’t you gotten enough? Or your asses are itchy and want a good kick from your old men?” 

The kids dashed away like scared pigeons. Jasmine thanked her. “Why did you come here? You don’t look like the locals.” The woman looked over at her, asked. 

“I just arrived in Shanghai today. A rickshaw puller took me here and said that this household may have rental rooms. Are you sister Gui?” 

“Yes, I am. I heard the call that’s why I came out. I do have one room for rent, but it is small and shabby,” she glanced once more at Jasmine’s clothes, “I am afraid that it may not suit you.” 

“Don’t worry sister Gui. I can’t afford an expensive one. Could you please show it to me?” 

“Ok, follow me this way!”

They turned to the rear of the house, walked a few more steps, then sister Gui untied a chain of keys hanging at her waist and opened a small wood door. Jasmine took off her veil hat and went in: The room was about ten square meters with only one window on the same wall as the door. By the window laid a trestle table and a small chair. Opposite them and against the wall, stood a wood-framed rattan single bed. Then nothing else. But what Jasmine liked about the room was, it was bright-- it faced south so the sun could flood in through the window; and it was clean both inside and outside. 

“Sister Gui, May I ask what the rent is?” 

“Will you live alone?” 

“Yes.” 

“Then each month you just pay me three and half silver coins including electricity and water. Usually, I rent it at four. The tap water is in my yard which I can show you later; and a public restroom is about one hundred feet away across the street in the east.” 

“Thank you, sister Gui. I will rent it. Here are three coins and fifty coppers.” 

Sister Gui took the money, scooted a glance at the bandage on her face, then asked curiously: “What’s your name? Where is your luggage?” 

“Please call me Jasmine. I don’t have any luggage with me.” 

“Well, you can’t just live like this. Let me tell you,” She signaled Jasmine to follow her to the door and showed her the direction: “Here is east, my front door is behind your room. Walk along the street toward west for about five hundred feet after passing my door, there is an open-air market where you can buy pots, buckets, blankets all sorts of things. Here is your key. I have a little old coal stove; if you want you can take it instead of buying a new one.” Jasmine said thanks to her, and followed her to her house for the stove. 

Sister Gui’s house wasn’t large either; in her little courtyard there were another two or three rental rooms which were all occupied. A kid ran into them, sister Gui grabbed his ear and scolded: “You little monkey! Are you blind? Go finish your homework!” 

The kid screamed: “Mother, it hurts!” After getting released, that kid ran away rabbit-like. 

“Sister Gui, how old is your son?” Jasmine asked. 

“He is already twelve years old,” sister Gui sighed, “never loves schooling. I told him many times that if he didn’t study hard, then two years later he would have to work at the bund as a longshoreman like his dead father. But my words went in one ear and out the other. Lucky that his sister is a good girl, saves me a lot of trouble.”

Jasmine got the stove from sister Gui, as well as one wood bucket. Later that day, she purchased some other things from the market to settle her new home, and had her first meal since yesterday, which was one bowl of Spring noodles which cost six coppers. In the evening, she figured on the bed: This whole day she had spent about twenty-three silver coins including the train ticket and rent. “I must be careful with money. Tomorrow, I plan to go to a clinic to check my facial wound, so perhaps the day after I can ask for sister Gui’s advice about jobs.”

However, her job hunting wasn’t successful. Since she didn’t have her own children she was considered unqualified to be a nanny; sister Gui recommended her as a housekeeper to three households nearby, two of which had already rejected her. After the interview with the third one, sister Gui came to her room that afternoon. “How is everything going?” She sat at the edge of the bed, asking. 

Jasmine was sitting on the bed sewing a button to her clothes, looked sullen: “They declined me.” 

“It’s strange. That hostess is a nice woman, and she knows me too. Did she tell you why?” 

“Yes, she said that the wage I asked for was fair, and I looked clean and decent. But she didn’t like the cut on my face which made her feel uneasy.” 

“Well, nothing I can say.” Sister Gui shrugged, “But personally I am also very curious: You are a pretty girl; the cut looks like it was done by a knife. I don’t want to be nosy, but if I know the reason why it was cut, perhaps in the future I can explain it to people before they give you an in-person interview.” 

Jasmine cracked out a bitter smile: “I wanted to divorce my husband, but he didn’t agree. So I cut up my face with a broken china piece to push him to free me. I never thought that it would bring me difficulty in getting hired.” 

Sister Gui sighed, and patted Jasmine’s knee: “Don’t worry, all will sort out, just a matter of time. Other than doing housework and cleaning, what else are you good at, or would you like to try?” 

Jasmine thought for a while, then said: “I like embroidering. I started to embroider when I was seven.” She showed sister Gui the clothes which she just sewed: At the hem of its sleeve, there were two swallows flying among willow branches. “Oil stained the sleeve, so I embroidered the swallows on top to cover the stains.” 

Sister Gui stroked the swallows, praised: “This is marvelous!” Then she spoked to Jasmine: “I happen to know a tailor who lives a few blocks away. I will show him this embroidery tomorrow; if lucky, perhaps he will be interested in letting you do something in his shop; or you can even sell your own embroidered goods in the market as a stopgap!”

Eventually Jasmine found a part time job with that tailor surnamed Zhang. Once Zhang had any clients who wanted to do embroideries on their either new or repaired clothes, he would let Jasmine do it; meanwhile, he could offer Jasmine his cutting remnants of fabrics for free, with which she could use his sewing machine in the evenings to make embroidered pillowcases, handkerchiefs, slippers and sell them in the market.

Jasmine was happy and busy. From day to night, she worked as hard as a little bumble bee. Once again, she felt that she was a useful person: She could not only take care of herself, but also make her own money. Her living expense was low; except for food and coals, she almost didn’t need to buy anything else; and sometimes she traded her merchandise for food. Because of her diligence, skillful hands and high taste level, more and more of Zhang’s clients requested to add embroideries on their garments. Gradually, by word of mouth, both Zhang’s shop and Jasmine’s street-vendor business increased. People called her “Embroidery lady from Suzhou”. Every time Jasmine heard that, she responded to them with a fragrant smile, and her smiling eyes bent into a crescent shape. 

At the end of Jasmine’s second year in Shanghai, she had saved about three hundred silver coins. “After one more year, probably I can rent a small shop and buy my own sewing machine, then I will be a boss like my father and brother.” She thought proudly, “I should write a letter to my family telling them all about this; they must have been worrying about me very much. Two years have gone by since I left Suzhou, Zhao shouldn’t bother me and my family anymore.” 

Rewinding to the past, she felt like it was an old dream, or someone else’s story. Now after jumping out of the box, she could see everything clearer: She was just like a pinball that was bounced among the men; nobody really loved her, they only adored her beauty, and wanted to possess her as either a property, or a pet or, like Zhao said, a trophy. And she was too obedient to know the importance of sticking to her own heart. Marrying a man, pleasing him and his family, having children in order to carry on the husband’s family name…As her father said to her on her first wedding day: “Jasmine, from now on you are a married woman. You should devote yourself to your new family, take good care of your parents-in-law and husband; their needs will be your priority. You should always be obedient, diligent, and raise children. Only when you can do these, your mother and I will be delighted.” So where did she figure into that picture? How about her needs and feelings? She loved her father; she treated his words as her bible; consequently, she cared about everyone but herself. But what happened to her later? The bible failed; the rules just couldn’t work for her. 

There was always a reason for everything that happened in life; if you took it positively, the reason could turn out to be a blessing—Learn from the lesson, appreciate the luck. All Jasmine had experienced finally helped her gain an independent soul. “I am no longer that woman who lay on the daybed smoking opium or sat in the house expecting my husband to love me. I mustn’t hate Zhao. I should thank him. Without him, I wouldn’t be woken and have had the courage to leave.” She looked around her room, “This little place is my world, my shelter; everything here is earned by my hands which nobody can take from me. Oh, I feel so good about it! Now I am disfigured, but I own something more important.”