He Dongsheng started to laugh-a sort of gurgling from his throat-it was still hard for him to talk. “I’d like another glass of water,” he said as he swallowed to clear his throat.
“Professor He,” pressed Fang Caodi, “can you explain it to us? That year when everyone was given a bird flu vaccination. It was really a drug created by the Office of Stability Maintenance to make us all forget, right?”
“No, it wasn’t,” corrected He Dongsheng. “The bird flu vaccination was to prevent bird flu, and only ten or twenty million people were actually vaccinated. Where would the Office of Stability Maintenance find such an amazing amnesiac drug? It would be wonderful if we did have one. Then our Communist Party could rewrite its history any way it wanted to.”
“Then what was the real reason why everyone forgot?” asked Fang Caodi.
“Was it the Ecstasy in the water?” asked Little Xi.
“How should I know?” He Dongsheng began to laugh again, a genuine, mirthful laugh. “If you ask me for the real reason, I can only tell you that I haven’t a clue! Don’t think we can control everything. Many things happen that are beyond our expectations. We never dreamed that the month you’re talking about would just disappear from people’s memories.”
“If you don’t know, then who does?” asked Fang Caodi. “Don’t try to keep anything from us…”
“I’m not trying to hide anything. Let me tell you everything I know. After the ‘Action Plan for Achieving Prosperity amid Crisis’ began to meet with some success, the first sentence in a
“At that time, the Central Propaganda Bureau issued another report that mention of the intervening twenty- eight days was dwindling, even on the Internet. We thought people couldn’t stand to remember those hard times, and everyone was too busy making and spending money.
“This was very good for the Party. Anarchy and suppression are not exactly splendid states-they’re bloody affairs, even sinful, if you’re a religious person. So the Propaganda Bureau took advantage of the situation and forbade all news media, including the Internet, from discussing those twenty-eight days. You know China’s Internet-control techniques are the best in the world, and of course the traditional media wouldn’t dare disobey our orders. Besides that, after China’s prosperity and ascendancy began, everybody lost interest in the West. Now the Chinese people prefer to watch our own colorful media, and only a tiny minority still watch non-Chinese media sources. In this way those already rarely discussed twenty-eight days completely disappeared from our public discourse.
“And then something unimaginable happened that to this day I still cannot fathom: more and more people genuinely forgot those twenty-eight days, and it was not just temporary memory loss, but they absolutely could not remember that time, just as though the whole country had unconsciously erased some painful childhood trauma.
“People in middle age and above had not really forgotten the earlier Cultural Revolution and June 4, 1989. It was just that during these two years of China’s ascendancy, everybody was living very well and very few people had any interest in recalling the Cultural Revolution and June 1989, so those memories just naturally faded away.
“But people were
“When I first realized what was happening, I went around sounding out various groups, including mid- and low- level cadres and specialist scholars. Just as I expected, they really had no recollection of that time; it was like they had brainwashed themselves. It was all so strange, but it was definitely true.
“It was for the best that they didn’t remember. The previous leadership group, having the blood of those twenty-eight days on their hands, was very eager for everyone to forget the events of that month. So they started to revise any materials that reported on that time. For example, they ordered that all newspapers in all public libraries should be in digital form only. We totally rewrote the history of those twenty-eight days. Most importantly, we brought the date that China’s ascendancy officially began forward to match the date that the global economy entered the period of crisis and stagflation, thus erasing the historical existence of that week of anarchy and those three weeks of harsh crackdown. No one objected to this distortion of reality, and practically no one even noticed it. Once in a while, when someone in or outside the country mentioned those events, we simply filtered them out. Very soon the new version of things became the only available version. To tell you the truth, even I was pretty surprised: how could the Chinese people so easily forget such events?
“What I want to tell you is that, definitely, the Central Propaganda organs did do their work, but they were only pushing along a boat that was already on the move. If the Chinese people themselves had not already wanted to forget, we could not have forced them to do so. The Chinese people voluntarily gave themselves a large dose of amnesia medicine.”
“Why?” asked Little Xi and Fang Caodi together. “Why did the Chinese people do it? How could they? There must be some explanation.”
“Didn’t I tell you already,” insisted He Dongsheng. “I don’t know!”
Little Xi and Fang Caodi were dumbfounded.
“I’m quite puzzled, too,” added He Dongsheng, seeing that they were all speechless. “Real life isn’t like a detective novel, and everything doesn’t have a perfect explanation. I have to admit this is one big riddle that I can’t solve. It could be that human beings are simply forgetful animals and they long to forget some aspects of their history. It could be that the Chinese Communist Party is just plain lucky. It could be that the Chinese people deserve to be governed by the Communist Party, and sixty-plus years is still not enough. It could be a miracle, or the Chinese people’s common karma. Too bad I’m a materialist, otherwise I would certainly say that it was the Will of Heaven, that Heaven wants the Chinese Communist Party to go on governing. Heaven saved my Party!” He gave another deep laugh.
Little Xi and Fang Caodi sat there expressionless and depressed. He Dongsheng looked victorious. Lao Chen sat there staring blankly at nothing. After a long while he regained his composure and saw that it was already growing light outside.
“Brother Dongsheng, let me remind you again that we have all made a ‘live or die together’ pact. No one is going to reveal anything that was said here last night. That way we can continue living our ordinary lives and you can continue living your official-promotion-and-money-spinning life. You think it over carefully. People, if there’s nothing else, I’ll let Mr. He go home.”
The others remained silent, so Lao Chen gently addressed their captive. “You can go now.”
He Dongsheng hesitated for a moment, rose, felt his arms up and down, and walked slowly to the door. Then he turned around and said by way of justification, “You think I care about official promotion and making money? I do what I do for the sake of the nation and the people.”
They all looked at him expressionlessly.
“Believe it or not, as you wish,” added He Dongsheng serenely, and then he walked out the door. A few moments later, they heard his SUV drive away.
Lao Chen, Little Xi, and Fang Caodi sat there in silence.
They walked slowly outside into the dawn light.
“I’d better go,” said Fang Caodi.
“Fine,” said Lao Chen.
“Can I give you a lift into town?” asked Fang Caodi.
“No, thanks,” said Lao Chen. “It’s light now. Little Xi and I will go and catch a bus. You’d better get going.”
Fang Caodi gave each one of them a hug, said his good-byes, climbed into his Jeep Cherokee, and drove off.
“Master Chen,” asked Zhang Dou, “are we going to be in any trouble?”
