Ben in Southwest China (3)-Ginkgo

Outside the Panda Centre, I spot a taxi and start running towards it.

“Come on Ollie! Quick! A taxi!”

“Stop! Ben, stop!” I feel a tug on my sleeve. “That’s what we call a wild taxi – no licence. It’s better to take a bus. Look, there’s a bus stop.”

Moments later, an empty bus arrives. As we are getting on, I hear the ching-ching-chong-chong sound of Ollie’s ringtone.

“That’s fine, don’t worry about me. I can look after myself,” says Ollie in English, finishing off her conversation. I throw her my most intense look of curiosity.

“Ben, that was my sister. She called to say she has to work late this evening and can’t go to dinner with me.”

“Your poor sister--working late every day, just like I used to in the investment bank.”

“Very late yes, but not in the office, in restaurants.”

“I see, is she a waitress?”

“No, she is not a waitress! She’s vice-manger in a company. She entertains--business dinners--the most important part of the job. For a Chengdu businessman “working is eating and drinking, eating and drinking is working.”

“Sounds brilliant. Beats slaving away at a flaming keyboard every flaming night.”

Ching-ching-chong-chong. That mobile again! Ollie adds a little English to her conversation so that I don’t feel totally left out.

“Why not? That would be interesting.” What would be interesting?

Ollie turns to me excitedly: “Ben, my sister invites us to go to her business dinner.”

I am confused: “Are you joking? We have nothing to do with her business.”

“The government officer who’s coming has a son studying in London, and the father wants to meet a real Englishman.”

“He can see them on TV,” I reply cheekily.

Ollie makes a face at me: “And you can go back to England and watch pandas on TV!” Her round eyes smile like sunshine on a cloudy Chengdu day. I have to resist giving her a tickle.

“We’re going to Ginkgo, one of the best restaurants in Chengdu.”

That evening, we take a taxi to Ginkgo, a posh southside restaurant. We enter through a double reception line of immaculately-attired beautiful young waitresses, each competing with the others to provide the most welcoming eight-tooth smile. As I walk through this tunnel of beauty queens, I feel like royalty and have to stop myself from returning the honour with a royal wave.

“There’s my sister!” Ollie points to a short women with fluffy, silky auburn hair chatting animatedly surrounded by a group of businessmen who seem to be hanging on her every word. She reminds me a bit of the sexy lady plumber. What she lacks in beauty, she makes up for with energy and a very sexual vitality very different to the reserved, dignified and statuesque beauty of her sister.

“Yes, don’t you think her sweetcorn hair is fashionable, Ben?” Ollie’s eyes brim with admiration.

“Er, er, sweetcorn hair, is that what you call it? Ha, ha. To be honest, it’s not my style--makes her look like she’s just been bombed or had an electronic shock.”

I can tell my tone of laughing has upset Ollie. Her eyelids drop and her lower lip pouts up, her whole face turns three shades darker. Then, recovering, she pulls me to the side. Her dark eyes pierce right through me.

“We were born in a remote mountain village in Zigong--two hours walk just to catch a bus. The land there is too poor to grow anything except maize.”

Ollie lowers her voice and pulls me closer to her. “So we have practically nothing to eat except sweetcorn. From lack of nutrition, my sister’s hair becomes yellow and dry like the tops on the sweetcorn when it’s ready to pick.” Every time Ollie says “sweetcorn”, she raises her voice and it fills the air with a soft intensity, and I feel her finger nails digging into my forearm.

“One day, my aunty gave sister some sweets as a special present. A village boy accused her of stealing them from him: ‘ Thief, thief, your family is too poor to buy sweets.’ Then he started singing:

‘Sweetcorn hair, sweetcorn hair,’

‘Ugly little girl with sweetcorn hair.

‘Sweetcorn hair

Sweetcorn eyes

Gonna have t’ eat sweetcorn

All your life.

‘Sweetcorn hair, sweetcorn hair

Ugly little girl with sweetcorn hair.’

“The other village children laughed and started singing and calling my sister ‘sweetcorn hair’. My sister swore to herself: ‘When I grow up, I will become rich and will never eat sweetcorn again!’ ”

Ollie’s eyes are full of tears and my forearm is quite sore. Every time she repeated ‘sweetcorn’ her fingers had dug in more deeply. Ollie continued:

“After she made some money in Chengdu, she started to miss her hometown sweetcorn! So she permed her hair and dyed it yellow and deliberately made it more like sweetcorn silk. And would you believe, after one year it became fashionable in Chengdu!”

After hearing the story, I feel like kicking myself from here to the moon, or finding an extremely small stone to crawl under.

“She must be very successful, starting off only eating sweetcorn and ending up eating here.”

Ollie smiles: “Yes, she is. She came to Chengdu 10 years ago and started by selling clothes for street merchants. At night she studied, and after only three months she began selling insurance. Seven years ago, she goes to a company to sell insurance to a local boss called Mr Chou. Mr Chou starts by refusing to buy any insurance, but ends up not just buying a ton of insurance but also hiring her as his secretary. As a secretary, not only didn’t she know how to write a report, but she didn’t know how to type or even photocopy. All she could do was drink and talk.”

“On her seventh day of working for Mr. Chou, she takes one of his most reticent clients, a client who had never given any business to Mr. Chou despite his many attempts, out on an evening of ‘working is eating and drinking’,. The next day, when Mr. Chou arrives at his office, he finds his secretary half-asleep on his office settee nursing a monster hangover. On his desk he is surprised to discover a signed copy of the largest contract his company has ever received. Since then, she has been his right hand ‘man.’ ”

“Wow! Is that a wine company? Is she a wine tester?”

“No, it’s a construction company.”

“How come a construction company promotes someone for drinking? The two things have nothing to do with each other.”

Ollie ignores my question.

“After she gets some money, she supports me through my education. Four years ago, she sponsors me to study in London. Without her, I would be just a girl standing in the reception line with a big grin on my face and no money in my purse.

“Those reception line bimbos are from similar villages to my sister’s and mine. They stand there ten hours a day barely making enough money to buy any good things. Every day of every month of every year hundreds of country ‘sweetcorns’ arrive in the city looking for a chance to get a life. They end up washing feet or standing in reception lines or worse. But I don’t have to, my sister pulled me out of the gutter. So, in answer to your question, I’ve never did figure out the relationship between construction and drinking, but I fully respect my sister and what she had done for our family.”

“You have a very good sister, her sweetcorn silk hair is very nice.” I say it from bottom of my heart.

One of those bimbos, smiling, neatly dressed and very professional, leads us to a room separated from the big hall, a private dining room. The walls are covered in lacquered wood arranged in a crazy network that at first appears random and disorganized, but which actually has a very carefully constructed symmetry, a kind of microcosm of Chinese life, or so it appears to me. Five people are sitting at the table, being served by three waitresses. Sweetcorn stands up and grabs me:

“Ben, this is Mr. Li, our most important guest, ‘king of the night’ as we say. Ollie, please could you translate for Ben?” She continues in Chinese as Ollie translates: “Mr. Li, this is Mr. Ben Gunn, a hedge fund manager from the city of London.”

Mr li is one of those shot, platty, middle-aged men who always seem to be swetting and out of breath. Burst blood vessels, most probably cause by drinking too much alcohol, give his nose a red glow. “Oh, my son told me that only the most intelligent English people are working in investment banks. He is studying in London, at the London Business School.” He looks at me full of respect, evidently expecting me to return the favour and complement the intelligence of his son. I sit down between Ollie and Sweetcorn. Mr. Li is next to Sweetcorn, on her left.

“But, but…. ” I am about to explain that I am no longer working when I feel a sharp kick on my shin.

Oille turns to me: “I have explained to Mr. Li how the situation for investment banks is very tough right now.You can’t say you have no job as you will lose Sweetcorn’s face and maybe the project!”

I want to keep my mouth shut. I am worried that I might say the wrong thing and lose Sweetcorn the project. Ollie begins translating again.

“Mr. Li says not to worry. You are still a young man and soon the storm will be gone and sky will be blue again.”

It appears that Sweetcorn and Ollie are the only ones at the table who speak English. I don’t have time to wonder how Sweetcorn managed to learn it. Sweetcorn smiles at me sweetly. Ollie looks me dead in the eyes, a phoney smile barely concealing that look of disapproval that I am beginning to get used to.

The dishes come up. They all look very nice and expensive. I put my hand into my pocket to get my camera. I am taking pictures of all the different foods I eat, but Ollie takes hold of my hand and whispers: “What are you doing, Ben? Do you want them to think you are keeping evidence of a government officer wining and dining with a businessman who is biding for his project? ”

“Sorry, I thought that it is legal and common here.” I put back my camera.

“Ben, I thought I had made it clear to you. In China, ‘common’ doesn’t means ‘legal’. Please understand that before you lose us the project. Sometimes I wonder how you ever got to be a hedge fund manager.”

So many different kinds of food, and I’m not allowed to take pictures. How will I be able to remember them for my cookbook? We start with shark fin soup, which is mixed in front of us. The shark fins are like clear noodles. They are cooked in a chicken and pork base and rice has been added later.

“We shouldn’t really eat this,” I say to Ollie. “I read that it is causing the extinction of several species of rare sharks.”

Mr. Li wants to know what I am saying. A few moments later, Sweetcorn translates his reply.

“Mr. Li is so glad you like the shark fin soup. The taste is in the fine broth which the fins absorb. They have no taste of their own, but they give the soup a very special texture, don’t you think?”

I taste a shark fin. It is a weird texture, like eating fish shavings. At first it is crunchy, but then it just seems to melt away and slide softly down the throat. When Sweetcorn speaks to be, I get a big charge from her energy and exuberance. I imagine her as clear, chewy and soft to swallow, just like the shark fin.

Later on Sweetcorn explains another dish to me. “This is stewed duck with aweto. Aweto comes from Tibet. It is a kind of worm in winter which turns ito a kind of grass in summer.”

“You mean it’s both an animal and a plant? But that’s impossible!”

“No, Ben, it’s true. It’s a fungus that lives off of the larvae of a moth all its life. The two never ever separate.” She picks up one of the wormy-looking things with her chop sticks and shows it to me. “You see, this small yellow bit is the larvae. You can just see some of its feet. Then this long thin bit here is the spore of the plant. Here, taste!”

Automatically I back away. “I’ve never eaten larvae before.”

“That’s OK, go on. It’s very good for the kidneys.”

“Go for it,” I say, and Ollie pops it in my mouth with the chop sticks while I close my eyes.

To my surprise, it tastes quite sweet. I can see Mr. Li is trying to say something to me. Again Ollie translates. But how do I know she is translating correctly.

“Mr. Li wants you to know that this is top quality aweto, and that it is very expensive, about £10,000 a kilo.”

I feel like I am eating gold. “Why so expensive?”

“It only grows in thevsnowy mountains in Tibet and Qinghai. There is very little of it and demand is getting bigger and bigger.” I try another one. Yes, it is sweet, but nothing too special.

“Why is it so popular?”

Mr. Li extracts one of the awetos from the duck and puts it in his mouth, says something in Chinese and flexes his biceps. Everyone laughs. Sweetcorn translates:

“It’s popular because it’s good for a man. Like Viagra. Go on, try it. It will help you with your sexy lady plumber!”

“How do you know about that?” I must have turned as red as a beetroot.

Sweetcorn laughs. I give Ollie a dirty look. She looks a bit sheepish and falls into the role of passive translator.

Mr. Li picks up a bottle of alcohol and examines the lid and label before allowing the waitress to open it. “Mao Tai. This is the real thing.” He shakes the bottle proudly in the air. “I like this restaurant. Everything here is real. Even the shark fins. I get so tired of eating artificial shark fins and drinking fake Mao Tai.” He hands the bottle to me, pointing to some writing. In the middle of the Chinese characters it reads 50%. 50%! Vodka is only about 40%.

The waitress pours the alcohol carefully into each guest’s little porcelain cup. Mr Li smiles and lifts up his cup: “Let’s toast to our English friend. Ben, try our national alcohol.”

Everyone picks up their cups, throws their head in the air and pours the golden liquid straight down. Then they turn their cups upside down and shake them to show that they are totally empty. I am the only one who hasn’t drunk all of his. I feel everyone’s eyes upon me.

I sip a little bit. It burns my tongue, and then my throat. It’s way too strong for me and I am about to put the cup back down when Ollie kicks my shin again, grabs my sore forearm and murmurs: “Ben, Ben, you have to finish in one go otherwise you will upset everyone!”

“Everyone? Including Mr. Li? Oh no!” I close my eyes, lift up my head and pour the whole cup of alcohol down my throat in one go. Everyone laughs and claps when they see my empty cup. I feel like I am walking between heaven and hell. The officer pats my shoulder: “Good, brother, we are brothers now.”

I don’t quite understand why we are suddenly brothers. Maybe Mr. Li has an alcoholic brother? In the pubs of oxford, there is a word: “Wine can turn a meal into banquet.” But Chinese alcohol is much stronger, strong enough to turn strangers into brothers.

Now each guest is toasted in turn. I do some quick calculations. There are six people at the table. Each one toast to me, I need to drink up 5 more cups. Oh no! I turn to Ollie. By the time everyone has been toasted, my throat is burning and my head is spinning. I have to hold onto the back of my chair to stop from falling over.

Then a second round of toasting begins. I turn to Ollie. “How long will this go on?”

“Three rounds,” she replies, stonefacedly.

“But that’s another 12 shots! And the shots aren’t small!”

Sweetcorn flutters like a butterfly from person to person. She reminds me of Mulan, the same porcelain skin, but with yellow hair instead of Mulan’s black. Her eyebrows are thin and curl upwards, which makes her face sharper and smarter. Her small eyes hide behind her eyelids, and are constantly moving, observing, calculating the next move, anticipating dangers and problems.

I sense that she wants to show how much she can drink. She asks the waitress change her cup for a double-sized one, and then goes over to Mr. Li to drink. He looks so happy and praises her. I hear the word ‘Mulan’. He must be telling her she looks like Mulan.

Now her face is beginning to turn scarlet and her eyes are turning red like rabbit eyes. But she carries on drinking. She just keeps talking, joking around, and drinking. But she eats nothing. Every man gets exited by her charm and comes to drink with her.

Drinking in English culture can be a very personal activity. For the Chinese, it is totally social and all to do with business. I am not used to this strong alcohol, but I still keep drinking. I can’t let Sweetcorn down. I have to be a good brother to Mr. Li!

After countless cups, (I lost count after 13) my feet are like shark fin noodle, soft and twisted, and my head is numb. Also the restaurant floors are swaying to and fro and the tables and chairs keep moving of their own accord, forcing me to sit down on a very wobbly chair that keeps trying to knock me over. “Stop, it chair, bad chair,” I scold it. But it keeps acting just like a disobedient puppy.

My new ‘brother’ comes up to me, pats my shoulder and announces to everyone: “He is the best foreigner I have ever met. The other foreigners don’t drink like him; they don’t give us face. Ben, you give us big face. I can see you are doing your best.”

“Ollie, whasht doesh give faesh mean?”

“It means a lot. It means you are showing us that we are important to you. This gives us face, makes us important.”

I roll my head in the biggest circles possible so I can show I am in total agreement. Ollie can see that I don’t understand a thing.

“Right now,” she adds, “It means you are drinking as much as Mr. Li wants you to drink, and he appreciates that.”

“Doesh thish mean he shwill give the constituchon project to your shister?”

“This banquet is just a warm-up. Lots of other things get involved too. But the banquet is a very important start. If he doesn’t feel good about my sister, he’ll turn her company off immediately and she’ll have no chance.”

“I shee. I shink shey like me?”

“Yes, definitely, you are the first foreigner fellow to join in the drinking culture. Even they won’t force a foreigner to drink. Everyone is so happy.”

With that encouragement, I volunteer to start one-to-one toasting again. Every body is so surprised and happy. ‘I am going to give them the biggest face they have ever had’ I say to myself.

“Cheers to you!”

“Cheers to you!

“And you!

“And a stoast to che man who inchented Mao Tai.” I stumble and someone catches me.

“A stoast to big face, whoever you are. Who are you big faesh?” People whirl around me. I grab at some perfumed sweetcorn hair as it falls in my face. Ollie comes out of a cloud and pulls my hand away. “No, no I shwant shweetcorn hair,I shwant shweetcorn hair!” We skip together over the Houses of Parliament and London Bridge. This has got to be the biggest face in the whole history of faces. “London Bridge is falling down, falling down, hey hoy silver.”

Every body in front of me is shaking and smiling. I see the sweetcorn silk hair shining and moving and whispering to me: “If the life rapes you and you can’t escape, just enjoy it. If you are forced to drink, just enjoy it.”

My ‘brother’ is laughing with huge satisfaction. He has gotten huge “face” from my intoxication. All I want is for his satisfaction to get Sweetcorn the project.

Finally, Mr. Li calls his driver in and orders: “This is my English brother, drive him home safely.”

Sweetcorn says to him: “ You are such a nice person, can I drive you home?”

He hold Sweetcorn” and laughs: “ I have eaten aweto today, don’t you worry?”

Sweetcorn uses her little hand to pat his back: “You are naughty. You are naughty.” They hold each other and are gone. The pain of jealousy makes me almost vomit.

After I get to my hotel, I rush to the toilet and vomit. My entire stomach empties out. I watch shark fins and awetos swirl down the toilet in a golden river of Mai Tai.

My head is exploding. There is something in the bed next to me. I reach down. Oh, the aweto must be working! If only the sexy plumber would ring at the door now. But the whole night passes with no ring and no plumber.