Chairman Mao Would Not Be Amused – Fiction From Today (12 page)

I stood in line for three days running, waiting my turn, but my turn never came. It was said that all the registry slips had slipped out by the back door. The masses at the front gate, tormented by bad teeth, were seething with anger. I wanted to make a scene then and there, but thinking of my status as a professor, I desisted. I would be in the middle of a scandal and still stuck with a bad tooth. I went home and told my wife everything. My wife said, "We have our own back door!" Back door, back door, enter ye who has the key.

I set out with two bottles of Maotai wine (don't blame me if they were fake; I can't tell the difference) to call on my wife's cousin many times removed, a certain Mr. Liu who was department head at one of the offices at the Ministry of Health. Mr. Liu told me first that he was supervisor for hospitals of Chinese medicine, that he had nothing to do with Western medicine, even less with dentistry and second that he disapproved of Western medicine on principle. The entire scope of Western medicine, he pronounced, was to take the human body apart for vivisection, a reflection of the outlook of the early days of the Industrial Revolution. If your tooth aches they'll attack your tooth; if your foot aches, they'll tackle your foot. All they can do, he continued, is to alleviate the manifestations. They're miles away from the root and source of the complaint. They resort to scalpels, forceps, hypodermics, saws, and clamps, treating people like machinery with so many parts. As to teeth, he added, all they know is to pull and fill, fill and pull, and they won't stop until they've rid you of your last tooth. With Chinese medicine, however, it's another story, and here Mr. Liu waxed eloquent. Chinese medicine treats the human body as an entity, a system, a construct of assimilation and dissemination, a system where the yin and the yang contend and supplement each other and the five internal organs move in unison. Even a puny little tooth has its roots in the heart, the lungs, and the kidneys, he assured me. And thus fuzzy mathematics, modern logic, total intuition, and sensory experience represent the postindustrial fifth wave. Mr. Liu informed me that famous physicians of the West had personally told Chinese medical students studying abroad that the future of medicine is embedded in China and will flourish in China, that it was preposterous for them to go west to study, that in fact it was scholars from the West who should make the pilgrimage to China to pluck the fruits of wisdom. He added that Picasso had owned up to Chang Ta-ch'ien that art is found only in China. Likewise, it is China, and China only, that is home to the genuine tooth. To sum up, Mr. Liu volunteered to help me get into the Hospital of Chinese Medicine for treatment.

I was so overjoyed that for the moment I even forgot my toothache. I have only myself to blame for my previous ordeal of that barbarous tooth extraction. Why did I have eyes only for Western medicine? I could kick myself. Mr. Liu went on to write a letter to link me up with a connection of his. I thanked him over and over again.

That first time I had trouble with my tooth, I had still believed in Western medicine as a science that would be the savior of my tooth. So infantile! Since then, times have changed, the years have chased one another down the aisle of history. As for myself, having passed through countless ups and downs, I have finally learned that science without philosophy or science plus philosophy but without the arm of backdoor connections will get me nowhere, cannot even save my tooth.

Department Chief Liu's letter, in his own calligraphy, read:

Dear Director Zhao:

How have you been? I have been terribly busy and thus remiss in paying my respects. Please excuse.

Regarding the affair entrusted to me, I have made arrangements. Please do not worry.

All these whispers about you-know-what, I think there must be some basis. Therefore please accept my early congratulations.

By the way, a friend-Professor Wang-has a toothache.

Thank you in advance for your attention to this little matter.

So this was the road to the salvation of my tooth!

There was a milling crowd at the Hospital of Chinese Medicine, not unlike Shanghai 's Temple Fair. There were even lines at the men's and women's rest rooms. People would exit still belting themselves up, such was the crush. I looked around in silent astonishment. Before liberation, Chinese medicine had been in such decline, but the scene in front of me now was bursting with activity. And to think that I alone had a letter for Director Zhao. This gave me a sense of superiority as I watched the crowd of patients rushing madly to and fro.

I said to a nurse, "I want Director Zhao. Show me the way to Director Zhao!"

She walked away, completely expressionless. Did she have an ear infection? I asked several other nurselike figures standing around in white jackets. No response either. Nobody seemed to have heard me.

"I have a letter from Department Chief Liu!" I shouted. But all to no effect.

I thought I had come to the wrong place and went out to check the sign at the gate. No mistake, it was the Hospital of Chinese Medicine. By the time I reentered the hospital grounds, I had lost my confidence and rushed about like the other patients. "I want Director Zhao. I have a personal letter from Department Chief Liu!" I insisted. But my demands gradually subsided into spineless whimpers.

While the hospital staff completely ignored me, the other patients turned on me with fury: "Go line up!" I looked around but could not find anyone in particular who had his eye on me. Just as I thought I was safe, again I heard the furious tones of patients shouting in one voice: "Go line up!"

In a sort of daze, I made my way to the registry office. Through the little window slot, I said to the nurse sitting on a raised seat, "I want Director Zhao!"

The window slot was tiny and situated very low. I had to bend and put my head down and then lift up my eyes to make out the (presumably) dazzling beauty of the nurse in charge. All I could make out was the fuzzy contours of someone high and mighty, looking down on the patients as so much trash. I shouted, "I want Director Zhao!" and waved my letter, which by now had become limp in my hands.

"Room seven," the unmoving, unmoved, and immovable figure behind the window slot mumbled. Was it
one
, or
seven
, or
eleven
? My neck had become stiff, as I was trying to bend my shoulders and lift my head at the same time.

I didn't have a second chance, for the people behind shoved me aside. I rushed to the consulting rooms, fighting my way through the crowd. I was continually pushed by other patients. This infuriated me, and I myself began pushing right and left, only to be swung to and fro by the human tide. I made my way into room i. A woman was sitting behind the desk. A woman? That could not be Director Zhao, I said to myself. I fought my way out through the mass of people craning their necks at the door. A young man was sitting behind the desk. No, that could not be Director Zhao either. Again I pushed and was pushed on my way out. Like a bubble on a boiling sea, I rolled into room 11. An elderly person with venerable white locks-"Director Zhao!" I shouted gleefully and was immediately shoved aside. I found myself in room 8. The doctor in room 8 was in a loud altercation with a patient, who pointed a finger at the doctor's nose and said in disgust, "I've never seen the likes of you!" The doctor pointed his finger at the patient's nose and reciprocated: "I've never seen the likes of you either!" I was sure this was not Director Zhao. Director Zhao would never quarrel with patients, nor patients with Director Zhao. But I had learned something in a flash of inspiration. It seemed that have never seen is a term of extreme opprobrium. What has never been seen is decidedly bad. But I had never seen Director Zhao, so why should I look so hard for him?

By now I had floated willy-nilly into room 9, and found myself face to face with a young fellow with long hair. Unlike the other crowded consulting rooms, this one was quite deserted. Obviously, he was not trusted by patients. I sat down and said hesitatingly, "I'm looking for Director Zhao…"

"I am Director Zhao," he said in firm tones.

I had no reason to dispute this, though I felt in my bones that something was wrong. Toothache, however, overcame my scruples. Leaving aside the verification of his identity, I began to tell him the history of my woes.

In friendly tones, the young fellow asked me to open my mouth. He began poking at my teeth with a steel prod. When he knocked on my bad tooth, I howled in pain.

The alleged Director Zhao nodded in sympathy and wrote out a prescription with many flourishes of the pen. I tried to make out his calligraphy on my way to the pharmacy. Suddenly, I deciphered: "Pain reliever 2 x 3 x 7."

Which means that all I was getting for my pains was pain-reliever pills to be taken three times a day, two at a time, for one week! Then I looked at the signature; it was even more undecipherable. It looked like Liu or Zhou or Xu; but whatever it was, decidedly it was not Zhao.

I had been cheated!

My pent-up feelings of anger exploded, and I made a scene then and there. Four individuals, male and female, young and old, all of whom claimed to be Director Zhao, tried to handle the situation. They said that Chinese medicine is quite all right, especially for chronic complaints, but for toothaches it is no panacea. Sad but true. Of course, this is only one view, for internal reference only, not for dissemination to the general public. All in all, Chinese medicine is superb, acknowledged by Western practitioners. But pain relievers are quite potent in relieving pain, they conceded and suggested I take some and go to a dental clinic. We are touched by your faith in Chinese medicine, they assured me. In theory, they continued, one cannot say that Chinese medicine is helpless when it comes to toothache. The root of toothache is an attack of sinister heat. For this, you may take the powder of crushed rhino horn, deer antler, and mountain-goat's horn mixed with mint and other medicines with cooling properties. But please remember first that these medicines require at least a month to take effect. Considering the pain you're in, can you afford to wait even a week? Second, all these medicines act as laxatives. If taken in small quantities, they don't work; if in great quantities, you will suffer from diarrhea. Considering the state you're in with your toothache, can your constitution tolerate an attack of diarrhea? Third, the most important ingredient among the cooling medicines is the powder of crushed rhino horn. The Ministry of Health has issued a document-x year, x month, x day-stipulating that rhino-horn powder be taken off the national medical-care program and paid for privately. It's a damned nuisance, as this medicine is very expensive. Of course, that was the point of the new regulation.

"Do you mean to tell me that I went through all this trouble, and even had to look up Department Chief Liu, just for a measly pack of pain relievers?" I shouted in anger.

"All right, all right, all right, we'll try acupuncture…"

They inserted a needle into the
hegu
acu-point between my thumb and index finger and another into my earlobe, and I had no choice but to leave with a pack of pain relievers in my pocket.

Actually, acupuncture and pain relievers did help. My symptoms were relieved, and so was I. What does it matter, Chinese medicine or Western medicine, so long as it works? Likewise, it doesn't matter, expensive medicine or cheap medicine, so long as it cures. On the problem of a toothache, there is no need for the differing schools of medicine to exclude one another.

Five days later, before I had finished my pills, the pain returned. This time, it was not only the tooth; one whole side of my head was throbbing. I could neither sleep nor eat nor even sit, much less work. I lay in bed groaning and moaning all night. Through the stillness of the night, our whole apartment building rang with the echoes of my lamentations. Much to my chagrin, I had disturbed the sleep of our neighbor on the floor above, President Shi Xueya of the Toothology Society.

President Shi came down to give me his personal attention. Dressed in a Western suit and leather dress shoes, with pin and tie and a matching handkerchief tucked into his breast pocket and exuding the faint aroma of Parisian cologne, President Shi had become a new man in a matter of days. I was impressed. He shook his head when he saw the state I was in.

"How could you let a petty little tooth reduce you to such a state? Our Toothology Society is an academic institution, now participating in an exchange program with the Royal Society of Holland. A complaint such as yours is beyond, as well as beneath, our concern. But your groans disturb my rest. This is a case of physical babblings interfering with metaphysical contemplations. Out of humanistic concern, I will alienate myself from my true identity and stoop to cure your toothache."

Then and there, as if in an epiphany, I realized that

President Shi got together a few old women, who prepared to scrape my back with copper thimbles steeped in vinegar. (Attention, readers, neither tin nor aluminum nor any other metal would do; it must be copper.) I exposed my back to their fingers. Up and down, up and down-the copper thimbles went the length of my back; from the neck to the tailbone, they left three blood-red trails. My whole body exuded the fragrance of vinegar, stronger than that of the sweet-and-sour fish at the Seafood Delight Restaurant, where the price had gone up three times running.