Authors: Sally Grindley
‘Oh, but it’s good pay, my dear,’ the woman encouraged. ‘Good pay. Good conditions. You come with us and you’ll earn enough
in no time.’
‘You work hard enough,’ said the man, ‘and we’ll have you home for Spring Festival. Plenty of young ladies would jump at the
chance, but you must make up your own mind.’
Spring Festival. A month away. I could cope with that, couldn’t I, after all I had been through? My heart skipped at the thought
of how my mother’s face would look if I walked through the door in time for Spring Festival, in time to give her a fistful
of money to spend on our celebrations.
‘What sort of factory?’ I asked.
‘The best,’ said the man. ‘A toy factory.’
‘Dolls, teddy bears, furry animals, rubber ducks, plastic lorries. Everything,’ enthused the woman. ‘Lots of other young girls
work there.’
Perhaps they would let me take something back for Li-hu, I smiled to myself.
‘We’re Mr and Mrs Wang.’ The woman held out her hand. ‘Trust us, my dear. We’ll see you’re all right.’
‘I’m Lu Si-yan,’ I said, shyly, shaking first her hand and then his. ‘Thank you for your help.’
Mr and Mrs Wang shared some food with me and asked me about myself. I told them a little about my family, but when they began
to pry into my recent past, I said that I had worked as a domestic, and left it at that. They seemed friendly enough, but
I was worried at the thought that I was putting my well-being into the hands of complete strangers, and I instinctively felt
that the less they knew about me the better. I had no choice but to trust them, though. They were offering me a lifeline.
Only the Best
We left the ferry more than a dozen stops further on, by which time it was nearly midday. As soon as we were ashore, Mr Wang
hailed a taxi. We were taken up a steep hill, through another partially demolished, deserted old town, beyond the new town
above it, and out into the country, leaving the river far behind us. We travelled for several miles before we reached a small,
shabby industrial town, where factory after factory belched foul-smelling smoke into the atmosphere, and where row upon row
of concrete dormitories lined the roads. We pulled up outside the gates of one of the factories.
‘Here we are,’ said Mr Wang proudly. ‘All this belongs to us. This factory and the two alongside. Three factories, three hundred
workers.’
‘And you will be one of them, Lu Si-yan,’ added Mrs Wang brightly.
I looked at the grimy, featureless facade of the building, its windows tiny and too dirty to see through. Yellow smoke poured
from its eight chimneys, otherwise there was no sign of life from the outside. Mr Wang unlocked the gates. We walked round
to a side door, along a short, neon-lit corridor and into his office. A huge black desk dominated the room, which was decorated
with an assortment of garish paintings, a red and gold silk carpet and an enormous red sofa.
Mr Wang plumped himself down at the desk. Very quickly he told me how much I would be paid and when, what hours I would work,
and what I would earn if I worked extra hours.
‘We’re very generous with our overtime payments,’ he said.
‘Very generous,’ echoed Mrs Wang.
It sounded like a fortune, for I had never earned money before. If I worked lots of extra hours I was sure I could leave after
a month and be home, as Mr Wang had said, in time for the Spring Festival. That was all I could think of then, just getting
through whatever the work entailed, and handing my wages to my mother.
‘You’ll sleep in one of our dormitories with some of the other girls,’ continued Mr Wang.
‘It’s very cosy and I’m sure you’ll make lots of friends,’ said Mrs Wang.
‘And you’ll be fed on the premises. We pay for that ourselves.’ Mr Wang patted his paunch.
‘It’s good food, too,’ smiled Mrs Wang. ‘Only the best for our workers.’
‘Off you go, then. Remember, work hard and you’ll reap the rewards.’ Mr Wang dismissed me with a wave of the hand.
‘Come with me, dear,’ said Mrs Wang. ‘We’ll look after your nice coat for you and get you kitted out like the other girls.
We provide you with two sets of overalls which you must wear all the time and wash yourself.’
She took me along another corridor, into a changing room. From a cupboard, she pulled out some overalls and made me put them
on instead of the clothes I was wearing. They were far too big, but Mrs Wang looked at me and nodded approvingly.
‘Perfect,’ she said. ‘Now, keep your own clothes with you and you can put them in a locker in your dormitory later on. One
of the girls will find you a space.’
She led me from the room and down another corridor. ‘Can you sew?’ she asked.
I nodded, grimacing inwardly as I remembered the last time I had been asked that question.
‘Then how would you like to make teddy bears? We’ve got lots of orders for those at the moment, so we could do with an extra
pair of hands on the production line.’
I nodded again.
‘Good.’ Mrs Wang clapped her hands. ‘Come on, then. I’ll show you where to go and find out what you’ll be doing.’
She led me down another corridor to a door at the end. She opened the door, pulled me through and shut it quickly behind her.
The wave of heat made me gasp. The smell of stale air was nauseating. In front of me, rows of young women and girls were hunched
over sewing machines. Not one of them looked up when we came in. Mrs Wang walked me between two of the rows to the far side
of the room, where a supervisor sat watching the girls.
‘Mrs Li, this is our new recruit, Lu Si-yan,’ said Mrs Wang. ‘Where would you like her?’
‘Eyes,’ Mrs Li replied, looking at me sourly. ‘A little young, isn’t she?’
‘Fifteen, and eager to do as much work as possible, aren’t you, dear?’ Mrs Wang answered quickly, staring at me for confirmation,
though we hadn’t discussed my age. I lowered my head in a half-nod.
‘Will her hands do?’ asked the supervisor.
‘I’m sure they’ll harden up in no time,’ smiled Mrs Wang. ‘I’ll leave her to you.’
Mrs Wang disappeared back through the room and out through the door. The supervisor rose reluctantly from her table.
‘This way, then,’ she said, without looking at me.
I followed her to the end of a row, where she made a young woman stop what she was doing and move to another position. She
sat me down at the vacated table and picked up a faceless bear from a box on the floor.
‘This is all you have to do,’ she said, pulling a carton of glass eyes towards her and taking two. ‘Poke two small holes where
the eyes are to go. Tie each eye into the middle of a strand of upholstery thread. Squeeze the eye wires together to form
a pin. Ease the threads on to a needle. Push the needle into the eyehole and pull the threads gently to work the wires into
the eyehole to seat the eye.’
She continued apace, without checking to see that I understood her instructions, until both eyes were in place. It was amusing
to see the bear’s face begin to come to life, but I was anxious that I should find the procedure too difficult. I wished I
could start with the nose, which I was sure would be much easier. The supervisor stood up and told me to sit down.
‘You will have the rest of today to practise,’ she said expressionlessly. ‘You are lucky this is the quiet season. You will
be expected to keep up with the rest of the girls. We do not tolerate slackness.’
She indicated that I should practise on the bears in the box, then returned to the far side of the room without another word.
I peered round to see if anyone was looking at me, but the girls were all too busy concentrating on their own bit of bear-making.
I pulled a bear out of the box, two eyes from the carton, and tried to remember what I had to do. Poking the holes, which
had seemed the simplest part of the operation, proved to be the first difficulty. I ended up with one much higher than the
other, giving the bear a rather mischievous look once the eyes were in place. Threading the needle and pushing it through
the dense stuffing and coarse-lined fur was the next major hurdle. I rammed it as hard as I could, joggling it around, but
achieved no more than a shallow indentation. I tried again and again, my fingers growing redder and redder, perspiration pouring
down my face.
I looked to either side of me for help. The girl to my left stole a glance in my direction and whispered, ‘Use the needle-grabber.’
I had no idea what a needle-grabber was, but she pointed to a piece of leather on my table, then returned to her work.
‘Thanks,’ I whispered, but she made no acknowledgement.
I wrapped the needle in the leather and tried again to push it through the bear’s head. It still refused to budge at first.
With perseverance, though, I finally managed to work the needle out through the bear’s neck. I breathed a sigh of relief and
stretched my arms out, only to catch the disapproving look of the supervisor. I pulled hard on the threads to manoeuvre the
eye into position, and was pleased that it actually stayed put, even if it was a little too low.
I set to work on the second eye. I managed to push the needle through more quickly this time, but when it came to tying the
threads together, they cut painfully into my fingers. I couldn’t believe that making a bear could be so difficult.
At last, the two eyes were in place. I stood the bear up in front of me and couldn’t help smiling at his cock-eyed look. I
wished I could keep him. I traced with my finger where I would have sewn his nose and a big smiley mouth. I would have called
him One Eye Up, One Eye Down Bear, I decided, were I allowed to keep him.
‘You’ll have to speed up if you want to keep your job here.’ The supervisor’s acid voice cut through my reverie. ‘Two eyes
are not much to show for over an hour’s work. Two eyes that are far from straight.’
‘It’s making my hands sore,’ I said, hoping that she might move me to noses or paws.
‘It’s the same for everyone when they start. You just have to get used to it.’
The supervisor returned to her seat. I picked up another bear and began the same process again, making sure this time that
the eyeholes were in alignment. For the rest of the afternoon, I threaded and shoved and jiggled and pulled until my shoulders
ached and my hands were stiff and bloody. Yet I managed to complete only four bears. Each time, the stuffing resisted my most
strenuous efforts to push the needle through it. I couldn’t see how I was ever going to speed up, and the threat that I might
lose my job petrified me.
A bell sounded. The other girls stopped what they were doing immediately and dashed for the door. I wasn’t sure whether I
should follow or wait for the supervisor to tell me what to do, but then I saw that she was disappearing just as quickly.
The girl who had spoken to me previously told me to hurry up.
‘Aren’t you hungry?’ she asked. ‘It’s suppertime.’
I dropped my work and jumped to my feet. I followed her along another corridor, through a door to the outside, and across
a concrete courtyard towards one of two enormous corrugated iron buildings, where dozens of other workers were converging.
We piled through the doors into a cavernous canteen furnished with endless lines of large round plastic tables and chairs.
The tables were covered with metal tureens of steaming food.
I kept close to the girl who had befriended me and sat down next to her, hoping she wouldn’t mind. She took a plastic bowl
from a pile in the middle and served herself from one of the tureens. As I did the same, she warned, ‘Be sure to eat well,
but don’t take more than you can manage. They’ll fine you if you leave any.’
I nodded, grateful but shocked at what she had said, though I was so hungry that I was sure I would have been able to eat
anything that was put before me. However, my appetite quickly disappeared as I tried my first mouthful of the chewy, over-salted
meat stew that was our dinner. For the second time since I had run away, I found I was imagining myself back at the Chens’,
where the food had always been delicious, even if I was only given leftovers. Everyone around me was tucking in voraciously.
Were they used to the food, no longer noticing its awfulness? Were they hungrier than me? Or had they simply never tasted
anything better? How strange, I thought, that regardless of how dreadful my time with the Chens had been, it had opened my
eyes to how good some things in life could be. I steeled myself and swallowed the remains of the food in my bowl, washed down
with a cup of thin, tepid tea.
‘Are you sure you’ve had enough?’ said the girl next to me. ‘You need it to keep you going.’
‘I’ve had plenty,’ I said. ‘What do we do now? Can we go to our rooms?’
The girl shook her head. ‘Not yet. We go back to work. There’s overtime for another four hours. Compulsory overtime.’
I could feel myself beginning to shake. Another four hours. I couldn’t cope with another four hours. Not today. Not any day.
‘Are you all right? You get used to it, you know. Sort of. What’s your name?’
‘Lu Si-yan,’ I whispered.
‘My name is Li Mei. Don’t think me rude, but you look too young to be working.’
‘I didn’t think it would be like this, working in a factory. They made it sound so special.’
‘They would. That’s how they tempt people like us, people with no hope of anything better. I’ve been here for six months.
Another six months and I’ll leave and take the money I’ve saved back to my family. Is that why you’re here?’
I nodded. ‘I thought if I could just do a month. They promised that would be enough. But I don’t think I can even last a week.’
Li Mei gazed at me in consternation. ‘How old are you, Lu Si-yan?’ she asked.
‘Nearly twelve,’ I muttered.
The bell rang at that moment. Everyone stood up and headed quickly for the doors. Li Mei helped me to my feet.
‘Think of your family, Lu Si-yan. Remember their faces, remember their smiles, remember the good times. Think of them and
you’ll get through.’
I nodded, but just the mention of my family made me want to cry my heart out. We hurried back across the courtyard. Li Mei
squeezed my hand encouragingly when we re-entered the machine room. I sat down at my table, picked up a bear, kept my head
bowed and struggled to regain my composure.
‘You can do it,’ whispered Li Mei.
I wished I could believe it. My hands were so sore that I could scarcely hold the needle, let alone exert enough pressure
to push it through. The supervisor came and stood behind me.
‘I knew it,’ she growled, after watching me for several minutes. ‘Why do they give me these girls who are not up to the job?’
‘Why don’t I change with her?’ Li Mei smiled at the supervisor. ‘I’m good at eyes. Lu Si-yan can sew on the ears instead of
me.’
I glanced gratefully at Li Mei, then stared straight ahead of me, certain that the supervisor would say no just to spite me.
After what seemed like an eternity, she replied, ‘She had better be good at ears. We are not running a charity here.’
She left Li Mei to show me what to do.
By the time the final bell rang, at half past ten, I was so exhausted that I could barely keep my eyes open. Even though it
had been easier to sew on the ears, my hands were still bruised and bloody from pushing the needle through several layers
of fur. My back and shoulders had begun to protest at every effort. But at least the supervisor had grudgingly accepted that
I was better at ears than eyes and might make the grade in a week or so.
Li Mei took me under her wing and told the supervisor that there was space for me in her dormitory and that she would show
me where to go and what to do. I was so relieved, for I was dreading having to sleep in a room full of strangers.