My neighbor Zhou Jie -- Big Sister Zhou -- invited me to the countryside for a birthday bash. Her friend's mother was turning seventy. Zhou Jie said I probably had never seen the countryside here. I told her I had barely seen the countryside in America. She said the celebration would be very re nao -- lively.
Two of Zhou Jie's friends picked us up in the morning from downtown Lengshuijiang. As we drove, the road became one lane and then narrowed. I stared out the window at the small crop plots and the wooden houses built throughout the terraced green hills. The huge black SUV we rode in seemed out of place in this simple landscape.
We drove for an hour before we turned off the narrow road and pulled onto a winding dirt path until there was nowhere to go by car. Then we climbed a hill and followed a rock-strewn footpath toward the sound of a marching band. On an outdoor stage a dozen men and women in red military jackets and caps played their rusty trombones, trumpets, baritones and a booming bass drum.
We followed the path as it curved around a lily-covered pond and through a giant inflatable arch before reaching a two-story brick house. Along the way, the path was scattered with red paper -- firecrackers. The men unfurled and lit the firecrackers, then ran up the hill away from the smoking and popping.
On another outdoor stage closer to the house, women wore the traditional qi pao dress and waved bright red scarves. A man on a stool in front of the stage played the erhu, the quivering two-stringed instrument sometimes drowned out by the pop!pop!pop! of firecrackers.
Huge red and yellow banners with Chinese characters covered the front of the house. At the main door sat a woman accepting cash-filled red envelopes, birthday gifts. Surrounding her on the front porch were about ten small tables with people seated playing cards and eating sunflower seeds and peanuts.
We squeezed into the main room of the house, a large space with concrete floors and bare walls. An eight-tiered birthday cake was displayed at the back of the room and in front of it sat the 70-year-old mother surrounded by her great-grandchildren. Before we ate, the mother's eight daughters performed a song and dance with the erhu in the main room. Then each of her children's families bowed before her and wished her a happy birthday and good health.
Before the speeches ended, Zhou Jie, her friends and I sought out a table, knowing the food would be served soon. Tables and benches appeared in every room of the house. The 500 guests found seats on the front porch, in the house or in neighbors' homes. Then we feasted for two hours. First there was chicken, turtle, rabbit ears and pork. The pig was the family's own and had been slaughtered that morning. Later the pig's intestines were served with some celery-like vegetable. When we all said we were full, more food came. Shrimp, duck, fish. The food tasted real, from the earth. Nothing processed.
I spent a sleepy afternoon watching the women play mahjong while the rest of the guests watched a countryside singing and dancing troupe perform on the outdoor stage. The women played mahjong through the performance and until the sun went down. Then we ate again, more chicken, shrimp, fish, and also winter melon soup, a favorite of mine.
As we prepared to return to the city, we heard a boom overhead. I looked up as hundreds of yellow and red and purple lights burst and then fell toward the earth. We watched the fireworks from the car and then slowly went back the way we came on the darkened dirt path.
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