Fiction: Group 4
New Tales of the Pearl River Delta
Heep Yunn School, Leung, Juliet - 15, Fiction: Group 4
he sun lashed out its fiery tongue, leaving sunburnt marks on already scarred backs while the waves
beat against the pier, equally relentlessly. The sun gloated at the lack of wind and tried to suffocate
the coolies. It was a stifling noon, but the Chinese foreman, standing on the raised platform, made
them skip lunch until the infinite stacks of cargo are stowed away. From the nearby eatery, the fragrance of
tea and
char siu
buns came wafting out, sending their stomachs into protest.
‘I am starving. How long does it take for us to grab a
daibao
and a sip of
polei
?’ hissed Ping. He eyed the
foreman with murderous eyes. At nearly six feet tall, he was the strongest, and the most violent of all the
coolies in this port; the precipitator of everything, mostly the troubles.
‘Exactly! We just want a bite, don’t we?’ echoed Keung.
‘That
gongtao
over there, who does he think he is? Not ten months ago he was slaving away like all of us.
Now hesees himself a British scoundrel too,’ scoffed Ping.
‘Someone tell him he’ll kill everybody off with the way he works us. He’ll be sending poor Chi-Wo over
there into a grave soon,’ said Wei-Hai as he shrugged his shoulders towards Chi-Wo, a tottering kid who
could barely shoulder the cargo on his back. They sweated like fountains spewing water, and cursed the
foreman violently in secret: the prospect of going up to him was far too intimidating.
In 1928 Hong Kong, ‘employee’ and ‘welfare’ were two separate ideas. The meagre wage which Wei-Hai
received was all that kept his family of six from the streets. Although Wei-Hai didn’t look like it, he had
already been his family’s breadwinner for four years since sixteen.
Eventually, when the sun decided to abandon its post, the foreman dismissed them without compensation
for the lost lunch. A veil of black crept over the city, and Wei-Hai trudged back home feeling numb in
places where he didn’t know he had muscles. A light appeared at the corner of his eye in a well of darkness,
and he saw the dried seafood store lined with all manner of delicacies: dried squid, abalone, and shark fins.
They always made his mouth water when he passed by every night. He remembered his impossible vow of
bringing home fish maw, but the occasional addition of
charsiu
on the dinner table was enough for the
family to relish for a week. Inside the seafood store, an old lady was setting the table for her workers' dinner,
as she had done every night while Wei-Hai dragged himself home. Wei-Hai longingly imagined himself in
a workplace where employers showed small acts of kindness, treat them to dinner. Then, the Chinese
foreman’s fat face swam into mind, and the light that had fleetingly floated into his heart was drowned by
darkness again.
Wei-Hai’s next day was equally back- breaking and he wished the scorching sun would disappear behind
the clouds to provide some respite. As he stacked interminable crates of tobacco at the end of the pier, he
noticed the two British managers in top hats daintily pick their way across towards the foreman’s office. The
younger gentleman had a handkerchief over his nose, and Wei-Hai rolled his eyes at the sight.
Ping came over, narrowing his eyes when he saw the two top hats bobbing across the pier. ‘Look at those
English dogs. I’ve had enough of this. We didn’t topple a Chinese empire for a British one!’ Ping looked as
if he wanted to throw his crate towards the foreman’s office. Wei-Hai didn’t reply, but when he looked
into the foreman’s office, he saw the foreman bowing ninety degrees before the two Englishmen.
Nor did it help when the sun melted away the clouds, and Wei-Hai nearly couldn’t suppress his boiling
feelings towards the despicable Chinese foreman, nor his contempt for the Englishmen. But he wasn’t born
to be rash like Ping, and he returned to his crates of tobacco. For four years, he had been trying to work his
way up to become a foreman. It would mean a chance to help all the coolies who shared the same fate as
him – terrorised by someone of the same skin colour as their own.
T
