During these days of quarantine back home in China, I have been staying in Grandma’s house again. This is also my time to relax and really get immersed in my native culture, which had become a little unfamiliar through time.
Beijing, my home. I was always proud to be born on a land where a majestic empire once rested its sturdy polars. The Hutong food, the traditions, the homely accents… Every time I return to the old Dongcheng district of my childhood, I feel this strange nostalgia, in ways like a time-traveler visiting their once-home many years after it had fallen.
I guess I am afraid of it leaving me, or rather I leaving it — as I (hopefully can) continue my foreign studies, or later, life, in another land. This apprehension have spurred me to try as hard as I can to be a Beijinger (北京人儿）.
Yesterday night, I accompanied grandma very(!) willingly to her nightly square-dance (广场舞) session. These ladies are much funner than I thought- some old, some younger, but all with the same, bouncy energy. People make fun of these dancing ladies for their passion, and I used to be one of them, until I had bathed in the incredible halo of their existence. NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING, will stop the ladies from dancing.
Only four had showed up at the start, but the leader did not show a glimpse of hesitance and turned on the music anyways.
I repeat, nothing will stop them. There were cars parked in the way; they swapped formation.There was a light drizzle; nobody left (except for one but nobody gave her the slightest attention). A car drove through the crowd; the ladies only shifted slighted to give way, but never stepped out of rhythm.
I was amazed. Astonished. At how admant our country’s older women are. Their passion is unshakable.
But that passion wasn’t a wildfire, like ones you’d spot in a Zumba crowd. Chinese square-dancing is more like… like a slow kiln, with all the energy contained within; color is tainted on by every uprisal in heat, until the final china glares back at you with striking glamour.
Also, throughout the entire 1h30m, not a single word was uttered between them. Just a couple dozens of old ladies drawing air pictures to pure music.
I swear, any foreigner who’s used to hyped up fitness dancing would literally choke on the silence there.
But as a Beijinger with the Beijing blood running in me, I only felt composed.
The swing of an arm, the bounce of a sole; how they could possibly move so gracefully yet so unified is a mystery to me till today. Turtle-speed dancing is not equivalent to the dismiss of quality in this case. Every action is slurred to the next with great control, like a slick long legato.
I don’t know about anyone else, but I definitely cannot make my arms wiggle like waves.
These square dancing ladies only have each other. They form friendships and those relationships are what relieves them from elder loneliness.
My grandma had made lots of friends, and she relies on them. I could tell that all those elderly women spend their day laboring for family or otherwise meaninglessly, just to wait till the sun sets punctually at 7:10pm behind the community square…
…When their day really begins.
