Ecuador (5)
The night stretched long and slow, and she slept without dreams until dawn.
In the early morning, Tan Guhong pushed open the window. Cold air rushed against her face, and the blue sky and white clouds at an altitude of more than three thousand meters were especially refreshing.
“Morning.”
She turned her head and saw Luo Jingming standing by the window of the room next door. He leaned against the sky-blue window panel, wearing a thin white shirt with the buttons at the collar undone. He was not wearing his glasses, and there was still a trace of the lazy drowsiness of someone just waking in his brows. His gaze was hazy and quiet, like mist-shrouded mountains and rivers.
“Morning, but…” She pointed at her own hair with a finger, then pointed at him. “Um, you…”
He realized what she meant and raised a hand to touch his hair, only then discovering that a few strands had rebelliously sprung up, completely defying gravity.
The strands were exceptionally stubborn. He tried to smooth them down, but it was completely useless.
“You must have slept badly last night.”
“The pillow was too low. It was uncomfortable to sleep on.”
“Me too. So I slept with two pillows stacked on top of each other.”
“I didn't think of that…”
They looked at each other for a moment before breaking into laughter at the same time.
Not far away, El Panecillo was bathed in the morning light, and faintly, the statue of the Virgin could be seen glimmering with spots of gold and red. For a brief moment, the worldly wariness, coldness, and distance between them seemed to have faded somewhat compared with yesterday.
Who was it that once said travel was the easiest way to bring people closer together?
Regardless of the past or the future, at least today, they were companions setting out on the road together.
The Andes Mountains run through central Ecuador. The country is home to numerous volcanoes and experiences frequent earthquakes, with many highland volcanoes surrounded by beautiful scenery. Today's destination was Quilotoa Volcano, southwest of Quito. Among the surrounding mountains, it was famous for its emerald-colored volcanic lake.
The journey from Quito to Quilotoa took about five hours. The two rented a mountain jeep locally and drove themselves there, with Luo Jingming at the wheel.
The roads along the way were in very good condition, the weather was good, and there were very few cars. The atmosphere between them was also somewhat more relaxed than yesterday. Tan Guhong teased him:
“What happened to your little sidekick?”
She naturally meant the man named A-Kun. The bodyguard was extremely conscientious and dutiful. Yesterday, he had followed them around Quito as well, only keeping his distance while remaining within sight and never approaching. When he was not wearing that gloomy expression, he simply looked like an ordinary Asian man and would not attract anyone's attention.
Luo Jingming replied, “I gave him the day off. He doesn't need to follow me. Besides, there won't be any danger in Ecuador.”
“Doesn't he speak Chinese? I've never heard him talk.”
“He does, but he only speaks Cantonese, not Mandarin. A-Kun is Filipino. He's the son of the nanny who took care of me when I was little. We grew up together.”
“He's pretty skilled.” His arms were long enough to reach past his hips, and the web between his thumb and index finger was callused. He was an excellent fighter, as well as a good marksman.
“Not bad.”
“What about you?” She glanced at him.
“When I was little, I learned a little for self-defense. I'm not particularly good at it.”
He neither confirmed nor denied it, and she did not ask any further. The subject ended there and was not brought up again.
Long journeys were always more pleasant and relaxing with a companion. The two chatted idly on and off along the way, and before long they arrived at the intermediate city of Latacunga, where they went into town to eat.
It was called a city, but in reality it was little more than a small town. Still, unexpectedly, even such a small place had a Chinese restaurant.
Tan Guhong stood in front of the distinctive bright-red sign, trying to read the spelling on it.
“Chifa? Does that mean eating?”
“It's the Cantonese pronunciation of ‘吃饭,’” Luo Jingming said beside her. “There are places like this in the United States too. Supposedly, toward the end of the Qing dynasty, large numbers of laborers from China's southeastern coast crossed the ocean to the other side of the Pacific, doing hard work in agricultural cultivation, road construction, and mining. Whenever food was served, Chinese cooks would always shout, ‘吃饭!’ Over time, South Americans came to call eating Chinese food ‘CHIFA.’”
Tan Guhong nodded and smiled. “Back in those days, most of the people who went abroad to make their fortunes were from Guangdong. I suppose Cantonese ended up being more widely spoken overseas than Mandarin.”
Although it was Chinese food, Chinese restaurants that opened overseas inevitably adapted to local customs, often becoming almost unrecognizable. So, with perfect mutual understanding, the two chose another barbecue restaurant next door instead.
Ecuadorian barbecue was basically grilled meat along with grilled fruit, seasoned with salt and mayonnaise. The flavor was strange, but not difficult to accept.
“I'll drive for a while later…” Tan Guhong said after they finished eating.
“There are only two hours left. There's no need.”
“It's fine. I have an international driver's license. With two drivers, there's no reason to let you do all the driving and get tired.”
Luo Jingming did not refuse again. After the two paid the bill and came out, he bought her a cup of coffee from a vending machine.
“For driving after a meal, so you don't get sleepy.”
“Thanks, but no…” She shook her head, still wary, refusing the drink. After hesitating for a moment, she said, “Actually, I don't drink coffee.”
He looked puzzled. “Why?”
“I'm especially sensitive to coffee. After I drink it, my nerves stay stimulated for a long time, and I can't sleep at all.”
“It's still early.”
She paused. “Do you remember the last time I went to the inn to find you? You poured me a glass of sidra, and I took a sip.”
“And then?”
“Then that night, I didn't fall asleep until eight the next morning.”
That serious? Seeing her solemn expression, he could not help laughing. He downed the coffee in his cup in one go and said with a smile:
“Okay. I'll remember that from now on.”
The journey through the second half was much quieter. She sat in the driver's seat on the left, while he sat in the passenger seat on the right. The two did not talk much, so she simply turned on the car stereo.
The car was old, and the CD was old too. An unknown band played, the lead singer's voice hoarse as he sang the same love song over and over:
“I don't like you, but I love you
(我不喜欢你，但是我爱你)
Seems that I'm always thinkin' of you
(我似乎一直都在想念你)
You've really got a hold on me
(你真的虏获了我)
You really got a hold on me
(你真的虏获了我)……”
Along the way, they crossed the undulating, seemingly endless Andes Mountains. The vegetation changed as they went, with fertile farmland here and there, peaceful green fields, and flocks of sheep. Different crops and plants were different colors, and from a distance, it looked as though the mountains and rivers had been draped in a patchwork quilt. Accompanied by the singing in their ears, their mood seemed to stretch endlessly toward the far distance.
Near the volcanic lake was an indigenous Inca village, where travelers passing through would stop to rest. There were several guesthouses in the village. They casually picked a family-run inn that looked decent, put down their backpacks, took a short rest, and then headed for the volcanic lake.
As they left, Tan Guhong saw that Luo Jingming had finally changed into something more relaxed and casual, and she could not help finding it amusing.
The man's manner was traditional to the point of being old-fashioned. No matter where or when they were along the journey, he had always been impeccably dressed in a suit, making himself look several years older for no reason. Now, wearing sneakers and casual clothes, he finally looked younger.
They passed through the village and climbed up the mountain. To reach the volcanic lake, they first had to get to the summit before turning back down toward it.
Quilotoa Volcano had been dormant for more than seven hundred years, with its last eruption occurring in 1280. The area was shrouded in clouds and mist throughout the year, making it difficult to see the volcano in its true form. But today they were lucky. The sky was clear, with white clouds against blue, and there was, unusually, no heavy fog.
Because it was located in a highland mountain region, the altitude here was extremely high, making the climb exhausting. The two said nothing. One followed the other in silence, steadily making their way upward.
After reaching the summit, they descended the mountain. After rounding a slight bend, Lake Quilotoa suddenly crashed into their view without warning.
Encircled by mountains, a silent lake shimmered with rippling light, tranquil as a mirror. Beneath the sunlight, it reflected shades of color that shifted from emerald green at the edges to deep blue at the center, like a gigantic emerald, and yet also like jade nectar poured down from the Nine Heavens.
As the ancients said, “The world's extraordinary, magnificent, unusual sights are often found in dangerous and remote places, where people seldom go.” Without seeing it with their own eyes, no one could imagine that there was a shade of blue in this world beautiful enough to intoxicate the heart, beautiful enough to make you instinctively want to cry.
The two stood side by side, stunned into silence by the overwhelming grandeur of nature. Neither said a word.
The extreme beauty of the landscape remained reflected on their retinas long afterward, its impact striking deep into their minds and hearts. For a moment, Tan Guhong felt the blood rushing faster through her body, her heart pounding violently inside her chest. A phantom ringing filled her right ear, and she staggered slightly.
Luo Jingming stepped forward and caught her by the arm.
“Altitude sickness?”
“No…” She shook her head. Altitude sickness did not cause symptoms like this.
“Then… is it your right ear?”
She looked at him and smiled. “You really did know.”
Otherwise, he would not have spent the entire journey, whether they were walking or sitting, intentionally or unintentionally, always staying on her left. Even when they were driving, she sat in the driver's seat and he simply stayed quiet.
Her right ear was deaf.
“I knew a little…” He paused. “I'm sorry.”
Using the strength of his arm, she steadied herself and shook her head, somewhat helplessly. “It's all in the past.”
It was not that she did not care. It was simply that it was already in the past.
Her parents had died in a car accident when she was three. She grew up at her maternal grandfather's home. Her grandfather was a soldier, and so was her uncle. From childhood, she had been immersed in their influence, and her only dream had been to become a soldier, to enlist in the military. At eighteen, she finally got her wish and was admitted to an Air Force pilot academy. Her future seemed bright. Unfortunately, not long afterward, a sudden case of deafness brought on by a minor cold caused her to lose her chance at the blue sky just like that.
After dropping out, there followed a long and painful period of treatment. Six months later, she had barely recovered her hearing, but she could never again meet the standards for becoming a pilot. Then she repeated a year of school and took the college entrance examination again, gave up on herself and casually chose a major, and drifted through university in a daze. A few years later, her hearing had basically recovered. As luck would have it, the university was recruiting for the military. Unable to give up, she threw herself into military life once more. All her passion, all her hope, was ignited again. She considered military academies, national defense students… She imagined countless possibilities for her future. But, alas, alas, none could withstand the twists of fate.
The brutal intensity of the training caused the sudden deafness to recur. This time, her right ear lost its hearing completely.
She was discharged from the military because of her illness. From then on, she and military green could never meet again.
“For a very, very long time, I couldn't get past it. I didn't understand. Why could something I'd worked so hard to obtain from childhood be destroyed so easily? It was only one deaf ear. Look, I can still hear sounds, and I don't even need a hearing aid. What's different about me from a normal person? But no. I have a thousand paths I can take. The only one I wanted to take was the one I couldn't.”
“Guhong…”
He called her name softly, wanting to say something. But with only those two words lingering between his teeth, there was already a thousand kinds of desolation, ten thousand kinds of loneliness. Beneath heaven and earth, a solitary figure, with no companion in sight.
She interrupted him. “But I told you, it's all in the past.”
The heavens and earth were vast, magnificent and grand. Standing beneath such a sky, upon such a mountaintop, you could sincerely feel just how small you were, and how laughable all those obstacles in life that you once thought you could never get past really were.
She turned her head. Her fair, delicate face was calm and unburdened, a smile lingering in her brows. “If one road doesn't work, I still have a thousand other roads I can take, don't I?”
Not everyone who encounters a setback has to become hysterical, give up on themselves, and slide into the abyss of darkness.
In this materialistic, pleasure-driven world, falling into depravity and indulgence is an easy thing. Using tobacco, alcohol, sex, even drugs, any means that can give the body brief pleasure while deceiving oneself and numbing the heart, all of it is astonishingly easy.
What is rare, however, is clarity. To remain awake, alone and in pain, throughout this long and barren life.
So all these years, she had traveled in every direction. She wandered without stopping. She saw mountains, she saw waters, she saw heaven and earth, she saw all living beings. She was searching, desperately, for her own road.
Even if she would always walk it alone.
After all, where in this life is one not walking alone?
……
The mountain weather was unpredictable. On the way back, a thick fog suddenly rolled in, shrouding the entire mountain in haze. The mist was everywhere, making it impossible to tell which way was which. Neither of them had brought a compass. Fortunately, they encountered some merchants driving pack horses. They rented two horses, and the merchants led them back to the village.
They had not rented the horses for transportation in the first place, so neither of them mounted. Instead, they simply held the reins and followed slowly behind the pack train, walking side by side.
“It's a shame we won't get to see the lake at sunset.” Tan Guhong sounded a little regretful. The evening clouds spread across the sky, casting themselves over the emerald-colored surface of the lake. The view must have been beautiful.
He paused, then slowly said, “Perhaps we can get up early tomorrow to watch the sunrise.”
“Will we have enough time?” She was tempted. She quickly calculated their itinerary. Tomorrow was Monday, and her flight would leave Quito in the afternoon.
“If we head back immediately after watching the sunrise, we should make it.”
“Then it's settled.”
She really did love this scenery.
“Okay.” Seeing her expression relax, he smiled too.
Suddenly remembering something, she asked him, “Do you know San Mao?”
“I do.”
“Have you read her ‘Heart Lake’?”
“No.”
“She once traveled alone throughout South America and came to a volcanic lake in Ecuador, where she wrote this piece. She had a powerful feeling that in her previous life, she had been an Inca woman by this lake, herding sheep, catching fish, hunting and gathering medicinal herbs, living in peace with the world. She married a kind husband who loved her deeply, but ultimately died in his arms while giving birth.”
She smiled. “There are no words that can prove where Heart Lake actually is. Perhaps it really is Lake Quilotoa.”
He did not answer immediately. After a moment of silence, he asked her, “Do you believe that people are reincarnated?”
“No.” She was an atheist. She believed only in this life, not the next.
The mountains were wrapped in clouds and mist. They could not see the road ahead or the way home, and even each other's faces seemed to have become indistinct.
His voice betrayed no emotion. “That's a shame. Perhaps you'll miss a lot of things.”
“You believe?”
“I never believed before. Later, though, I began to hope.”
She was curious. “Do you follow a religion?”
“No.”
“Are you a theist?”
“No.”
She laughed. “You don't believe in religion, you're an atheist, yet you believe in past and present lives?”
“I wouldn't call it belief. It's just hope. Belief puts the initiative in someone else's hands; hope puts it in your own.” He smiled too. “Besides, isn't this perfectly normal? Chinese people have always been this way. We pray to gods and worship Buddha, and we observe all the proper rituals, but that doesn't mean we believe. It's different from Western religion.”
Not fanatical believers, not people who simply submit to whatever fate brings, but a subtle kind of transaction. I offer you my worship, you grant me your protection. We each get what we need. If you fail to answer my prayers, naturally I'll find another mountain to worship.
He looked ahead, a faint smile at his lips, his eyes deep behind his lenses.
“When I was little, my family also worshipped Lord Guan. Rather than saying we believed in Lord Guan, it would be more accurate to say that we respected the two things he represented: ‘loyalty and righteousness.’ When I grew up, I stopped worshipping him, because I felt that one's fate lies in one's own hands, not in Heaven's.”
When he was little, he did not understand. He would ask his father whether Lord Guan could protect their family and keep them safe and well, and whether worshipping Lord Guan meant they no longer had to do anything themselves.
He remembered for the rest of his life how Luo Zhanfei lifted him up and told him, word by word:
“A-Ming, remember this. Chinese people may pray to gods and worship Buddha, but we never sit around waiting for death. We have never been the kind of people who look up at the sky and thank Heaven for its blessings.”
“Not like Americans.”
“We never thank the god.”
“We are the god.”
✦
No movie recommendation today. Instead, I recommend a book, San Mao's 《萬水千山走遍》.
Book description: This book recounts San Mao's travels through Mexico, Honduras, Panama, and other places, along with what she saw and heard along the way, as well as the local customs and culture.
Recommendation: San Mao was a woman who had been through too much hardship, possessed too much talent, was too free-spirited, and was also far too stubbornly devoted. She was a famous Taiwanese writer. She dropped out of school as a teenager, withdrew into herself, and rebelled, and later went abroad to study in Spain, Germany, and the United States. There, she met José, a man who loved her deeply. After the two married, they settled in the Sahara Desert and built a home together from nothing. Life was both difficult and sweet, and she wrote many classic works.
But later, José died unexpectedly, and San Mao suffered a devastating blow. She traveled alone throughout Central and South America, searching both for a way forward and for a way home, and turned everything she saw and experienced along the way into this book.
It is difficult to imagine that in the 1980s, she traveled alone to so many remote corners of the world that few people had ever visited, bringing us stories and poetry from those distant places. She was so free, and so brave. She traveled across a thousand mountains and ten thousand rivers, yet sadly, she still could not make it past the obstacle in her own heart. One day in 1991, San Mao took her own life in a hospital. At last, she could be reunited with her José.
The “Heart Lake” mentioned in this chapter comes from this book.
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