Chasing Changchun

By Feifei Sun

I arrived in Changchun, located in the northeast corner of China, with my mother, desperate to reconnect with my hometown. But the first place my aunt took us was Wal-Mart.

Long ago, trees defined Changchun, which literally and ironically means forever green. Lush poplar, pine, and willow trees lined the sides of the street at one point, creating canopies of relief from the hot sun. State parks also decorated Changchun, serving as the unofficial convergence points of the city. Around noon, men dressed in sport jackets and ties would chat loudly and energetically with their friends, occasionally spitting out pieces of their lunch by accident. In the afternoons, rich mothers lazily strolled through the grass fields with their daughters, sometimes stopping to throw bread at the pond ducks.

But a couple of years ago, corporate America bullied its way into the neighborhood. Now the parks and poplars have been replaced, and a two-story Wal-Mart store stands as the most prominent building in Changchun. On both sides, Wal-Mart is bolstered by fellow Western brands: Revlon, McDonald’s, KFC. These buildings, all covered with bright, colorful ads, rise so high they create the Changchun skyline. From a quick glance, you’d think the city ended there, with those buildings.

Amid that corporate exploitation, I felt at home—an unexpected comfort, considering how foreign I felt during past visits. For there is nothing that suggests Changchun was the city I was born in except my mother’s words—and a birth certificate that no one in my family can find.

Changchun is abrasive. Strangers collide with strangers. Cars do not yield to pedestrians, which seems appropriate—the city is known for its automobile industry. There is no small talk. Beggars pack the streets; crying, dancing, banging their heads against the concrete road. Anything that will earn them money. This emotional coldness intensified during my December visit—the literal chill hurt me at the bone. The wind blew so violently it felt like knives sliding against my skin.

Each time I return, I am older, more understanding of words like home, birth, roots. Yet, with each visit, I feel more foreign in Changchun—like a stranger whose body cannot permeate the walls of the city. I wear their clothes, speak their language, sip their tea.

Regardless, they always know I’m a visitor. And I will always be just a visitor.

The Wal-Mart building is narrow, tall, unlike the low, wide Wal-Mart buildings in America. A corner of a large poster of Chinese pop stars that hung above the store’s sign had fallen, covering some of the W-A-L-M-A-R-T letters. The obnoxious yellow smiley face was unmistakable, however.

Petite, frail Chinese girls in oversized Santa costumes greeted me. “Hi, wel-cam to Woll-Marr,” they said, in broken, mangled English.

“Xie, xie,” I replied, in broken, mangled Chinese.

In one respect, the Chinese Wal-Mart is really no different than the Wal-Marts in America. The aisles are packed: cookies, DVDs, makeup, toys, yoga mats. Everything you don’t really need. And always low prices. Always. And in Changchun, these low prices erase any moral objections the Chinese people may have had about shopping there. Citizens of third-world countries can’t afford that type of integrity.

I decided to visit China in December, hoping to escape the holiday madness that pervaded my college city. (When you’re a non-Christian living in the American South, Christmastime can really test your sanity.) But to my surprise, I discovered that the Chinese celebrate Christmas with an intensity and passion you do not find in even the most Christian of American cities. Wreathes and tinsel covered the entire store—nothing was spared. Each aisle was monitored by a Chinese Santa Claus, most often a young girl, eager to promote products in her aisle. I took out my camera to take pictures, positive that no one would believe me without them. But just as I turned the camera on, the manager rushed toward me.

“Ay, ay, ay, no pictures!” he yelled.

“Just one, please,” I said, almost begging. “I want to show my friends.”

“Absolutely not!” he said, waving both hands at me.

My aunt grabbed my arm and led me away.

“He’s afraid you’ll steal his display ideas,” she whispered.

I loved the pink dress with white polka dots the moment I saw it. It was 60 yen—not even ten American dollars. I grabbed the XL off the rack, thankful they had my size so I would not have to ask for it in my Chinese.

The clothes in China may be modeled after American fashion, but they are made for Chinese physiques. My frame is not considered “Chinese.” At 5’5” and 130 pounds, I am fat. Almost obese to my family.

We walked to the cashier and handed her the dress.

“You’re too fat to fit into this,” she said matter-of-factly.

My cheeks burned, and I swept my bangs across my eyes to mask my embarrassment—an embarrassment I should not have felt. There was no meanness in the cashier’s voice or in her intentions. In her mind, she was just speaking the truth. Like Chinese children are raised to do.

I began to formulate a response, but my mother cut in.

“What’s it to you?” she demanded. “I’m paying.”

My mother has always represented everything Chinese to me. My childhood, a language I will never speak fluently, the ability to make perfectly-flavored dumplings. Since I moved to America, she has been the Chinese weight at my feet, countering the millions of American balloons in my hand that are desperate to take me away.

But in that moment, I realized my mother was stuck between two cultures, too, although she would never admit that to me. To admit it would be to concede—to suggest that it might be alright to forget my Chinese heritage.

Wal-Mart is not the only change to the city. The air is dirtier, the roads browner, and the sky grayer. Every morning, a gray sky full of clouds.

“Is the sky always gray? Or is today just foggy?” I asked my aunts.

They weren’t sure what I meant. Industrial pollution is as common and familiar as air to them.

I hesitated to ask more. America is already such an unattainable place for them. Why rub it in that the country has clear, blue skies?

Walking home, I fully understood why China makes such a good target for American investors and businesses. The Chinese are a desperate people—desperate to survive, desperate to feed their families, desperate to adopt and incorporate American culture.

“Would my haircut be considered cool in America?” A girl my age had asked me.

I stared for a long time at her over-processed mullet.

“Uh, huh,” I nodded. I didn’t have the heart to tell her the truth. It’s not how America conditions her children.

We climbed the ten flights of stairs to my aunt’s apartment, and I was thankful to be inside, surrounded by her Chinese knitting needles, the stench of Chinese cabbage, Chinese everything. I climbed into bed, pulled the covers over my face, ready to fall asleep.

Moments later, my aunt sat down next to me, pulled the covers back.

“Rest up,” she whispered. “I’ll take you back tomorrow!”

Feifei Sun
New York, NY
Feifei Sun graduated from the Savannah College of Art and Design and currently works in publishing.