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who cling to the past. The Party has pledged to raise the country’s living standards to a moderately prosperous level by 2000. It is giving us all the chance to live better lives.’ My mother was speaking to my father in a warmer tone than she’d used the night before.
    ‘I saw two foreigners in the street today, Dad,’ my brother said. ‘Their eyes were yellow.’
    ‘I hope you weren’t following them,’ my mother said sternly. ‘The neighbourhood committee called us in the other day and told us that if we see foreigners in the street, we shouldn’t crowd around them and stare.’
    ‘They were walking along the pavement as I was coming out from school. Their footprints were huge.’
    ‘If there are foreigners walking down the streets of Beijing, it won’t be long before Chinese people are allowed to travel abroad again. I’ll write to my uncle in America tomorrow. He has two apple trees in his garden. In autumn, so many apples fall onto the grass, he has to leave most of them to rot.’ My father picked up a slice of cucumber that my brother had dropped onto the table and popped it into his mouth.
    ‘Dad, I still haven’t seen a squirrel yet.’ My brother always dropped food onto the table when he ate. My mother would smack him whenever it happened, but it never had any effect.
    ‘Don’t eat with your mouths open,’ my mother said. ‘You sound like dogs.’ My brother and I quickly shut our mouths and continued chewing.
    ‘Mum, Dai Ru threw stones at the pigeons again today,’ I said, suddenly recalling the incident. ‘The old lady downstairs got very angry. She had to come out and drag him away in the end.’ I was always having to apologise to others for my brother’s bad behaviour.
    ‘You’ll smash someone’s window if you keep doing that, then you’ll have to pay to get it repaired.’ My mother glanced back to my father and said, ‘Before people go abroad now, the government allows them to buy three domestically produced items tax-free. If you sell just two of them on the black market you can make enough money to last you a year.’
    ‘We should all go abroad. I’ll teach the violin, you can give singing classes, the children can both go to university.’
    ‘Do you think you’ll still be able to play your violin with hands like that? And anyway, I’m just a chorus singer now. How could I teach a foreigner? I’ve been singing revolutionary operas for the last twenty years. I’ve forgotten all my Western training.’
    ‘You were the most talented soloist in the company when we first met. You had a beautiful voice. I’m sure that if you had a chance to sing Western operas again, all your training would come back to you. In America, the government leaves people alone. The rich are rich, and the poor are poor. Everyone just gets on with their lives. I’ve spent every day of the last twenty years regretting my decision to return to China. The only thing that kept me alive in the camps was the hope that one day I might go back to America. Without that hope, I would have committed suicide years ago.’ My father was staring at his left hand. The little finger had been broken when he was beaten up in the camp. Although he was wearing a clean white shirt that night, when I looked at his shaven head and weathered features, it was hard to imagine that he’d once been a professional violinist.
    ‘Don’t praise foreign countries in front of the children. Now that you’re back, you’ll have to read the papers every day and make sure you keep up with the changing political climate. We can’t let our family be torn apart again.’
    ‘Mum, will you sing me that Li Gu ballad “Longing for Home”?’ I said. The tune had been in my head all day.
    ‘Li Gu’s voice is weak and breathy. It has no revolutionary spirit. Our company received a statement from the Ministry of Culture today warning that her ballad has had a corrupting influence on young people and could lead to the ruination of