Time: 11:03AM September 22, 2012
Place: North Gong Hutong
Person: Uncle Yang
Passing through North Gong Hutong, we see Uncle Yang sitting on a small stool next to an empty chair. His orange uniform makes it easy for us to determine his job: a public bathroom janitor.
A stream of cars pass in front of him while he sits motionless. We walk towards him with Xiaohei. A pair of black-framed glasses sits in front of his red, swollen eyes. We greet him and his eyes follow us earnestly but his mind is elsewhere.
Our discussion topic starts with the chair beside him. The chair came from a dumpster in the area. “Somebody picked it up for me.”
Uncle Yang is responsible for the sanitation of the public bathroom behind him and another in the area. When asked how long he sits there each day, he quickly and clearly responds, “16 hours”.
What do you do when you sit here? Uncle Yang reaches for a bag hanging from the chair and pulls out a fanny pack wrapped in a waterproof raincoat. In the fanny pack is a small notebook which he hands to us.
He says he has only completed third grade in school, but there are several characters the the sixty-year-old has written in the re-purposed hospital record notebook. On each page he has repeatedly written, “miss home”, “heavy hearted”, and “bitter life”. Uncle Yang’s partner “died early.” She has already been gone for more than ten years. His brother-in-law introduced him to a job here two months ago. He has three kids in his hometown of Gansu, but he doesn’t really like talking about them.
We silently flip through his notebook. On one page he has written, “Man lives for a lifetime, grass for a spring, with age comes difficulty, hoping for your children’s success is a waste of love, this old man is useless now.” The notebook also contains a note for two thousand renminbi that Uncle Yang has lent out to another Yang family person. Reaching down beside him, Uncle Yang pulls out a calendar with markings on September 30th’s Autumn Festival and October 1st’s National Holiday. He points out more of his writing on the calendar, “Grass leaves roots, man leaves children and grandchildren, Buddha left the holy scripts, the sky leaves rain.” We ask him what this means, but Uncle Yang just smile shyly and says nothing. After a moment of silence, he suddenly says, “My name is Yang Ruyi.”
After looking at the calendar, Uncle Yang pulls out another small envelope full of photos. “Last year I was a security guard here,” Uncle Yang explains as we look at photo of him in a security uniform standing tall in Tiananmen Square. He looks ages younger in the photo.
“This is my grandson, 8 years old. This is my granddaughter, 14 years old.” Uncle Yang not only has four-inch photo of his grandchildren, he also has 1-inch portrait photos. Each four-inch photo has been carefully tucked in into the envelope and the one-inch portraits in a sidepocket of his wallet. “I won’t go back for the New Year. It grieves me to go home,” Uncle Yang explains he can only work in his hometown’s steel factory, but now he’s too old for the labor. His bloodshot eyes are moist with tears and his nose has begun to run.
Uncle Yang does not have many words. He has a thick Gansu accent. When we don’t understand a word, he says it again. After taking his photo, we shake hands goodbye. He looks into our eyes cherishingly. In the clatter of the hutong’s lines of tourist carts, his silent gaze follows us as we leave.
