The People’s Monument, rallying point of the 1989 student revolt.
“Mistah Hobison, did you hear about the Tiananmen Square?”
It was 1993, four years after the massacre. Communist leader Deng Xiaoping threatened to die any moment; the political climate bristled with potential for unrest. My teaching organization had warned me not to discuss Tiananmen Square with students, especially as many would be Communist Party members.
I’d been in China just two months when they asked me about it.
This wasn’t class, this was “free talk,” the two-hour window every evening I opened my apartment for informal English practice. Free talks usually ranged from silly games like Uno to wacky conversations about movies and celebrities and whether I would marry a Chinese woman. Sometimes my students sang songs. Often they bragged about their hometowns.
Then one evening came The Question.
My organization didn’t want me discussing it. From the expectation in their eyes, though, I could tell my students weren’t seeking an official response. They wanted to know. They needed to know.
“Well, yes,” I said, assuming as flat a tone as possible. “I think most of the world heard about it. We watched it on TV.”
All sixteen of them hushed, leaned forward.
“Terrible,” one said.
“Very, very sad,” said another.
“There were many students,” said another.
“My friend was there,” said Jerry. “She does not talk about it. She was there.”
“It was very strange,” said Grace. “Li Peng got on the television and he was yelling at the students to go home. His face was very red and he was yelling.” (Public displays of anger are a major no-no in Chinese culture, a serious loss of face.)
“There were –” Charlie asked in Chinese for a word, which someone supplied: “Tanks.”
“Many students died.”
Another laughed nervously. “The government said twelve students died. Only twelve. They died from, how do you say …” With some pantomiming we came up with the word trampling. “The tanks came and the students ran and the students were trampling.”
“No,” interjected Zhang Li Yan. “No one died. That is incorrect.”
“But the Party says –”
“No,” insisted Zhang Li Yan. He was in his early thirties, slightly plump – the only student I knew for sure was a card-carrying Party member. His determined grasp of English matched his polished, businesslike demeanor. Jokingly his classmates called him Little Mao, a nickname I assumed came from political aspirations. But there was no joking now as he insisted, “No one died in Tiananmen Square.”
“If the government says twelve people died –”
“No. You are incorrect. The government did not say anyone died. That is a lie from the students.”
Everyone fell silent. Zhang Li Yan’s eyes scrutinized those who had spoken, then bore down on me. Unwilling to look him in the eye, the others followed his lead and watched me.
“Maybe we should play Uno,” I suggested.
That was the only time I heard anyone discuss Tiananmen Square.
South side of Tiananmen Square.
Communist Revolution monument near Mao Zedong’s mausoleum in Tiananmen Square.
