Yang pulled over and stopped, and, as he brushed the dust off of his body, said to Chen, “I’ve been so busy over the past decade I haven’t had time to come back. Now that the people in my firm can work independently, I’ve finally found some time, but to be honest, I’m scared about seeing the grassland. Zhang Jiyuan came for a visit this past spring and told me about the desertification. So I’ve had plenty of time to prepare myself emotionally. But I’m afraid it will be worse than I imagined.”
Chen patted the steering wheel. “Why don’t I take over? It’s barely been twenty years since Papa died, and we’re already seeing the bad end he predicted. We really should pay our respects to him, and, besides, Little Wolf’s cave will be filled up by sand if we wait a few more years. That cave is the only remaining relic left by wolves that dominated the grassland for thousands of years.”
“I miss Uljii too,” Chen added. “I’d really like to see him again so I could ask about the wolves and the grassland. But unfortunately he felt so bad about the grassland that he left after retirement and now lives in the city with his daughter, where he’s recovering from some illness. Since China doesn’t have a competitive, scientific, and democratic system for selecting top talent, honest and frank people are denied a chance to rise up. Uljii, a rare expert on wolves and grassland, was buried under the yellow sand of our current system, which is far worse than the yellow sand of the grassland, because the system was the true origin of the dust storm there.”
The Jeep continued in the dry, dusty wind for over five hundred miles, and by the time they were close to the Olonbulag their arms were tanned and prickly from the sun. They entered the Olonbulag the next day, and finally saw connected patches of sparse pastureland, since this was, after all, a border area corner of the Great Ujimchin Steppe. But they could not bear to look down at their feet, for just beneath the grass, sand and surface, rocks met their eyes. Sometimes there were long, thin gray mushrooms that looked like bean sprouts. In the past, decomposing fertilizer from livestock droppings would be at the base of the dense grass.
Chan and Yang were worried. They knew that farther on there was a thousand-year-old river, with water that came up to the horses’ knees or even their bellies. Big trucks had been the only vehicles that could cross it, and Jeeps like theirs had to speed up if they had any chance of crossing. During the rainy season, the flood river would cause the suspension of mail delivery and create shortages of food and other necessities for two weeks, even a month. As Chen and Yang talked about how they were going to cross the river, they reached the near riverbank. One look ended the discussion. The fast-flowing water of the old days had receded until the rocky riverbed was exposed; nothing but wet sand and a few wormlike streams crisscrossed the dry rocks. The Jeep crossed the river easily, but their hearts grew heavier.
Shortly after crossing the river they felt as if they’d entered a battlefield; cement posts and wire fences were all over the once vast and lush Olonbulag, and the Jeep had to travel down passages created by chain-link fences. Chen studied the fences, which enclosed areas of several hundred acres each. The grass inside the enclosure was much taller than that outside, but the overall appearance was still of a sparse pastureland, for sandy soil was visible under the grass.
Yang Ke said, “Those are what they call grass kulun. After receiving a parcel of pastureland and some livestock, herdsmen build fences around them for lamb birthing and don’t live here during the other three seasons.”
“How could so little grass be enough?” Chen asked.
Yang replied, “I’ve heard that the herdsmen have been reducing the number of livestock, some cutting the total in half.”
They passed a few more of the grass kulun areas, where they saw three or four redbrick houses with tiled roofs and birthing pens. But obviously, no one lived there at the moment, for no smoke rose from the chimneys, nor were there any dogs or calves by the front doors. The people might have herded their livestock deep into the mountains, where the animals were free to roam.
As he looked at the chain-link fences, Chen said emotionally, “In the past, who would dare build a fence on a grassland famous for its Ujimchin warhorses? At night, a horse could get tangled up in it and, in the worst cases, die struggling. But the horses whose hooves once shook the world have been driven off the Mongolian grassland. I’ve heard that sheepherders now use motorcycles, a sign of prosperity they show on television. Actually, that was because the grassland could no longer feed the horses, which disappeared after the wolves. The cows and sheep will soon follow, I’m sure. Horseback races have turned into motorcycle races, and may one day evolve into a race of ecological refugees. We’ve witnessed the ‘impressive victory’ of an agrarian society over a nomadic herding society. Current government policy has developed to the stage of ‘one country, two systems,’ but deeply rooted in the Han consciousness is still ‘many areas, one system.’ It doesn’t matter if it’s farmland or pastureland, forest or river, city or countryside; all they want to do is mix them all up to create a ‘unified’ flavor. With the ‘impressive victory’ has come a tremendous amount of subsidies, but the grassland could not return even if the subsidies continued for the next century.”
They rode along a dirt path leading to the site of their previous company headquarters, eager to see the herdsmen or, for that matter, anyone. But they crossed the familiar mountain ridge, only to see the old site replaced by a dying yellow sandy grassland overrun by mice whose tracks snaked across the ground amid piles of dry sand. The row of brick and rammed-earth houses was gone. As Chen drove around the once bustling company headquarters, he didn’t have to worry about running into any walls, but he got stuck several times in collapsed mouse dens. It had only been two decades, but the remains of the past were completely covered by yellow sand, as if wiped off the face of the earth.
Chen sighed. “Mice are kings on a wolfless grassland. They dig deep holes and store up large quantities of food, giving them hegemony over the grassland. We like to say that everyone shouts ‘Kill it!’ when a mouse crosses the street, but deep down we worship the mouse and place it at the head of our zodiac.”
Yang took the wheel and sped off to a nearby hill. They looked to the north, where they spotted some cows and a few houses with chimney smoke, but still no yurts. Yang headed toward the nearest chimney smoke.
They had been driving for a dozen li when a column of yellow dust rose up on a dirt path in the distance. Chen hoped it would be a herder on a fast horse, but when it drew close enough, they saw it was a shiny Yamaha motorcycle. The rider was a Mongol teenager wearing a jacket-like shirt and a baseball cap. The motorcycle screeched to a stop by the Jeep. Chen was shocked to see a small-caliber rifle slung over the youth’s shoulder and a medium-sized hawk tied to the seat, dripping blood. Chen was reminded of the startled and fearful look in Bilgee’s eyes when he first saw one of those weapons, and was surprised to see a young Mongol boy in possession of one, not to mention that he was riding an advanced, imported two-wheel vehicle.
Yang greeted the boy in Mongolian and identified himself. A distant look of indifference appeared on the fair-skinned boy’s face. Staring at the Cherokee, he told him in Chinese with a Shandong accent that he was Chulu’s youngest son and was spending his summer break from a high school in the league capital. It took Chen a moment to recall that Chulu had been an outsider, a minor cadre in charge of basic construction at the old pasture headquarters. Zhang Jiyuan and other old classmates had told him that the pasture employees and retired soldiers from the corps who stayed behind were all given land and livestock after the grassland system was changed. They became Han-style herders, adding an additional 30 percent of Han settlement pastureland to the Olonbulag.