N.B: This post is both story and reflection integrated, because they’re especially essential to each other in this particular case.
She’s stick-skinny in a worn floral-print dress—I notice long tendons jut out her arms as we shake hands. Her hair is salt-and-pepper, cropped at a boyish length (the strands fall evenly over her forehead, ears, and nape). Her heart-shaped face is remarkably pretty, with even brown eyes (just feathered at the edges), skin light and slightly aged. Her thin lips curve into a broad smile, rounding her chin and framing a small nose.
The conversation starts out normally.
***
‘Anna’ was born in a tiny farming town in Northwest China.
“When I was a little kid I was living XiTuan Xiting. It’s even a very little little small farm. And when I was in middle school, I moved to YiZhong cause I was living in teachers village. So around me, all the teachers.”
It was an isolated site:
“If I need to go to Aksu [the nearest city], I need to ride a bus. And the bus almost needs five hours.”
Just making it to school was rough, she said, compared to the standards for children in America.
“When I was a little kid, I need to walk from home to school, school back to home for morning class, then afternoon class. So almost every day I had to walk on my own feet for three hours, no matter it is raining days or sunny days, or windy days. Oh, the winter is so cold! Very cold!”
Living day-by-day in the countryside, she grew up with a robust interest in nature, she said.
“I promised to God I want to become a scientist or teacher. And my big family help me become a scientist.”
Her dreams began to be realized when, upon graduating high school, she was accepted into the Lixing Accounting Institute. She packed her meager bags and moved clear across the country to Shanghai, China on the East coast.
“Accounting is a science. It’s kind of math science, about how math science applies to reality. That’s why I fist choose [accounting]. I love mathematics. I am good at math. This is why I choose accounting as my first science project. I want to see how math applied to the reality.”
Upon graduation, she was hired almost immediately.
“My first job was with Nestle, the number one food company in the world, as an accountant. After two years of accounting, I worked for KPMG, one of the biggest accounting firms in the world. Become an auditor.”
During this time of working, she received a healthy dose of ‘real-world’ injustice.
“The accounting training me to see the reality not on the pink side. Because when I was in school, I have some ideal view about human society, and sometime too, too optimistic about society. Accounting training me, the some people are really nasty, ugly, ugly, ugly. Not the pink side of society. There are black side. There are pure black side. Accounting, auditing train me to view the society from different aspects.”
She made a second huge move in 2001: from Shanghai, China to San Francisco, USA.
“[I] study US accounting guide. So, I got my master’s degree in San Francisco University. Then I worked for Wells Fargo for nine months. I quit my job and went back home, I went back to China.”
She then gave her full force to her original childhood dream of environmental studies.
“I quit my job, totally, completely quit my job and do my research. I travel around almost 85 regions in China, and I also travel around United States. East Coast and West Coast, Mid-West US and Canada.”
She immersed herself in her study of nature, she said.
“This is why you need to have the scientist’s consciousness: how to actually save the nature and save the society. Not to destroy the harmony and beauty of nature. And you are only thinking of making big bucks. I don’t like that at all. I never think I can get pension from those accounting job. You know, I pay my dues, I do my research. And God give me the pension for it. Now, I am doing my research job here. It is really wonderful.”
***
I ask her why she originally chose to move to America.
“Because my mom and dad, my grandpa, grandma, all my big family, even my husband… are birds flying in the sky.” She points to a straggle of grackles, staggering across the pale sky underlined by the concrete bridge.
I immediately give a sympathetic sigh. I gently ask her how they passed—perhaps she felt hopeless afterwards and looked for a fresh start in America, I think—but she ignores the question.
Things start to become clearer afterwards.
***
She’s been in Austin for three years, continuing her research, she said. As she studies nature, she said:
“Birds, all the birds are my sisters and brothers. Dogs, cats, all the trees are my big family.”
She said she has faith in her family, and is constantly growing closer to her family members.
“My mom and dad are never sick. They are all birds, they are never sick. See all the birds flying? They’re never ever handicapped. I don’t even need to worry about that. Everyday, we see each other, they are still alive every day, we take care of each other every day. Birds can work, cats can work, dog can work. Now, it’s not a secret.”
She’s strongly defensive of nature:
“[People] want to degrade all these wonderful natures. They want to degrade birds’ brain, they want to degrade dogs’ brain, they want to degrade cats’ brain.” In fact, she emphasized the consistency of new research pointing to animals’ intelligence.
When asked how she would describe her research, she outlined the way she actually competes, in a way, with her research subjects.
“That’s why I kill the bugs every day. My little sisters and little brothers see that. And [they think] oh God, big sister killed the bugs every day. Cause you know, all the little birds they kill the bugs, save the trees.”
She paused for a second.
“I still think I’m a bird. Cause originally, I’m a pigeon, I’m a bird. And right now, just two wings become two arms.”
***
At this point, one of the of the Church Under the Bridge volunteers sees us while walking by—he comes up to introduce himself as Brian.
His church, Hyde Park Baptist Church, was hosting CUB that week. He brings up religion.
***
“I went to a Chinese church when I was in San Francisco. I don’t really believe in Jesus. I have sung the church songs, but I don’t believe in Jesus. I am a Communist, a real Communist. I believe in science, I believe in humanity, I believe our civil right in society,” she said.
She also believes in humanity’s ability to control nature.
“We made the trees! Cause originally actually the trees coming from the ocean. But generation by generation, those young trees [become] way big trees. We planted tree seeds, we use the sun, we create all the space, so the trees can grow up.”
In fact:
“I can make the weather, I can make today a raining day. That’s why we have the weather forecast. If we cannot make the weather, how can we have the weather forecast. Scientists, we collect information every day—we make the weather.”
THE WHOLE UNITED STATES IS MY HOME. CHINA IS MY HOME TOO. EUROPEAN COUNTRIES IS MY HOME TOO, SOUTH AMERICA IS MY HOME, TOO. THE PLANET IS MY HOME.
The reason she’s against Christianity? Nationalist sentiment.
“I want strong, tough. I don’t want some people, they just lay on the bed and just give up to Jesus. That really piss me off. I say to them, you are fucking psycho. I want to see the strong, tough Chinese. As Chinese, we need to be tough as the eagles. Americans say ‘Oh! Uh! Uh! We give up our life!’ We will never ever give up our space. We will never ever give up our ground.”
She elaborates on her life on the streets, presenting it as a heroic choice of sorts.
“I raise my voice every day. Some people pretend not to understand me. I do not care. What I care [is], I already speak loud. That is it. I educate kids by my actions, not only by my words. Words are cheap. I educate kids by my actions.
I join the team. Every day I play, tough and strong. I stay outside for the whole day, for the whole years. I play. Nobody can influence me. I play. Strong like the eagles. That’s why I said, ‘Hey little kids, come out of the house. Survive on the street, and play. Don’t let your color of skins prevent you. Play on the street, can you survive?’”
People have reached out to her about pulling herself up.
“People come to me, try to bother me. Try to say, ‘Hey, come back to San Francisco.’ I said, no—I am doing my research here. People come to me and say ‘Hey, Chinese, come back to China.’ I say no. I play every minute, every second, every day on the street. I am doing my research here.”
This is her reality:
“I live on the street every minute, every second, every day. Whole years, years, years, I live on the street. I do not have a penny. I don’t even living in a house.
The whole United States is my home. China is my home too. European countries is my home too, South America is my home, too. The planet is my home. And I am still alive. Still young, healthy. I am strong, and tough—and I play. I expect you play every day. Then you never ever think oh, you are getting sick. You never think oh, you are going to die. I expect you stay outside: during the night, enjoy the sky. [Then], you know who you are.”
Her final advice to me and Bryan:
“Change the other perspectives to see the reality. Throw away those Jesus, those sick ideas to influence you. This is my point. Not only to look like Chinese. Even those you speak Chinese, your life attitude is not like Chinese. I piss you off. You are fake Chinese.
We, Chinese, create the planet—we create the world.. We create the young trees, we create these humans, the bird, the dogs, the cats, all the wildlifes.
I want you think like this way. You can never, ever give up your space to somebody else. If you give up your space to somebody else, you are not real Chinese. Even though you can understand my Chinese, my Mandarin. Your life attitude should be tough, like a real Chinese.
Otherwise, I think you are Japanese. Or you’re Vietnamese. Or you’re Korean.”
***
Her voice grows in volume and pitch through the whole monologue, until she practically shrieks—then delivers the last line in a menacing hiss.
We stand in silence for a minute, then Anna picks up her plastic bags with a curt, “Nice talking to you.” She walks away.
I was… a bit shocked. It’s not for me to judge whether it was something in Anna’s past that brought her to her beliefs, or whether Anna suffers from a mental disorder—or whether her conclusions can be reasonably justified. In any case, I look for her at Mission Possible every week.