| Muller | Hitchhiking Vietnam
Page 142 |
The main support beams were massive - I could barely encircle one with both arms. There were certainly no trees of that diameter left anywhere in the neighborhood. The roof shingles alone had to weigh several tons. Yet wood was so scarce that the women were laboriously digging up roots to feed the fire. Where, I asked, did all the lumber come from?
The patriarch looked around and nodded his head, then slowly refilled his pipe and began to scratch some numbers into the dirt floor. The house was over thirty years old - ancient, by Zao standards, and so well made that not a single wood borer had yet dared take up residence in its beams. The massive foundation posts had been dragged no less than fifteen kilometers from a secret place near the border of China. Ten men and four buffalo worked twenty days to haul in a hundred tons of building materials and then two dozen clansmen had labored through the winter to complete the structure. All the proper sacrifices had been made before the house was raised, and as an additional precaution the posts and beams had spent three years immersed in water to discourage insect infestations. This house, he promised gravely, would still be here to keep his great-great grandchildren safe and warm. It suddenly seemed more than a muddy floor and smoke-stained walls, filled with wet laundry and sniffling children. It was one man's legacy to his family and clan, a foundation upon which to build the future, a home.
And despite his present wedding dilemmas, the old man was already planning improvements. In a few years he would buy a hydro-pump and sink it into a nearby stream to power a ten-watt light bulb for a few hours each day. Several piglets were committed to taking part in a merit-making ceremony that would appease both spirits and the ancestors, and bring luck in all future endeavors. He even had hopes of buying a small stereo system, and one day filling the room with scratchy tunes and disco beat. That would have to wait, however. He was afraid the batteries would be a continual drain on the family's resources, and the younger generation might be inclined to sit and listen, rather than going out into the fields to do their work.
An outhouse, running water, a refrigerator and ice; they were dreams only his children would have, or perhaps his children's children. He didn't seem to mind. Sitting there, shuffling a place in the fire for his tea kettle, surrounded by a small stampede of bare-legged progeny, he looked like he already had it all.
