Over Christmas I read Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton, and a Chinese book, The Chronicles of a Blood Merchant (许三观卖血记）by Yu Hua (余华), The latter was the second book I had read by Yu Hua; the first was during the start of the pandemic, his most famous book, To Live, that was made into a movie. It was a delightful almost child-like read of some very serious topics, and in some ways it was an echo of my wife's grandfather - the protagonist was the son of a landlord who lost everything in the Revolution. (But as opposed to A Gong, the protagonist was a ne'er-do-well who wasted his money.) The Chronicles of a Blood Merchant and another book of Yu Hua, The Seventh Day, had sat on our bookshelf for four years until the present period to be read. I'm glad that holidays and then this hamstring niggle have given me the chance to read them.
The Chronicles of a Blood Merchant is another child-like tale of a simple man who discovers that selling his blood can give him money to address the crises that arise in his life. China at the time did not do blood donation, and in fact the act of giving blood was considered expending life energy and not an advisable thing to do, hence the buying of blood for the medical system. That weird premise is just a background detail of the sacrifice he made as his life tracks the Chinese Revolution, the Great Leap Forward and then the Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution, surely not some small moments, to get his family through. It is really the family focus that hits home in the most peculiar way in this story, as he discovers that his first firstborn of his three sons is not his. (The result of a rape by his wife's previous admirer.) And how he struggles with first rejecting him, then showing partiality, to accepting him as a son, then almost loving him at times beyond the sons that were his flesh and blood. Also it is a thorough exploration of how people see self-sacrifice and denial in their lives.
The Seventh Day was unexpected after these but it made sense by the end. It opens in the most peculiar way that, as a non-native reader, it made me question whether I understood the Chinese correctly:
"It was thick and foggy when I walked out of my rental home, into a city that was wriggling awake in empty chaos. The place I was going was a funeral parlour, a place called a "crematorium" in the past. I received a notice to go there by nine a.m. The time of my cremation was half past nine."
It is a strangely beautiful book even if written from an ambivalently afterlife perspective on the life lived before and the affections with the world that has been. Again it was written child-like and the elements of surrealism that were in his other works are exaggerated here.
I had read most of it before the Waterfront Half. My debilitating "hamstring injury" was addressed by a few specialised exercises and stretches, and just like my hamstring after Coatesville, it has not made a peep since. But I had new reason not to run much. In a great display of irony, the ankle on my other foot caused me a lot of angst. It started just after the race when I had a massage at the venue as a pre-emptive especially for my hamstring, but coming of the massage bench I put my left ankle on the ground and a bolt of pain almost sent me to the ground. I could walk but it felt as if I had sprained it. After a little walking I was manageable. My arch was sore and my upper ankle tight. The rest of the day was fine, I felt it tight the following morning but could still run 10km, but at work I couldn't walk naturally. The next day was the same, and on the third day, and another 10km run it finally felt a bit more normal. I managed to read a few more pages of The Seventh Day and got to the end tonight.
I ran 24km up one of the steepest roads in the Waitakeres with no trouble to my hamstring or my left ankle. My hip, well, it was cranky on the way down the hill. Looks like I've got some strengthening and conditioning to do!
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