them.
This evening, after dark, we all went down to thesquare again. The white things had been fitted together to make a statue. It’s a tall white figure of a woman, much like the Statue of Liberty in the States, only she’s using two hands instead of one to hold up the torch. Lao Xu says the students are calling her the Goddess of Democracy.
What’s really interesting is where they put her. She’s standing in front of the Gate of Heavenly Peace, where Mao Ze-dong declared the founding of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949 and where his big picture hangs now.
And she’s staring at the picture of Mao right in the face.
Things are really intense.
Journalists are going nuts, talking together in the hotel coffee shop, faxing photos of the Goddess and reports of the latest developments to their papers and TV stations, trying to find tourists who will smuggle videotapes to Hong Kong, Japan, Europe — anywhere. As soon as they’re out of China the tapes can be couriered back home or, better still, sent by satellite.
Chinese radio and TV are still railing against the students, calling them counter-revolutionaries, accusing them of trying to destroy the economic reforms of the last ten years, telling the citizens the demonstrators are all hooligans. But the people aren’t buying it.
More rumours. The Beijing police have refused to clear the students out of the square or to tear down the goddess. The government is going to send in the troops again.
And they did. Tonight, after dark, the troops tried to come in. The word went up and down the streets like an electric current. People poured out of apartment blocks and
hu tongs
and flooded into the streets, bringing all traffic to a halt. Dad and I and Eddie left the hotel and rushed east along Chang An Avenue. We didn’t get far before we saw the crowds. It was like the people were a sea and each truck in the column was the tip of an island.
And the people were an angry sea — not like last time. They shouted and waved their fists at the soldiers in the trucks. I wondered why. I couldn’t understand what they were shouting.
Dad was standing behind a tree, holding the camera against the trunk so it wouldn’t be too conspicuous, getting it all on video. We knew the pictures wouldn’t be very good quality, but we also knew this was too good to miss.
I got as close as I could to the trucks. A bolt of excitement hit me. No wonder the people wereangry. This time, the soldiers were armed! Each one carried an AK 47 machine gun. And each AK 47 had a wicked-looking bayonet fixed to the barrel. The PLA wore helmets and those big ammunition pouches on their chests.
They didn’t look bewildered and embarrassed the way the soldiers had on the twenty-third. They looked tough. And mad. This time they looked like
real
soldiers, not those kids in green who “guarded” the doors of the Great Hall of the People or those wimps who sat in the trucks and got an earful from the civilians.
The stalemate lasted for about three hours. Then the trucks reversed, turned around, and withdrew.
The citizens, and the students, had won again. What an army, I thought. They lost face again. They looked stupid. I was glad.
This morning I was grounded.
I came back early from school because classes have been postponed indefinitely. Most of the diplomats pulled their kids out because they don’t think it’s safe enough to send them to school. It’s just as well, I guess, because I’ve been missing classes quite a bit lately. My tones are probably really lousy now.
I got back home to find Eddie and Dad deep intoa conversation that stopped short when I came through the door. They both looked at me guiltily, so I knew something was up.
And here’s what they cooked up. Eddie wanted to go down into the square again. Rumours said the army was going to make another try.
“Great,” I put in, “I’ll go with you. I don’t want to miss that.”
Nope. The plan was that I would
This evening, after dark, we all went down to thesquare again. The white things had been fitted together to make a statue. It’s a tall white figure of a woman, much like the Statue of Liberty in the States, only she’s using two hands instead of one to hold up the torch. Lao Xu says the students are calling her the Goddess of Democracy.
What’s really interesting is where they put her. She’s standing in front of the Gate of Heavenly Peace, where Mao Ze-dong declared the founding of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949 and where his big picture hangs now.
And she’s staring at the picture of Mao right in the face.
Things are really intense.
Journalists are going nuts, talking together in the hotel coffee shop, faxing photos of the Goddess and reports of the latest developments to their papers and TV stations, trying to find tourists who will smuggle videotapes to Hong Kong, Japan, Europe — anywhere. As soon as they’re out of China the tapes can be couriered back home or, better still, sent by satellite.
Chinese radio and TV are still railing against the students, calling them counter-revolutionaries, accusing them of trying to destroy the economic reforms of the last ten years, telling the citizens the demonstrators are all hooligans. But the people aren’t buying it.
More rumours. The Beijing police have refused to clear the students out of the square or to tear down the goddess. The government is going to send in the troops again.
And they did. Tonight, after dark, the troops tried to come in. The word went up and down the streets like an electric current. People poured out of apartment blocks and
hu tongs
and flooded into the streets, bringing all traffic to a halt. Dad and I and Eddie left the hotel and rushed east along Chang An Avenue. We didn’t get far before we saw the crowds. It was like the people were a sea and each truck in the column was the tip of an island.
And the people were an angry sea — not like last time. They shouted and waved their fists at the soldiers in the trucks. I wondered why. I couldn’t understand what they were shouting.
Dad was standing behind a tree, holding the camera against the trunk so it wouldn’t be too conspicuous, getting it all on video. We knew the pictures wouldn’t be very good quality, but we also knew this was too good to miss.
I got as close as I could to the trucks. A bolt of excitement hit me. No wonder the people wereangry. This time, the soldiers were armed! Each one carried an AK 47 machine gun. And each AK 47 had a wicked-looking bayonet fixed to the barrel. The PLA wore helmets and those big ammunition pouches on their chests.
They didn’t look bewildered and embarrassed the way the soldiers had on the twenty-third. They looked tough. And mad. This time they looked like
real
soldiers, not those kids in green who “guarded” the doors of the Great Hall of the People or those wimps who sat in the trucks and got an earful from the civilians.
The stalemate lasted for about three hours. Then the trucks reversed, turned around, and withdrew.
The citizens, and the students, had won again. What an army, I thought. They lost face again. They looked stupid. I was glad.
This morning I was grounded.
I came back early from school because classes have been postponed indefinitely. Most of the diplomats pulled their kids out because they don’t think it’s safe enough to send them to school. It’s just as well, I guess, because I’ve been missing classes quite a bit lately. My tones are probably really lousy now.
I got back home to find Eddie and Dad deep intoa conversation that stopped short when I came through the door. They both looked at me guiltily, so I knew something was up.
And here’s what they cooked up. Eddie wanted to go down into the square again. Rumours said the army was going to make another try.
“Great,” I put in, “I’ll go with you. I don’t want to miss that.”
Nope. The plan was that I would
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