With the other family members holidaying in
Beijing, I had the house to myself and did
whatever pleased me. I shut down the heater in the
morning and the temperature dropped to 60F by
9:30pm. Wearing a light sweater and after some
cheap wine, I felt perfectly fine even barefoot. But
my nose felt the difference.
This reminded me of early childhood when mom and
I rented a small place (one room divided into two
by a faux wall) on main street. She was frugal to a
fault. To save money (for my education mostly), she
would put in a block of bee-hive-shaped coal (蜂窝煤)
in the small stove (for both cooking and heating),
cover it with a round lid, and seal the cracks with
ash at the edges to cut oxygen so that the coal burn
slowly. That block would last the whole night and
mom would put in another one in the morning to
keep the fire alive till she came back from work to
put in the third to cook supper. So three blocks a day.
It was freezing cold at night as we burnt so little
coal and we huddled under the quilts under
more quilts and heavy overcoats. Once there,
body heat was trapped inside and it became
comfortable after a short while. I never learnt
to bury my head under the pile and therefore
my nose always felt numb breathing the cold
air. I don't remember sleepless nights in those
years. Getting warm and drifting to sleep seemed
so satisfying and such a treat to look forward to.
Of course, getting up in the morning and marching
back into the cold took some grit.
Cold was not the worst thing we had to worry
about. Carbon monoxcide from burning coal was a
major cause of death in the winter north. Every
year, we heard horror stories of whole families
succumbing to it. Burning more might have to do
with it but even three blocks a day didn't keep the
colorless, odorless, deadly gas away. Through trial
and error, mom and I learnt to detect it with our
senses. We shook heads from time to time and a slight
headache from anyone was enough to trigger action.
We opened the windows and the door to let in fresh
(and icy) air until everyone felt clear-headed again.
That was how we survived the north China winters
until I was about 11 years old. I had lived there for
about eight years before boarding in middle school.
Winters in that school were no warmer but that was
another story.
I slept in and wrestled with the Coleman 40F(4.4C)
sleeping bag, a sequestered gift for Tim's birthday,
over night. It was 53F around 8:00am. I got a little
sweat from my daily ration of Surya Namaskar, the
whole body warmed up, and I felt great.
