The suona wail

I heard the sound before in the grasslands of Nei Menggu (Inner Mongolia) of traditional music at one of the tourist stops foreigners gets trapped in. I was impressed by the volume of the sound, a combination of a flute and a trumpet, an oboe with a brass spout.

My neighbor across the street married her son off and their wedding mixed the modern white-gown-suit-and-tie and a black sedan appropriate for the young couple, with some traditional music, a suona solo that was impressive in both verve and virtuosity. I was not sure what was appropriate so I discreetly recorded the event from my solarium, losing much of the clarity since I shot through a glass pane.

The energetic girl’s relatives in their countryside ways of instinctively getting things done vs. the sophisticated (we’ve-got-someone-paid-to-do-that) nonchalance of the boy’s city slickers was evident when it was fireworks time. The crackers were laid on the street like two hearts lanced by an arrow, which the pros made sure it only required one lighting at one end. The girl’s aunt and father interfered with the set-up. When it finally was time to light up the firecrackers (and roman candles), the father and the aunt had to run twice into their section as the lighting cascade kept getting interrupted.

My teaching colleague at the university bawdily exclaimed on occasions like this: “Well, someone is getting screwed again!” Hardly. Bedroom manners in China hold virginity before marriage to be of no import for couples; 71 percent generally live together before the formal “wedding” (unless one has a bishop that still keeps his nose close to the bride’s tiara). The groom’s parents tend to worry more on getting a place for the couple to live in, and having enough cash to pay for the wedding party. Most often, the marriage certificate is a done deal signed and registered before the wedding party. Connubial exertions are desserts, not hors d’oeuvre and hardly the main course!

The routine goes: the groom is driven to his bride’s pick-up place, gathers her into the black sedan, and then is driven back to his home (where they are welcomed by fireworks), presents the bride to his parents, who give their blessings with no shortage of red envelopes stuffed with cash that the girl’s family will equal, if not better, at the wedding meal. The groom takes his bride back to the car and a parade of black sedans (at least, eight, ba, which also sounds like the word for “happiness”), hired for the occasion ensues with lights flashing and horns blaring, in a circuitous route to the party venue.

The party entails a lot of speeches (the bride and groom’s words of gratitude to their parents are tearjerkers), and the red envelope pours in earnest, customary from all guests. When the bride and groom leave for their new abode, the bride carries with her a big fat purse full of red envelopes and the count takes precedence over any eye on concupiscence.

Last week, came the blaring sound of souna again accompanied by electronic sheng and drums, five doors down the street. A makeshift elevated stage and a shed stood on the playground with huge flower arrangements surrounded by artful calligraphy. I grabbed my camera, resolved that my pictures would be from the ground level this time.

Since I could not read any of the messages, I went with the upbeat music that was loud enough to be heard 10 blocks away. There were somber looks on people’s faces that I obviously missed. I assumed that since we were in a former rural area, the suona was more frolic than solemn for the wedding.

Had I paid closer attention, I would have noticed the colorful paper flowers around the tent instead of fresh ones, and the stack of “fake” paper money (the kind burned during the tomb-sweeping festival in honor of ancestors). When the suona players alighted from the stage to meet what was coming out of the building, I might have noticed the canopy of a white blanket that four male adults held at the doorway. Weddings are wildly colored red!

I had my camera pointed and running when it dawned on me that a wrapped corpse had just been laid into a casket inside the tent full of Daoist symbols. Horror of horrors, I was shooting a funeral! I was slow on the draw. One lady put her hands in front of my camera and said: bu hao (no good), before I could turn it off.

It was a tiny body and I asked a child if it was a boy or a girl, and how old ze was. He answered: “Boy. 10.” I was sad and I did not understand the perky suona music for the occasion. It turned out to be my second faux pas. The child referred to himself as a boy of 10 in his limited English. I later discovered that the corpse had “suddenly and unexpectedly died at the ripe age of 73.” Though perky, the suona wail still hit hard. I am only 4-bends short behind that chronological journey.

The souna wailed three days, sunrise to sundown, before the body was delivered to the crematorium. I am tracking down a good souna wail for moi.