The northern part of country M.

Xiao Xue took a car from the port to Boss Qian's manor and was overjoyed by the grandeur and luxury of the manor.

I met Boss Qian, it's been a long time. Become richer, more powerful and powerful.

Catch the wind and wash the dust.

Got to know a lot of local leaders. Secretary of the county party committee, county magistrate, minister

Armed chief, brigade commander

coveted Xiao Xue's beauty.

The building has three floors, with a wide yard with a gate always open during the day like showing off your wealth. Three off-road vehicles were parked under the carport. The wide eaves that jut out into the courtyard always provide shade at all times. As far as Xiao Xue can see, the "eldest sister" and his husband sit under the eaves of the porch all day long, entertaining guests, chatting, and eating three meals a day. The "eldest sister" wears a light purple tweed coat and a white gauze scarf around her neck. He was plump, his chest was high and bulging, the skin on his face was dark and shiny, and his melancholy eyes were big and bright. She looks a lot like a woman in the Kham Tibetan region, and she speaks with a terrifying domineering air, showing that she, the matriarch, is the head of the family. His husband fits all the descriptions of a playboy-like rich man in the novel: loose muscles, heavy bags under his eyes make him look pale. His demeanor was a kind of decadent melancholy because he was too rich. He lazily tucked his whole body into his chair, smoking cigarette after cigarette, sometimes sticking a cigarette into the mouthpiece of a long hookah, snorting and snorting out of his nostrils. Several underage maids are on hand at all times. They brought bottled mineral water on a tray, a cup of hot tea, and a piece of toilet paper on the outside of the cup, which was carefully delivered to Xiao Xue. Xiao Xue has never figured out what business the "eldest sister" relied on to make a fortune. Smuggling rosewood, running rubber plantations, mining mines, or selling drugs? Sometimes, a large group of businessmen from Cangyuan, Yunnan Province, would sit under the eaves of the porch for a long time, looking sad, and as long as Xiao Xue was present, they would never talk about business.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the establishment of Nampaling Village, and there will be a grand celebration. The "eldest sister" said that she could take Xiao Xue to this celebration. Before the celebration, Xiao Xue had to look around in Bangkang, the capital of Wa State. This is also in line with Xiao Xueyi.

Ai Bao took Xiao Xue out of the yard, turned right not far away, and it was the hotel of the "eldest sister". The guesthouse is rented to a Sichuan man. The lobby of the hotel is cluttered with long sofas, mahjong tables and mineral water bottles. For several days after that, whenever Xiao Xue walked down the stairs, Xiao Xue would see a bunch of men and women, lying on the sofa like jelly. The Sichuan boss registered Xiao Xue's ID card and handed Xiao Xue a key. Xiao Xue climbed to the third floor. In the hallway, you can see the garden on the roof of the "eldest sister's" house and the red cross rising above a Christian church in the distance.

Outside the windows of the two-person standard room, road builders are laying gravel, cement and asphalt roads, and rumbling rolling mills pass and go. The thin window panes are not soundproof, and they are useless. The original white sheets and duvet covers were dirty. The sheets of one of the beds were stained with dark brown blood. On the wall at the head of the bed and on the wall behind the peeling paint TV stand, there is an image of a girl in a bikini with a print of erotic services and phone calls. Dirty. For several days, as soon as she walked into the hotel room, Xiao Xue felt dirty.

The "eldest sister" gave Xiao Xue an unofficially published biography "Washan Chizi Zhang Yuexiang", and Xiao Xue learned that she belonged to the red elite family in Wa State. This genealogical biography has become a certificate of the noble lineage of the "eldest sister" family and a blueprint for the imagination of the ancestors of later generations. He was a former member of the Central Committee of the United Wa State Party and Minister of External Relations of Wa State. In 1999, his relatives spent 170,000 yuan to erect a tall tombstone for him, next to the "Monument to the People's Heroes" and overlooking the dusty Great Hall of the People below. Nowadays, not many people remember that this propagandist, who was once trained by the CCP, wrote many political propaganda songs, such as "Follow Chairman Mao with All Your Heart", or "The Unquenchable Fire Pond is the Party's Kindness".

Throughout Zhang Yuexiang's life history, you can vaguely get a glimpse of a modern history of the Wa people.

Drive away from the dusty streets, through the laneways, and towards the top of the mountain. The hilltop park overlooks the whole city. In fact, from a bird's eye view, there is nothing worth seeing in Bang Kang City. The buildings are messy and sparsely planted. It's just the rubber groves planted after the forests in the distant mountains have been cut down, and the green clouds linger on them, so that you don't feel too desolate. Descend the mountain, through dusty streets and ugly shops again, and find a halal restaurant for breakfast next to a Rohingya mosque. Bangkang has about 300 Rohingya. They could not have citizenship in Myanmar and fled to Bang Kham. It became their refuge. An Arabian-style green-domed mosque rises from the ground. They speak Chinese and do business. A melancholy-looking Rohingya said to Xiao Xue: "Xiao Xue loves Wa because there is no persecution here. "Like the monks of the Theravada Buddhist monasteries, they are poor, but they are content. 200,000 of their compatriots, denied citizenship, are freezing and starving in refugee camps in Myanmar's Rakhine State. In a land where drugs and guns are rampant, people endure the test of life and death every day, but they look down on many unnecessary disputes, and they show a rare tolerance for religion, even if Bao Youxiang's second daughter, a respected Christian, everyone calls her "Second Sister Bao"—said in front of Xiao Xue: "Believe in Christ, only Xiao Xue's Christianity is the only correct religion." ”

Lao Li and Xiao Xue each enjoyed a pea vermicelli and a small dish of dried beef rice, spending a total of 50 yuan. That's more than the breakfast cost of a citizen in Beijing, where the average civil servant earns just over 1,000 yuan a month. Almost all daily necessities in Wa come from China. Mountains and forests and tin mines were leased to Chinese merchants, and it was the officials who profited. The Wa State, like Kokang, has no access to bookstores, publishing houses, cinemas, theatres and gymnasiums. People don't need writers and artists to enlighten the mind and shape the soul. What's the point here? People live, just live, and that means everything. Xiao Xue didn't even see the lively primary and secondary school students walking home with their schoolbags in the afterglow of the sunset, but underage child soldiers could be seen everywhere. Dressed in loose olive-green uniforms, they hid in the dark corners of the Great Hall of the People and played games on the Internet, or, at the family banquets of dignitaries, they served tea and water to the guests. The barrenness of knowledge leads to the lanxing of creativity, which in turn desolates the hearts of generations of people.

Lao Li took Xiao Xue to his car repair shop on the outskirts of the city. He is the repair shop manager. Off-road vehicles weave around the city's laneways. "All roads in Bangkang are connected," Mr. Li said.

"Why? Isn't there a dead end?" Xiao Xue asked.

"...... needed for drug trafficking"

Xiao Xue suddenly realized: Bangkang was originally built for drug trafficking. David Aymer found during a trip to the countryside that the rough dirt roads were deliberately unleveled and paved with cement and asphalt in order to prevent the Tatmadaw from being burdened by the Tatmadaw Force. Drug trafficking/economy and war/defense of de facto independence, are the themes of Wa survival.

On the outskirts of the city, the mountain villas under the shade of trees loom in the sky, like a royal mansion, and there is still a private armed guard. "The high-ranking officials and the rich all live outside the city," Mr. Li said. Opposite the Theravada Buddhist monastery, a luxurious mansion, the door plaque is written in traditional Chinese script with two gilded characters "Zhao Fu", and the doorman with a gun looks at an apricot yellow robe under the eaves of the corridor and disappears by the side of the road. An asphalt road, which runs between a luxurious mansion and a Buddhist monastery, separates secular money worship from ultra-secular asceticism, like ice and fire, as if the abyss of life and death on this shore and the other shore.

The car repair shop is halfway up the mountain. The spacious courtyard is filled with Japanese-made cars smuggled from Thailand. The TV in the office plays CCTV5 sports. Lao Li's two sons and daughters ran out and ran in. His wife looked ten years younger than Lao Li. She returned from shopping. A house across the street from the office seemed to be their home. Lao Li took Xiao Xue down the mountain on foot and walked on a flat ground on the side of the highway where a building was to be developed. The slopes of the hill full of rubber trees are close at hand. Xiao Xue proposed to go mountaineering, and Lao Li shook his head. He doesn't have the stamina. Apart from the military, the men of Wa have little exercise. Men who do not exercise, mostly alcoholics, prostitutes, polygamy, opium smoking, and a clean man like Lao Li is quite rare.

"When people reach the age of 60, it is legal to smoke opium," Mr. Li said. The subtext of this sentence is that many people under the age of 60 in Wa have a history of clandestine drug use.

"You look like a reporter or a writer like this, or Xiao Xue will take you to Xiao Xue's boss's friend's house to watch him smoke opium," Lao Li said.

"Xiao Xue is not here to hunt for curiosities or reveal secrets, but to hear different life stories so that she can see the other side of human life," Xiao Xue said. Xiao Xue believes that as long as it does not cause harm to others and society, any kind of behavior is understandable. ”

"A person like him has earned enough money for several lifetimes, what's wrong with smoking opium? Okay, Xiao Xue try it to see if he wants to see you. ”

In Wa, Xiao Xue already has two waits: the "eldest sister" promises to take Xiao Xue to Nampaling, so that Xiao Xue can observe the rural life of Wa, and Lao Li helps Xiao Xue contact the opium-smoking boss, which is a way to experience the high society of Wa. There will be another wait: with the permission of the second sister Bao, the female college student Ahmgai will be interviewed by Xiao Xue's video.

It was a weekend night, and the hustle and bustle of the streets was quiet. Xiao Xue walked into the tallest building in the center of Bangkang, Christ Church. The music room on the third floor, with guitar accompaniment, someone is singing hymns in Burmese. A group of men and women in their twenties, dressed in style and elegant, clearly from the upper class of the Wa State. They weren't enthusiastic about Xiao Xue's welcome, but they were friendly. Xiao Xue sat down and watched a girl write Chinese characters under the Burmese lyrics on the blackboard in the phonetic way of Chinese characters, and then lead the singing. Those rows of Chinese characters create many strange associations when read. The boy sitting behind Xiao Xue, wearing black-framed glasses, looked suave and elegant, like a college student. "Xiao Xue's name is Su Xu," he said as he shook hands with Xiao Xue.

After the singing, Xiao Xue and Ahmgai talked. She studied at a seminary in Myanmar and is now a third-year student at the Faculty of Law at the University of Yangon. Xiao Xue felt that she had encountered an emerald in the rubble, because almost all the young people in the Wa State were either in the military camp, in the casino, and some in the monastery. Ahmgai has fair skin, a thin build, and a pair of single-eyelid eyes behind myopic glasses.

"Xiao Xue can you follow your daily life," Xiao Xue said, "because Xiao Xue wants to see a different Wa young people." ”

"Then you have to ask Xiao Xue's second sister, without her permission...... Ahmgai pouted and shrugged. "Tomorrow at Mass, she will attend. ”

The girls hurried away. Xiao Xue and Su Xu walked into the night. He was from Kunming, a missionary. After a year in Wa, he had too many feelings. "Don't look at the majesty of the church, but it is a desert of faith, and most of the people who come to the church are asking God to bless them for promotion and wealth. Xiao Xue talked as they walked. The streets are being paved with asphalt. The rolling mill is still operating. In front of the hotel, Xiao Xue made an appointment to meet tomorrow. He lives in a low-rent house halfway up the mountain. Wa State is safe and secure, so you don't have to worry about night roads.

The next morning, Xiao Xue came to the church. The church was full of people. Two elderly Christians from Kachin State, wearing black and red headscarves, stood on a high pulpit and spoke into the microphone about the purpose of their visit to Wa: to raise money to build a village church. A sturdy man translated their Jingpo Dashan dialect into Chinese. They took turns talking for a long time. This is to the effect that, under the control of the Tatmadaw (TDF), whenever they go out to collect donations, their relatives are persecuted because the FDN believes they are secretly sending information to the Kachin Independence Army. Xiao Xue saw that in the middle seat of the front row, there was a lady with a smooth face because of good maintenance, about forty years old, looking at her mobile phone from time to time. Compared to the dull faces of the middle-aged women around her, she looked graceful and luxurious. There is no need for introduction, Xiao Xue knows that she must be the second sister of Bao. She has a princess-like temperament.

End of fundraising presentation. Ahmgai came to power and preached the importance of intellectual curiosity, citing the example of the Jews. She was articulate and won bursts of applause from the audience. Ahmgai is educated in theology and jurisprudence. Xiao Xue estimated that she was the most knowledgeable person among the younger generation of Wa people. Most of her peers are dealing cards in the casino at the moment, easily earning a monthly salary of four or five thousand yuan. In contrast, Ahmgai is so unique in Xiao Xue's eyes that it can shine like a star.

Finally, a group of young people sing Burmese hymns to guitar accompaniment. Ahmgai is versatile and one of them. For several nights, Xiao Xue listened to their rehearsals in the church music room. The phonetic method of Chinese characters allows these Christians who do not understand Burmese to interpret each hymn into a strange meaning.

Some left, some stayed. Xiao Xue walked over, handed a business card to Second Sister Bao, introduced herself to Xiao Xue, and then explained the intention of the interview. Her fair skin glowed with a pearly glow on her well-maintained little face. It just so happened that Ahmgai and her obese mother were right next to her. They discussed it for a while.

"Yes," said Second Sister Bao, "no problem." ”

Ahmgai is next going to a church in the countryside to collect donations for the Kachin elderly.

"Xiao Xue is going with you, right?" Xiao Xue said.

"Xiao Xue's car has no seats," Ahmgai said.

However, in the courtyard outside the church, when Ahmgai and two female friends got into the SUV, Xiao Xue found that the passenger seat was empty.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" Xiao Xue said, "It seems that your car still has one empty seat." ”

"Xiao Xue is going to eat first," Ahmgai said. "You'll come back tomorrow. ”

At this time, Xiao Xue already felt that Ahmgai was lying. But Xiao Xue's intellect suppressed intuition. Xiao Xue's intellect tells Xiao Xue that a person who has been educated in theology and law will not lie, because he/she knows how to open his heart and face God's justice, and he or she knows how to be fair and face the justice of the world. Lying, on the other hand, is not only a moral issue, but especially a matter of faith.

This is Xiao Xue's third wait in Wa, and this wait ended most quickly.

Su Xu spent the morning at the home of a new communist. Christians who are not yet firm in their faith cannot withstand the blow of a broken marriage. He was an alcoholic, discouraged, and not only had he lost faith in God, but he was also not interested in life. He needed Su Xu's comfort. Su Xu played the role of a psychotherapist for a morning, and then rushed to meet Xiao Xue. The snow walked through the dusty streets and took their seats in a bar in the red-light district. Across the bar, a row of humble massage rooms with pink doors and windows dusty. Sex workers with health certificates are at the door. The soft love songs of the singers are played in the bar. Xiao Xue ordered an expensive pot of black tea, which was as expensive as in a Beijing bar, and even more so. The design of the bar was crude, and if it weren't for looking for a place to chat under the dusty sun, Xiao Xue wouldn't have sat on this loose sofa.

"Second Sister Bao agreed, and Xiao Xue also added her WeChat," Xiao Xue told Su Xu.

"Great," Su Xu said, "Xiao Xue has always been worried about you, because in Wa State, you must have a backer." There are gray areas everywhere, and if you're not careful, you'll be in for trouble. ”

Xiao Xue was like a guy climbing a dragon and a phoenix, a little complacent, a little throbbing and a sense of safety. In fact, this villain-like illusion and vanity did not last long, and it was soon shattered by the words "eldest sister": "In Xiao Xue's Wa State, it is the eldest lady and the third lady who help Commander Bao to manage things. Second Sister Bao doesn't care. She believes in Christ, but Xiao Xue's Wa people believe in ghosts. The different beliefs made the people very dissatisfied with her. When she said this, Xiao Xue looked up from under the front porch of her house at the red mantra hanging on the lintel, on which the ink script used the word "ghost" as the side and the words "Fu Lu Cai Shou Zhao Cai Jinbao" in two couplets. And this is the result of the invasion of the Wa people's witchcraft beliefs by the native religion of the Han people, Taoism. Christianity opposes witchcraft and ghost worship. The second sister converted to Christianity and became an opponent of the Wa witchcraft faith.

When night fell, Su Xu took Xiao Xue to stroll through the streets. Xiao Xue walked into a military store. A young clerk and a few friends are playing cards. Rows of genuine M65 U.S. Army combat trench coats hang from the hangers. Wa men like to wear a jungle camouflage M65. But in the wholesale market, a replica of the M65 that costs 200 yuan in a Chinese military store actually costs 800. Everything here is very expensive, except for the golden eagles, muntjacs, porcupines and bee monkeys that are hunted in the bazaar, except for prostitutes, drugs, guns and buying murder.

As Xiao Xue played with the saber, a short, flamboyantly dressed man walked into the store and handed the clerk two Chinese-made Type 95 automatic rifles. As the clerk spoke, he expertly unloaded the magazine, squeezing out the bullets one by one. "Put it here," the clerk said, "If anyone wants it, Xiao Xue will help you out." ”

Xiao Xue's phone rang. Ahmgai said on the phone: "Xiao Xue is going to Yangon tomorrow. ”

"When are you coming back?" asked Xiao Xue.

"I don't know, I guess it's a month. ”

A lie is a lie after all, and it pours into your ears like this street of dust.