HISSSSSSSSSSS

It's 2013, Year of the Snake on the Chinese Lunar Calendar.  I am a rabbit.  According to China's top astrologer, Alvin Ang, rabbits are fucked.

I'm not terribly superstitious, but I can't help but thinking Mr. Ang's soothsaying is right on the money as we are clattering down the Beijing Shanghai South Expressway in a circa 1995 Buick station wagon, and I am peering over the back seat looking for flashing police lights because we just escaped--you read that correctly--ESCAPED--from a whole contingent of gun-toting police who stopped me for DWF (Driving While Foreign, or rather DAWF-- driven around while foreign) and were about to put my passport-less ass into a holding cell.

It was not really my intention to escape.  It just sort of happened.  The boys and I were returning home from the Lang Fang School for the Handicapped in Hebei Province, where we had spent the entire day with 8 other wonderful volunteers building a library for the school.  We braved a Level 9 sandstorm--10 uproots trees-- that blew out the glass doors of the school and the worst pollution I have ever experienced--Beijing's toxic cloud drifts south adding to Hebei's coal-fired factory scrum-- to create this amazing space for kids to dream and learn.

I was feeling snugly wrapped in my good karma blanket when we came upon a police checkpoint.  There a  plenty of checkpoints in China; I've only seen one in actual operation.  I've seen policeman mannequins at checkpoints, but rarely, you know: real police.  I suspect they are all sleeping at their desks or playing ping pong or playing Fruit Ninja on their phones.  (No joke.)

We get pulled over and I immediately note that these uniformed me are a different kind of police because they have large guns.  Guns are outlawed in China; not even the civilian police can carry.  One unusually thick police man raps his knuckles on the back window and points to me.  The driver rolls down his window and Officer IHATEYOURASS starts barking at me.  I pretend I don't understand but I get every word.

Officer:  "What are these foreigners doing in the car?"

Driver:  "I'm driving them home."

Officer:  "Where do they live?"

Driver:  "Beijing."

Officer: "They are going to need to show proof of address and passports if they want to return. Tell them!"

Driver: "I can't translate.  I don't speak English."

Officer: "You don't speak English???????"  He looks at me and yells so hard spittle hits my window "You understand me?"

Me: Blank stare.  Shrug Shoulders.

Officer:  (to other officers) "Can anyone translate?"  I see heads shaking.  (to driver) "Park over there and take them into the detention center."

At this point my cortisol level explodes and I start seeing flashing lights behind my eyelids.  I think I might throw-up because I did not bring any of our passports.  I always bring them for longer trips on planes and tranes and even buses, but I did not think to take them to a place an hour away.  Honestly, I was preoccupied with the details of hauling large boxes of books down from the 28th floor and loading the car in a sand storm with two children in tow.  Bringing passports was not on my mental checklist.  Besides, from personal experience, carrying around one's passport everyday invites loss or theft or, um, damage by washing machine.

The driver looks at me and I say "Zou ba," meaning let's go. "Ba" is a suggestion not a command.  He seemed surprised and repeated the phrase.  Then he drove forward towards the parking area but vered right back onto the freeway instead.

Me: "Uh?  What are you doing?"

Driver: "You told me to go."

He thought I was telling him to leave--as in escape-- when in reality I was just telling him to go park so I could surrender quietly.  The chase scene from Heat started playing in my head and I felt my bowels vulcanizing   My kids are sitting there playing Plants Vs. Zombies on my Kindle, totally clueless to the fact that the car is about to be swiss cheesed by bullets.  I instinctively sink down in my seat and peer through the space below the headrest.  If we did manage to survive this, I had another problem.  My husband is in India and I have no way to reach him.  He has the numbers of people I can contact if I ever, say, find myself in a Chinese prison.

I keep peering back but the anticipated police chase has not initiated.  Now I am doubly confused because I am a fugitive and nobody is looking for me.  I whistle out a half-sigh of relief until I see signs for another police check point ahead and I swallow some vomit.  Surely, SURELY Officer IHATEYOURASS has just called ahead and they will be waiting for us with their mobile execution van.   However, we pass through the checkpoint and the officers are not even looking at us because they are all arguing about something--maybe how they were going to execute us when we arrived.

We continue another 20 minutes without any cop cars tailing us so I begin to laugh and hiccup and cry a little.  For the first time the kids looked up from their game, puzzled by my hyperventilated giggles.  I just hugged them.  I felt some relief, but I had a huge headache that lasted through the night.  I couldn't shake the feeling that I would get a knock on the door.  I woke up in terror several times last night.

As I type this I realize that our detention/escape is the third bowel liquefying incident since the start of the Chinese New Year.  Mr. Ang is right: I think I better stay home for a while.(*)


*Sheppard definition of staying home a "while" = 10 days.  We are going to Yunnan in two weeks!