While We Are Here

A sudden blackout swept through the villa estate, illuminating every window with a fleeting flash. The familiar hum of electricity evaporated, leaving a profound stillness under the eternal sun.

Sun, a petite girl in a white visor, sighed as she walked beside Peng, a lanky boy in a chef’s uniform. After dinner in the canteen, they headed back to the company housing. Beneath the shade of palms, acacias, and towering mast trees, Sun stepped into the safe cocoon of their three-story villa, oblivious to raucous crows and lustful cats outside.

Inside, they were surprised to find Accountant Zhou, a slender girl with pronounced cheekbones, curled up on the red leather sofa by the wooden spiral stairs, her figure hidden in the dim shadows of the living room. Zhou rarely stayed downstairs. The devoted girlfriend often receded to her bedroom to video call her boyfriend in China.

Noticing their curious looks, Zhou explained she’d come down because her room felt like an oven. She complained that she was out of data and battery and couldn’t call her beloved boyfriend.

Sun and Peng sank into red recliners facing the French window. Scorching rays slanted in like a silent companion, touching an unoccupied sofa, a tea table, and the tips of their shoes.

The chef lit a mint cigarette, but the accountant quickly stubbed it out, proclaiming that she hated the smell. He rolled his eyes and scrolled through choppy TikTok videos of beautiful girls.

Meanwhile, Sun, the translator, grabbed the two books she had once left on the table: Desertion and The White Masai. Both featured love between whites and Blacks in Africa. She’d love to read something with a Chinese character; every time she made her monthly pilgrimage to the city’s local and international bookstores, she asked for China-Africa titles. But none were ever in stock—not even sort-of-popular ones like China’s Second Continent or The Dragonfly Sea.

After a while, Sun picked up the classic—Desertion, her fingers pausing on the cover, a dreary mix of yellow, blue, and green superimposed over a closed door. She took a deep breath. Resonance rippled in her heart as she flipped through the pages, lost in the feeling of her own desertion, her own love half-lost.

Sunset deepened but the living room remained stuffy. Outside, mango trees scratched the window-panes. Crows cawed. Cats yowled.

Time stood still.

Peng and Zhou, both in their early twenties, were lured to Tanzania by the promise of quick money and abundant leisure offered by private Chinese companies. However, whenever the power was out (or when the water was off, or when the internet was cut, or when they were hospitalized because of infections or, even worse, malaria), they questioned why they spent their vigorous youth here.

Finally, Peng broke the silence. “We should do something,” he said. “There’s probably a dozen Kilimanjaros in the fridge.”

“Good idea,” Zhou echoed.

Sun nodded.

Peng pulled off his double-breasted uniform and put on a white vest over his tanned skin and robust muscles, which he was always eager to display. Then he fetched Kilimanjaros and a flashlight in case the power stayed off. He used a lighter to pop the caps. Drops of water glistened on the brown bottles.  

Amid the clinking and hissing of beer bottles, the chef and the accountant began to chat. Sun half-heartedly listened to the conversation, her focus drifting between the words in her book and the murmur of voices around her.

“She’ll be the last,” Chef Peng announced, referring to a salesgirl he had fallen for at first sight while grocery shopping in ChinaTown. “I need her contact. Help me get it! Guys! She’s the one, I swear. I’ve already figured out our baby’s name.”

“Like I’d believe you,” Zhou said, rolling her eyes. “Just yesterday, you were bragging about your ‘glory days’ in China when you—and I quote—‘had three girlfriends at once.’ Why do you need so many lovers? I can’t even imagine being with anyone other than my boyfriend.”

“I’m serious this time. Really.”

“Right,” Zhou said, wrinkling her nose in disgust. 

“I’ll marry this girl.”

Zhou swatted two mosquitoes.

As the topic shifted to marriage, Zhou began outlining her ideal future with her boyfriend, who she described as “handsome, tall, caring, smart, and everything.” She detailed her marital timeline as if life were a project with fixed deadlines: when he would graduate with his PhD, when she would return to China, when they would buy a car and a house, get married, and eventually have dragon-phoenix twins, that is, precisely two children, one boy and one girl.

By then, her quest had become slightly elusive, so she searched the love stories between the Chinese and the Africans. She wanted to know if her interracial love with Paul would work.

The relentless stream of plans made it impossible for Sun to focus on her book. She could have spoken up, criticizing Peng’s fickleness, but she felt she wasn’t in the place to do so, not anymore. She could have voiced her disdain for Zhou’s mundane life, but she decided to keep that to herself. She set aside the book, her thoughts scattered like the pages she couldn’t finish.

“To be honest, Manager Lin is my role model,” Zhou continued. “It’s a shame I haven’t met her in person.”

“You’ll get a chance,” Chef Peng chimed in. “Sometimes, when she takes a break from the project site, she stays with us for a few days. Actually, the empty room next to yours used to be hers.”

“But she hasn’t come back since I came. It’s been five months,” Zhou said. “I really admire her. She has the perfect life—a successful husband, caring, too; a daughter with good grades. And she’s the only female project manager in the Tanzanian branch. How does she manage all that?”

Sun resisted the urge to interject. Like Zhou, she had attended many company drinking banquets where colleagues hailed Manager Lin as a role model for Chinese women in Africa. But Sun had never admired her so-called success in the traditional sense, and she had heard whispers of other truths—truths that wouldn’t paint Lin in a flattering light, but which made her more interesting, at least in Sun’s eyes. Sun kept quiet.

“Yeah, she’s so charming.” The chef spoke as if melting. “If she ever divorces, I’d marry her.”

Zhou rolled her eyes. Then she asked, “Have you ever thought about what you’ll be like in your 30s?”

“Sure,” Chef Peng said. “By then, I’ll have married my girl and bought an apartment in my hometown.” He paused for a moment, then added, “Or maybe I’ll stay in Tanzania, considering the cost of living at home. With all the money I earn here, I could open a Chinese restaurant and live in a nice villa.”

Zhou chuckled, nodding along. Both then turned their eyes to Sun. Sun shook her head and didn’t answer.

The question of her future weighed heavily on her. Her contract in Tanzania lasted three years, and she didn’t intend to renew it. She had promised to use this time to find what she sought. If she failed, she would start somewhere else, though she wasn’t sure where. All she could think about for now was her three-year promise to herself in Dar es Salaam.

Sensing her discomfort, Chef Peng ruffled her hair, messing up her bun. Sun punched his hand away.

“I believe you could be as good as Lin, if not better,” the chef said, feigning a solemn look.

A flicker of annoyance flashed in Sun’s eyes.

“Oh. Did you know?” Peng shifted the topic quickly. “I just heard this a few days ago. Lin’s parents are super rich. They even have a vineyard in Greece. Honestly, I don’t get why she came to Africa in the first place.”

Zhou shook her head in awe.

“Mind your own business,” Sun snapped.

“Why’d you come, anyway?” Chef Peng stared back.

Sun waved him off, her glare demanding that he back down.

Sun often found herself the subject of gossip, which reinforced her belief that the world revolved around her. Chef Peng had told her that many colleagues gossiped about her friendship with him and, most intriguingly, her reasons for being in Africa.

Sun, a straight-A student with an innocent look, seemed out of place in this unremarkable company. While most colleagues came to Africa because they had no better options to earn money, Sun was coveted by many enterprises back home. But Sun had insisted on Africa. Then she made friends with a cook who hadn’t finished high school and whose main interest was girls.

Rumors abounded. Perhaps she did something bad at home. Perhaps she was sick somewhere. Perhaps she was a spy. Even Peng didn’t know what exactly Sun was doing here except that she was searching for something.

Sun saw no point in revealing her true purpose in Africa—especially not to her colleagues. How could they ever believe that Sun had come in search of love?

However unlikely, the truth was that Sun came to Africa for Paul, a German artist of Mozambique heritage whom she had met during her college time in Beijing. At that time, neither had ever been to Africa. 

Born in 1991, Paul was a decade older than her. He stood tall, his muscular frame commanding attention, his dark skin gleaming under the sunlight. He also had those delicate brown eyes, which seemed to hold secrets only a few were meant to know.

Their affection grew as they explored wheat fields beneath soaring planes, wandered through gallery basements to admire Chagall’s paintings, and discovered exhibitions hidden in decaying housing compounds. He also wrote soulful poems about her and made bold sketches of her. Their love seemed pulled from a romantic film, and for the first time in life, her heart skip a beat. She felt adventurous—well-loved. 

It wasn’t long before she moved in with him.

Paul didn’t introduce Sun to his family. She knew that his mother stayed in Germany and his absent father allegedly lived in South Africa, but he didn’t talk much about them.

Meanwhile, Sun’s family refused to meet Paul. Whenever she called her parents, they muttered harsh, stereotypical cliches like how African men would have multiple wives, would beat girls, and would desert their flings with foreigners. She didn’t listen.

How could any bystander understand love?

But Paul did leave her. Nine months into their life together in Beijing, he left after receiving a strange bird necklace from a close Ghanaian friend—a bird with its head turned backward and its feet facing forward. She didn’t know what it meant until much later. 

Paul explained that he urgently needed to find something in Africa. Later, she wished he had been more specific and regretted not pressing him when he refused to talk about his roots.

Sun had expected Paul to return within a week, as he often did when he followed his whims, but a month passed. The only message she received read: I love you, but I have to go.

There was no more news from him.

After Paul vanished, Sun embarked on an impossible quest to unravel the mystery—a journey she believed to be extraordinary, far beyond the mediocrity of the ordinary. After all, the devoted girlfriend admired Paul, to the point of reverence—how could she not? He was her first love, and a romantic, beautiful, and unconventional one at that.

Sun’s journey started in South Africa, where his father might be. It was also her first foreign destination. She reached out to artists Paul had casually mentioned as friends during their visit to a rare South Africa-themed exhibition in China, hoping they could offer some clue. But no one had any answers. No one ever did.

Three months later, her visa expired. A sense of failure almost conquered her, but she persevered. She looked for jobs throughout Africa, and a former classmate offered her a position in Algeria. It was unlikely that Paul would be there, but she decided to try her whimsical luck. She found her way to search for Algerian artists. By then, her quest had become slightly elusive, so she searched the love stories between the Chinese and the Africans. She wanted to know if her interracial love with Paul would work.

“Did you hear about the African engineer who fell madly in love with Lin?” Zhou leaned in, her voice dripping with gossip.

Sun had zoomed out a little as the conversation continued to revolve around Zhou’s admiration for Manager Lin, but the word “African” jolted her out of her reverie.

“What?” Chef Peng shouted. “Please tell me that they weren’t together!”

“Of course not!” Zhou replied.

Sun felt a familiar wave of nausea. She had heard this story before, and it unsettled her every time. She disliked how the feelings of an African man were turned into something akin to ridicule.

“About seventeen years ago,” Zhou started, “when Lin first arrived at the site near Lake Victoria, there was this engineer who courted Lin persistently. Every day, he gave her flowers: a bouquet of red canna, white frangipani, or pink oleander… You name it. Finally, Lin told him:

“‘You like me. Okay. But you have to exercise and lose weight first.’

“‘Inshallah,’ he answered. If God wills.

“Later, he slimmed down and asked again if Lin would be his wife.

“Lin said, ‘You’ve lost weight, okay. But you need to speak fluent Chinese, too.’

“That sounded tough, but after a year of hard work, he learned enough Chinese to converse. ‘Mashallah,’ he said. God has willed it.

“Then guess what Lin said? She said, ‘I still can’t be with you. But on the bright side, now you are healthy and speak Chinese.’”

Zhou beamed as she spoke.

“Wow!” Chef Peng applauded enthusiastically, his voice tinged with genuine admiration, his tone strangely similar to Zhou’s. “Isn’t she something? I’ll marry her if—”

A sudden clink of the doorknob interrupted Peng mid-sentence.

All three let out startled gasps and turned to see a beautiful woman in a green qipao standing in the doorway, a large suitcase in tow.

The two girls were baffled. Then it clicked. Manager Lin was shorter than they thought.

“Ah! Sister Lin!” Chef Peng shouted. “You’re back? What a great surprise! Come, come, come! Sit with us! Have some beer!” He popped open a bottle for her.

Lin hesitated. “Thanks,” she said. “But I need to unpack first.”

“There’s no electricity,” Chef Peng reasoned. “It’s too hot to get any work done now. Come. I’ll help you with the luggage in a bit. Pole pole ndio…”

He looked at Sun. She had taught him some Swahili and often tried to force him to remember the words—never with any success.

“Pole pole ndio mwendo,” Sun enunciated.

“Right,” Chef Peng said, nodding. “It means slow and steady wins the race. And…” He trailed off, expecting Sun to continue.

“Haraka haraka haina baraka,” Sun added, “haste makes waste.”

“Great African philosophy,” Chef Peng declared. “Come. We were just talking about love.”

“And life,” Zhou added.

Throughout the night, Sun reflected on her love and life, too. 

She left Algeria after a year because she had had enough of her life there. She decided to continue looking for her love in Tanzania, a country Paul had mentioned he hoped to visit.

Sun shared her CV in several WeChat groups for Chinese expats in Africa and quickly landed a position in Dar es Salaam.

Three months into Dar, she dragged Chef Peng to every art gallery, museum, and exhibit she could find, many of which were held in unfinished buildings. She never saw Paul, but she came across a photo of the Sankofa bird in one gallery. The artist explained that Sankofa is popular in the African diaspora and that in the Twi language of Ghana, Sankofa means “go back and get.”

What exactly did Paul want to go back and get? 

Sun found herself obsessing over these thoughts. She missed Paul—his fine face and body, his artistic energy, his insatiable curiosity, his existential wondering, and his whims. She also missed the togetherness, especially when she wasn’t outside exploring, especially when she felt isolated in the cocoon.

Sun always frowned upon the connotation of the stereotypical question, as if Africa was such an undesirable destination.

To soothe her longing, Sun immersed herself in Africa-researching, trying to piece together Paul’s family history. After great efforts, she learned that in 1978, East Germany requested help from its communist ally Mozambique, resulting in the migrations of thousands of Mozambican workers to Germany. However, in 1991, when Paul was born, East and West Germany reunited, and communism declined worldwide; soon, the Mozambique laborers were deported home. Many returnees couldn’t find jobs in Mozambique and became migrant workers around the continent. Many German children, like Paul, never met their fathers or set foot on the African continent. Sun grasped the fuller picture.

Though Sun hadn’t seen Paul for over a year, she sometimes felt closer to him. She saw his fragmented identity, his disconnection from his ancestry. She also started to ponder her own diaspora. She believed that she had become part of the African story, too.

Sometimes, she had this strange realization that it didn’t matter if finding Paul turned into a lifelong journey. She was well-accompanied and captivated by Africa. She had a purpose.

At least, she felt her search had a purpose.

“I’ll fly back to China in a few days,” Lin told Chef Peng after drinking some beer. “I’m planning to take an extended leave. I haven’t been home in three years because of the pandemic.”

Lin noticed the two new faces and asked, “Who are you girls?”

“I’m Zhou Zhou, the accountant.”

“I’m Little Sun, the translator.”

“Oh!” Lin’s eyes shined. “You’re the one who graduated from Peking University?”

Sun nodded awkwardly.

“Nice!” Lin beamed. “You know what? I started as a translator, too.”

Sun smiled, trying not to hear expectations in Lin’s words.

“So, when are you coming back?” Peng cut through the silence. “I don’t know, actually. I think I’ve had enough of life overseas.”

“You’re leaving?” Zhou asked.

“I don’t know. What can I do after I get back? We’ll see.”

“You’re already rich. Just rest.” Chef Peng laughed. “You know what? You’re her role model.” Peng turned to Zhou, grinning.

Zhou blinked rapidly, a soft pink hue rising to her cheeks. “Well. It’s true,” she stammered. “I mean. How do you manage your family life so well, even in Africa? I’m worried that my relationship with my boyfriend won’t survive the long distance.”

“No, no,” Lin chuckled and blushed. “I don’t manage it that well. My daughter misses me so much.”

“But I’m sure she understands. You have a wonderful family. There are so many unmarried women in the company.”

“You can surely get married if you want to,” Lin said. “To be honest, sometimes I even envy the freedom of being single.”

Hearing this, Sun recalled the rumors she had heard spreading among the other translators, where the word “divorce” had been mentioned in hushed tones. They said Lin and another Chinese manager, both married, had grown too close during the Covid lockdowns.

“Really?” Zhou asked, puzzled.

“Just kidding,” Lin answered, slightly uneasy. “I love my daughter too much.”

Zhou nodded, though a bit confused.

“Well, my family has always kept me on track. Of course, coming to Africa wasn’t part of the plan—” Lin chuckled, “—they knew that working abroad might disrupt my adherence to the standard Chinese social clock, so they engaged me to their friend’s son when I was your age. I married and gave birth to a baby girl at age 28, the best age to get pregnant according to biology textbooks. And that’s it.” Lin spoke as if reciting from a screenplay. She must have repeated this hundreds of times.

As Zhou nodded thoughtfully, Sun sensed a deep sorrow in Lin’s words.

Peng kept the conversation going. “Sister Lin. Since you might be leaving, I have to ask you this.”

“Yeah?”

“Why did you come to Africa in the first place?” Peng’s tone wasn’t enthusiastic. “You know, it’s Africa. Why?”

The room fell silent.

I am simply glad to experience Africa. It’s a fascinating place, a marvelous place, a truly beautiful place.

Sun always frowned upon the connotation of the stereotypical question, as if Africa was such an undesirable destination.

Manager Lin smiled politely. “It’s a beautiful place, isn’t it?”

Sun’s diary entries, which began with her first glimpse of the Sahara, listed the beauty she admired in Algeria and Tanzania. She hoped to share these with the Chinese. Over time, her words evolved from simple appreciation to something resembling a love letter. Once again, she felt adventurous—well-loved.

Entry 1: The Sahara Desert stretches out with its endless sea of golden dunes that hosts caravans of dromedaries and the nomadic Tuareg tribe, draped in blue turbans and robes. Writers like Sanmao and Isabelle Eberhardt have been drawn to settle within its sands. 

Entry 7: The Roman ruins of Tipaza stands against the azure Mediterranean sea, with crumbling columns and faded mosaics. It has opened “the eyes and heart” of Algerian-French writer Albert Camus. 

Entry 60: Africa’s highest peak, Kilimanjaro, rises into the pale blue sky; its snow-capped summit, veiled by drifting clouds, watches over the vast Serengeti savannah, where herds of zebras and giraffes roam among scattered acacias. The mountain has sparked Hemingway’s imagination. 

Entry 89: The island of Zanzibar boasts white-sand beaches, turquoise waters, and spice-scented air in its old stone buildings. It’s the birthplace and inspiration for Nobel laureate Abdulrazak Gurnah, author of Desertion. 

Entry 239: I’m captivated by local female writers in Africa. So Long A Letter. The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives. The Sex Lives of African Women. These beautifully-written books prompt me to reflect on polygamy and polyamory, to examine its upsides and downsides, from our female perspective, of course.

Entry 320: I’m thinking about a hermit’s life in Africa, a nomad’s life in Africa—like those artists, those writers—a life I would cherish with people. With Paul. I’m waiting for my moment of existential clarity to reveal itself here, on this continent. What a loss it would have been to never set foot on this land. I have fallen for it. Sometimes, I even think it’s not about Paul anymore; I am simply glad to experience Africa. It’s a fascinating place, a marvelous place, a truly beautiful place.

Isn’t it?

“Let me show you some photos of the lake,” Lin said. “You guys haven’t been there, right?”

They shook their heads, moved closer, and circled Lin.

As Lin described life at the site, Sun gazed at the manager—beautiful, slim. She matched this delicate face to all the gossip she had heard in her translator circle—gossip neither Chef Peng nor Accountant Zhou knew.

Beyond the company legend of Lin and the African engineer, Sun also heard a more secretive cautionary tale of a local boss from a partner company, who had come to the conference room nestled by the serene lake to meet Lin, who wouldn’t let go of Lin’s hand after they shook, who put his arm around her waist, who told obscene jokes, who requested that she become his second wife…

A sense of disgust welled up in Sun’s chest. Such harassment was far from an isolated incident; even Sun had experienced something similar that she refused to recall—the filthy hand, the bald man.

But despite the discomfort, she focused on the beauty she could find, ignoring Africa-related tragedies on purpose, and even blaming those who couldn’t concentrate on the opposite.  

In her diary, which gradually became letters addressed to her love, she wrote entry 503: 

Dear Paul, 

How are you today? I bet you’ve had some epiphanies, too. 

I have long realized that the Chinese sojourners love to stay in a cocoon, with all the nice villas and delicacies, because of their fear. In their minds, the outside world in Africa is so different, unfamiliar, unpredictable—hence dangerous. Besides, when money is their sole priority, why bother to experience or understand the outside? 

What a pity. They don’t know how marvelous things are in Africa, even the small things, like the colors. The sun can be golden here and pink there; the sky is forever blue; the sands are mostly yellow, sometimes white; the clouds boast the hues of the rainbow; oceans and lakes have shades ranging from transparent to all kinds of blue and green; trees ooze lush green; flowers riot with warm tones.

What a pity. They don’t know that the people here are so hospitable, kind. Despite hardships, local friends share their happiness. Whenever I manage to get out of the cocoon and stay with them, I feel welcomed, a feeling reminiscent of my childhood when the communities were close-knit and centered around some sort of nature, unlike the current gated communities of concrete jungles where neighbors remain strangers. 

But on the bright side, at least their cocoon is not of the same nature as that of the colonialists. They are not here to rule. 

Sun convinced herself she could never become like Lin—she had no interest in following the social clock, and her modest family held no control over her choices.

Thanks to the internet, I’ve also discovered young Chinese drawn to Africa not for work or money like my colleagues, but for passions—nature, art, or research… We share an eye for beauty. I have forged friendships across the continent—and I believe you are doing the exact same thing. We are connected by this land.

Anyway, I hope that the Chinese presence in Africa can be a beautiful one in the larger diaspora story. I truly wish that more Chinese can understand that the outside is not dangerous, not as they think, at least no more than anywhere else.

In another entry, Sun wrote about the worst harassment Lin endured, which came from within the cocoon, from her Chinese boss. While no one knew the full details, Sun had pieced together fragments.

Entry 512: It all started one night. The younger Lin heard someone pounding on her door. Just as she unlatched the lock, a drunk Chinese broke into her home. The drunk was a boss who had a wife and a daughter in China, whom he called to say “I love you” in a sentimental tone. In Africa, he had several lovers in the campsite and often compared with other bosses about the number of miscarriages he had caused or bastards he had fathered.

Sensing danger, Lin ran around the lake as he chased her. Eventually, she reached a lighted container room where several male colleagues played poker. She banged on their door.

No one even moved.

Later, Lin demanded a transfer back to China. Seeing the situation, the company calmed her, negotiated with her, and agreed. That was when she married and had her daughter. She could have remained in China forever, but the project stalled in her absence. The company decided to move that incompetent boss to projectless Zambia so they could reinstate Lin as project manager. And that was when the employees crystallized the image of a perfect Lin: happily married and important at work.

When Lin was talking, she kept looking at Sun as if seeing a reflection of herself.

Sun tried not to see herself in Lin, though it became increasingly difficult as this middle-aged Chinese woman in Africa suddenly appeared as a real person and forced expectations upon her. She dreaded the thought that her life might, in the end, become as conventional and banal as Lin’s.

Sun convinced herself she could never become like Lin—she had no interest in following the social clock, and her modest family held no control over her choices. Yet, a quiet dread crept in: the fear of becoming poor and jobless, or of being lumped in with the old, lonely single women she had encountered among her Chinese coworkers in Africa. Adrift, she decided she could not contemplate her future until she found Paul.

Once, though, she had thought about her future—a version of it, in Algeria.

A picture emerged in her head. An Algerian man and a Chinese woman sat atop an olive mountain, smiling beneath the stars. They were weaving stories together, each contributing a sentence: after roaming the vast expanse of Algeria like nomads, constructing a hermitic tent house in the Sahara with a dromedary resting beneath a date palm, they eventually settled in Norway—

“You’re too quiet today!” Chef Peng elbowed Sun, interrupting her thoughts.

“What?”

“We’ve all shared this story or that,” the chef said. “It’s your turn.”

“Yeah,” Zhou said. “Share something.”

“But—” Sun wanted to protest, but seeing their eager faces, she decided to tell a story with her continued thoughts. “Alright. How about a story between a Chinese girl and an Algerian man?”

“Ah?” Chef Peng blurted out. “Why are you so interested in Black men?” he grumbled.

“Why do you dislike them so much?” Sun retorted.

“They are not good-looking.”

Sun reminded him of the models at the local fashion show that she had taken him to.

“Well…” The chef was speechless. After all, he had praised, uncontrollably and lavishly, the muscular men and slender women walking the runway.

“And!” Sun continued. “Not all Africans are Black.”

“Really?”

“Many South Africans are white-white, descendants of European settlers. Many North Africans are Arabic- or Amazigh-white.”

“Really?” Chef Peng asked.

“And my story features an Amazigh—a Kabyle, specifically.”

Peng almost blushed at his ignorance.

“Let’s hear the story,” Lin said, raising her bottle. “I’m intrigued.”

Peng and Zhou nodded, clinking their beer bottles.

“There was this Chinese girl,” Sun started. “She was a translator in Algeria, stationed in her company site among the olive mountains. Unlike the men, she wasn’t allowed to leave the site. For security reasons, you know. But she wanted to go outside. She hope to look for things in Algeria. Anyway, as she couldn’t leave the campsite, she became increasingly grumpy, bored, and lonely. That was when she met Mohamed, an engineer, driver, guardian, and sometimes barber. He helped her sneak out and kept her safe. A rapport grew between them, and finally, one night—”

Sun took a draught of beer. The others urged her to continue.

“Finally, one night, when the Chinese male bosses were busy ordering prostitutes, she asked Mohamed to visit. She wore a white Kabyle frock, with a silk towel tied at her waist—not the traditional red, striped ones but one in sapphire. And she brought a bottle of gin and invited him to the office at the mountain site. Somehow, in their talk, she blurted out, ‘Je t’aime’—I love you.”

The listeners’ pupils dilated. They cheered.

“Mohamed didn’t answer. The next day, when sober, she called him, asking if he remembered the stupid things that she’d said the previous night. He said, ‘No worries. All forgotten.’ He knew too well that she would revoke her confessions.”

The audience nodded.

“Except she didn’t. She meant it. Mohamed remained silent. His hesitancy was understandable. There were too many differences. He was Muslim; she was not. He was poor; she was not—at least comparably, with her salary at that time. He lived in Algeria; she would go back to China.”

They shook their heads.

“But there was one more reason for Mohamed’s hesitancy. She still had a boyfriend, who happened to be his Chinese boss.”

Zhou goggled and gaped.

“What then?” Chef Peng asked.

“Then nothing. She just said, ‘Why should we care about that? Enjoy our life while we are here!’” Sun shrugged. “Carpe diem—seize the day, right?”

Chef Peng laughed. “Exactly,” he said and toasted.

Sun and Peng clanked their bottles. Zhou followed reluctantly. Manager Lin raised her bottle, too.

“Anyway, that girl wasn’t serious with her Chinese boyfriend. She wasn’t serious with Mohamed, either. She had someone in her heart. But… how do I say… she was kind of confused and too lonely, I guess. She developed real feelings for Mohamed and immediately broke up with that Chinese boss.”

Sun paused, as if still seeing that moment.

“And?”

“And things didn’t work out. Mohamed, whom she had believed to be guileless, was also seeing an Algerian girl, though he didn’t mention it until the very end. After that, he asked his boss to transfer him to another campsite and left, being a good, devoted employee.”

The listeners sighed, feeling sorry for the girl.

Sun frowned and went on, “But she moved on. A year in Algeria was more than enough, especially when her freedom was restricted. She travels. Continues her search. Her life is wonderful.”

Sun finished her bottle.

“Has she…” Manager Lin asked cautiously. “I’m just wondering… Has she found what she was searching for?”

Sun was stuck for a second. She wasn’t ready to share another story—the story. Sun lowered her head and then glanced at Lin. She sensed some sparks in Lin’s eyes. Perhaps the manager had been searching for something, too, when she first arrived in Africa.

For a brief second, she suspected that Lin had probably never found what she was searching for. Or maybe Lin realized that her life remained empty even after she had found the thing. Or maybe life’s incidents, like those with lecherous bosses, might have altered her mind. Or maybe age had transformed Lin.

Sun chose not to answer directly. Instead, she looked at Lin and asked, “Have you found what you were searching for?”

They both laughed. Then, Lin glanced over at Accountant Zhou and Chef Peng. “Have you?” 

They all shrugged.

A strange existential bonding revealed itself to Sun, a sense that she should never assume that Lin’s life was ordinary or anyone’s life—Accountant Zhou’s, Chef Peng’s, and Mohamed’s—regardless of race, class or anything. The world did not revolve around her, or her priorities.

Paul had once told her about the sort-of-existential concept of sonder, the idea that everyone is at once a hero, a supporting act, and an extra in overlapping, imperfect stories. Everyone. 

As night deepened into quiet disillusion, Sun opened her existential eyes and heart. She had let go of her dichotomy—love as either devoted or polyamorous—and now she abandoned her split between life as mediocre or extraordinary. She also let go of her obsession with adventure. In fact, she had never truly been searching for Paul—or Africa, neither of which she had ever truly understood. 

The door light flickered back on, casting a soft glow alongside the moonlight. It washed over the pink bougainvillea climbing the walls, the vibrant red ixora and the white pinwheel flowers blooming in the garden. It settled over the swaying palms, the acacias stretching like green clouds, and the towering mast trees standing sentinel. The light slanted onto the drowsy group in the living room, too, faintly touching everything—in the villa, across the continent, around the world.

No one noticed the light. They had fallen asleep on their sofas, oblivious to spiders spinning webs in their hair and ants trekking across their skin—creatures they had grown accustomed to in the tropics. The moon gave way to the sun. Crows cawed. Cats yowled.

–

This novella has been awarded the Second Prize in the category of fiction in the First Global China-Africa Writing Competition (2024) held by CASIN (China-Africa Shanghai International Network). The Elephant is granted rights to publish this work first by both CASIN and the author herself. For more details about the competition and CASIN, contact us at casinwriting@gmail.com.