From a street performer, translated…
In the men’s bathroom in the Minghsiung Performance Art Center in Chiayi, I was humming the classic of Marilyn Monroe’s “The River of No Return”. My twisted body lay on the icy, cold, damp white tile floors, my legs were hanging on the walls, and the water release system before my eyes wreaked of the smell of antisepctics. As the audience pushed their ways into the cramped up restroom, they could hear me singing with this breathlessness, “If you listen, you can hear it call.”, and, that look of confusion came from their faces, they’d started, whispering to one another. Other than a weird stature I was holding, perhaps, it’s my attire for the show, and the decorations of the public restrooms—black pantyhose, without any shirt on, with a pair of boxers pulled down to my knees, with a bride’s dress, hanging halfway in the air—to those who’d come to the “Whatever-Art Festival”, it’d caused this unsettling kind of adjustment for them.
and this, is the PAIN that the writer speaks of…
In 2000, the last year student of middle school, Yong-Chih Yeh was found, lying in a pool of blood in the school restrooms. Being feminine from when he was younger, he’d become the target of bullying, the classmates’ torturing him, made him only ask for the instructors to go to the restrooms the few minutes before the bell, so he could avoid getting taunted by his fellow classmates. On this day, he’d left his classroom as he usually done before class was over, but, a tragedy that’s gotten no answers to date had occurred…the story of Yeh’s death often surfaced into my mind, because I was once, a subject of the taunting of sexism, “sissy”, “gay”, had often accompanied me.
On my elementary school reunion, the teacher suggested that we do a short play on the novels. After my teacher picked the handsomest guy in the class to play the male lead, I was so full of confidence, that I’d raised my hand up, told the teacher, that I can surely play the role of the female lead—the Dragon Girl. The teacher told me, “You’re a boy, you can only play the role of the huge magical bird.” Back, in middle school, a few of the misbehaving guys, every time I’d gone into the restrooms, they’d stopped me, pushed me toward the girls’ bathrooms, laughed and said, “Get yourself on over there! You Sissy!”, for a while, I’d written the word, “sissy” all over a sheet of paper, and wondered WHY as these two Chinese characters stood next to one another, it’d become such a great shame. In 2002, I’d shared the story of Yeh with the students in my cram school, a lot of them showed this discomfort with the subject. “he’s a homo!”, the students quickly labeled the news story as such, seems like by so doing, they can make the story make sense to them somehow.
I’d decided to put on the “Breathing in Your Face” at the Whatever Arts Festivals, because I’d wanted to use performing, using my own way, to offer memoriam to Yeh, and who I once was. And still, because of how tied-to-the-locals this art festival was, I’d not mentioned on the advertisements of the festival, I’d even, wrapped the story up with the elements of love. Humming the song “The River of No Return”, to cover up the cruelty of that tragic tale. In my performances, I’d slowly, risen up from the ground, put on that pair of underwear that someone else had taken off, with my soft body, started, dancing inside that smelly restroom, the self-flush urinal stalls became my orchestra, the audiences became my guests, I’d gladly, performed my own wedding. Actually, it was nothing more than playing house, playing house, with Youth Rose.
I’m guessing, that if Yeh’s soul came back, what would he have said, inside that blood-stained bathroom? Said what he’d wanted to say, do what he’d bravely done “something that’s outside the expectations of the society”, singing his favorite songs, showing his own kindness toward others; and maybe, one day, to accuse, to stare all the bystanders straight in the face: being alive, without the slightest bit of FEAR on his breaths.
All of these words, actually, I’d repeated to myself, over, and over again.
And so, this, is from the angle of the theatre performer’s interpretation of a young man’s committing suicide, or getting bullied to death, and this raises such a huge alarm, because believe it or don’t, these SORTS of covert AND overt bullying is still happening very close to where you live, heck, it may be happening to your own kid right now, you just don’t have ANY clues of it!!!