Charlie's War

Charlie had always been a quiet, unengaged fellow, more likely as a child to sit in the basement with his Legos than watch TV or play with other kids.  The outside world and Charlie had always had a tenuous relationship, but as he grew older, he felt a burning need to get out of the skin he had grown around himself. He wanted to earn his isolation not be a prisoner of it.

So after finishing his degree in Computer Science, he packed a bag and headed to China, which he figured was as different from his Midwestern upbringing as possible. He had had a small group of friends who wished him well but seemed unfazed by his upcoming 12,000-mile journey. Perhaps because they were so used to entering and conquering so many fantasy worlds and navigating the intricacies of cyberspace, visiting Asia didn’t seem like such a big deal.

The most difficult good-bye Charlie made was to his menagerie of furry and scaly companions. Eddy Izzard the Lizard, Thelonious Chipmunk, and if forced to choose a favourite, a fluffy ginger cat named Einstein. Charlie loved his three pets more than the three humans who also shared his home, and with whom he rarely spoke.

Charlie booked a room in a hostel next to a canal in the old part of Nanjing. He had his first meal in a noodle shop, relishing the simplicity of water, chicken, and noodles. He had subsisted on Tony’s frozen pizzas and Lipton iced tea all these years and imagined this was his new local equivalent.

On his third day, he wandered into an open air market. Above hung a multitude of opened coloured umbrellas, giving the narrow and poorly lit laneways a festive feel. Small stalls sold pirated DVDs, others live fish and turtles in giant Styrofoam containers. One stall only sold belts, another stationary, and in between were baubles, fresh fruit, vegetables, and herbs. Charlie looked at all the wares with mild interest until something stopped him dead in his tracks. So still and motionless was he that several people bumped into him.

Before him were stacks of cages, five high and three deep of various animals, each cage containing at least ten small creatures—kittens, puppies, rabbits, ducklings, and guinea pigs. He knelt down and tried to look the rabbits in the eyes but they seemed too lethargic to meet his gaze. One brazen kitten with matted grey fur began to squeakily beg, his siblings (or distant cousins) barely lifting their heads before nuzzling back into the heap of fur. So crammed was the cage of tiny felines that it was difficult to make out whose limbs belonged to whom.

Charlie felt a sharp stabbing sensation in both his chest and gut and in a few seconds was able to imagine the entire life of the kittens with no fresh air, no chance to run and play. He couldn’t allow himself to imagine their fate if not sold and wasn’t entirely sure what their fate would be if they were.

Next to the cages a middle-aged man sat in a plastic chair, smoking and looking at his mobile. He didn’t greet or acknowledge the foreigner as tourists didn’t usually buy pets on holidays. Charlie stood and realized he was shaking. The man didn’t look up from his phone, which further elevated Charlie’s anger. He had a sudden urge to grab the man’s throat and squeeze as hard as could. Having never felt a pull towards violence, he felt a sudden urge to escape and quickly walked away. It was a sweltering hot day and though not a heavy drinker, Charlie longed for a beer and made his way back to the hostel and its bar.

On his second beer, he tried to rationalize that his indignation was a by-product of his privileged white upbringing and that the trading of animals was just business. Why would a country that still hadn’t secured the rights of all its human citizens be advanced enough to be worried about its animals? By his fourth beer he had googled and contacted several animal rights groups that existed in Asia. The eloquence of his impassioned pleas surprised him and he briefly wondered if he had made a mistake not delving into a field involving the written word. After his sixth beer and not having received any replies, he began drinking whisky and developing a plan. He called it “Operation Furdom”, which momentarily put him into a giddy and giggly state.

What happened upon the implementation of Operation Furdom he would later describe as glorious and the closest he ever felt to God.

The Merchant of Cruelty (as he called him) was deeply engrossed in a conversation with a seller of cell phone covers, so didn’t notice Charlie clumsily opening all the cages. Though many of the animals were too weak or dazed to grasp the situation, a good many of the creatures sprinted from their tiny cells.

They masterfully dodged the shoppers and shop owners, who for a variety of reasons, tried to catch them. They wiggled out of hands and disappeared into cracks and crannies that seemed improbably small. People shrieked and shouted and the man worked frantically to stuff the shyer and stupider animals back into their cages, cigarette still dangling from a grimace. He briefly looked at Charlie, who hands in pockets, swayed and grinned at the mayhem. The man shouted, the words sounding like nothing more than barking.

The next day as he headed to the train station to begin a 24-hour journey south and away from the crowded cities, he saw something perched on a crumbling wall. As he neared, he became more certain that it was the grey kitten, who a day earlier, had begged him to do something. Though the cat hissed at first, he allowed himself to be petted before jumping down the other side of the wall and disappearing into a laneway without so much as a backward glance.

(Note: This story is based on my experience of seeing these pet stalls in Nanjing. I wrote a non-fiction blog about it here.)