Seven Days Staring at Bamboo
Seven Days Staring at Bamboo — a philosophy story. 10 illustrated pages, narrated, on the kids shelf, free to read on Wonder Philosophy.
Page 1
A cold gust came roaring down the frozen road outside the great grey gate, and with one sharp crack the ropes on the merchant's cart snapped loose. Forty bamboo poles, each as long as two men lying head to toe, tumbled off the cart bed and went clattering and rolling across the frozen ruts in every direction. Shouren dropped his notebook and sprinted after the nearest pole, his wide sleeves flapping like wings. Qian Youzhi dove sideways, his round lunch box bouncing hard against his stomach as he scrambled under a camel's swaying legs to grab a runaway length. Xiao Lian, tiny and quick, chased a bouncing pole with her one-eared rabbit still clamped under her arm, nearly vanishing between the camels' knees. One by one they hauled the poles back, stacking them crosswise against the fence until the pile stood as tall as the fence itself, the three of them panting white clouds into the freezing air.
Page 2
Shouren grabbed one side of the big grey stone stool, waist-high and heavy as a sack of rice, while Qian Youzhi hauled the other side, both of them dragging it scraping across the flagstones until it faced the green bamboo clump square on. Xiao Lian came running with cushions stacked in her short arms, higher than her own head, and they piled all four onto the stool, wobbling, until it looked like a lumpy little tower. Shouren clambered up first, settling cross-legged, eyes fixed hard on the swaying leaves. Qian Youzhi scrambled up after him, squeezing beside him on the narrow cushion-top. For a whole hour nobody moved, staring at the bamboo like it owed them money. Then Qian Youzhi shifted to scratch his nose, the cushions slipped sideways under him, and he slid off with a flailing yell, landing bottom-first in the chrysanthemum pot by the wall, petals and dirt flying up around his round face.
Page 3
The bamboo rows stood taller than any house Shouren had seen, their green trunks rising in straight ladders toward the sky. He wedged his ink-stained fingers into a notch and began climbing, knees scraping bark, sandals slipping, calling down that the topmost leaf would tell him everything. Qian Youzhi hopped anxiously below, lunch box bouncing against his stomach, shouting warnings up the pole, while Xiao Lian clutched her one-eared rabbit and hugged the trunk's base as if she could hold it steady with her small arms. Old Bo stood apart, calm, straw hat already sliding off his back into his waiting hand. As Shouren stretched for the last leaf, the whole pole bent slowly, gracefully, like a fisherman's rod hooking a great fish, lowering him in a long arc until he tumbled, startled but unhurt, into a deep drift of dry fallen leaves. His notebook spun loose from his sash, and Old Bo stepped forward, flat hat raised, catching it dead center before it touched the mud. Everyone burst out laughing, Qian loudest of all, his gap-tooth grin wide with delight, while Xiao Lian clapped her small hands together.
Page 4
Three days of notes lay spread across the railing, pinned under Shouren's inky fingers, when the great drum behind them let out its booming thump — a sound so huge it shook the whole gallery floor. The blast of air sent every page leaping into the sky at once. Shouren lunged, grabbing at nothing but wind. 'My notes!' he yelled, scrambling along the railing, which stood as high as his chest. Qian Youzhi dove after a sheet skittering across the floorboards, slamming his whole round body flat on top of it. Xiao Lian, quick on her small legs, snatched a laundry pole twice her own height leaning against the wall and swung it in wide arcs, netting two fluttering pages out of the open air before they sailed over the parapet. Old Bo, towering over them all, yanked the cartwheel-wide straw hat from his back and slapped it down over a drift of pages skidding toward the edge, pinning them flat beneath his huge bony hand.
Page 5
The raft was broad as a door and twice as long, bundled bamboo poles lashed flat and floating low on the canal water at Tongzhou wharf. Shouren crouched on its wet planks, counting hollow joints under his breath, tapping each one with a knuckle. He did not notice the mooring rope working loose from its piling until the whole raft tipped gently and slid out into open water. 'It's moving!' shouted Qian Youzhi, dropping his lunch box with a clatter and grabbing the trailing rope. Old Bo lunged after it, his long arms closing around the wet hemp, bracing his straw sandals against the stone edge. Xiao Lian threw her whole small weight behind him, squashing her rabbit under one arm while gripping the rope with the other. 'Pull, pull!' cried Old Bo, and all four heaved together, boots slipping on the slick stones, until the raft bumped gently back against the pilings. Shouren toppled backward onto the bamboo, notebook still clutched tight, breathless and grinning with relief.
Page 6
Shouren's nose had been itching since the doorway, and on day six of his bamboo staring it finally won. The sneeze came enormous, tearing out of his thin chest, and his flailing elbow caught a wide-mouthed jar sitting open on the hip-high counter. The jar tipped, rolled, and burst its load of dried orange peel into the dim air, a whole orange cloud sifting down over Qian Youzhi's round shoulders and settling in Xiao Lian's green yarn buns. Old Bo, ducking under the low shop beam, threw his huge straw hat up like a shield but only managed to catch half the storm. Mei Po, bent nearly double, did not flinch. She dragged a wooden stool to the wall of little drawers, climbed it with surprising speed for someone so small, and swept the scattered peel off the shelf edge into her swinging brass scale pan with quick flicks of her wrist. Then she hopped down, pried open Qian's round lunch box, and packed it tight with fat knuckles of ginger and wrinkled jujubes.
Page 7
On the seventh day, the bamboo grove below Tanzhe Temple wore a thick roof of snow, each stalk bowed low under the white weight. Shouren, still scribbling notes with numb fingers, pressed close to one tall culm taller than the temple gate to peer at its leaf-tips. A gust slammed through the grove. The loaded stalk sprang upright, and a whole shelf of snow crashed down, burying Shouren to the shoulders in an instant. He sneezed so hard his brush flew from behind his ear. Old Bo came crashing through the drifts, hauling him out by the armpits and wrapping him straight into his own huge pine-green coat, big enough to swallow Shouren twice over. Qian Youzhi came running with the wheelbarrow borrowed from the temple gate, its wooden wheel already squeaking. Xiao Lian scrambled up to stuff her one-eared rabbit against his chest for warmth, while Mei Po packed snow off his collar with her small quick hands. Together they heaved him into the barrow and pushed him grinding and squeaking up the snowy slope.
Page 8
The stone channel wound through the pavilion like a little river, knee-deep to nobody, splashing along a groove wide as two hands. Mei Po set a steaming cup of ginger tea onto the water with a tiny push and it went spinning and bobbing down the curves. "Run, boy, run!" she cackled, and Shouren, swaddled in blankets up to his chin, lurched along the channel's edge with Qian Youzhi hauling him by the elbow so he wouldn't slip. The cup dipped, tilted, nearly dove at the final drop where the channel fell away into a basin — and Shouren flung himself flat on the stone and grabbed it with both hands, tea sloshing but saved. Everyone cheered. Behind him, Xiao Lian knelt by the water and launched her own vessel: a little boat folded from seven crumpled days of his useless bamboo notes, pushing it off with one finger. Old Bo, crouched at the rim, cupped a hand to steer it safely past the rocks. "Your notes finally float better than they read," he said, and even Shouren, dripping and laughing, had to agree.
Page 9
Old Bo laid the fat bamboo culm, thick as a man's arm and longer than Shouren was tall, across two flat stones and knelt over it with his curved saw. He drew the blade down the length of it in one long hissing stroke, and the pole cracked open to show its dark hollow inside, ringed like a ladder of empty rooms. "Hollow all the way," he said, "that's why it sings." Qian Youzhi grabbed one split half and hauled it upright, grunting, while Xiao Lian stuffed handfuls of yellow ginkgo leaves out of the way with her small arms. Mei Po pulled strips of paper from her patch pockets and pasted them along the curved rib, smoothing each one flat with her thumb. Shouren knelt bending thin green withes into a bow-shaped spine, lashing the two bamboo halves together, then bound a short hollow whistle-tube crosswise with twine. When he lifted the frame and blew a test breath through it, a low eerie hum rattled out, and Xiao Lian shrieked with delight and spun in the drifting leaves.
Page 10
Seven days of staring and this was the proof. Shouren planted his worn cloth shoes on the stone planks of the long bridge, gripped the spool with his ink-stained hand, and ran. His legs, long as a stork's, pounded past lion after carved stone lion, each one taller than his waist and lined up like a watching crowd. Behind him Xiao Lian clung to his flapping blue sash with both small fists, her green pom-pom buns bouncing, dragged half off her feet and shrieking with laughter. The hollow bamboo kite jerked, dipped toward the river, then caught the sunrise wind and climbed, the whistle lashed along its spine humming a long low note over the water. Qian Youzhi slammed both hands on the parapet, lunch box clanging against the stone, hollering fit to wake the lions. Old Bo leaned his great height over the rail, pointing with one bony finger at the rising kite, laughing from under his white eyebrow. Mei Po, bent nearly double, clapped her small wrinkled hands, the brass scale swinging wildly at her wrist.
About this story
- Audience: kids (ages 6–12)
- Format: 10 illustrated pages, narrated, on the kids shelf, free to read on Wonder Philosophy
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