Beijing Coma #4

As the story goes on, we meet A-Mei, Dai Wei's new girlfriend. She is attending college at the same place as Dai Wei, and later they move in together. During a holiday, Dai Wei travels to Guanxi, while A-Mei goes home to Hong Kong. Dai Wei traveled to Guanxi, because his father wished him to meet some of the people he knew at the labour camps their, and to see if they were still around.

He talks to a lady who worked at all the camps, and who knows Dai's father, but she tells him everyone is dead. When Dai asks who the murderers were, she responds, "Who were the murderers? You could argue the only murderer was Chairman Mao" (67). I think this really shows the contrast from the beginning of the book, where people were afraid to even copy books, to the current time frame where people freely oppose the government.

Dai Wei returns back to college once the holiday is over, but A-Mei does not come back. A week after she was supposed to return, he gets a call, in which A-Mei says that her parents will not allow her to be with him, as he is a political criminal, and they eventually break up. I think it's interesting that the people from Hong Kong seem to have different stadards than everyone else in the country of China.