My biggest wish was to be old enough to join the People's Liberation Army. I couldn't wait to die in order to prove my loyalty to Mao. I wanted to go to Vietnam, North Korea, or Albania. I wanted to fight the enemies like those heroes whose stories I had been reading.

My mother said that people had too much fire in their bodies. When I asked why, she lowered her voice and said it was because the Communist party had banned the worship of the spirits. And this was how our ancestors showed their anger. Right after hearing my mother's words, I started my menstrual cycle. I had no idea what it was. I thought the fire my mother had described had boiled down into my body.

Since turning twelve I had been feeling uncomfortable with my body. I was ashamed of my developing chest. It was terrifying. I wrapped my chest with three layers of cloth plus a tight undershirt. Even in the summer heat I wore the same shirt, ignoring the skin rashes. I wondered how other girls were coping. Most of them began to act hunchbacked. Some girls were proud of themselves because their chests were as flat as washboards. One day a dozen girls from the neighboring class sobbed together. It was because boys had threatened to "marry" them.

We were again learning nothing else except Mao's teachings on how to carry on the Cultural Revolution. "The battle between the bourgeoisie class and the proletarian class has intensified and is taking the most violent forms." Violence was a part of living then. People divided themselves into factions according to their backgrounds, and each faction tried to prove itself Mao's loyalists. Hot Pepper was proud because she was born "red." She came from a family of illiterate miners. Even though I didn't necessarily belong in the anti-Maoist category, I was told that I had to earn my right to breathe. "When I order a reactionary to crawl, you crawl," said Hot Pepper, "or my umbrella will teach you a lesson."