Cronología de la muerte

Capítulo 7

I turned around and quoted him a third of his original price; he doubled it. I said if he liked a dead man's house so much, he should keep it for himself. I said I was different; I only wanted the little box inside the coffin to store some of my small things, and then I chopped the coffin into wood and burned it.

"This coffin has a lot of space to store things."

The farmer called out, and then raised the price slightly.

I let out the loudest sigh I could muster and told him that he was responsible for transporting the coffin to Wuhan.

make a deal!

Very good!

Back in San Francisco, as soon as the coffin arrived, I placed it in the back room of my shop to store ancient textiles from the Nanyi tribe.

Soon, I invited guests to taste different Pu-erh teas—the only tea that gets better with time; the others, after more than six months, could be used as a cat's bed.

On the fifth round of tea tasting, we tasted the oldest tea, a 25-year-old variety called "Camel Breath." Although it tastes particularly unpleasant, it is said to lower cholesterol and promote longevity.

“I’ll die sooner or later,” I joked. “And this,” I said, patting the enormous “furniture box,” “this magical ship leading to another world, the Cadillac in the coffin, is where I dream of being buried. And the coffin lid has to be open so that everyone who comes to my funeral can admire the art inside…”

After my death, several people who attended the tea party remembered my bizarre remarks. One of my witty remarks was portrayed as "precognition," equivalent to "the last hope must be realized," and so on, which was nauseating.

And so I lay in this wrecked, ship-like coffin, thankfully without the eunuch's dried-up remains. The ivory-lined box containing the horrible remains was gone, as was the jar containing the Tibetan mastiff bones the eunuch loved. Though I couldn't fathom why anyone would steal such ominous things.

The museum made some minor repairs and polishing to the coffin, but left the cracks and protruding pieces untouched. That's their attitude towards leaving it as it is. A Chinese restorer would have made it look brand new and applied a layer of shimmering gold lacquer. Because the coffin is deep, they lined the bottom with a layer of pod-shaped foam plastic, and then covered it with a layer of velvet—beige artificial plastic velvet, which couldn't look more horrifying.

This is how I am displayed in the museum hall. I lie in a huge black lacquered coffin, engraved with legendary animals and the name of the original owner, who would surely wave an eviction warrant to drive me out of this coffin.

Alas, I now deeply regret my actions. If I had seriously planned for my funeral arrangements, I would have requested Buddhist cremation, so that I could disappear instantly and avoid being bound by the physical body.

No single urn is suitable for holding my ashes. I will choose nine exquisite boxes of different sizes, all from my "Immortals" shop. For example, a curved box from the Southern Song Dynasty, a round box like the one Tao Yuanming used to collect chrysanthemums, and my favorite, a Ming Dynasty black leather brush box that I deliberately priced high so it wouldn't sell. I used to often open it, take a deep breath of the air inside, and feel the poetic flow of air on my face.

Nine carefully selected boxes were to be placed on the table, arranged in three rows and three columns, like flipping a Qing Dynasty coin three times—both random and meaningful. Nine friends, chosen from among the social elite, were each allowed to choose a box containing a portion of my ashes.

As I requested, they would take me to a lovely place—not a mantelpiece or a Stanway piano—and scatter my ashes, but keep the boxes as a keepsake. The nine boxes will be in a museum, their value increasing over time, and people will remember me for my "constant appreciation."

Ah ha, they'd be laughing their heads off if they read such a will. That way, the process of disposing of my ashes would be easy and pleasant, and I wouldn't have to lie in that open coffin and be seen by everyone.

But everyone, including myself, is waiting to see this show.

In my short life, friends, acquaintances, and strangers from different stages of my life stood before the coffin one after another to say "goodbye." Many people watched with curiosity as the funeral staff covered the wounds of the dead. "Oh my God!" I heard them mutter to each other.

I was startled to see how bizarrely they were handling me as I stepped onto the stage of death: they had made a huge bow out of a shimmering silver scarf and wrapped it around my injured neck. It was like a turkey wrapped in aluminum foil, about to be put into the oven.

Even more so was Chucela Benny, the most sorrowful emcee at the memorial service and the one who cried the most throughout the entire event.

The photo displayed at the memorial service was taken three years ago during our expedition to Bhutan.

I look strong and happy in the photo, but my hairstyle is terrible—I haven't washed my hair with hot water for three days, and it's greasy and matted. There's also a deep indentation on my forehead, left by a sun hat.