Chapter 52 The American Dream

   "Ronnie", Meg picked up the ice cream in her hand and stuffed it into Ronald's mouth.

   Ronald took a sip and took his own cone.

  The two were waiting for a boat at the pier in Battery Park at the southern tip of Manhattan.

  This is the southernmost tip of Manhattan Island, and the Statue of Liberty is not far from Liberty Island.

  It is different from the orange passenger and cargo mixed ferry to Staten Island. The ferry of the circle company is for picking up tourists, purely individual passengers, and painted in sky blue.

   Soon Ronald and Meg arrived, and they boarded the boat and watched the scenery on the deck.

  The Statue of Liberty belongs to the national park directly under the federal government, and visiting the Statue of Liberty is free. But the ferry to the island requires money, and American capitalists can always take advantage of it.

  The first boat to approach is another small island, Ellis Island. This is the isolation point for new immigrants who came ashore in the early years. Since the beginning of the last century, millions of immigrants have been isolated on the island in batches, looking at the new continent of their dreams.

  The only tall building that new immigrants can see on the island is the statue of the goddess of Liberty Island next door. Through the panes, they looked at the Statue of Liberty and envisioned their future American dreams.

   This is reflected in many Hollywood movies.

  Ronald and Meg are also looking at the Statue of Liberty, thinking about their American dream.

  The ferry continued to move forward, and Ronald was a little disappointed when he saw the goddess statue getting closer and closer on the boat. The goddess statue in disrepair was a bit old and dirty in appearance.

  After landing on the island at the pier, it is a long trail. Meg was very excited to see the Statue of Liberty for the first time.

  Ronald also kept looking up at the goddess, and the two moved forward slowly.

   A gust of wind blew past, and Ronald seemed to see the right arm of the goddess holding the torch slightly shaking a few times, "Meg, look at the hand of the goddess holding the torch, is it my eyes?"

   "Ah, it seems to be shaking." Meg also found out.

  In 1886, the gift from the Chinese people to the American people was nearly 100 years old, and the old one was really scary. Just like on the land under your feet, many companies are also operating tremblingly, accidentally...

   Ronald and Meg were a little scared and didn't dare to climb up to visit. The two walked around the island and took a lot of group photos.

   Taking the ferry back to Lower Manhattan, the two walked into a movie theater and picked out a movie called "The China Syndrome" to watch.

  Besides that the name is somewhat related to the two, and the leading actress is Jane Fonda, there is a bit of magic in this movie.

   The meaning of "The China Syndrome" actually has nothing to do with Hua Guo.

   It is about an accident at a nuclear power plant in America, where the core melted and leaked. Harmful substances are not hindered, and can burn the earth through a hole, leading directly to Huaguo on the back of the earth, and leak nuclear waste to Huaguo on the opposite side of the earth.

  So this serious nuclear accident is called Huaguo Syndrome.

  Ten days after the movie was released, an accident occurred at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant, causing an uproar across the country. Movies became prophets. It became famous all of a sudden, and the box office was very good.

   Ronald went to buy Coke and popcorn, but when he came back, Meg disappeared.

  Looking around, I found Meg Tilly staring blankly at a poster at the door.

   walked quietly behind her and found that Meg was looking at the performance poster of the New York City Ballet. In late April, the ballet's spring performance season is about to begin.

  This year, the New York City Ballet recruited the principal dancer from the American Ballet, Mikhail Baryshnikov, whose appearance is on the poster.

   In order to become a hit, big money was spent on poster advertisements in major movie theaters, shopping malls, and the New York City Ballet in the city.

   "Baryshnikov, is he dancing well?" Ronald asked with his mouth open.

  "Ronnie", seeing that it was him, Meg simply leaned back on Ronald's body, let Ronald fold his arms around her, and brought popcorn and Coke to her.

   "Mikhail is a talented ballet dancer. He was originally in the Leningrad Ballet Troupe of the Soviet Union. A few years ago, he took the opportunity of visiting Canada and defected to America."

   “If you’ve ever seen him dance, you know he’s great. At ballet school, he’s the idol of all the girls, and everyone wants to be paired with him.”

   It turned out to be him. No wonder Ronald felt familiar.

  Christmas the year before last, Ronald and Aunt Karen, Donna, watched Baryshnikov dance "The Nutcracker" on CBS TV.

  The host, Charlie Rose, also briefly introduced his story of rushing to the "free world" in order to realize his "America Dream".

   "Since he is so talented, he should also be the principal in the Leningrad Ballet Company. Why did he defect?" Ronald looked at the poster, this dancer who was once Meg's idol, was a little strange.

   "I heard that he wanted to dance innovative modern ballet, but Leningrad only let him dance classical ballet."

   "However, some people say that he is too short, only 5 feet 4 (1.65 meters), and he is not good enough for the female dancers of the Sowell Union, so he can only play supporting roles."

   Meg gossiped and giggled.

   Ronald knew that she was still regretting that she missed a professional ballet dance career, so he joked:

   "Ha, yes, you are taller than him. He can't dance the prince and princess in the Nutcracker with you."

   "And my height, hey hey... is more suitable to play a prince."

   "Hahaha...", Meg was amused by him, and stretched out her hand to hit Ronald.

   "But even if I'm not injured, I won't go to the New York City Ballet." Meg felt better, and took the initiative to talk about her ballet dream.

   "Why? Aren't they the best ballet company in New York?" Ronald asked.

"Balanchine, the dance director of New York City, is also a Russian. After World War I, he went into exile in America. More than ten years ago, he received a grant of US$8 million from the Ford Foundation, which was mainly used to create new ballets. The waltz, jazz, Even the Star-Spangled Banner is a ballet."

"So many dancers who go to the New York City Dance Company are rich second-generation, and they bought it with money. They don't have the strength to rehearse the real classical ballet, so they can only dance these..." Meg made a "garbage" Mouth.

   "And my dream is to dance all the classical ballet roles before the age of 24, Giselle, Coppelia, Sleeping Beauty, and Black Swan..."

   "I want to hear the audience yell Bravo at me on stage in New York, Leningrad, London, and Paris!"

   "I want to be famous! I want to be famous!"

   Meg got off Ronald, facing Baryshnikov's poster, stood on tiptoe, raised her arms high, posed in a ballet pose, and uttered her dream loudly.

  Ronald saw the blazing fire of ambition in the girl's eyes.

  …

  The film is very good-looking, and various coincidences and arrangements make the audience feel anxious about the nuclear leak. Jane Fonda is excellent as always, and her supporting role, Michael Douglas, is also good.

Now is the time when people are talking about nuclear discoloration. The shadow of the Cold War hangs over everyone’s head. Some people are crazy against nuclear. Anything related to nuclear, including nuclear missiles, nuclear submarines, nuclear tests, and nuclear power plants, is in the sequence of opposition .

   It is estimated that the box office of this movie will be good.

   After watching the movie, the two went shopping in Chinatown in lower Manhattan. Ronald has just moved in for a day, and many daily necessities are not prepared yet, so Meg Tilly helps to purchase them all.

   Meg has good taste, and the things she chooses are always inexpensive, but the combination enhances the aesthetic quality.

   Such as snow-white tablecloths, with scarlet napkins. Another example is the translucent lampshade for the floor lamp in the bedroom.

  Carrying a lot of things, Ronald and Meg went to the china shop again.

   Meg went to buy wine glasses and china tableware, while Ronald chatted with the boss boredly.

  The boss's English level is as bad as Ronald's Cantonese level. Can only communicate with sporadic words and gestures.

   Asked if the boss had any good black tea, the boss quietly took out a pack of paper-packaged tea from under the counter: "Domestic, good tea." Ronald only understood a few words.

  Put it under the nose and smell it, it really smells fresh.

   "Qimen or Wuyishan?"

  “Qimen”, the boss turned over the tea bag and showed him the label.

   Sure enough, the words Qimen State-owned Tea Factory were written on it in imitation Song style. Ronald threw down $10 "heavy money" and bought two packs to try something new.

   "I'll buy another candlestick, you give me two candles, and I can have a candlelight dinner at night." Ronald pointed to the candles on the counter.

  The owner of the store took out the candlestick and raised his thumb, indicating that Ronald knew romance very well.

  (end of this chapter)