Around the construction site the men speak in shouts. It’s like listening to nonsense, to people praying in tongues; it’s Chinese, it’s our languages, it’s English mixed with things, it’s the machine noise. Because the men don’t really understand one another, hands and tools often rise in the air to help the language. When we approach the black men shoveling earth into wheelbarrows, some of them pause to watch us. They look like they’ve been playing in dirt all their lives—it’s all over their bodies, their clothes, their hair. They don’t look the way adults always try to look, making like they
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