China and the West

Conrad, Joseph. Typhoon and other stories [ID D27531].
Kapitän MacWhirr und seine Crew befahren auf dem Dampfer Nan-Shan, im Auftrag einer englischen Reederei, jedoch unter der Flagge von Siam, das Chinesische Meer. Auf einer Reise gerät das Schiff in einen Taifun, und die Seeleute kämpfen ums Überleben. Die Situation wird dadurch erschwert, dass die Nan-Shan eine Gruppe chinesischer Kulis an Bord hat, die im finsteren und sturmbewegten Zwischendeck um ihre ersparten Silberdollars kämpfen, die aus den zerbrechenden Seekisten fallen. Es gelingt MacWhirr und seinen Leuten, die Ordnung wiederherzustellen und die Nan-Shan, wenn auch schwer gezeichnet, in den Hafen zu bringen.
Chap. 1
The Nan-Shan was on her way from the southward to the treaty port of Fu-chau, with some cargo in her lower holds, and two hundred Chinese coolies returning to their village homes in the province of Fo-kien, after a few years of work in various tropical colonies. The morning was fine, the oily sea heaved without a sparkle, and there was a queer white misty patch in the sky like a halo of the sun. The fore-deck, packed with Chinamen, was full of sombre clothing, yellow faces, and pigtails, sprinkled over with a good many naked shoulders, for there was no wind, and the heat was close. The coolies lounged, talked, smoked, or stared over the rail; some, drawing water over the side, sluiced each other; a few slept on hatches, while several small parties of six sat on their heels surrounding iron trays with plates of rice and tiny teacups; and every single Celestial of them was carrying with him all he had in the world -- a wooden chest with a ringing lock and brass on the corners, containing the savings of his labours: some clothes of ceremony, sticks of incense, a little opium maybe, bits of nameless rubbish of conventional value, and a small hoard of silver dollars, toiled for in coal lighters, won in gambling-houses or in petty trading, grubbed out of earth, sweated out in mines, on railway lines, in deadly jungle, under heavy burdens -- amassed patiently, guarded with care, cherished fiercely.
Chap. 6
The beggars stared about at the sky, at the sea, at the ship, as though they had expected the whole thing to have been blown to pieces. And no wonder! They had had a doing that would have shaken the soul out of a white man. But then they say a Chinaman has no soul. He has, though, something about him that is deuced tough.
Heliéna M. Krenn : The wisdom and patience of the Chinese are implied and simultaneously questioned by the repeated and strongly ironic references to them as 'Celestials'. 'Chinamen' are thus not entitled to the treatment white people expect for themselves.
The coolies on the 'Nan-Shan' are accommodated in the 'tween-deck', normally a hold for cargo.