Catfish and Mandala (7 page)
Read Catfish and Mandala Online
Authors: Andrew X. Pham
Our last night in Phan Thiet, Chi and I monkeyed up the star-fruit tree and onto the tin roof of the kitchen shack. We picked star fruits and, dipping the wedges in chili-spiced salt, ate them sitting below a glittering sky. The fruit tasted sun-baked, for in full ripeness it was golden, the color of cloud underbellies tickled by a slanting sun. It had a flowery texture halfway between a melon and an apple, though it was less substantial than either. Its juice was sharp, indecisive between sour and sweet, resulting in a dizzied tanginess that made me think of being out in the sun too long. Chi said it was how sunlight tasted.
I told her a secret game I played when Mom and Dad left me at home alone overnight. I talked to space aliens with my flashlight, flickering photons to the reaches of darkness. Spaceships would come if I ever really needed them, I told her.
“What would you do if a spaceship came?” Chi asked.
“I'd ask them to take us to America. Here, your turn.”
Chi beamed her message into the sky.
“What did you say to the spaceships?”
“I sent my wish to the angels.”
“Angels? They're up there with space aliens?”
Chi nodded solemnly.
“What did you wish for?”
“I want them to watch over Grandma when we're gone.”
Chi wasn't as excited about going to America as I was. She felt at home in Phan Thiet and she loved Grandma. Chi said she'd asked Mom to let her stay with Grandma, but both Mom and Dad wouldn't hear of it. We babbled late into the night, waiting to eavesdrop on the adults discussing the escape inside the kitchen shack. Everyone was there, including the fishermen who would be taking us out onto the ocean. Some of them were angry about Uncle Hung's last-minute decision to stay with Grandma. He said she was too old and needed someone to take care of her. He was convinced that with the continuing food shortages burglars would break into the house and rob her.
“You're a turtle!” Mom mocked her brother. “You never stick your neck out to take a chance. A little noise andâfffthhhâin goes your head, scared of everything.” She looked around the room for emphasis and threw up her hands. “There's nothing for you here. We have relatives who will take care of Mother.”
Everyone, including Grandma, urged him to go, but nothing could sway him into risking the open sea in a fishing boat. Aunt Dung, his sister, on the other hand, was all for it. She was twenty, and full of fire. A repressed little town with neither opportunity nor food was not for her. Neither were its cowardly men.
“I'll take care of Mother better than any relatives,” Uncle Hung said doggedly. “Besides, maybe I'll go back to Saigon and watch your house so that it'll be there if you come back.”
At this, joy bled from Mom's face. The house was her greatest treasure, their milestone in life, their monumental accomplishment. Banks didn't make home loans. The house meant security, a departure from their difficult past. They couldn't sell it because that would look suspicious. They had started out with nothing and now they were about to lose everything.
“No.” Dad shook his head. “Let it go. The government will confiscate it. I don't want you implicated in our escape. We won't be back. If we return, we are as good as dead.” Dad knew if we waited till next spring, he stood a fair chance of being discovered and executed. The cops swept through the neighborhood regularly and dragged people off to labor camps. Properties were “seized” and “redistributed.” If they took Dad, they would send us to live in jungle hamlets.
Mom nodded, saying over and over that he was right. She was a smart and resourceful woman who had bribed the prison guards to keep her husband alive, making sure he had the little food and medicine he needed to survive the jungle. Besides rescuing him, she had worked with her brother to find seven fishermen with a boat willing to risk the high seas with us. The crew were young men from Phan Thiet, the oldest twenty-five, the youngest seventeen. Phan Thiet was my mother's hometown so it was the safest place to recruit, but it was also my father's former government station, the place where he was most likely to be recognized. They had been planning for months. The men had been stashing government-rationed diesel by the pint and hoarding spare engine parts. At first, Dad worried it was a trap, for there were many fishermen-turned-pirates who took passengers out to sea to rob and murder. Then he suspected that it was a military sting to capture would-be escapees.
“Tai, the skipper, is Mr. Tang's son,” said Uncle Long, introducing his handpicked crew one by one. When he finished, he vouched for them: “I've known every man here since they were kids. All these men are safe. They have as much riding on this escape as you do, Brother Thong. If they're caught, their families can lose their boats and all fishing privileges. They will become beggars.”
They began to discuss rations and details of our escape, slated for the next day.
“Oy! An.” It was Hoa standing in a tree in her backyard, calling me over the fence.
“Hi, Hoa. You want some star fruit?” I whispered, hoping the adults below couldn't hear me.
“Yes. Meet me out front?”
Chi giggled. My face burned. She said loud enough for Hoa to hear, “Take some chili-salt for your girlfriend.”
Too embarrassed to say anything, I stuffed my shirttail into my pants, put some star fruit down my shirt, and ran out. Hoa sat on the front porch with me. Other kids were playing Knock the Can in the street.
“I know what your family is doing,” Hoa said, nibbling the point of a star fruit.
I pretended I wasn't listening. Dad had said it was supposed to be a big secret.
“All those men going into the store, then sneaking behind into the house. They don't leave until really late at night. They're fishermen, aren't they? Your family is going to cross the border, aren't you?”
I shook my head, almost feeling my father's cane on my backside. It was my fault she was hanging around the house every day.
“Everybody knows. You can tell me. We're friends, aren't we?” she insisted, calling our friendship into question, which was more than I could bear.
“Yes, we're leaving,” I admitted.
We sat quietly. She picked up pebbles with her toes. The kids in the street were laughing, having a good time at their game. I wished I had brought some of my toys from Saigon to give her.
“You'll come back and visit?”
“Sure, I have to visit my grandma, don't I?”
I gave her my flashlight and she let me hold her hand. My palm turned sweaty, but she didn't let go. I liked the feel of her hand. It was soft and it made me dizzy. All my blood was dammed up in my ears.
Early in the morning, Mom ordered us into tattered clothes. The lot of us were going to pass as peasants. She had bought each of us a pair of sandals, known as Viet Cong sandals because they were made out
of used tires, the cheapest footwear available. Mom and Aunt Dung hired two rickshaws to take us out of town. Going to visit relatives out in the countryside to have a picnic, Mom explained to the drivers. After they dropped us well beyond the fisherfolk's shanties that ringed the town, we walked for several hours on back roads and trails. The sandals retained their tire curvature and rubbed our feet raw. Huy and Tien began to bawl about the blisters on their toes, but I was too frightened about having told Hoa about our escape to care. If she'd told anyone, we were all going to jail again.
of used tires, the cheapest footwear available. Mom and Aunt Dung hired two rickshaws to take us out of town. Going to visit relatives out in the countryside to have a picnic, Mom explained to the drivers. After they dropped us well beyond the fisherfolk's shanties that ringed the town, we walked for several hours on back roads and trails. The sandals retained their tire curvature and rubbed our feet raw. Huy and Tien began to bawl about the blisters on their toes, but I was too frightened about having told Hoa about our escape to care. If she'd told anyone, we were all going to jail again.
We threw away the sandals and went barefoot. Chi held up bravely, carrying Hien on her back for miles when he was too tired to walk. We were supposed to meet up with Dad sometime late that night, then halfway to dawn our fishermen would come for us. I was frightened that I wouldn't be able to make the swim to the boat. Yet as we walked deeper into the trees, I found myself becoming entranced by the coconut forest. The palms swayed gently in the evening breeze, their naked trunks sweeping into the sky, their splaying leaves, bright green oranging in the sunset, arcing out and down like frozen fireworks. Not a soul traveled the road.
It seemed, then, that we could simply walk out of Vietnam and right into America, beautiful free America, somewhere at the end of this wondrous road. It seemed so easy I didn't think about the thousands of boat people who died trying to escape Vietnam, or about the Vietnamese navy shooting at boats on sight. I almost forgot that this truly was our last gamble.
Mecca-Memory
Rain mists the glass pane as the airplane sinks through the clouds and banks into the midnight sky over Ho Chi Minh City. Outside the window a feeble dusting of streetlamps marks the dark sprawl beneath. I search for signs of old Saigon, neon messages, bright boulevards. Nothing familiar in the bombed-out darkness. Gone, too, are the red tracers of bullets ripping the night sky.
I am afraid,. This unnameable apprehension isn't something I had anticipated. The hardships of a pilgrimage lend no courage for facing mecca. In the past few months, I have biked 2,357 miles, sleeping in ditches along the road, cooking meager meals of steamed rice and boiled eggs over campfires, and bathing in creeks. I am tired, nearly broke, and scared. Surprise. So I toss back yet another lowball, this one a toast to my twenty-year anniversary since I had forsaken this city. Here's to you, Saigon. I've come for my memories. Give me reconciliation.
The cabin tilts in descent. Passengers, mostly Vietnamese, begin fighting their luggage out of the overhead compartments, spilling packages into the aisles, rallying toward the exit. A Vietnamese couple across the aisle furtively jam uneaten airline cheese and crackers into their handbags, squirreling away the freebies, knowing better but unable to resist old immigrant habits. A middle-aged pair, luggage in
hand, rush up from the rear and plop down in the empty seats next to me. Sporting a lavender double-breasted suit and half a pound of gold around his blubbery neck, the man grins at me. At my inquisitive stare, he bobs his head and offers, “Almost there ⦠How do you do?”
hand, rush up from the rear and plop down in the empty seats next to me. Sporting a lavender double-breasted suit and half a pound of gold around his blubbery neck, the man grins at me. At my inquisitive stare, he bobs his head and offers, “Almost there ⦠How do you do?”
“How're you doing?” I answer instinctively, the American rhetorical salutation. Then, honoring our common etiquette, I address him in Vietnamese, “
Uncle-friend, are your family-relatives welcoming you at the airport?”
Uncle-friend, are your family-relatives welcoming you at the airport?”
“Yes
,
my brothers and sisters,”
he fumbles, surprised at my Vietnamese, gauging the ethnic shape of my face. “
Brother-friend, you're Vietnamese?
” I nod. “
I was sure you were Japanese or Korean. Sure you're not a half-breed?
”
,
my brothers and sisters,”
he fumbles, surprised at my Vietnamese, gauging the ethnic shape of my face. “
Brother-friend, you're Vietnamese?
” I nod. “
I was sure you were Japanese or Korean. Sure you're not a half-breed?
”
I shake my head, taking no offense at his bluntness.
“One hundred percent Vietnamese,
” I announce in a tone final enough for anybody.
“One hundred percent Vietnamese,
” I announce in a tone final enough for anybody.
He laughs, amused at my Americanized idiom.
“Okay! Whole, undiluted-concentrated fishsauce you are!”
Then on a more friendly note: “
Visiting family-relatives?
”
“Okay! Whole, undiluted-concentrated fishsauce you are!”
Then on a more friendly note: “
Visiting family-relatives?
”
“Yes, perhaps. Distant relatives-neighbors. I don't remember them very well. I
'
m really just visiting the fatherland.
” But no Vietnamese American returns unless he has a family to visit. He pauses, eyeing me again, probably thinking I am one of those lost souls he's heard about. America is full of young-old Vietnamese, uncentered, uncertain of their identity. The older generation calls them
mat goch
âlost roots.
'
m really just visiting the fatherland.
” But no Vietnamese American returns unless he has a family to visit. He pauses, eyeing me again, probably thinking I am one of those lost souls he's heard about. America is full of young-old Vietnamese, uncentered, uncertain of their identity. The older generation calls them
mat goch
âlost roots.
“
Too bad. What a shame,”
he mumbles to his moon-faced wife, who concurs with clicks of her tongue. She whispers to him. He scribbles something on the back of a business card.
“Here's the address of my brother's house in Saigon where we're staying. Call us if you get lonely. And don't forget to put ten dollars in your passport for the immigration officials. They'll let you through the gate faster.”
Too bad. What a shame,”
he mumbles to his moon-faced wife, who concurs with clicks of her tongue. She whispers to him. He scribbles something on the back of a business card.
“Here's the address of my brother's house in Saigon where we're staying. Call us if you get lonely. And don't forget to put ten dollars in your passport for the immigration officials. They'll let you through the gate faster.”
I thank him and wrangle with myself again whether to slip the bureaucrats a little grease. I don't know if my tiny canister of pepper spray or my eight-inch fillet knife is legal. Plenty of Vietnamese Americans who visited Vietnam returned with harrowing tales of the grubby nasties at the airport, and I have been fairly disturbed at the prospect of losing my bike.
He wishes me luck, claps me on the shoulder, then sprints with his wife in tow up to seats closer to the exit. The printed side of his card
gives his American profession: a realtor in Santa Ana, a member of Century 21. Another Vietnamese-American immigrant success story coming home all spelled out in jewelry and gaudiness.
gives his American profession: a realtor in Santa Ana, a member of Century 21. Another Vietnamese-American immigrant success story coming home all spelled out in jewelry and gaudiness.
Copies of the same fable, some exaggerated, some true, stock the plane, every one of them beside himself with giddiness. Husbands and wives squawk directions at each other, squeezing hands, grinning the victor's grin. Young children caught up in the rush of adrenaline wail. Their triumphant homecoming is at hand.
The Japanese and Koreans, all business travelers, flinch, scorn thinly veiled, drawing back from the Vietnamese. From both ends of the plane, flight attendants, round sensual faces distorted in desperation, scream in Korean-accented English, ordering the horde to put their luggage back into the overheads. On the intercom the captain orders the passengers to return to their seats for the landing. A duffel bag becomes unzipped and rains new toys into the aisle: action figures, fistsized teddy bears, and Ping-Pong paddles. Somewhere up front, a little boy howls, and on the instant the party shifts into full cry. Mutiny.
A tall European flight attendant spearheads the assault, her smaller Korean counterparts covering her flanks. With small white hands, they wrestle the Vietnamese one by one into seats. They slam closed the overhead compartments. Someone complains about his bruised fingers. Harsh Korean, countered by Vietnamese curses, rattles the cabin. The din alone should send the plane tumbling out of the sky.
Mortified by the Vietnamese's behavior and equally dismayed that I feel an obligatory connection to them, I sink deeper into my seat, resentful, ashamed of their incivility. My grandmother used to say to me when I was unruly: A monkey in a prince's gown is still a monkey.
Eventually the plane touches down and they mob the exit. The flight attendants dive into the fray for another round of taming the animals. Last off the plane, I bang my way out, lugging a helmet, two backpacks, and a rolled sleeping mat. The wet night heat wraps around me. I realize I should have changed during the flight but I was too drunk. Still am. Under my insulated Lycra bicycle tights and fleece, both caked with dirt and sweat, is a full-body thermal. It is winter in Japan, tropical in Vietnam. Early this morning, after forty-five
days of touring a thousand miles of Japan, I pumped my bike directly onto the departure ramp at Tokyo's Narita Airport with no time to spare. I tossed my bike and panniers unboxed onto the conveyor belt, fretted through the immigration checkpoint, and ran to the boarding gate, helmet still strapped on my head.
days of touring a thousand miles of Japan, I pumped my bike directly onto the departure ramp at Tokyo's Narita Airport with no time to spare. I tossed my bike and panniers unboxed onto the conveyor belt, fretted through the immigration checkpoint, and ran to the boarding gate, helmet still strapped on my head.
I tail the other passengers across the tarmac toward the docking gate, surprised at Saigon's sleek new facility. I expected something more native, maybe a little burnt-out or run-down, at best a quaint shanty like the Maui airport in Hawaii. Tan Son Nhat International Airport seems fairly modern and in good working condition, comparable in size to an airport of a small Stateside city.
“Visa. Passport,” demands a Vietnamese immigration official behind a counter. The sign above him reads: DO NOT PUT MONEY IN YOUR PASSPORT. So I pass over the paperwork minus the grease.
“Pham, Aan-rew,” he pronounces, lifting an eyebrow, then rolls the words at me, sneering: “
Viet-kieu.
” Foreign Vietnamese.
Viet-kieu.
” Foreign Vietnamese.
I ignore the slight, pretending I don't understand Vietnamese, and as I had hoped, his English isn't enough to prolong the questioning regarding my intentions in Vietnam. He makes me pay five dollars to a woman who takes a Polaroid of me “
for extra paperwork.
” Fifteen minutes and I collect my papers and pass through immigration.
for extra paperwork.
” Fifteen minutes and I collect my papers and pass through immigration.
I edge into the press of people at the baggage claim just in time to see the handler, wearing flip-flops, dragging my bike backward on a moving conveyor belt through a portal. The bike jams in the small door, squeaking loudly against the rubber belt. The idiot was too lazy to lead the bike around the long way. He hollers to someone on the other side to give the bike a good push.
I drop everything, shouting as I blade through the crowd, then leap clear over the moving belts and luggage. I help him work the bike free of the door. One pannier rack is bent. One brake grip on the handlebar is broken off. The rims look irreparable. Something heavy settles on me. This cheap old bike has taken me far, farther than my imagination. Thanks to nitwits in flip-flops, it is practically scrap metal. Oh, God, if this is how I see the Vietnamese, what sorry sights they must be to Western eyes.
“Stupid!” I wrench my bike from him.
Broken bike on one shoulder, one backpack on the other, one backpack on my back, and a set of panniers in hand, I make my way toward the jam of people pressed against the customs gate. People are jostling and elbowing each other to get to the X-ray machines. The officials randomly open boxes and invite their owners into rooms for inspection, doing the routine shakedown dance. White foreigners are off-limits; Viet-kieu are fair game, easy pickings.
Ten minutes in line and I am no closer to the exit. This is a Vietnamese line: shove your way to the front, bumper-car your path through the mess. One Vietnamese-American woman pushes my bags back so she can move her cart forward. It is hot and claustrophobic. Under my thermal, I sweat like a pig next to a roasting pit. Ten more minutes. I snap. I take the offensive, amused at my ability to summon the Vietnamese in me, the grubbing-snatching-edging Vietnamese behavior anathema to the Western me. It doesn't get me far with this crowd, so I spice it up with a dash of American commandeering bullheadedness.
I lift my bike above my head with one arm and bellow: “Out of my way! I'm coming through!”
I swipe two men with the dirt-caked wheels, knock the head of a third with the handlebars. He yipes and falls back, head in his hands. Another man elbows me. I poke him hard in the ribs with a pedal and he too reels back protesting. I throw him a look, angry enough to toss the bike with it. Grandma was right about monkeys.
An uproar. Officials yell in English and Vietnamese. They can't tell whether I am Vietnamese.
You can
'
t go that way.
I barrel through a gap between two X-ray machines, snarling back at them in English: “I'm next! I can't fit this bike through the machine. Can't you see that?”
You can
'
t go that way.
I barrel through a gap between two X-ray machines, snarling back at them in English: “I'm next! I can't fit this bike through the machine. Can't you see that?”
With the bike over one shoulder, I grab my backpack and panniers coming out of the scanner. I simply turn and walk out the door. The officials are objecting. I become conveniently deaf. Somehow they let me go, giving up on the crazy Asian wearing a bike helmet and filthy clothes.
Outside, the street is wet. The rain has stopped. A crowd of several hundred presses forward, angling for a glimpse inside, each searching
for his relatives. There must be a welcoming party of ten for every person coming off the plane. Then there is a brigade of cyclo and taxi drivers hustling for a fare. I search their faces and they search mine.
for his relatives. There must be a welcoming party of ten for every person coming off the plane. Then there is a brigade of cyclo and taxi drivers hustling for a fare. I search their faces and they search mine.
Twenty years have passed since I've seen Grandaunt Nguyen, my grandmother's cousin-in-law As a child, I used to play with her sons, whom I must call Uncle despite the fact that we are the same age. I have never written them, nor they me. I half hoped they wouldn't come. I wanted to return, quiet and alone, to fold myself into the city, but my mother learned of my flight number through my brother and told them I was coming.
“An! An!”
Someone calls my Vietnamese name. A man pushes through the crowd. He is smiling and waving at me. I can't place him, so I grin.
“How are you?” he asks in good English.
“
Khoe. Chu sau?
ӉI'm fine. And you, Uncle?
Khoe. Chu sau?
ӉI'm fine. And you, Uncle?
“Noi teing Viet duoc, ha?”
He is genuinely surprised I speak the language.
“Remember me? I
'
m Khuong.
”
He is genuinely surprised I speak the language.
“Remember me? I
'
m Khuong.
”
They emerge from the crowd and surround me, my grandaunt, whom I remember from pictures, and her three sons: Viet, a jovial, dark, portly thirty-five; Khuong, a slim, pockmarked, good-humored thirty-two; and Hung, a fat, pale, mustached playboy of twenty-eight. Two decades stand awkwardly between us, the crowd around us oblivious, pressing in. We exchange pleasantries. How was your trip? I'm so sorry the plane was late and you waited for me. How's your mother? You all waited here two hours in the rain? Did you really bike all this way?
But what I want to do is hug them or shake their hands. No room for either. A hug too familiar. A handshake too disrespectful to an elder. So I grin and bow and sweat profusely in my thermal.
“Is this all you have?”
asks my grandaunt in a tone that makes me ashamed.
asks my grandaunt in a tone that makes me ashamed.
I nod, coloring, because I have neither money nor gifts for them, only some traveler's checks and camping gear, no room for gifts for fourteen people and not much money to play the good-conquering-son returning home with a cargo of treasure. The Vietnamese I know
who came back brought on average three thousand dollars' worth of gifts. Every passenger off the plane has cartloads of goodies: cameras, microwaves, computers, microscopes, tennis rackets, badminton rackets, boom boxes, clothes, soap, shampoo, facial cream, perfumes, cognac, Johnnie Walker by the case, bicycles, electric rice cookers, Walkmans, Discmans, stereo systems, hair dryers, cosmetics, books, music cassettes, CDs, train sets, Japanese geisha dolls in glass display cases, videocassettes, videocams, metal welding kits, car parts, moped parts, tools, and anything else that can be bought and fit into a shipping box.
who came back brought on average three thousand dollars' worth of gifts. Every passenger off the plane has cartloads of goodies: cameras, microwaves, computers, microscopes, tennis rackets, badminton rackets, boom boxes, clothes, soap, shampoo, facial cream, perfumes, cognac, Johnnie Walker by the case, bicycles, electric rice cookers, Walkmans, Discmans, stereo systems, hair dryers, cosmetics, books, music cassettes, CDs, train sets, Japanese geisha dolls in glass display cases, videocassettes, videocams, metal welding kits, car parts, moped parts, tools, and anything else that can be bought and fit into a shipping box.
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