China Dog (14 page)

Mah ignored my question. “Do you know what she said to me?”

My mother switched to a higher register as she mimicked her friend’s voice. Her body leaned forward, but her head turned away from me, as if she was speaking to an imaginary Gladys.

“ ‘Sorry, ah, Choy
syeem
, but I really don’t have time to talk. I’m so busy these days. Not lucky like you, no children at home, no grandchildren, all your time to yourself. Me, I’m so
busy looking after Bobby and Valerie’s baby. Helen’s not even in high school yet. And getting ready for the wedding! You have no idea how hard my life has become now that I’m a grandmother, and now with Jean getting married. It’s going to be at the Pearl Court in Toronto. Not too high class. Very simple, only about six hundred people. I hope everybody in your family will be able to come. I know it’ll be hard for David, going to school in B.C. But Jean will really want to see Nancy. By the way, how’s Nancy? Does she have a boyfriend yet?’ Well, I wasn’t going to let her get the better of me. I just said to her, ‘Nancy doesn’t have time to think about marriage. She still has another year of university. The teachers say she’s very smart. Some of them even want her to get a master’s degree.’ And then do you know what she said? ‘Well, I guess if you can’t get a boyfriend you might as well go to school. But you should tell Nancy that men don’t like girls who are too well educated.’ ” My mother then turned to me, her expression a blend of frustration and indignation. “Oh, that Gladys just makes me so mad! Just because she has a grandson, and now Jean, that horse-face girl, is going to have a big fancy wedding and a reception at an expensive restaurant.”

As I listened, I tried to maintain a thoughtful expression on my face. But in fact it didn’t matter. My mother was too caught up in the telling to notice that I was trying to repress a smile. In my mind I could see her face as she received this news from Gladys, who would of course be smiling a superior smile, pointedly, but humbly informing my mother of their new family conquests. A reception for six hundred people at
the most expensive restaurant in Chinatown was a feather in Gladys’s cap that refused to be ignored. And her growing concern about me served only to make my mother’s fury more fierce. Yet a part of me felt responsible for my mother’s hidden pain. I wasn’t giving her grandchildren so that she, too, could complain about the difficulty of her life.

At this point in her conversation with Gladys, my mother decided to play her ace. Everyone knew that Jean was getting married to a
lo fon
, a white man. Her family had not been pleased. However, the fact that he was a doctor with a flourishing practice meant that he was fairly quickly accepted. “So you know what I said to her? ‘Nancy isn’t going to marry a
gwei loh
, a ghost man. When it’s time for her to choose she will pick a Chinese. She wouldn’t marry a
gwei loh
. She has too much respect for me.’ ”

“Ma-ah!” I exclaimed in complete exasperation, as I tossed the metal spoon into the near empty bowl of filling, making a loud ringing clang. But my mother carried on as if she hadn’t heard a thing.

“In a way I feel sorry for Gladys. She’s not going to be able to talk to her big shot son-in-law, you know. She can’t speak English and he can’t speak Chinese. And when they have children, the children won’t speak Chinese, you know. They won’t know anything about being Chinese. They’re going to be able to say anything they want in front of her. They won’t even want Gladys around.” She picked up a wooden spatula and started to scrape together the filling stuck to the side of the bowl. There was just enough minced meat left for one last wonton.

“Mah, how can you say that? You don’t know.”

“Nancy, you’re the one who doesn’t know. Once Jean’s married, Gladys will hardly ever see her.” My mother stood up and carried the tray of finished wontons to the counter next to the stove.

“But Mah, just because Jean’s getting married to a
lo fon
, doesn’t mean she’s going to forget about her own family.” I started to carry the dishes over to the stove. My mother carefully dropped the finished wontons into a pot of boiling water as she continued talking.

“Oh, it’s not that Jean doesn’t care about her mother. But once she’s married to a
gwei loh
she’ll be spending all her time with
lo fons
. She’ll forget about being Chinese. I know. Jean will want to spend all her time with her
lo fon
family. She’ll forget all about being Chinese. I know.” Afterwards my mother drained the cooked wontons and placed them in a swirling broth made from pork and chicken bones. I knew from a certain stiffness in her shoulders that the discussion was over.

The few times that I had brought a white boy home, my mother always hovered about, leaving and then returning with plates of sliced oranges, bunches of grapes, and sweet biscuits. With a stiff smile on her face, she interrupted with her litany of English phrases: “More pop?” “Eat more.” “You want some more?”

When my
lo fon
boyfriends left, or when I returned home from a date, my mother never failed to remind me, “Nothing
wrong with being friends with a
lo fon
, but you should never marry one. You’d be asking for trouble. Think about your children. They wouldn’t really belong to us Chinese or to the
lo fons
.”

I always wanted to meet my mother head on. “Well, why not? There’s nothing wrong with
lo fons
. They’re people just like us. Anyway, there aren’t any Chinese guys in Urquhart. And I’m sure as hell not going to let you get one from the matchmaker. This is Canada, not China.” But my tongue always seemed to thicken, as the words caught in the dryness of my throat. My response became standard: “There’s nothing to worry about. We’re just friends. I’m not serious about anyone. I want to finish my education before I even think about getting married.”

Of course, what my mother was trying to get from me was reassurance that I would not marry outside our race. Our lives in Canada, as far as she was concerned, were already overrun by
gwei
, ghosts –
gwei
men,
gwei
women,
gwei
children. We served food to
gwei
customers, bought from
gwei
shopkeepers, were treated by
gwei
doctors and taught by
gwei
teachers.

When I was a child it was confusing because she talked about ghosts back in China. Were they like the ones here? the ones that I saw everyday and spoke to? the ones who were my teacher and my best friend?

My mother finished counting the attendants and was now furtively looking around to see who was at the wedding. She
nudged me in the side and motioned with her head. “Look, there’s Edward Lim.” I looked blankly at her and shrugged my shoulders. “Don’t you know? Edward Lim, the developer from Hong Kong!” she whispered in exasperated tones. I nodded my head and turned to watch Jean finish her slow walk down the aisle on her father’s arm. While Jean was exchanging her marriage vows, I started thinking about my mother’s story of the farmer and his ghost bride. I had listened to this tale all my life. The people in my mother’s stories were never what they seemed. The stories were like labyrinths. In the back of my mind there always floated unanswered questions. What does this mean? Where does it lead to? But suddenly I was viewing the farmer and his bride through a new lens, one that was in focus, allowing me to see more clearly. I couldn’t help smiling. Was I finally beginning to understand what this story meant to my mother?

When we arrived at the Pearl Court for Jean’s reception, my mother sat stiffly while she and my father made polite conversation with the other guests at our table. Sitting across the table from my mother were Mrs. Yee, the matchmaker, and her husband. As a younger woman, Mrs. Yee had been responsible for arranging many marriages in Chinatown, locally and by mail-order. To supplement her matchmaking income, she also sewed beads and sequins on gowns and jackets for fancy dress shops. Over the years, what had started as a way to make a little extra money had been transformed into a lucrative business. She now had a small shop on Dundas Street that advertised her bead and sequin work. These days, the real money
was made from selling rough, lumpy beads made of clay, wood, and shells to unkempt-looking young people with long hair, scruffy jeans, and shapeless flowered skirts. But Mrs. Yee still performed the occasional matching of hearts.

My mother recognized Mrs. Yee immediately and smiled weakly at her. Mrs. Yee smiled broadly as she leaned towards her. “And this is your daughter? Very pretty.”

“Yes, oh, so-so,” My mother acknowledged, falsely modest.

“And when is she getting married?”

“No time for boyfriend. Too busy going to school.” My mother shook her head and fidgeted with her gold bangles as she spoke.

Mrs. Yee then looked at me. “You want a boyfriend? I know one I can introduce you to. Good family. Lots of money.”

“That’s very kind of you, but.…”

Before I was able to finish, my mother interrupted. “I say good idea. But you know young people today. Don’t listen to us anymore. They want to arrange their own marriages.” Mrs. Yee smiled and shrugged her shoulders as she and my mother exchanged a glance of mutual understanding and resignation. Then they both turned to the elderly guests at our table and started to heap onto their plates the choicest morsels from each dish, each trying to outdo the other in their concern for the well-being of others.

Everyone
oohed
and
ahhed
at each new course. There were delicately flavoured shark’s fin soup, lobster with ginger, deep-fried oysters, gently stir-fried scallops served in a crispy taro basket, smooth juicy white chicken with scallions, and more.
From these dishes, it was clear that Jean’s reception was expensive, but the garnishes elevated it into something exceptional. The plates weren’t simply accentuated with leaves of lettuce or sprigs of parsley, but arrived accompanied by dragons, swans, fans, flowers, each item exquisitely carved and intricately fashioned from carrots, white and red radishes, cucumbers and green onions. Chopsticks moved gingerly around each ornament, taking care not to get too close, making sure that it remained still and pristine in its sacred position.

There was no doubt that Jean’s wedding was a triumph for the Woos. When the wedding party came to our table to exchange greetings, Mrs. Woo said to my mother, “Soon Nancy will be next.”

But my mother would not have any of that. She wasn’t going to give Gladys the satisfaction of being generous. “Oh, I don’t think so. Nancy has more important things to think about. She’s far too busy with school.” Then they both laughed.

If my mother had known how prophetic her words would be, she might not have given them voice. She had to wait for another fifteen years and suffer through a Ph.D. before I was married. During that long wait, she never missed an opportunity to remind me that Gladys Woo now had two grandchildren, then three, then four, then five. Although my brother had been married for more than eight years to a lovely Chinese woman, there were no children.

One day, when Jean had been married for several years, my mother was visiting with Gladys when Jean dropped by with her
gwei loh
husband and her two half
-ghost
children. That
evening, my mother made a point of phoning me. “I saw Jean at her mother’s today.”

“Oh? How’s she doing?”

“She was with her husband and her two little kids.”

“Did you have a nice visit?”

“Her husband is very nice. Spends a lot of time with the children. Doesn’t talk much, though.”

“Well, of course. He can’t speak Chinese and Gladys doesn’t speak English.”

“Gladys only sees them once every few weeks, you know.”

“But Mah, they live an hour and a half away. They’re very busy.” There was a slight pause. In my mind I could see her weighing her thoughts before speaking.

“If Jean had married a Chinese, they’d probably visit her mother more.”

“Mah!”

“They have beautiful children, though.”

“I’m sure they do.”

“You know the one thing I do have to say about half-ghost children is that they are beautiful. They get the best of both. But Jean’s children have been especially lucky. Neither of them got her horse-shaped face.”

When I finally got married, I was thirty-eight years old. The fact that I, too, was marrying a
gwei loh
, a ghost man, had become irrelevant. For my mother, the shame and humiliation of having an unmarried daughter quickly approaching forty
had become almost unbearable. She was also convinced that no Chinese male in his right mind would want to marry an over-educated woman nearing the end of her child-bearing years.

On the day of my wedding, my mother helped me with my wedding gown. It was a sheath of white fluid silk with long narrow sleeves, outstanding in its simplicity except for the forty-eight pearl buttons down the back. There were forty-eight loops, delicately woven from strands of silk, each of which had to be slipped over a button. My mother carefully pulled each loop over each opalescent head. I could feel the opening of the dress gradually close. And as my mother’s fingers worked deftly, she told me once again the story of the young farmer and his ghost wife. She finished the story just as the last loop was slipped over the head of the last button. As I listened to her words, my jaw and fists became clenched, as if stiffening would shut my pores and prevent the rage building up in my body from escaping. I wanted to scream,
Why are you telling me that story? Why today of all days? Can’t you for once put aside your fears and accept? Can’t you just let go? I’m not going to forget about you
. When my mother finished with my dress, she straightened herself up and dropped her hands to her sides. I turned abruptly and glared at her face. Her eyes were wet with a film of tears. I saw in them not just the fear and hunger of the young farmer, but suddenly, a reflection of fear and hunger that was my own. The words that were ready to burst like a volley of bullets from my lips vanished. All my anger dissolved. I put my arms around her, and for a moment we held each other and said nothing.