The Dim Sum of All Things

by Kim Wong Keltner

  Everyone came over to look at the pictures. They talked excitedly, and Pau Pau said in English, “See! They all know who you are! I write them everything!” Lindsey was so overwhelmed that she felt like bursting into tears, but everyone else was so happy that she forced a smile. She gave her eyes a rough swipe with her sleeve when she thought no one was looking.

  She felt a sense of awe around these sincere, openhearted people, who seemed oblivious to the fact that they had nothing. She followed out the doorway as they all traipsed through the village in search of Uncle Bill’s grandniece.

  Behind a separate cluster of low, crude buildings, they found the grandniece scrubbing pots by the common washing area. After initial explanations, everyone retreated back to the first house, where they had more tea. Pau Pau, her Toisanese a little rusty, talked slowly and listened carefully to decipher the thick village accents.

  Lindsey sat quietly, remembering Pau Pau’s stories of the last few days. She looked at her now, sitting on a stool in this village where she had so much history, and she thought of the malaria, and the mysterious “snake” illness, and how these girls’ grandmother had helped Pau Pau survive. She thought of her mother as a baby almost dying in this same village, so many years ago.

  When it came time to leave, she gave each person a hug and felt, for the first time, exasperated that she could not speak Chinese. She felt cheated that she was not able to express her feelings to these people, to say how happy she was to have met them. When she’d left the hotel that morning, she’d had no idea that she would be meeting people who had watched her progress since she was a baby. Why hadn’t Pau Pau told her anything before? Her good-byes seemed feeble.

  Pau Pau delivered the bad news about Uncle Bill. She distributed some money, and soon after, she and Lindsey were alone, walking the short distance back to the bus.

  “Your Gung Gung was born here,” she said as they strolled along. “So different now, not so many mud house,” she added, making casual observations. Lindsey wondered what else Pau Pau might be remembering, but she let her grandmother keep her private memories to herself.

  When they arrived at the bus, Lindsey climbed inside right away. Pau Pau stood outside smoking until all the other passengers trickled back and mounted the steps. She stubbed out her cigarette and was the last to board the bus before it revved its engine and carried them away from the past.

  Early the next morning, after packing up her suitcase in the hotel, Lindsey prepared her own Ovaltine and fixed Pau Pau’s tea. She had just gotten used to her travel routine, and now it seemed a shame that they were leaving so abruptly. She still hadn’t completely absorbed all the things she had seen and heard (and smelled) in only one week. She felt as though she had read just the first page of a thousand-page history book, and even this single page was difficult to translate and digest.

  After checking out of the hotel and riding the shuttle to the airport, they finally settled into their airplane seats. She had become accustomed to drinking warm sodas, so when she ordered a 7 UP from the flight attendant, she was shocked to find it refrigerated, and with ice. A week ago she never would have noticed such a detail, having expected all her life to receive a cold drink upon demand.

  “You getting sick?” Pau Pau asked from her adjacent seat.

  “No, I’m okay,” Lindsey replied.

  Pau Pau touched her cheek and said, “When we get home I make you doong-gwa soup again. Make you better.” Satisfied, she turned around and closed her own eyes, intent on napping.

  A few hours later Lindsey and Pau Pau were both awake, with ten more hours of flight time left. Lindsey asked, “What was Chungking like?”

  Pau Pau sighed, then tried to eat a peanut but couldn’t chew it, so she spit it out.

  “In Chungking, life very good. Gung Gung getting paid good U.S. money, and we live on mountaintop surround by cloud. On other side mountain is Chiang Kai-shek Kuomintang headquarter. He move there from Nanking after Japan destroy, see?”

  Lindsey nodded.

  “Gung Gung move to U.S. army base in Kunming, but send money every month. I finally have time enjoy myself. I have one servant help take care of baby, and in evening, sedan chair come for me, take me to Nationalist government party. Thousand of step, up and down the Sichuan mountain, but I insist walk myself. Night breeze very nice, and four man carry sedan chair behind me. Dance every night in Chungking. Was best time.”

  Lindsey smiled, but then noticed Pau Pau’s expression darken. Her grandmother’s voice dropped down to a whisper. “One night was eclipse of moon. That night I wish I am anywhere but Chungking. I was asleep when I hear bomb begin. I wake up and grab Lillian. We crawl down beneath kitchen table, and I pull chair around us. Japanese bomb so loud! Chunk of wall break apart above my head and slam on top of table, smash rosewood chair. The ceiling shake, building next door complete destroy!

  “Your ma still baby, and crying, crying. I don’t know what to do, so loud. Bomb falling, I can hear wood and bamboo burning outside. I rock Lillian back and forth. I try to sing song to her Gung Gung teach me. I sing, ‘Oh, Susanna, oh don’t you cry for me…’ I sing over and over, all night. Then I heard gong. It was early morning, but moon still like shadow. Chungking all gone, destroy. But your mommy and me, we alive.”

  Pau Pau tapped her fingernails on the plastic tray and poured herself some more 7 UP. Her face brightened and she said, “Finally we reunite Gung Gung in Kunming. I learn English from GIs, little by little, siu siu. I learn ‘gee whiz,’ and ‘mess hall.’ I play pink-ponk, and GI give me color cigarette and big heart fill with American chocolate. Ho teem! One day Gung Gung say we take boat to United State. Too dangerous stay, he say. My ma die in China so I know Gung Gung telling truth. We board great big boat! Nice one, American one. We eat very tasty food from can. That was first time I have best Virginia ham!”

  Black Cubes of Grass Felly

  Lindsey had missed the comfort of her own snuggly bed. She was just becoming aware of the cozy flannel pillowcase against her skin when she was roused by the voices of her mother and Pau Pau in the living room discussing Uncle Bill’s passing and the logistics of his funeral arrangements. Apparently, in his room at On Lok, he had had a stroke in his sleep and slipped into a coma. He had quietly passed away at St. Francis Hospital.

  Pau Pau and Mrs. Owyang then moved on to describe the cemetery plots the family had purchased years ago.

  “We lucky,” Lindsey heard Pau Pau say. “No place left to buy in Chinese section. I hear some have to bury in Russian cemetery. Ai-ya!”

  Lindsey listened as the two older women described how Uncle Bill would be buried next to his wife, and how several other plots had been reserved for Pau Pau, Lillian, Lindsey’s dad, Vivien, and Uncle Donald. From her bed, Lindsey heard these morbidly matter-of-fact details and felt sick. She wondered if, when the time came, Auntie Shirley would have to fend for her own burial site.

  Just then, she overheard her mother. “Shirley wants to be cremated and sprinkled in the Marin Headlands.”

  Pau Pau said, “Cremate no good! Since Vivien divorce, put Shirley there. No more Donald, hai la.”

  Lindsey rolled out of bed and took a quick shower. The convenience of her own soaps, shampoo, and hair conditioner struck her as extremely decadent after her week of skimping with travel-size toiletries. She appreciated the even-temperatured water and the softness of her own towels.

  When she emerged, she helped herself to the pink box of assorted dim sum items that Pau Pau had bought earlier that morning in Chinatown. The greasy hom gok dumplings were familiar and comforting. In addition, her mother had brought over an assortment of Noah’s bagels and spreads, and Lindsey helped herself to those as well. As she stuffed her face with a big gob of lowfat lox shmear, Pau Pau said, “Cold food no good! Gee whiz!”

  Mrs. Owyang and Pau Pau continued to discuss the details of paying for the funeral service and organizing the meal afterward. The telephone rang several times, and Mrs. Owyang made many outg
oing calls as well, to florists, her sisters, and other relatives.

  “Lindsey, everyone else says they’re too busy, so you’re going to have to run errands,” her mother said. “You still have time off from work, right? Here’s a list of things and the addresses where you should go.” She handed her daughter a scrap of paper with notes in the margins.

  Lindsey was jet-lagged and hadn’t even had coffee, but soon she found herself walking through Chinatown on a random weekday, as if she had never traveled to China at all. She passed all the same markets and stores she had visited a hundred times before, but she saw them slightly differently now.

  She went to a florist on Waverly Place and purchased a black ribbon wreath to hang on the apartment door to signal that they had a death in the family. Next, she stopped at the bank to get crisp twenty- and fifty-dollar bills, which would be given as lay-see gifts to friends and relatives who sent condolences. She exchanged some bills for coins that she and her cousins would later place inside tiny red envelopes to dispense at the funeral.

  Doubling back down Grant Avenue, she looked up Clay Street toward the window where she used to spend her days as a toddler. Her mom used to drop her off at the travel agency every morning before heading off to work. Clients came in and out, booking flights to Hong Kong, Vancouver, and other destinations. When Pau Pau or Gung Gung met with customers, she stayed in the back room, playing with the rotary-dial telephones or typing nonsensical words on the manual Underwood typewriter.

  She recalled a Chinese funeral procession from those pre-kindergarten days. She had heard the dolorous horn section of the Green Street Mortuary band, and had run to the window to see the slow stream of uniformed musicians strolling at a mournful pace, playing dirges in their bright white hats.

  “Ai-ya!” Pau Pau had screamed, whisking her away from the Levolor blinds before she could get a good look at the Cadillac hearse topped with a large portrait of the deceased. Lindsey had wanted to see all the flowers draped on the big black car, but Pau Pau shooed her into a coat closet and locked her in there until the procession moved out of sight. Pau Pau said that the hovering ghost would see the lively girl, so full of life, and might snatch her away. After the funerary music could no longer be heard, Pau Pau let her out and took her across the street to Uncle’s Cafe for grass-flavored gelatin and vanilla ice cream.

  Lindsey now headed toward Pacific Street to a store called Supernatural Exquisite, where they sold the fake paper money. She walked through the aisles, past incense and a variety of portable altars with small statuettes of various gods. Lindsey read the words in the margins of her mother’s note: cigarettes, cell phone, watch, shirts, and Nikes.

  “What you need?” a young girl asked. Lindsey showed her the slip, and the girl rushed around the cramped shop, selecting different items and finally bringing them over to the counter.

  “Here you go. Anything else?” the girl asked. Lindsey looked at the plastic packages. Each individually wrapped bundle contained a three-dimensional, colored-paper version of an item on the list: a cardboard cell phone, neatly creased fake shirts, cartons of phony cigarettes, a wristwatch with digital numbers printed on the face, and a puffy pair of paper shoes with a big Nike swoosh. The cashier explained that all these items, in addition to the fake money, were to be burned so that the deceased would have these necessities in the afterlife. Lindsey wondered why Uncle Bill would need Nikes and a cell phone, seeing as how, while still among the living, he’d had no concept of what these things were at all.

  Last of her errands, she needed to buy tiny red envelopes for the coins and white envelopes to hold small pieces of candy. She stopped at several places before finding the items at the same store where Gung Gung’s picture peeked out from under the calendar. She paused and gazed at her grandfather’s image, and wondered whatever had happened to that dapper hat he always used to wear.

  When Lindsey arrived home, Pau Pau was sitting at the kitchen table eating a bologna sandwich on Wonder bread. Between small bites she said, “I meet your boyfriend today. He very nice.”

  Lindsey was washing her hands at the sink, and, with the water running, she wasn’t sure she had heard her grandmother right.

  “What?” she asked, drying her hands on an apron.

  “Your boyfriend very handsome. He bring this—not your birthday, so must be Valentine sweetheart.” Pau Pau stood up and retrieved a largish red box, carefully wrapped and tied with a grosgrain ribbon.

  “Who’s it from? Franklin Ng?” Lindsey stared at the package, picked it up, and shook it.

  “No, not Fanny Lee nephew!” Pau Pau said. “Your American boyfriend bring this one hour ago.” She squirted some French’s yellow mustard on her sandwich.

  Lindsey whisked the package away to her bedroom. She unfolded the layers of crimson paper and found a note:

  Dearest Girl Goddess,

  Happy Belated Valentine’s Day.

  I’ve corrected the mess at work, and hope you like the gift. Maybe we can use it together some Saturday morning.

  Please talk to me!

  Michael

  Digging through the bubble wrap, Lindsey clapped her hand to her mouth in disbelief.

  It was something she had always wanted. She had gone to the specialized store many times to admire the pink plastic device, but she’d always been too embarrassed to ask a salesperson to show it to her. She had wondered if its electrical cord was long enough or if it was difficult to clean. How had Michael known she had secretly coveted it?

  As she fingered the knob that offered various settings, she could not wait to use it with her favorite sourdough bread. Dropping a piece into the slot of electric coils, she’d watch the device as it imprinted Hello Kitty’s face onto the bread with crispy perfection. The slice, with Kitty’s head lightly toasted onto it like a holy image on the Shroud of Turin, would no doubt add scrumptious flair to her morning breakfast routine.

  Gleefully, she placed the appliance back in its box and stashed it under her bed. She jogged back out to the kitchen to interrogate her grandmother.

  She wondered if Pau Pau had offered Michael stinky soup or picked her teeth in front of him. Lindsey hoped Pau Pau hadn’t asked him to fix the garbage disposal or the leaky toilet.

  “Were you nice to him?” she asked, worried.

  Pau Pau responded with a low, rumbling fart. “I always nice! You think I country bum-kin?”

  Lindsey chewed a fingernail. “So what did you think of him?”

  “I told you! He ring bell and come in. Very polite, and nice face.”

  “You don’t mind that he’s not a grandson of your mahjong friends?” Lindsey sat at the table and fidgeted with the loaf of Wonder bread, nervously squeezing it until it was misshapen and squashed with her handprints.

  “Gee whiz, be glad not Fanny Lee nephew. She big cheater,” Pau Pau said, working a toothpick between her incisors.

  “So…is it okay with you if Michael comes here, or I go out with him?” By now Lindsey had mangled the loaf into a piece of modern sculpture. She anxiously awaited Pau Pau’s reply.

  “Why ask me?” Pau Pau said, lighting a cigarette and blowing the smoke out a crack in the window. “Your life, not mine. My ma, she no like Gung Gung, but I am like you, no listen. Good think. Gung Gung bring me here, and I have nice life. Don’t ask me.”

  Pau Pau shimmied the leftover bologna into a Ziploc bag and placed it in the refrigerator.

  “We watch Gunsmoke, then we go, okay?”

  She shuffled to the living room and left Lindsey alone in dumbfounded silence.

  The Chinese Must Go

  At the mortuary, Uncle Bill’s body looked waxy, with over-rouged cheeks. White and yellow chrysanthemums were festooned with red ribbons painted with Chinese characters in silver ink, bearing the names of those who sent sympathies: the On Lok senior center, the Lions Club, various benevolent associations, and the Chinese Chamber of Commerce. One arrangement of stargazer lilies and carnations ingeniously displayed rows of f
ake mahjong tiles with the message, “In heaven you win every match.”

  Lindsey’s mom poked her in the shoulder and asked, “Did someone remember to put a coin in his mouth?”

  “What’s that for?” Lindsey whispered.

  “So he can pay his way to cross into the afterlife.”

  Lindsey shrugged and watched her cousins and aunties as they somberly filed between the pews. Pau Pau smoked a menthol in the corner behind a floral display and pretended she didn’t understand English when the funeral director told her smoking wasn’t allowed. When she was done, she stubbed her cigarette out on the carpet and sat in the aisle near Lindsey.

  Soon after, an officiant from the mortuary stepped to the podium and made a wooden speech about salvation and the Holy Trinity. Lindsey picked the lint balls off her black sweater and pretended to care. Not that she wasn’t sad about Uncle Bill. She was. It’s just that she knew Uncle Bill had been Buddhist, and this talk about the Holy Trinity was about as relevant to his life as cell phones and Nikes.

  Pau Pau had brought along the same giant Christmas tin she’d used at Gung Gung’s grave, and when it came time to burn the paper items, she unceremoniously clunked the container on top of the coffin and dumped everything inside. An old Chinese man set the whole lot on fire with his Zippo lighter.

  Mourners approached the casket and tossed wads of fake dollar bills into the smoldering pile. Since Pau Pau hadn’t bothered to remove the plastic wrap from the paper Rolex and cardboard cell phone, an awful burned chemical smell filled the mortuary as the flames leaped three feet above the deceased’s head. Lindsey and her cousins watched at first with curiosity, amusement, and then panic as an overhead banner caught fire and lifted through the air. It floated up to the rafters as people gasped, but then it spiraled down in wispy, crumpled cinders and disappeared into translucent spirals of smoke.