Chop Suey Nation

by Ann Hui

  Within about a month, they began letting him assist with food preparation: chopping, cutting and washing ingredients for the si fus. For hours on end, it was his job to chop spareribs down into bite-sized pieces, which would later be steamed with black beans and garlic. Other days, he would cut up hundreds of chicken feet, careful that they were uniform in length, to cook evenly as feng zhao.

  Once in a while, one of the si fus might offer some advice, telling Dad to defrost the meat longer before cutting, for example, to make it easier. But most didn’t have the time or the patience.

  The work was repetitive. And when the restaurant was busy, such as on Saturday or Sunday afternoons, it was hectic. But Dad enjoyed it. He liked working with his hands and being able to see the results of his work: the pile of spareribs he chopped growing larger and larger. He liked figuring out how to do things. He liked how, by the end of a shift, he would discover simple solutions that would make the next day easier.

  He also loved tasting the food. Many of the dim sum dishes were new to him too. This was restaurant food, and his family had rarely eaten out in China. Even if he had, many of these dishes didn’t even exist in Guangzhou, and certainly not in Jingweicun. These were Hong Kong dishes, created by the chefs who wore tall white hats and were trained to cook for British officials. Occasionally, when a si fu had extra of something, or a dish that hadn’t come out quite right, he’d set it aside for the kitchen staff. Dad would sidle over, popping a piece into his mouth. He catalogued the dishes and the flavours in his head.

  As he reached the end of his six-month placement, he had a discussion with a former classmate from his English class, an older man in his forties. Mr. Chen was a si fu, sponsored by Nanking Restaurant on East Pender to come to Canada as a skilled immigrant. Dad told Mr. Chen about how he enjoyed his work at Gum Goon, but worried about the potential for advancement. All of the si fus at Gum Goon were relatively young and nowhere near retirement. If Dad wanted to move up in that kitchen, he would have a long wait ahead of him.

  “Why don’t you come work for me?” Mr. Chen said.

  So, once Dad’s placement was over, he did.

  Nanking was a much smaller restaurant. Unlike the lavish Gum Goon, this one had just a couple dozen tables. It was much more casual—a family-style restaurant. Officially, Dad was hired on as a dishwasher. But because the kitchen staff was so small (just Mr. Chen, two other cooks and Dad), he would pitch in with food prep too.

  At Nanking, the specialty was Peking-style duck. Dad watched, mesmerized, as Mr. Chen would hang the birds vertically to dry before roasting. When they were done roasting, he’d finish the ducks, holding them up one by one while using a large ladle to pour hot oil over them. The hot oil would fry the skin, creating a perfect golden-brown crust. Dad tried his first bite. The skin was thin and crispy. The meat inside tender and juicy. Hoisin added a hint of sweetness. It sent his head spinning.

  All that time growing up, he had focused solely on the functional aspect of food. Food was survival. All he thought about was: Is there enough to eat, and how can I maximize what have? But at Gum Goon and now at Nanking, he was learning an entirely different world. There were flavours and ingredients, he discovered, that could set his heart racing. He was amazed at how, underneath all the chaos of the kitchen—the shouting, the boorishness of the si fus and the painstaking, obsessive efforts—everyone and everything was devoted solely to the pleasure of food.

  A few weeks after Dad started at Nanking, Mr. Chen turned to him and asked him to make that night’s staff meal. Every night after service, the kitchen cooks and waitresses ate together in the dining room. Simple, family-style meals: steamed vegetables, maybe a meat stir-fry and white rice. This was his chance to cook a meal from start to finish. And he could make anything he liked, Mr. Chen said.

  So that night, Dad approached the wok nervously. In his hands he held a small bowl of thinly sliced beef that he had marinated with soy sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil and cornstarch. He poured into the wok a little bit of oil and waited. After a few moments, he held his fingers under the faucet, then shook the water off above the wok, the way he’d seen the si fus do.

  The oil hissed and sizzled. It was hot.

  Into the hot wok, he dropped the beef mixture. Another loud hiss. He used the wok paddle to separate the slices. All the while, he kept a close eye on the flame below, careful not to let anything burn or overcook. Tai foh, just as he had learned to do all those years ago. As soon as he saw the edges of the beef turn from bright red to brown, he flipped them carefully, one by one. With the beef ready, he’d turn his focus to the vegetables. Into the same wok, he dropped the gai lan, adding a bit of water before covering it to steam.

  He carefully arranged the bright green vegetables onto a clean plate. Then he scooped the beef on top. Gai lan with beef. He’d watched Mr. Chen make this dish a hundred times by now, and was anxious to try it himself.

  Mr. Chen and the other cooks ate thoughtfully. Mr. Chen gave Dad some pointers. A little less cornstarch, he said. “See how these pieces are stuck together?” he said, poking at the beef with his chopsticks.

  “But overall,” he said, “not bad.”

  Not bad, Dad thought. That meant it could be better.

  From then on, he kept a close eye on Mr. Chen and the other cooks around him. Each night, the staff meal remained his responsibility. And each night, Mr. Chen would offer his critiques. Too salty. Too sweet. Not enough wok hay. Dad took note of Mr. Chen’s critiques, going over them in his head each night before bed.

  Add more soy next time.

  Wait until the wok gets hotter before adding the meat.

  Steam for twelve minutes, not ten.

  It can still get better.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Moncton, NB.

  Spring 2016

  It was nearly ten p.m. by the time Anthony and I finally arrived in Moncton.

  We hadn’t yet eaten, so I searched to see what was around. The usual chain restaurants popped up first, Swiss Chalet and Harvey’s and the like. There were some gastropubs and bistros too, but after an almost full day on the road, the last thing we wanted was to sit for an hour-long meal.

  I kept searching until one of the results caught my eye. “Korean Restaurant/Acadia Pizza & Donair,” it said. It was as if the owners had read both of our minds. For the past two days, Anthony had been talking about wanting a “proper, east-coast donair.” The sweet, sticky white donair sauce I found so repulsive he found delicious. “Sweet meat?” I asked, and he nodded back with wide eyes that said, Yes, please! Meanwhile at that point, I was craving Korean food—or any Asian food that wasn’t Chinese, at that point.

  We drove up to the restaurant, a small white building with a red roof located on a quiet sleepy stretch in the Moncton suburb of Dieppe. The restaurant was tiny. We could see the entire dining room without turning our heads. Posted on the walls and behind the counter were the menus. There were a few of them. One menu was Korean, with dishes like japchae and ramyun. And then there was a menu with traditional maritime dishes like the donair. And then there were hybrids.

  Behind the counter, a middle-aged Korean man with neatly styled hair and an apron tied around his waist greeted us with a smile. He was friendly and answered our questions about the menu. “Bulgogi pizza,” he explained. “It’s bulgogi—sweet-marinated beef—tomato sauce and cheese.”

  It was a breed of pizza that had recently become popular in Korea. These were pizzas that had little to do with their Italian ancestors, often topped with traditional Korean ingredients like gochujang. Others blended in American ingredients, like hash browns or nacho chips. I had heard that Korean pizza was beginning to appear in cities with large Korean populations, like Los Angeles. But never would I have imagined finding it in a sleepy place like Dieppe.

  Later, when he brought over my steaming bowl of spicy ramyun, we introduced ourselves.

  He introduced himself as Jae Chong. He gestured toward the kitchen, where a midd
le-aged woman was working. “My wife, Eun-jung Lee,” he added.

  He said there’d been a small boom in Moncton’s Korean population about a decade earlier, when local business groups undertook recruitment efforts in the hope that new immigrants might stimulate the local economy. Between 2006 and 2011, the Korean population in Moncton increased from 65 to about 550. Many of those newcomers became his customers. Plus, he added, there were some locals in Dieppe who loved Korean food, such as the ones who had travelled to Korea to teach English.

  But for those who had never had Korean food before, dishes like bulgogi pizza were designed as a way of introducing them to Korean flavours. It was like chop suey, but Korean.

  I asked him how they’d wound up in Canada, and he explained how he and his wife moved to Canada for the sake of their two sons, who were both studying music. They had initially moved to Fredericton, but later came to Moncton in order to be closer to their sons’ music teachers. The restaurant helped pay for the music lessons. He pointed to the wall, at a poster advertising a classical music concert. “My son,” he said proudly.

  As we spoke, I thought about how, the farther we travelled and the more restaurants we visited, the more I began to see how loosely the term “Chinese restaurant” might be applied.

  There were the restaurants that just happened to be run by Chinese: cafes and steakhouses and “Western restaurants.” Sometimes they had spring rolls and chicken balls tossed onto their menu alongside the steaks and sandwiches. But not always.

  Then there were chop suey restaurants, dozens of which we’d already visited. Some of them hadn’t even been run by Chinese people, like Lan Huynh, the Vietnamese woman selling “Chinese pierogis” in Glendon, or Mr. Le in Nackawic.

  I remembered how Henry Yu at UBC had emphasized families, and said to me that the term “Chinese restaurant” might be better defined by the labour—the family networks that ran them, rather than the cuisine.

  In his view, it was the “family restaurant” system that made these places Chinese. It was a business model dependent on uncles and aunts and cousins and grandparents all pitching in. It was the system described by Mr. Choy in Stony Plain and Ms. Tang in Hearst of the kid in the back of the restaurant, washing dishes between homework. It was the template we’d seen all along our trip.

  Professor Yu had also mentioned how many of the new Chinese immigrants in larger cities were opening non-Chinese restaurants. It was a trend I’d seen in Vancouver and Toronto—how so many new sushi restaurants, or Thai restaurants, or pho restaurants were actually run by Chinese families. These too, he said, might be considered “Chinese restaurants.” After all, it was all the same model—just different food.

  Now, as I finished the last bites of my ramyun, I wondered whether this little restaurant in Dieppe might fit that definition too. That, as Professor Yu had pointed out, maybe a “Chinese restaurant” really wasn’t about the food or ethnicity at all. Instead, it was all about the families. The family restaurant.

  Ms. Lee came over with a plate covered with aluminum foil. The bulgogi pizza was finally ready. Anthony picked up a slice, then took a large bite. Long strings of cheese stretched from the pie to his mouth. “It’s different, eh?” Mr. Chong said, chuckling. “It’s different!”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Abbotsford, BC.

  1976–77

  On a clear day, you can see from the window in my parents’ living room all the way across Burnaby. Their house is on the top of a hill and faces south, overlooking the tiny houses in neat rows and skyscraper condos in the distance. But on one grey January day, all of those neighbourhoods were clouded over, disappearing behind a thick veil of fog. Still, Dad sat next to the window, staring out from his usual spot on the couch.

  For the past few weeks, he’d been getting worse. His naps were getting longer. He was spending almost all of his time on the couch. He skipped a Saturday hike with his friends. Even indoors, he wore a toque and puffy vest on top of a fleece sweater to stay warm. I’d offer to cook and he’d accept a little too eagerly. On this day especially, he was cranky and tired. All of us were. We’d driven out to the hospital that morning for another one of his appointments. More bad news.

  Mom and I decided to leave him be. We were flipping through old photos: mostly wedding photos and pictures of their first years of marriage.

  They had met in ESL class, where Mom had caught Dad’s attention. Unlike the other girls in class who were shy and quiet, she was loud and talkative. She had short hair, styled in a pixie cut like the Hong Kong starlets. Her name was Siu Hung, or “Little Red.” But she hated the name. By coincidence, it happened to be a name commonly used in Chinese movies and television shows for prostitutes. She also resented the implication that there was anything small about her.

  In class, Mom was often the first to raise her hand when the instructor asked questions. Only later did the instructor realize it was because she had been placed in a beginner class by mistake. She had grown up in Hong Kong and studied English throughout her schooling. But for whatever reason, during her assessment, she had had a bout of uncharacteristic shyness. And so she wound up stuck with the rest of the beginners, relearning her ABCs and 123s.

  One day after class, she marched up to Dad. She was organizing a class outing.

  “Hey, are you coming to Queen Elizabeth Park with us this weekend?”

  Dad looked at the woman, with her pixie cut and sharp eyes.

  “You should come,” she said. He did, and they wound up spending the afternoon together. Two years later, they were married.

  The photos were carefully arranged in albums bound in emerald Thai silk or bright fuchsia floral patterns.

  The pictures showed Mom flanked by her bridesmaids, getting ready for their wedding at St. Francis Xavier in Chinatown. She wore a Victorian lace gown and a white Eliza Doolittle hat over her mushroom-cut hair. Dad posed next to her, dressed in a powder-yellow tux with a bow tie. It seemed like an odd choice, considering the only sartorial flourishes he took these days were the hats he collected in his travels.

  “Why yellow?” I said, turning to my mom.

  It was a rental, she said, and a popular colour at the time. It seemed as good an explanation as any.

  We flipped through the pictures, one by one. There was a sepia-kissed image of Po Po brushing Mom’s hair in the traditional Chinese pre-wedding ceremony. Mom had done the same for me at my wedding—insisting that I buy new pajamas, because old pajamas would bring bad luck to the marriage. With each stroke of the hair brush, she counted aloud, then offered a blessing.

  One. A marriage that lasts a lifetime.

  Two. A happy and harmonious partnership.

  Three. A home full of children and grandchildren.

  Four. A marriage that grows into old age.

  There was a picture of my aunts serving as bridesmaids, dressed in pastel gowns with their bangs neatly curled. My uncles wearing boutonnieres of red carnations and baby’s breath. They all looked so young and full of energy.

  Sitting in the living room now, Mom kept one eye on the pictures and another on Dad. By now, he had reclined his seat on the couch and was taking a nap. She gazed just slightly past the images, as if the people in the photos were strangers.

  After the wedding, she said, she moved into the house with Ye Ye, Ah Ngeen, Jennie and Janice.

  I asked what that was like.

  She widened her eyes and shook her head.

  “The first few months were hard,” she said.

  Dad still hadn’t adjusted to living with Ye Ye and his new family. And though Dad and Ye Ye were no longer working together, they were still tense around one another. Adding my mother—a headstrong Hong Konger—into the mix further upset the household rhythm.

  Small gestures that seemed perfectly normal to Mom seemed wasteful and frivolous to her new in-laws. Mom had grown up poor too. Po Po had raised her and her siblings in public housing in Hong Kong. From the time she was nine years old, Mom worked in
a sweatshop making plastic flowers and beaded jewellery to help feed her brothers and sisters. But poor was relative. Mom was Hong Kong poor. Mainland China poor—Jingweicun poor—was a different level of desperation.

  And now that Mom was in Vancouver, making decent wages as a waitress at the Hyatt Regency downtown, she was anxious to explore her new life. One day not long after moving in, she bought giant pots of rich golden chrysanthemums. She wanted to plant them outside the front door, something pretty to decorate her new home. But Ah Ngeen scolded her. To her, the flowers were a waste of time and money.

  Another day, Mom took Jennie and Janice downtown to taste pizza for the first time. There were so many new foods in Vancouver, and she was curious to try them all. They bit into the hot slices, surprised by the tangy, sweet tomato sauce and the crunch of the crust. Mom thought it was tasty, even if Jennie and Janice weren’t won over. When they got home, Ah Ngeen was irritated that Mom had fed the girls these foreign foods.

  “They need rice!” she said with a loud sigh. She’d have to feed them again.

  Tensions between Dad and Ye Ye, meanwhile, kept boiling over. Over the dinner table or in the hallway on the way to the bathroom, they’d squabble. Ye Ye didn’t understand why Dad didn’t follow his example.

  “Why bother with English school?”

  “Why aren’t you working with me in construction?”

  “Why are you wasting time in restaurants?”

  Dad was still at the Nanking. He was getting paid $1.25 an hour—roughly $10 each day, or $200 each month. He wasn’t sure what the older cooks or Mr. Chen were earning, but he suspected it wasn’t much more than him. On the other hand, he knew that the restaurant’s owner was doing very well, owning properties and businesses all over Chinatown.

  He knew he’d only get so far working for others.