Stretching from mid-century China to the United States at the turn of the millennium, Beautiful as Yesterday explores issues of identity, of family and friendship, love and loss. Written in beautifully crafted prose, this is a penetrating exploration of what it means to belong, and the impact of history and memories on one’s life.
Stretching from mid-century China to the United States at the turn of the millennium, Beautiful as Yesterday explores issues of identity, of family and friendship, love and loss. Written in beautifully crafted prose, this is a penetrating exploration of what it means to belong, and the impact of history and memories on one’s life.
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Overview
Stretching from mid-century China to the United States at the turn of the millennium, Beautiful as Yesterday explores issues of identity, of family and friendship, love and loss. Written in beautifully crafted prose, this is a penetrating exploration of what it means to belong, and the impact of history and memories on one’s life.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781439109557 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Atria Books |
| Publication date: | 07/07/2009 |
| Sold by: | SIMON & SCHUSTER |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 368 |
| File size: | 415 KB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
One
November
It's a sunny day in California. The sky is a transparent blue. Occasionally a plane flies by, very high, tiny as a bird, dragging a straight white contrail. Somewhere in Mary Chang's Sunnyvale neighborhood, a lawn mower hums, disturbing the otherwise quiet Saturday morning. Mary, standing in her backyard, arms akimbo, inhales deeply to take in the aroma of freshly cut grass, one of her favorite smells. Thirty-seven years old, she looks good for her age, with a petite but firm body under a pair of well-washed jeans and a blue sweatshirt with rolled-up sleeves -- her usual gardening outfit -- though fine wrinkles have begun to climb to her forehead and surround her eyes. She has large, beautiful eyes, almond-shaped, narrowed habitually when she is in thought, and if you saw her in this state of mind, you'd think she 's quite a pensive person while in fact she might just be wondering what to cook for dinner.
A man sneezes loudly inside the house. That's her husband, Bob Chang, who is rushing to close the sliding window in his study. Medium-built, fair-skinned, with hair closely cut, wearing a pair of silver-rimmed glasses, he looks more like a doctor or a teacher than an engineer, which is what he is.
"Honey, could you shut the backyard door?" Bob shouts from inside.
"Didn't you take your medicine today?" Mary says as she starts for the French doors, and after taking off her outdoor shoes and arranging them neatly beside the straw doormat, she steps inside the house, shutting the door behind her. "You know Richard always mows the lawn on Saturday mornings." She washes her hands in the kitchen and gets a glass of water from the fridgedispenser, meeting Bob in the living room with a Claritin pill in his hand. Bob swallows the pill with the water and hands the glass back to her. "I have to go to the office to restore a corrupted database. I'll have lunch with my coworkers." His voice is apologetic. Since he joined a communications networking start-up with forty-plus employees one month ago, he's been working often on weekends.
"But you worked until midnight yesterday." Mary frowns and is about to complain. What about the afternoon walk in the community park he promised her earlier? But when she opens her mouth, the words that come out are "You need to look after your health. You don't want to get burned out so soon." What else can she say? She knows that working for a start-up is not just a job, it's a lifestyle, as people in Silicon Valley like to say. Also, it was she who suggested that Bob join a start-up. But it's not all her fault, she reasons. He was bored at Santa Clara University and wanted a challenge. It was his idea to go into the private sector. If she were to blame, it was because she suggested that he join a pre-IPO company -- she had heard so many stories of people becoming millionaires overnight because of stock options.
"Pick up Alex on your way back then," she adds as Bob plants a casual kiss on her lips. Alex is their only son, six years old. To help him learn Mandarin, they have hired a Chinese teacher, a student at De Anza College, sharing with a friend who has two children under ten. The teacher comes to their house every Wednesday evening; every Saturday she goes to their friend's house in Mountain View, a few miles north. Earlier this morning, Mary dropped Alex at their friend's house.
After seeing Bob off in the driveway, Mary returns to the backyard. This autumn has been unseasonably warm, and her flowers are lush, basking in the unfiltered sunlight. Along the fence, to the east, a row of camellias blooms; they were planted more than thirty years earlier by the house's first owners, a family from Japan. The palm-size scarlet, pink, white, and yellow flowers attract bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. Too bright and gaudily colorful these camellias are for Mary's taste but she has never considered getting rid of them; after all, they are the house's real owners; besides, the plants form a nice hedge, offering privacy between her yard and the two-story pink house next door.
The star jasmines she grew in late summer in both side yards are thriving and in her mind's eye, she can see their soft white flowers quivering in the spring breeze like tiny hands waving. They're the type of plant she likes, leafy, small-flowered, a little subdued. Her favorites are clivias, however, and her fascination with them started six years ago, when she visited a flower show in San Francisco's Japantown, around the time she and Bob bought their first home, a tiny two-bedroom condo in downtown San Jose, two blocks from San Jose State University.
She squats and tends the clivias in the shady area along the back of the house, loosening the soil, removing the weeds and wilted leaves, then watering the plants thoroughly. It is not flowering season yet for clivias; in another few months their orange or white flowers will blossom, wedged between the leaves like slightly parted lips. She strokes the wide and glittering leaves as if talking intimately with them -- to her, even the leaves are pleasant to look at, elegant and graceful, reflecting the plant's Latin name: Clivia miniata, which she had learned from a saleswoman at Spring Winds Garden, a local nursery where she bought all of her clivias. She likes even more the plant's Chinese name, Junzi Lan, referring to its resemblance to a gentleman with noble appearance and virtue. A perfect translation, thinks Mary now.
A while ago, she wrote a friend in China who had studied horticulture in college, seeking advice on growing clivias. Instead of offering advice, the friend told her that the plants, though precious in China in the mid-eighties, when Mary had come to the United States -- easily costing a month's salary and commonly used to bribe officials who liked flowers -- were no longer pricey. Even an average family could now afford to display them on their balconies. She suggested Mary grow rare orchids, saying that they were now in fashion and could also be a good investment. When Mary saw her friend's reply, she laughed: why was everyone in China so pragmatic these days?
"You've been away from China too long. You're out of date on what China is like," the friend also wrote. Though Mary visits China every year for a week to see her mother, widowed eight years earlier, she has always been called by her friends there "a half-foreigner" or "a Chinese-American." Thinking of her friends' mockery, Mary shakes her head with a smile: well, whatever they say. But she admits they're right that she wouldn't be able to live in China anymore -- she simply cannot image herself in a condo in a concrete high-rise, without immediate access to a garden. Her and her husband's current Sunnyvale house, their second -- with three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a two-car garage, a yard of slightly over three thousand square feet -- though standard in this neighborhood, would be a huge luxury in China.
Mary also cherishes their Sunnyvale house because they spent nearly a year having it renovated right after they moved in: the original dark green carpet in the hallways became maple floor; a double door replaced the single front door; recessed lights superseded the ugly fluorescent ceiling lights in the family room and living room; the master bathroom was enlarged and equipped with a Jacuzzi. She redesigned the kitchen herself, after having read stacks of Better Homes & Gardens, This Old House, and Dwell and borrowed ideas from friends' houses, turning a dull and claustrophobic space into a spacious, open area with a black marble countertop, wooden cabinet doors, a large bay window, a skylight, and stainless-steel appliances. Though she and Bob have lived in this house for barely three years, she 's developed an attachment to it. Of course, now, since her mother might emigrate to the United States and live with them, it'd be nice to buy a house with an inlaw unit so her own family can still have privacy. It's only three weeks until her mother's arrival: this time she 's staying for six months, the maximum stay her visitor's visa allows, to see how she likes living here, living with them. Mary sinks into thought, fancying what kind of house she and Bob will get next. Then she remembers that she hasn't eaten her breakfast. It's almost ten now. Since Bob and Alex are not at home, she decides to fix herself a bowl of pidanzhou, "century egg" porridge, topped with green onion rings. Though Bob and Alex like Chinese food, they refuse to try this porridge. "Yuck!" Alex would cry out at the prospect. "Mommy is eating rotten eggs!"
No matter how exhausted or upset she is, whenever she enters the kitchen, Mary becomes joyful, like a thirsty person downing a glass of cold water. A skilled chef, she can cook various Chinese cuisines, her specialties being Sichuan, Shanghai, and Hunan. Her three best friends, Mingyi, Julia, and Yaya, who all go to the church she attends, nag her to cook for them when they crave certain dishes. Sometimes they bring ingredients to her house and make her cook them. She welcomes and even longs for these occasions: she likes to have her friends over, to chat, to gossip, to laugh, and since they are all from China, they converse in Mandarin, though each can also speak her hometown dialect. Some days, her friends come to help her in the garden, and afterward the four of them sit outside, at the teak table, chatting over tea and dessert Mary has prepared.
Mary met Mingyi at the Sunnyvale Chinese Christian Church two years ago, and they have been friends ever since. Yaya and Julia didn't come to the church until last August. Mary sees them as a blessing from God. Since Alex started his Saturday Chinese class, the four of them have become accustomed to meeting at her house every Saturday for lunch. Bob has gotten used to their meetings and hangs out with his own friends that day, watching sports or playing golf (of course, these days, he might just as likely be working in his office). This week, however, Mary and her friends have had to cancel their rendezvous because Yaya is in China, Julia's daughter, Sophie, is sick, and Mingyi needs to volunteer at a shelter for homeless people in East Palo Alto, a well-known troublesome area separate from the exclusive Palo Alto itself. Mingyi works as a manager in the human resources department at Intel, and after work she often volunteers. She lives close to Highway 101 in Menlo Park, next to a gas station where police cars are often seen patrolling. Just a few days ago the gas station was robbed by two armed men. But whenever Mary asks her to move to a better area, Mingyi just smiles, saying that she has become used to her community and has made friends with her neighbors.
As Mary cuts a semitransparent, greenish century egg into tiny cubes and throws them into the boiling rice soup, she recalls those happy luncheons with her friends, and their lively conversations. It'd be nice if she and Bob could talk like that. This thought makes her regret, once more, that Bob speaks so little Mandarin. Not his fault, of course. After all, he is a fifth-generation Chinese, whose ancestors came to the United States from Fujian Province in the late nineteenth century to build the California Central Railroad over the Sierra Nevada. Maybe she should be glad that he understands at least some Mandarin and can manage a few common greetings, she tells herself. Also, he was very supportive when she suggested they hire a private Chinese tutor for Alex one year ago.
"What do you talk about with Mingyi, Yaya, and Julia?" Bob once asked.
"Everything," Mary said. "Husbands, kids, movies, books, cooking, gardening, shopping, work. Just...everything." As she replied, she remembered a Chinese saying: three women together is a show. Unlike men, who seem incapable of sharing things intimately, women talk with each other about almost everything.
Afterward, Bob called Mary and her friends "The Gang of Four," not knowing that this term, to Chinese, refers to a leftist political faction arrested in 1976, the year the Cultural Revolution ended, following the death of Mao Zedong. Mary once considered telling Bob about that period of China's history, which she had experienced, when what Mao started as an anti-liberal bourgeois campaign turned violent, causing millions of people their lives. But what was the point? A person like Bob, who grew up in a well-to-do neighborhood in Los Angeles, wouldn't be able to relate to it. And even she herself wanted to forget about that unpleasant time.
After finishing the porridge, Mary continues tending the clivias in the backyard, noticing now that the bark mulch she applied several weeks ago is thin around some plants, because of rain, wind, or animals like squirrels, cats, or raccoons. She saw raccoons in the yard the day before yesterday, an adult and two babies moving along the fence. Luckily they didn't do any damage to the lawn and plants, but neighbors later complained about missing pond fish and destroyed plants in their vegetable garden. Mary walks to the white plastic shed hidden behind a Kentia palm tree in the other side yard and takes out a half bag of bark mulch. She spreads the mulch evenly, remembering that the tree man she talked with a while back had told her that the palm tree needed to be felled because it had grown dangerously tall and thin for trimming. And the street-facing fence has been infested with woods ants and should be replaced, according to a contractor. The gutters also requires a thorough cleaning now that winter is approaching. She sighs: having an old house does require a lot of work. Bob promised her that he'd take care of these matters, but with his crazy work schedule...Mary's face darkens, and her large eyes narrow. A breeze brushes her face, and she breathes deeply, feeling the gentleness of a lovely late autumn day. "Things will get better. They always do," she says to herself as she dumps the empty mulch bag into the recycle bin.
She calls the tree guy and the contractor to schedule appointments. As for the gutters, it seems easy enough for her and Bob to clean them themselves. She'll have to talk with Bob tonight to decide on a time.
Mary met Bob the fourth year after she had come to the United States. She was a Ph.D. candidate in analytical chemistry at U.C. Berkeley, observing rows and rows of bottles and tubes in her lab most of her days and nights. After eight years studying chemistry, four for undergraduate and another four for graduate studies, she suddenly realized that she had neither the talent nor the passion to become like Madame Curie, her idol through college. But she was determined to complete the Ph.D. program, to be called "Doctor," so that her years of hard study would pay off.
Her adviser, an ambitious Russian with a heavy beard, bushy eyebrows, and coarse white hair, had his eye on the Nobel Prize. He was strict with her from the day she joined his team, and while he chatted and joked with his American students, asking them about their pastimes and even their romances, he grilled her and a few other Asian students only on their experiments and test results, as if Asian students knew nothing but how to work hard, a stereotype secretly shared by many professors in the department. After she failed in a few experiments, he warned her that should she not make significant progress she wouldn't be able to pass her thesis defense coming up in a year.
Mary began to toil through her days in the lab. Her stress and exhaustion did little to help the experiments. She knew better than anyone else that she couldn't afford to lose her scholarship, because she had already brought her younger sister to the United States. Ingrid was studying accounting at San Jose State University, an hour's drive from Berkeley. Mary had paid most of her sister's tuition with what she had saved from her scholarship and the little money she made from grading undergraduates' papers. It was quite a financial stretch, but she faced it without complaining.
The pressure weighed her down, though, and sometimes she wished she could talk with her parents in China about her depressing situation. But what could she say to them? In their letters they only asked if she ate well or slept well or had enough to wear, and what they wrote about was so trivial: a colleague in her mother's factory just had twins, her father's working unit was organizing a study of Deng Xiaoping's Collection, Old Wang's hen died of plague, there were a lot more mosquitoes this summer than last year. When she read their letters, Mary would sigh, knowing that she would never be able to tell her parents the truth about her life in America. She could have talked with her sister about her worries -- after all, Ingrid was her only family in the United States -- but she refrained from doing so, fearing that her sister would refuse to take her money if she knew her situation.
One day, Mary had a severe fever but had to complete a report on an experiment. When she finally got out of her lab, it was four a.m. and pouring outside. Without an umbrella or raincoat, and having eaten no dinner, she biked to her dormitory. The freezing December rain beat down, soaking her. It was dead quiet save for the raindrops splattering and her bike 's skidding on the slippery street. The sky, huge and dark, resembled a grim face. A sensation of unbearable sadness and loneliness suddenly hit her as she realized that her hometown and her friends were thousands of miles away, and on this strange land under her bike wheels she was nothing but a rootless and pathetic foreigner. Her future, if she had one, was as foggy as the view in front of her. Every raindrop seemed ready to crush her, to propel her into an unknown darkness.
She burst into sobs, wailing like a three-year-old. Ahead was a church, which she had passed often but never thought of stopping at. That night, however, as if called by a mysterious voice, she parked her bike and walked up the stairs. She peeked through the gap between the door halves -- she saw nothing but darkness, and she slid down onto the threshold, leaning back against the door. She stared at the slanting rain and listened to the drops splashing on the ground. She felt safe and peaceful, and soon fell asleep. She did not open her eyes until an early jogger woke her up. For the following three weeks, she was confined to her bed, stricken with pneumonia, and more than once she pondered death.
After she recuperated, the first thing she did was visit the church. A month later, she met Bob, a graduate student in computer science, at a Bible study there. They married a year later, and before long she left the graduate school with a master's degree and joined Advantage Biotech as a statistician.
To this day, she recalls clearly that early morning ten years ago, cycling to her dorm with a fever. It so haunted her that she had sworn she would never get sick again, or allow herself to be so vulnerable. However absurd her resolution might seem, her psychological strength prevailed, and she rarely fell ill afterward, not even so much as catching a cold, as if her spirit indeed affected her body. Once, she hiked in Yosemite with friends and they were caught in an hourlong, icy rain. Everyone except Mary went home with a terrible cold or fever. This trip won her a reputation as "an iron woman." Mingyi said that studying chemistry must have done something magic to her. Even now, Mary seldom needs to see a doctor apart from annual checkups.
At three p.m., Mary drives to her church for choir practice. With Christmas less than two months away, the choir has asked its members to rehearse every Saturday afternoon. If not for the church or other special occasions, she would wear jeans year round, a habit that she conveniently blames on the influence of the engineers in Silicon Valley, who have a reputation for dressing tastelessly. Though she is not an engineer herself, most of the people she works with are, and in her company even the executives sometimes wear jeans to work. It's not uncommon to see people at the office wearing sneakers and Tshirts printed with the company's logo on the chest and back. If she dressed up a bit, her engineer colleagues would tease her, asking if she had just returned from interviewing with another company. Today, however, because of the rehearsal, Mary has put on a knee-length, Aline print skirt, a white cashmere sweater, and a mother-of-pearl necklace that Bob bought her last Christmas. Before she left the house, she examined herself in the mirror and smiled with approval.
Her church, recently remodeled with an exquisitely carved maple door and off-white stucco exterior walls, sits on a spacious property surrounded by oak trees, a fifteen-minute drive from her house. The parking area has been enlarged and each parking space widened. Most of the church members are from mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, and there is also a small group of American-born Asians. Eight years ago, when Mary first visited this church, there were fewer than ten people from mainland China, but that number has increased to over one hundred. Even the newly appointed pastor, Pastor Zhang, is an immigrant from Zhejiang Province, a former Communist who later devoted himself to Christianity. Preaching in his deep and resonant voice, he is full of passion, gesturing often to stress his points. It amazes Mary that he can recite long Bible passages without error. Unlike her previous pastors, whose preaching focused on literal interpretations of the Bible, Pastor Zhang knows how to incorporate facts and stories into his sermons, preaching about topics that people can relate to, such as relationships with parents, spouses, and children; communication skills; balance of work and personal life; and health issues.
On entering the church, Mary spots Mingyi, who is arranging a basket of fresh flowers on the rostrum, not looking a bit tired from the six hours' volunteer work she has done.
"Hi, Mingyi," Mary calls out, appreciating her friend's impeccable appearance: a mauve silk jacket on top of a long black dress, smooth forehead, black and lustrous hair, and sensuous lips with a slight touch of natural-colored lipstick. Though her waist has thickened since Mary first met her, Mingyi still looks good, especially for her age, forty-eight.
They hug each other warmly and chat a little before the choir starts to rehearse. They'll be singing three songs: "O Holy Night," "Angels from the Realms of Glory," and "Joy to the World," Though none is professional, years of training have taught them to sing harmoniously, with the male and female voices -- soprano, tenor, and bass -- well-coordinated. Mingyi is the lead singer. Her voice has a wide range, and her face is serene. When the time comes for Mary to sing, she feels her voice rising from her chest like a clear spring. Her praise is transforming her, bringing peace and joy to her heart: she feels she is communing with God in her singing. At the last note, she regards the sculptures of Jesus on the cross against both side walls and the stained-glass windows, where the soft sunlight streams through, praying silently: My Father in Heaven, please bless and enlighten my body, my heart, and my soul. I admire you, praise you, and I will follow you forever.
When Mary returns home she sees that the message light on the phone is blinking. The first message is from Bob: he has to stay in the office for at least another hour to fix the broken database and might not come home for dinner. "I called your cell phone, but it was turned off. I guess you're at church. Could you pick up Alex?" Then there is a message from American Express, notifying her that they have suspended her credit card because of a suspected fraudulent charge in Africa. The last is from Alex's dentist, reminding her of his appointment next Tuesday morning.
She drives to Mountain View to pick Alex up and chats with her friend briefly. On their way home, Alex talks excitedly about the Chinese characters he's just learned how to write and says that writing them is like drawing a picture. "Teacher Huang praised me five times today. One, two, three, four, five. Five times." He counts his fingers, eyes gleaming.
"Wow, you have to tell Dad that when he's home," Mary says and smiles encouragingly, feeling the pride of being a mother.
She and Bob would have loved to have had more children, but since Alex they haven't been able to get pregnant. Believing that children are gifts from God, Mary consoles herself that God has already blessed her with Alex. When he was diagnosed with asthma at one year old, she had a hard time accepting it. Seeing him struggling to breathe, his small, lovely face twisted with pain, she was heartbroken, wishing it were she who had the disease instead of him. Despite her bitterness, she kept going to church and praying, and when, two years later, the doctor told her that Alex had improved significantly and his asthma was under control, she praised God for his healing. Though she was baptized years ago, it was not until that year that she began to experience a closeness with God.
As Mary pulls into her driveway and parks, Claudia Dawn, her manager at work, calls her cell phone. Mary lets the phone ring and then listens to the message: Claudia wants her to conduct a conference call with the European division about some market research data for the upcoming quarterly earnings report. "Please be sure to be in the office at seven o'clock Monday morning" is her last sentence, her voice distant yet aggressive as usual.
Claudia is a fresh MBA graduate from Stanford University who joined Mary's company three months ago. In her early forties, divorced with no kids, she treats her employees the way a general treats his soldiers: telling them what time they should arrive in the office, what time they can leave. She imposes a twelve-hour email reply policy and demands that people check emails and phone messages after work. Once she called one of Mary's colleagues at eleven in the evening and asked her to present a report at nine o'clock the next morning. She is temperamental and capricious, sometimes all smiles, but a moment later, sullen and cold. When she is dissatisfied, she calls employees to her cubicle and loudly accuses them of deficiencies, knowing that the other employees are listening. Mary and her colleagues used to call Claudia a psychopath behind her back. Within one month of Claudia's being hired, three of Mary's colleagues quit, and though they had complained about Claudia to HR before they left, she remained and was even given more responsibility. Only recently, Mary and her colleagues realized that she is the chief operating officer's sister-in-law. This knowledge immediately turned some of Mary's colleagues into Claudia's most loyal followers, which first surprised, then disgusted Mary.
Maybe I should quit soon, Mary thinks, stepping into the house. It's not the first time she 's told herself this, but she has yet to update her résumé. She has been with the company for nearly ten years, and its convenient location -- less than ten miles from home -- comprehensive medical coverage, and generous 401(k) package are attractive to her. Of course, she has seen people around her hopping jobs like restless bees buzzing to find a better, sweeter flower, but it never seemed to her that they were any happier despite the higher salaries; there was always something wrong with the new company. If she switched to a new company, she now reasons, she might have to commute much farther or her new boss might be just as terrible as Claudia. Perhaps she should wait to look for a new job until she cannot tolerate Claudia any longer.
Her younger sister, Ingrid, once called her "pragmatic," an adjective Mary dislikes. Easy for Ingrid to say that, Mary thinks bitterly. If she had a mortgage and a child, she wouldn't use that word about her older sister; she would know having these responsibilities changes things.
Ingrid had left a message on Mary's home phone last Wednesday -- she had called during the day to avoid speaking with her directly. The message was in English, businesslike, not a single unnecessary word, saying that she would visit San Francisco at the end of November or early December. Though Ingrid came to the United States four years after Mary, her English is much better than her older sister's.
Of course, Ingrid's English is better than mine, Mary thinks, frowning at the recollection of her phone message. She hangs out with bohemian Americans every day, and she may have even forgotten how to speak her mother tongue.
Mary hates it when Ingrid speaks English with her; she views it as a deliberate way to create distance between them, to deny their kinship. Isn't Ingrid still Chinese? Isn't Mary the only sister Ingrid has? If not for her, how could Ingrid have come to the United States?
As Mary cooks dinner, she thinks of Ingrid once again. It had been a year since Ingrid had called her and three years since they saw each other. Their last meeting took place at Mary's previous house, where they had a falling-out. That day, right before supper, Ingrid -- without informing Mary beforehand -- brought over a dark-skinned man, a DJ at a nightclub up in the Haight in San Francisco, a hippie area to Mary's knowledge: Ingrid introduced him as Steven. Bob was at Berkeley for an alumni reunion, so only Mary and Alex were at home.
At the first sight of Steven, who wore a tight, shiny black shirt and snake-shaped sterling-silver earrings, Mary disliked him. Ingrid's appearance was even more unpleasant: newly dyed blue and red short hair, baggy jeans with holes front and back, and shoes with transparent plastic heels. Though she had become used to Ingrid's habit of bringing friends to her house for dinner without prior notice, seeing her and Steven that day upset Mary. Besides, she noticed that they were intimate: Steven would stroke the back of Ingrid's head now and then, and Ingrid would whisper into his ear with her hand on his shoulder.
Steven was a strict vegan, who didn't eat eggs, fish, or meat, so Mary had to make two special vegetarian dishes for him. It was a silent dinner except for Alex's gibberish about his preschool and some polite yet unnatural exchanges between the adults. Apparently the two dishes didn't suit Steven's taste; after only a few bites, he put down his knife and fork, claiming that he was full. He didn't stay long after dinner, saying he had to go to his nephew's birthday party. Ingrid saw him out. Through the kitchen window, by the light from a lamppost, Mary saw them leaning against the trunk of his car, kissing. Before Steven hopped behind the wheel, he squeezed Ingrid's hips and pulled her pelvis tight against him.
As soon as Ingrid entered the door, Mary blew up.
"What do you think my house is? A Motel Six? You could at least tell me before you bring people over."
"It isn't the first time I've done it. Why didn't you say anything before?" Ingrid was irritated, then her expression changed to a sneer. "You didn't like Steven, did you?"
"Who is this Steven, anyway?"
"A friend."
"A friend? You kiss all your friends on the lips? You let all your friends pinch your hips?"
"Mary!"
"If you had any respect for me, your older sister, you should have told me about him before you began to date him."
"Well, now you know I'm seeing him."
"You'd better be a little more responsible."
"Am I irresponsible?"
"Just look at yourself in the mirror. I'm not picking on you for dressing like a punk, but dating a black guy is too much."
"He isn't black. He's Indian." Ingrid paused, raising her eyebrows. "Does it matter?"
"Of course it does. What do you think?"
"It doesn't matter to me."
"You can't date him. You can't date an Indian or a black."
"Don't you Christians always talk about equality? What's with this nodating-an-Indian-or-a-black thing? Are you telling me you're a racist?"
"It has nothing to do with being a racist. You have a different background and culture from theirs. Look at Steven! What do you know about his family and upbringing? I'm thinking about your future, about your children."
"You didn't complain when I was seeing Peter last year. He's a Caucasian. He didn't share my background and culture, either."
"His father was a professor. He grew up in a good family."
"How do you know that Steven's father or mother isn't a professor? How do you know he didn't grow up in a good family?"
Mary was silent, knowing that this argument would turn ugly. Of course, it was stupid of her to assume Steven had a seedy family background. But how unpleasant his appearance was! And the way he'd pinched her sister's hips and pulled her toward him.
"I just knew," Mary insisted.
"Let me get this straight. You're okay with me dating a white guy but not a black or an Indian. Are Caucasians and Chinese more similar to one another than Chinese and blacks and Indians? Are children by Caucasians and Chinese prettier and smarter? Bob is Chinese, but how much does he know about China? How much Chinese can he speak, read, or write? How much of your background does he share? He's a banana, yellow on the outside and white on the inside. I can't see anything common between the two of you."
Mary was enraged. She pounded on the countertop. "I'm your older sister. How can you talk to me like this? You know how much I have gone through to bring you to the States? Your tuition, your apartment, your food and clothes, your car -- which one of those things wasn't paid for by me?"
Ingrid kicked over a stool, and it bounced into the side of the dishwasher. "Mary, listen! I'll repay every penny of your money, with interest. From the day I arrived in the U.S. you have manipulated me as if I were your pawn. I've had enough. Enough!" She stormed out and slammed the door, leaving Mary stupefied, then weeping with her head buried in her crossed arms on the countertop. Minutes later, Alex walked into the kitchen and said timidly, "Mom, don't cry. Mom is a good kid and Mom doesn't cry."
Mary clasped her son's head against her chest, holding back her tears. "Mom is fine. Mom isn't crying." She managed somehow to suppress her sobbing for his sake.
Three weeks later, she received a brief letter from Ingrid, with a three-thousand-dollar check enclosed, saying that she had found a job in New York. More checks followed in the next few months, in varying amounts. She tore the checks to pieces, but more kept arriving.
As Mary and Alex eat dinner, she still cannot put Ingrid out of her mind. She listens halfheartedly to Alex's chattering about his friend Jenson's hamsters, wondering if Ingrid is doing well in New York. At least, being an accountant, she concludes, Ingrid shouldn't have trouble finding a job. Maybe she even works on Wall Street, with a big-namefirm like Morgan Stanley or Merrill Lynch, receiving a handsome year-end bonus and spending it on a shopping spree, who knows? Between them, Ingrid has always been the luckier one, hasn't she?
When they were little, Ingrid was cuter, cleverer, and more likable, and she would sing "Red Stars Are Twinkling" in a sweet voice when asked by the neighboring aunts, who would then reward her with candy or a picture book. But they ignored Mary, rarely praising her or giving her gifts. It might have been because she smiled little; even if she did smile, she did not have deep dimples, as Ingrid had. At age five, a few months before Ingrid was born, Mary's parents sent her to the countryside for two years to stay with a family they barely knew. She did not return to the city until Ingrid had learned to walk and talk. Probably thinking that Mary was too young to remember things, her parents never explained why they had sent her away, as if it had never happened.
Many days Mary and Ingrid were left home alone since their parents both had to work. Mary was Ingrid's babysitter. Behind their parents' backs, Mary pinched her little sister's cheeks, kicked her, and drew on her face with pens. Their age difference made it easy for her to bully Ingrid with tricks and punishments, though she was careful not to make her sister cry -- somehow Ingrid's tears would soften Mary's heart and make her realize their kinship. Whenever Ingrid was about to cry, Mary mimicked the mythical characters such as Monkey King or Pigsy, or danced around like a manic wizard; then Ingrid's tears would freeze in her eyes and she would laugh and clap wildly at her older sister's performance.
Now Mary is thirty-seven and Ingrid thirty-one, yet they're like strangers to each other. Mary sighs at the thought but changes her sigh into a smile when she sees Alex's bright eyes gazing at her. "Mom, are you okay?"
"My little angel, want to help me clean the table?" she asks and winks at her son.
Bob is still not home; earlier he'd called again, saying that he wouldn't be able to leave the office until ten or later. "Both the founder and the CEO are here. That corrupted database contains a lot of advertising data, and it's crucial to fix it," he told Mary. His voice sounded stressed.
Alex sits at the piano for his daily forty-five-minute practice, with Mary next to him. Alex has been taking piano lessons for a year, but his progress is slower than that of the kids who started at the same time; his teacher blames his lack of interest and his inability to concentrate.
"You just skipped these two legatos." Mary knocks on one side of the black Yamaha upright piano. Alex is playing a piece by Bach. He purses his lips and mumbles a complaint then restarts the piece.
"Your little fingers are sticking up. Also, press the keys with your fingertips, not the flats of your fingers. Teacher Li said that if you cannot correct your posture, she won't teach you new songs." Mary has to interrupt Alex again a little later. Then, again. Finally, a fourth time.
"Mom, I don't want to learn how to play piano." Alex turns around to face her and speaks defiantly. "I don't like any other musical instruments, either. Why must I do this?"
"Music is very beautiful. People who know how to play an instrument are happier and more inspired than those who don't. When I was little, I dreamed of having a piano." She strokes Alex's head. "Teacher Li said you're very talented and all you have to do is concentrate on your playing. I'm sure you'll catch up with Amy and Jenson soon."
"But if playing the piano doesn't make me happy right now, how can it make me happier later? And I don't like Teacher Li. She's too strict. She always scolds her students. She even hits us. Last week, she slapped Leo's hand and said it was as clumsy as an elephant's foot."
"Teacher Li is strict because she wants her students to be good and play well. She used to teach at the Central Conservatory of Music in China and performed solos. A lot of kids want to learn how to play piano from her. You're lucky to be her student."
Alex sighs like an adult. "Jenson told me last week that he'd put his hamsters inside his piano and let them chew through all the strings. He hates playing piano."
"Jenson was just joking. I met his dad two days ago and he said Jenson played for an hour and a half every day and planned to take a test next year."
"Really?" Alex pouts.
Mary feels guilty about her lie, and as a way to make up with Alex she says, "Okay, you can take a break today. Want to watch the cartoon movie Dad bought yesterday?"
"Of course, yes!" Alex jumps off the piano bench and drags her by the hand to the family room.
After the movie starts, Mary walks to the master bedroom and turns on her work laptop -- she has to compile some data for tomorrow's conference call with Europe. Barely five minutes into working, she returns to the family room, checking to see if there is inappropriate content in the movie. Bob always laughs at her concern and says she is oversensitive. But Alex is only six, and she must make sure he's not exposed to any violence or indecency. Even if it's a cartoon, it may contain content inappropriate for children.
Since the shooting at Columbine High School, she no longer buys toy guns for Alex. Every time she meets Julia and her other Chinese friends who have kids, she share their worries. They have endless worries: when their children were small, they complained about the loose curriculum at school, fearing that their children would learn very little compared with kids in the same age-group in China, whose curriculum was much stricter, whose school bags were filled with textbooks and homework, and who wrote compositions by age six or seven. In the United States, Mary's friends said, it was not uncommon that kids couldn't recognize all twenty-six letters of the alphabet by the time they needed to go to primary school. How absurd! they exclaimed, feeling ashamed for America's public-school education.
They lectured Mary on the importance of starting Alex's education early, telling her she had to develop his intelligence and talent; send him to after-school tutoring to learn math, chess, English, history, and geography; enroll him in a Chinese-language school and classes to learn music, dancing, swimming, or drawing. Some of them have sent their children to private schools, paying thirty thousand dollars a year just for tuition despite the fact that they live in a neighborhood with good public schools. Sometimes, Mary was afraid to talk with these parents, for they always gave her the feeling that she should have done more for her only child. It was a competitive group, no doubt. When these children reached their teens, their parents began to worry about whether they will do drugs or date too soon, whether their sons will make a girl pregnant or their daughters will get pregnant. Last month, Julia told Mary pensively that her son had not dated, nor had he brought any girl home.
"Isn't it great? George is focusing on school," Mary said.
"But what if he's a homosexual?" Julia said. "One day I found an opportunity to chat with him about homosexuals, but before I could finish he squinted his eyes and said, 'What's wrong with being homosexual? They have their opinions, their rights. They're cooler and more stylish than heterosexuals.' You tell me, shouldn't I worry? I didn't dare tell his father what he said. His father wouldn't let him step into the house if he turned out to be a homosexual. And his grandparents...oh, I can't imagine."
The next time Mary saw Julia, Julia talked about her son again, but this time she looked cheerful. She said that she had checked his computer when he was not at home and found pictures of female movie stars and singers. "At least he's interested in girls. He's normal," Julia said with relief.
Julia's concern seems ridiculous to Mary, but she can still empathize with her.
The cartoon movie looks fine, so Mary returns to her room. After working a little longer, she pushes away the documents on her desk, the numbers on the computer screen staring at her like malicious eyes. She decides to take a break by cleaning Bob's study, which will be her mother's room during her stay. She begins to tidy the desk, where files, software, and music CDs pile up. The floor around the desk is just as chaotic. Though Mary tries to clean his study every week, she doesn't want to mess up Bob's belongings, so all she can do, usually, is dust the desk and vacuum the floor. Today the messiness irritates her. She has asked Bob more than once to empty the room for her mother's stay, but he has done nothing yet. She takes an empty plastic container from the garage and dumps the cascade of files and CDs into it. If there was one more room in the house, that would be nice, she thinks.
Two nights ago, Bob told Mary that he had just been granted a significant number of new stock options.
"Do you know what these shares mean?" he asked, waving the letter excitedly.
"We may become millionaires overnight," she said.
"You don't look like you care. Isn't it your dream to buy a house in the best school district? Wasn't it you who urged me to join a pre-IPO start-up?"
She was slightly hurt: he sounded like he was doing all this for her, instead of for the family. But she feigned a smile, like she always did when facing a possible confrontation. "Of course I'm happy. After your company completes its initial public offering, we'll buy a big house in Palo Alto. Two-story, with a nice garden and an inlaw unit. Alex can go to Gunn High School and attend Stanford University someday."
She didn't care so much about money, but if her mother emigrated to the United States, they would have to buy a house with an inlaw unit to accommodate her. That was the plan they had agreed on before she started to prepare immigration documents, so Mary could take care of her mother while they still had their privacy. She felt fortunate that Bob had agreed to her plan despite some hesitancy; she knew that this kind of living arrangement was unusual among Americans, who, in her eyes, weren't sufficiently committed to caring for their elderly parents. But since their initial discussion, years ago, they hadn't talked about it seriously again; a few times she 'd brought it up, but Bob had put her off. Now, with her mother visiting soon, they need to talk about it without delay. It takes time to save money and find the right house.
She shouldn't have asked him to join a start-up, Mary reflects gloomily as she continues putting files into the plastic container. They don't need a million-dollar house in Palo Alto, she tells herself. Somewhere in Cupertino or West San Jose, where the school districts are excellent yet houses are less expensive, would be more realistic. Of course, it still costs more to buy in these communities than in Sunnyvale. But at least there 's a possibility they could afford a house there, if they can sell their current house at a good price. She suddenly becomes agitated. If Bob was more involved in running the house, she 'd be less stressed. It's time for her to sit down and have a good talk with him.
She goes to the kitchen and drinks a glass of iced water. Feeling better, she returns to Bob's study to finish clearing up -- when she starts something, she wants to get it done. Also, besides tending the garden and cooking, she likes to clean; it feels good to see the house tidy. She pushes the container into the hallway and begins to vacuum. There is a futon under the window. She opens it and lies down, bouncing to test its firmness. It's a Simmons and fairly firm. She figures she 'll let her mother try this first; if she doesn't like it, Mary will buy a real bed. She takes a set of sheets and pillowcases from the dresser in her room and makes the bed, then empties the closet, finding a few of Bob's sweaters that are fairly new but that he no longer likes. She folds the sweaters, puts them in a half-filled plastic bag in the garage, and takes the bag to the sidewalk. Tomorrow morning, a Salvation Army truck will stop to collect donations. She looks into the distance for a while, in the direction from which Bob usually drives home. She has to ease up, she thinks, as the night deepens and the air gets chillier.
Copyright © 2009 by Fan Wu
Reading Group Guide
This reading group guide for Beautiful as Yesterday includes an introduction, discussion questions, and ideas for enhancing your book club. The suggested questions are intended to help your reading group find new and interesting angles and topics for your discussion. We hope that these ideas will enrich your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book.
Introduction
Mary Chang, a Chinese immigrant living in Northern California, is a devoted wife, mother, churchgoer, and a high-tech professional. She is torn between fulfilling her filial duty as the oldest child and admitting her true feelings towards these obligations. Mary’s lukewarm relationship with her fifth-generation Chinese husband and her estranged sister, a political self-exile who prefers her bohemian friends’ Latin culture to her own, only complicate things further. And when her widowed mother, Wang Fenglan, a state factory retiree, travels from China to the United States for the first time at Mary’s request to explore the possibility of emigrating, she awkwardly reunites the family and unknowingly stirs up buried family tensions and secrets.
Stretching from mid-century China to both of the coasts of the U.S. at the turn of the millennium, Beautiful as Yesterday explores issues of immigration, acculturation, family, friendship, love and loss. It is a penetrating exploration of what it means to belong, what it means to be a family, and the impact of history and memories on one’s life.
Questions for Discussion
1. “Though Mary visits China every year for a week to see her mother…she has always been called by her friends there ‘a half-foreigner’ or ‘a Chinese-American’” (p. 6). How does Mary define her ethnicity to others? To what extent does her suburban American lifestyle prevent her from embracing her Chinese heritage, and in what respects does it inspire her to be more assertive in seeking out old connections to her family and Chinese friends?
2. To what extent does the tension in the sibling relationship between Mary and Ingrid seem to stem from their parents’ treatment of them as children? Why do they seem to revert to the stereotypical roles of older and younger sister in their behavior toward each other? What role does envy of the other’s situation play in their sibling connection?
3. “Perhaps it was because of her fear of dying alone that she agreed to emigrate to the United States, to live with her older daughter and her family” (p. 39). How do Wang Fenglan’s preparations for her trip to America betray her anxieties about leaving China? How does her living situation in China compare to what awaits her at Mary’s home in Silicon Valley? Why does Wang Fenglan resist her daughters’ efforts to have her emigrate to their adopted country?
4. How would you characterize Mary and Bob Chang’s marriage? What keeps them together as a couple, and what threatens to pull them in different directions? How does the presence of Mary’s mother in their home affect their relationship? What roles do Bob’s inability to speak Chinese, his lack of religious observance, and his intense workload play in Mary’s level of marital satisfaction? To what extent does Bob’s treatment of his wife reveal his feelings about their marriage?
5. “As [Ingrid] lay on the bed after a satisfying orgasm…it struck her that what she had been doing was an attempt to sever her ties with the past, with her innocence, ignorance, and naïveté, everything in her that wasn’t American” (p. 106). What does Ingrid’s rebellion against her family’s expectations for her reveal about her character? Why does she feel so conflicted about her filial obligations? To what extent would you describe her as a “liberated woman”?
6. What do the central male characters in Beautiful as Yesterday have in common? What does their depiction suggest about the traditional role of men in Chinese culture? How is Bob Chang depicted as a father and husband, and how does his portrayal compare to that of Wang Fenglan’s husband? How important is Alex—the only male child—to the other characters in the novel?
7. “In fact, in all her previous visits to China, [Mary] has never hugged her mother, not even when saying goodbye—it is just not the custom there” (132). How would you describe Mary and Ingrid’s respective feelings toward their mother, and Wang Fenglan’s feelings toward her daughters? Why does Wang Fenglan share the secret of Ingrid’s conception with Mary, and what does their conspiracy reveal about the unique nature of their family’s dynamics? By American or Chinese standards, to what extent do the relationships between Wang Fenglan and her daughters seem suggestive of a dysfunctional family?
8. How does the return of Han Dong, a figure from Mary’s romantic past, threaten her domestic contentment? What might Han Dong represent to Mary in light of her marriage to Bob? Given her religious beliefs and her commitments to her family, why does she agree to meet with him, and then go with him to his hotel room? How is she complicit in her own seduction? To what extent does their erotic encounter uncover a complexity to Mary’s character hinted at in other moments of the novel?
9. “Since coming to the United States, [Ingrid] hasn’t participated in any political events—she just cannot bring herself to be passionate about American politics, about which she knows little to begin with” (289). How does Ingrid’s exposure to Chinese politics in the 1980s protests in Tiananmen Square in Beijing affect her? Why might a recent immigrant to the United States feel some degree of political indifference? How does Chinese history inform Wang Fenglan, Mary, and Ingrid’s political and social perspectives in Beautiful as Yesterday?
10. How does Mary and Ingrid’s return to China at the end of the novel impact their sibling relationship? What does their experience in China with their extended family reveal to them about their own individual trajectories as Chinese natives who have become American citizens? Why do you think the author chose to bring Mary and Ingrid back to their native country, and what might such an ending represent to these characters, and this story?
Enhance Your Book Club
1. Did the experience of reading Beautiful as Yesterday kindle your interest in learning more about the book’s author, Fan Wu? If your book club is interested in reading additional interviews with the author, attending one of her book signings, or reading more about her life, visit www.fanwuwrites.com for an in-depth, intimate glimpse at this author and her work.
2. The political fallout from the Cultural Revolution and the crackdown against democratic activists in the late 1980s resonate for the characters of Beautiful as Yesterday. When you think about your life, and your family’s life, what are some of the key political and social events that shaped you? If you were writing a cross-generational novel about your family, which events and which family members would you choose to include and why?
3. Food plays an integral role in the lives of the characters of Beautiful as Yesterday. As Mary Chang cooks and serves meals with her church friends, they share memories of their lives in China, as conveyed in the flavors and preparations of the foods they eat. What are some foods that carry extra meaning for you, and why? How do these foods link you to your family or your history? You may want to consider a potluck meal with your book club, where each member brings a dish that carries additional memories or significance.