My Study Office
To a Religious Fanatic
On Sunday two weeks ago, my house held a tag sale. My house is on busy South Main Street in West Harford. My wife and I set up our new and old merchandise on our driveway and the front yard. We left our entrance open, so our customers could park. Our tag sale items covered the back part of the driveway, the front yard, and the garage. We offered new and old dresses, kitchenware, lady purses, designer leather bags, jewelry, and three bicycles on the front lawn yard.
It was the beginning of September; we chose a sunny weekend to hold the tag sale. The temperature of the day was still high; the Summer did not want to leave. After we set up the goods. My wife went to do her kitchen work upstairs in the house. In the garage, I sat down on a chair with a makeup table stacked up with merchandise boxes to have my breakfast coffee and bagel and to hide away from the sun.
I saw a pickup truck turn into my driveway. You stepped down from the truck. All six feet tall of you with broad shoulders, a plaid shirt, and blue jeans stood in front of me. As strong as the pickup truck you were driving. I did not notice what kind of truck you have. But the strong feeling makes me guess that it should be an American’s truck.
“Good morning.” You greeted me first. “Such a nice man,” I was thinking in my mind. You were in your fifties with a polite manner. “Good morning, welcome to our tag sale,” I greeted. “I am interested in your bikes. What are your asking prices?” you ask. When I told you that the three bicycles – a Mongoose, a Specialized, and a Trek – that were displayed in my front yard, were brand-name bikes in good condition. The price was between $150 to $200. In the bike shops, they were sold for $400 to $1000. You shook your head and said, “I cannot afford to buy them.”
By this time, my wife was coming down to join us. She was so pleased to welcome you as our first customer. “We have a lot more merchandise in the garage,” she invited you to go into the garage. You picked up a $6 used electronic vegetable chopper from the display on a shelf and told my wife, “I want to buy this machine.”
“Do you want me to plug in the electrical outlet to show you if it works?” my wife asked.
“No, I trust you. You both look honestly,” you answer.
“Do you believe in God?” You asked my wife after you put your wallet back into your pocket.
“I do not belong to any religion, but I believe in Buddhism’s teaching of being a good person – do your good deed and you will be rewarded. But my husband is a Christian.” My wife said.
“There is only one God,” you insisted. Your tone was changing. You became a preacher. You told us that you used to stray away from God. During that time, you were addicted to alcohol and narcotics. But you were saved by Jesus and became a reborn Christian now. You wanted to save us from our sins and follow you to be a reborn Christian like you.
“Please excuse me. I need to go back to finish my cooking,” and she walked away. I knew that she felt so uncomfortable and disinterested in this argument about religious matters. You looked at your watch and told me that you needed to pick up your young daughter from the church. But you promised to come back to finish our discussion. “Please do not come back,” I prayed in my mind.
Fortunately, by that late afternoon we sold our Mongoose, and Specialized bike. We had over $400 business for the day. My wife came down to tell me to clean everything up and close the tag sale. But your pickup truck reappeared again. My wife rushed back to her kitchen. This time you asked me if I go to church very often. I told you that I seldom go to church, but I had God in my mind. I practice Confucius's teaching: benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, and trust. But you insisted that it was not enough. And preached that I should devote myself to God and to church. You kept the conversation going until my wife came out to yell at me that I had to close the business. Before you left, you griped my shoulder and prayed for God to help clean my mind and soul.
Bewildered and displeasured, was my reflection as I packed up the unsold items. I did not know that there was a compression to believe in religion. What happen if an Islam fanatic met with you? a fight may occur. However, I still wish you luck and admire your zeal for the Lord. Just do not drag me into your level of belief.
Hello Kitty
One day a few years ago, my wife drove our Prius with me from New Britain Avenue in West Hartford to West Farms Mall. As we were driving a car came up alongside us, and the man on the passenger side signaled my wife to roll down the car window. Curious, my wife rolled down the window at the stranger’s request.
“I like your Hello Kitty,” he said. The man pointed to the small doll which hung from the rearview mirror.
“I love my Hello Kitty. Thanks,” my wife answered. She turned and smiled at me as if to let me know that there are people as crazy as her about Hello Kitty.
As a woman in her sixties, my wife still loves to collect these Hello Kitty products. In 1987, on our first trip to Thailand - like a child - she was mesmerized by a two-foot-tall Hello Kitty puppet being sold by a vender on the street. At the time, we did not even know the name of the puppet.
“Why do you want to buy this puppet?” I asked her.
“She is so cute,” she answered.
I almost wanted to say, “You are so childish!” Of course, I did not. I could never say something like that to her. I cannot stand to see her feel bad.
On our trip back to America, quite a few of the airplane’s passengers smiled upon seeing her carrying the puppet onboard. A girl pointed at the puppet and said, “I love your Hello Kitty.”
“Thank you,” my wife said as she discovered the doll’s name was “Hello Kitty”. When I saw the girl and my wife smile, I thought they were like the puppet itself – cute and innocent.
Since then, our house has gradually added ever more of the Hello Kitty line of products for decoration and functionality. Small kitty dolls line the windowsills. A kitty radio and toaster are used in the kitchen. The tall puppet from Thailand and a humidifier stands in the bedroom. She also carries her iPhone wrapped in a Hello Kitty cover with her all the time. When she showed me the iPhone cover, she brought from Taiwan, I just felt glad to see her smiling face.
Upon further research, I found out that Hello Kitty was produced by the Japanese Company Sanrio, created by Yuko Shimizu, and currently designed by Yuko Yamaguchi. Sanrio depicts Hello Kitty as a female Japanese Bobtail with a red bow and notably, no mouth. Hello Kitty had been designed to be a perpetual third grade student who lives outside London, England. Her nationality is English. Kitty shares the same birthday with her twin sister, Mimi, on November 1st. Shortly after her creation in 1974, the cartoon characters became a media franchise, including a product line, apparel, toys, manga comics, anime series, popular music, and other media. 
Cuteness (kawaii) was the feature of Sanrio toy products. First aimed at children and pre-teenage females, Hello Kitty’s market includes adolescent and adult consumers. Sanrio has groomed Hello Kitty into a global marketing phenomenon. By 2014, when Hello Kitty was 40, she made about $8 billion (about $25 per person in the US) (about $25 per person in the US) per year. The Hello Kitty product range has expanded from dolls, stickers, greeting cards, clothes, accessories, school supplies, and stationery to purses, toasters, televisions, massagers, computer equipment, and other home appliances. These products range from mass-market items to high-end consumer products and rare collectibles. As of 2014, there are more than 50,000 Hello Kitty product lines available in over 130 countries.
My wife once told me about her childhood growing up in a farmland village. She seldom had any toys or dolls to play with. When she played with other children from her neighborhood, she always cosplayed as a mother cooking dinner for them. That was one of the reasons that led her to learn how to cook and why she has become a good cook now. I think the reason she likes to collect Hello Kitty might be to compensate for what she lacked in her childhood. For me, I will encourage her to do anything that makes her feel happy.
When I was about ten my father gave me his only stamp collection album. He had some of the earliest Chinese postal stamps, some dating back to the early 1900s. From a collector’s point of view, these stamps were invaluable. After a few years of collecting, I added more to the album myself. My collection now had stamps from China, Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, and other countries. However, I did not bring them with me when I came to America. I learned a few years later that these albums burnt down along with the house we were renting. I was so upset over losing the collection that I had painstakingly acquired. That is why I would never ban my wife from collecting Hello Kitty. I never want her to experience the loss of her treasured collection as I have.
Even after living in America for more than forty years, my wife keeps her Taiwanese citizenship. The main reason is to keep her eligibility for Taiwanese National Healthcare Insurance intact. Their healthcare system is cheaper and better than the ones in America. Only Taiwan nationalities with residency can join the healthcare system. Every two years, like other overseas Taiwanese natives, she will return to Taiwan to make up for her present and to pay her insurance dues. A few years ago, she called me from Taipei, Taiwan and told me:
“I saw a car driving on Taipei Street with a Hello Kitty picture spray-painted on it. I was so excited.”
“Honey, I know you would like to have it, but it’s impractical,” I answered.
“I know, I know, but it’s still very cute, and I like to think about it.” Her tone had a disappointed feeling. I wanted to fly to Taiwan to hug and comfort her at that moment. It is hard to imagine my wife driving a Hello Kitty car on the streets of West Hartford.
Two years ago, my wife brought news from the New York Chinese newspaper World Daily and showed me. “Look, the Taiwan Eva Airline has a Hello Kitty airplane flying on the Taipei – Tokyo route.” She pointed at the picture of Kitty on the airplane to show me. The news said the airline promotion tactic was successful. However, the need for products on the plane– blankets, pillows, and other products with Hello Kitty pictures on them was missing. The airline customers took these products with them as souvenirs.
“I want to ride on this airplane,” she requested.
I nodded at her request, even though we would have to pay more for the ticket to travel from the New York Kennedy Airport to Tokyo, then transfer to Taipei instead of a direct flight from New York to Taipei. But if that was her wish, I wanted to fulfill it. This could be a dream trip for her. About ten years ago, on her routine trip back to Taiwan, she added a tourist excursion to Tokyo to her itinerary. However, she had to cancel the whole trip abruptly due to a change in her job schedule. She felt so bad about it at the time. That is why I want to create a chance to make up for her lost opportunity. We worked our whole lives to support our family. Now that we are retired, I want to make our dream trip into a reality. We could stay over in Japan for a few days to enjoy ourselves before traveling to Taiwan and Thailand.
My wife – who will be 62 in April of this year and is retired now – is still obsessed with this collecting hobby. She does not spend money lavishly. She counts every penny she spends. Every weekend, she likes to go to the tag sales in West Hartford and surrounding towns. She will not let any Hello Kitty products pass by. She needs to buy them there, since the second-hand market is a lot cheaper than in stores. If this hobby makes her happy, I will not mind the house filling with increased Hello Kitty’s. In my mind, she is Hello Kitty itself!
Hoarding
We have lived in West Hartford for nearly 40 Years. Every weekend, my wife loves to drive around the town looking for tag sales. This scavenger hunt for treasure became her hobby. One Saturday morning of 20 more years ago, she brought me to join her for the treasure hunt. We stopped at one tag sale near the town center, she noted that they had a new Zojirushi rice cooker for sale at $10. She recognized that the Japanese rice cooker was worth around $160 at the time. Without saying a word, she picked up the rice cook pot and went to pay for it right away. She showed me her smile and told me in Chinese: “The rice cooker is still brand new without any scratch. The American people did not know how to cook rice. They might get this pot as a gift. I grabbed it before other people noted it.” Her smiling face tells the story. After using it for a few years, we sold the rice cooker for $35. She added 6 or 7 more of the advanced and more expensive ones in her stocks.
My wife seldom goes to any department store to buy brand-new merchandise. She hates to pay full price for anything she likes. Besides the tag sale, she likes to roam on the bargain websites, “Offer Up” or “Mercari” for her purchases. She got her lady leather bags like LV, Coach, and other brand-name lady leather bags for a portion of the original price. She knows how to clean the bags and make it like a new one. After all these years of purchasing, she has hundreds of bags, more than hundreds of China dishes, plates, bowls, rice cookers, woks, etc. More than 10 shelves, rakes, and cabinets in the basement were not enough to store these merchandise. My two daughters already have their own family, every time they were short of something they would call and ask my wife for what they needed. They already got each a Cordless Dyson vacuum ($500), a more advanced Zojirushi Rice cooker ($500), a Vitamix brander ($300), and a lot of different other utensils for free. My wife will say, “See, I have good use of all my purchases.”
During this period, my wife likes to collect something that is considered cute by her. In our master bedroom, there were countless Muppets like Winnie Bears, Micky mouses, and others decorated on top of the headboard. She also likes to collect Hello Kitty merchandise. We have a Hello Kitty puppet, dolls, a toaster, a clock, and an iPhone cover around the house. There are several boxes of Hello Kitty box stage in the basement too. Every time we talk about this merchandise, a happy smile will appear on her face. And I love to see her smile.
My wife's favorite son is the second oldest among the children in the family. He lives in Wilmington, Delaware - an MRI technician would call his mother every day for greeting and chat. Only this child dares to call her a “Hoarder”. Once he told her, “If you don’t clean a space for me to sleep in the bedroom, I will cancel the annual visit.” My wife asked me for help, and I moved half of the lady bags to the other bedroom to clear out a space for him. When I need to buy a computer, printer, or iPhone, my wife will forbid me to do it. Her reason is “All of these digital things will be obsoleting in no time.” This favorite son cannot stand it, I got a new laptop, a new printer with a whole box of toner, an iPhone, and an iWatch from him as a gift.
For me, I like to see her happy. And her hobby does not cost a fortune for us. I would not want to forbid her to do whatever she likes to do. Fourteen years ago, I wrote an anniversary poem for her. It reveals how I treat her in life.
Just Like to See You Smile – 24th years anniversary
Just like to see you smile.
No matter how far the distance
No matter how high the price
I will get them for you,
If you are happy.
Just like to see you smile.
Dark clouds will disappear
Sunlight will be more shining
I will be more satisfied,
If you are happy.
Just like to see you smile.
Good Taste
When I met my wife more than thirty years ago, I did not know at the time that she was good at cooking. She came from Taiwan, and I came from Thailand. However, my parents were immigrants from China, and I had my basic education in Chinese in Thailand. My wife and I have no language barrier in communication. On our first date, we went to a Thai restaurant in New York. After the dinner, I was surprised to hear that she could taste and name the ingredients inside the steamed lemon-fish dish and the ones in the hot and sour shrimp soup. She can cook the same kinds of food even though she has never been to Thailand.
There are experienced chefs that can use their taste-buds tongue to separate the different ingredients of foods. They know the sweet taste from sugar cane or palm sugar, the salty taste from salt or fish sauce, the spicy taste from green pepper or pepper powder, the sour taste from lemon or vinegar, and the scent from onion or garlic. Then they can mimic these tastes to make the same types of food.
After we married in 1985, she followed the Thai cookbook and made several Thai dishes for me to taste. These included: Somtum (Papaya salad,) Moo Satay (Pork barbecue skewers,) Gang Keaowan (Chicken green curry,) Gang Panangneux (Beef panang curry,) Pla neux manao (Steamed lemon fish,) and Tom Yam (Hot and sour soup). In general, Thai cuisine will include the taste of sweetness from palm sugar, the taste of salt from fish sauce, taste of spice from small green peppers, and the taste of fragrance from kaffir lime leaves or lemon grass. In general, her Thai dishes are better than a lot of the Thai restaurants in America.
My wife has worked as a server in Chinese and Japanese restaurants for more than twenty years. After watching the operation of the chefs in those kitchens, she has learned various cooking recipes from those experiences. These have increased her cooking ability. When one of our relatives opened a Chinese, Japanese, and Thai Restaurant, she was invited to be a partner of the newly opened restaurant. She was in charge as a chef for Thai and Japanese cuisines. Once, a Japanese female customer tested her Shabu Shabu (Japanese Hotpot). She praised the authenticity. And another Vietnam War veteran tasted her Tom Yam (Hot and sour soup) and said that when he was deployed to an American airbase in Thailand, he enjoyed the Tom Yam so much. He never tasted that same Hot and Sour Soup with kaffir lime leaves again in any other Thai Restaurant in America. On another occasion, while the Chinese chef was not showed up in the kitchen one day, she helped to cook a sweet and sour whole fist for the customer. The manager and chef praised her kitchen skills.
Besides Chinese, Thai, and Japanese food, she possesses skills in cuisines from other countries, including Korean and Vietnamese. Once she worked as a live-in babysitter who needed to cook one 3-dish dinner five days a week for a physician couple’s family. The menu of dishes renewed every day without repeat for 3 months. Both the doctors appreciated her cooking very much because they got a professional cook of their own. They can taste different country's styles of cooking, and they also saved tremendously on dine-out expenses.
My wife is a good baker too. Her Cappuccino cheesecake, Fruitcake and Apple-cake are all delicious. When I was still working at the Post Office, when I brought these cakes to share with my coworkers, they all praised the taste. Some of them even said it was out of this world. For the last 35 years, our family has seldom gone out for dinner or ordered takeout food. We do not need to. We have a professional cook in our family. There is a Chinese proverb that says, “When a girl needs to capture a man’s heart, she needs to capture his stomach first.”
I strongly believe in this motto.
My Childhood
The Mae Sai River is the border which separates Burma and Thailand. On the west side of the river is Daqili village, which belongs to Burma. Mae Sai village is situated on the east side of the river and belongs to Thailand. I grew up and attended a Chinese school in Daqili. During the 1950s, the Burmese government still approved the immigrants to open Chinese schools in Burma. The Thai government forbade the Chinese schools to exist. So, the Chinese families in Thailand had to send their children across the border to have Chinese education. These students had to hide whenever the Burmese immigration officers came to check for illegal aliens in the school. Only the students who lived in Daqili like me were shown in the classroom.
These two border villages are located in the notorious “Golden Triangle” drug trafficking area. This area includes Burma, Thailand, and Lao. There were around ten thousand acres of land in this mountainous area where poppies were grown. Opium is extracted from poppy flowers, and morphine is extracted from opium. At the time, there was no equipment to refine heroin. There were different drug lords who had their own armies living in the jungle area. The three governments could hardly get them under control.
When I was around 8, Daqili still had an open opium house for opium addicts. Children could walk there freely. There were two fifty-foot-long wooden couches on both sides of the corridor. Every 6 to 7 feet apart there was a gasoline lamp situated. A couple of the drug addicts would lie down on both sides of the lamp. Both had their own one-foot-long smoke pipe with opium which they purchased from the house owner. They lit the opium with the lamp and then inhaled it into their lungs. A few years later, that house was closed by the government.
I also witnessed a war between the Burmese army against the Chinese nationalist troops fleeing from China. When Chinese communists took over China and established The People's Republic of China in 1949, Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalist army retreated to Taiwan in eastern China. In the southwest, the nationalist army – the 93rd division - had to flee to the jungle in Burmese land. The Burmese did not want them to stay in their territory, so they sent their army to chase them out.
I saw the Burmese Bombers drop bombs in the faraway mountainous area almost every day. And the Burmese artillery infantry on top of the village hill fired innumerable cannon toward the mountainous area. When a cannon was fired, the village shook. The sound of machine guns and rifles sound from the jungle never stopped. Occasionally, there were military Jeeps passing by with injured soldiers on them. I still remember that the house we rented had a dugout about 4x4x4 feet under a bed at the back with a wooded board cover. I believe that was prepared for a hideout space if the battle reached the village. A few years later, after a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations, Chiang Kai-shek’s government agreed to take back their lost army. I had the chance to witness these nationalist soldiers in civilian clothes walk down from the hill in Mae Sai village. Several buses waited to pick them up and took them to the nearest airfield. The war ended.
Burma used to be a colony of Great Britain. Thailand was an ally of the Japanese Empire during WWII. To prevent the Japanese army from attacking Burma from Thailand, Great Britain's air force bombed the only iron bridge between Mae Sai and Daqili, just like what happened to the bridge on the river Kwai. When my family moved to Daqili, there were broken bridge piers left on both sides of the bank. When the villagers needed to do their business, they needed to wade across the river on foot. In the rainy season, they needed to take a transit boat to cross the river. One year, the transit boat capsized, and several people drowned.
When I was about 10 years old, I used to follow my mother and wade across the river when it was shallow. But it was during the daytime. One evening, I followed one of my older cousins wading across the river to the Mae Sai marketplace to watch an open-air Chinese opera performance. When the show was half over, I turned around and could not find my cousin. I thought she had left me alone there. I panicked and decided to run back home. When I got to the river, the moonlight was dim. I did not recognize which section was shallow. In the section I waded down, the water got deeper, I took off my shorts to prevent them from getting wet. The water got up to my waist. The water flow was a bit turbulent; it washed away my shorts. I did not dare to retrieve them. I just tried to wade across the river to the bank. For the first time, I ran home bare bottom and crying. My father was scared to death when he opened the door and saw my embarrassed look.
The same river almost claimed my young life in another accident. The Chinese school was near the river, and students liked to swim in the water. One day, I saw several of my friends playing in the water. I thought the water should be shallow. I took off my clothes and jumped in the water with only a pair of underwear on. By the time I realized my feet did not touch the riverbed, it was already too late. I drank several mouthfuls of water. When I was about to give up, I felt something underneath the water pushing me back toward the bank. When my feet could touch the waterbed, I knew I was saved. Turning around, the man who pushed from under the water was another older cousin. He was playing with me, but he saved my life.
Since my family was not wealthy, and I was the eldest son of the family, I knew then I had to say goodbye to my school and my education altogether. I needed to find a job to help my family’s financial situation. But a thirteen-year-old child could hardly find any job at the time. I also knew that I would have to work in some kind of room and board factory to learn some skills without pay for a few years before I could actually earn a living by myself
Welcome to New York
An Autobiography
It was about 4:00 p.m. on September 14, 1972. I was 24 years old at the time. My parents, my brother, and two other sisters accompanied me at Bangkok ‘Don Muang’ Airport, to send me off to New York, America. More than twenty friends and relatives came to wish me a good trip on my journey to further my education in America. This was my first time ever taking a flight to leave my beloved country – Thailand. I had some mixed moods. I was glad that I would go to study in America, but I was worried about what I was going to face in a far away and unknown country.
The Belgium “Sabina” airline flight was scheduled at 5:00 pm. I was checking my belongings before boarding the flight, when I realized that I forgot to bring my chest x-ray film, a document which was required for passing the health department at Kennedy Airport. I left them at the travel agency who helped me buy my ticket and process my visa from the American Embassy. My mind was numb at that moment. I did not know what to do or how to solve the problem. I did not have enough time to get the X-ray film from the city. I could not change my departure time at such short notice in fear I might lose my ticket money. But if I boarded the flight, customs in New York might deny my entry and send me back home. I walked around in a panic and kept blaming myself for my oversight. Fortunately, a past colleague of mine from a hotel in Bangkok who knew a Sabina airline ground crew member at the airport helped me solve the problem. The crew official suggested to me to get on the flight and let my family member pick up the x-ray film and send it on the next Sabina airline flight. But I had to wait for more than half a day in Belgium Brussels Airport to get the film and catch the following flight to New York. Finally, after they changed my ticket schedule and itinerary, I sighed in relief and boarded the plane.
On this flight, I had another acquaintance Pote flying with me. We both seek a temporary stay with another friend Guang who already lived in New York. We hoped to rely on our mutual friend for our adventure in a foreign country. After the plane took off, miscellaneous moods poured into my mind. Can I survive in New York? How would I continue my education? Can my sisters and brother take care of our parents without me? The questions went on and on without any answer. I did not even know when I fell sleep.
The announcement woke me up, I found out our airplane was sitting on the tarmac of Iran Tehran International Airport for refueling. It was midnight. This took almost two hours before the plane took off again. I fell asleep the whole time en route from Tehran to Brussels, Belgium. I woke up again at Brussels airport. It may be 5:00 am. I had to claim my luggage and planned to stay in the airport for an entire day to wait for my X-ray film. I begged Pote to ask Guang to come to pick me up again when I arrived at New York Kennedy Airport, for I may be lost in an unfamiliar city.
I had to bring my luggage and leave from the boarding area to the waiting area outside. When the custom officer saw my English – Thai dictionary in my backpack, he just smilingly told me how to spell “Dictionary’ in French and let me get out to the waiting area without checking my luggage. I had a long day at the airport waiting area. I wished to get out to Brussels city for a tour. But scarce pocket money and no visiting visa prevented me from any excursions. The waiting time was so tedious. I also had to spend about $10 on a steak for my lunch in the airport’s restaurant. That was a little more than 200 baht in Thai currency. My pocket was slightly lighter.
Finally, I got the news from the Sabina Airline desk counter official that my X-ray film had arrived. So, after more than 12 hours of waiting, I could continue my journey again. On this cross-Atlantic Ocean journey, I fell asleep again for the whole time. When I got off the plane, a ridiculous thing occurred. The customs official did not even bother to touch my X-ray film. He just checked my passport and visa and let me leave easily. All the fears on the trip were wasted. I wanted to wail and realized that I had created all the trouble myself for worrying.
When I got out of the airport arrival hall area, I saw the clock point at 5:00 pm. Looking through the glass wall outside, it was still very bright. I confirmed with the airline counter, the date was September 15. The whole journey from Bangkok to New York took me about 36 hours (about 1 and a half days). I experienced a wonderful phenomenon --- One day equals 36 hours.
I waited in the arrival hall for almost two hours. Neither Pote nor Guang showed up. The sky got darker. New York was a completely strange city to me. Was I going to get lost in this unfamiliar city? Was this supposed to be my fate in this new city? I knew I could not wait any longer. I needed to solve the problem right then by myself.
I went outside and hired a taxi. The taxi driver helped put my luggage in the trunk. I handed over Guang’s address and my trust to him. I prayed to myself before stepping into the car. It took about half an hour to get to the Queens address. I thanked the driver for the safe trip and gave him $10 for taxi fees and tips.
No one answered the doorbell at Guang’s apartment. I had to wait outside the building door for almost 15 minutes. Fortunately, a tenant from the same building was returning from outside, saw me wearing a suit and necktie, and let me into the building. I carried my stuff, took the elevator upstairs, and found Guang’s apartment. Nobody answered the door. I stood and waited near the window at the end of the corridor. Guang went to work in a Chinese restaurant and Pote was with him all that time.
I waited almost two hours; my Seiko watch pointed at 11:00 pm. I was relieved to see Guang and Pote come out of the elevator. They helped bring my belongings into Guang’s bedroom. After we settled down, Guang told me, “Change your clothes, we go out to see the nightlife in New York.” I changed my suit into comfortable clothes and went out with them.
On the way to the subway station, Pote told me, “Guang shared the apartment with another roommate. His roommate had forbidden him to bring additional friends to the apartment. We needed to leave before the roommate came back from work to avoid confrontation.”
A novel feeling got hold of me when I rode the subway train for the first time. No subway transit system existed in Thailand at the time. We rode the train from Queens to Manhattan. Chinatown was our first destination. The Chinatown atmosphere looked like the Chinatown in Bangkok. The nightlife was still very lively. Little Italy nearby had a fair going on. In Chinatown, we went into a restaurant that was still open. We had a bowl of wonton noodle soup each for about $4, 10 times higher than in Bangkok.
Times Square, our next place to visit, was considered one of the most famous red-light districts in the world at the time. The street was still full of visitors from around the world. There was a live sex show theater and some sex goods stores with sex goods and magazines on the street. The famous neon light advertising signboards in Times Square were still flashing in the evening. At about 4 o’clock in the morning, our legs felt tired from walking. Guang told us, “Let us go back to my apartment. My roommate should be asleep at this time.” We took the subway from Manhattan back to Queens. We walked back to the apartment building and sneaked into Guang’s bedroom. We all fell asleep immediately on the bedroom floor.
We woke up around noon. We had expected another friend Dai who took the same Sabina Airline flight to arrive at 5 p.m. that day. Guang needed to go to work in the Chinese restaurant. He told Pote and me, who were still new to New York, to pick Dai up from Kennedy Airport. He showed the subway’s transit map to us and pointed to a Queens station, then we should transfer to an airport shuttle bus. He then went to work and left the two newcomers alone.
Around 3 o’clock, Pote and I followed Guang’s directions to Kennedy Airport. We left early, because we were afraid, we might get lost and miss the pick-up time. We waited in the arrival hall for more than an hour. At about 5 o’clock, we saw Dai walk out with his luggage. We greeted him and went to help with his luggage.
At that moment, I recognized another passenger from the same flight as Dai. She was my university schoolmate. She was a grade above me. I started my university education late; she was younger than me. She was also my co-worker in a hotel in Bangkok. I went to greet her. She told me, “I am waiting for my friend to pick me up. But she does not show up. Instead, she sent a young Thai man who came to pick up someone else and pick me up too.” My school sister was worried about leaving with a stranger. She looked at me with pleading eyes. I knew she wanted my help. However, I had my own problem with my dwelling place. I did not want her to suffer like me the night before. I could only apologize to her and let her know about my situation. I left her alone to face her own uncertainty, even though I could hardly bear to do that.
The same episode repeated itself again. Guang, Pote, Dai and I had to sneak out from Guang’s apartment before his roommate came back. We toured Chinatown and Times Square again that evening. But I saw Dai was uncomfortable with a sick look. He told me “I have a reaction to the vaccination.” The vaccination was required for every passenger from certain countries to enter America. I suggested we should find a motel to stay in for the night. Guang took us to a motel near Times Square. We shared the $40 hotel room fee and hoped to sleep better that night. In the bedroom, Guang asked us how to tip the waiter, but the waiter already snatched the $4 from Guang’s hand and left. All of us just jumped on the two twin beds and fell asleep soon after.
The next day, all four of us went to rent a hotel room in the upper west side of New York to solve our temporary lodging problem. Each of us had to pay $100 in advance for one month's rent. My pocket money of about $1,000 which I brought from Thailand had reduced significantly.
After settling the lodging issue, I needed to handle my educational problem. I received an I-20 form (a document issue by an educational institution in America which is approved by the immigration department for entry and permission to study in the US) from an English school in Washington DC. But I did not have a friend or an acquaintance in DC. With Guang’s assistance, I obtained an I-20 form from an English school in New York and went to the Immigration office in lower Manhattan to apply for a transfer of school from DC to New York. A few days later, the hotel clerk handed me a letter from immigration. The printed letter stated:
“It is necessary for you to depart from this country before October 15, 1972.”
This terrible news shocked me tremendously. I had just arrived in New York on September 15, now I was ordered to leave with only one month to stay. My dream of education in America had just vanished. A doomsday feeling shrouded all my consciousness.
No one could help me this time. My three roommates were foreign pupils. No one likes dealing with immigration. I did not have enough money to hire a lawyer to help me solve the case. Only one thought was in my mind. “I have struggled in society since my childhood. This time, I needed to use all my courage to fight the problem face on.”
I went to the Immigration department and requested to meet an Immigration officer for my case. I was told that the reason for the deportation letter was due to my abrupt changing of school. They suspected the main purpose for me to stay in New York was just illegally working. I showed him my document to prove that I had two years of education in Thailand with the most famous Chulalonkorn University. I told him that I really want to continue my education in America. The reason I needed to change schools was that I had friends who lived in New York but not Washington, DC. I asked him what I could do in this case. He finally told me to submit a ‘Motion for Reconsideration’ letter explaining why I needed to change the school to New York instead of Washington DC. He also insisted that I had to stay in school and not work. I followed his advice by submitting a two-page letter explaining the reason for me to change the school and city. I also paid $50 for the fee before I left the Immigration office and hope to get a favorable reply from them a few days later.
Following the order of the Immigration officer, I went to register in the English school in New York and paid about $200 for the class. I began to attend school every day and dared not work. My pocket money was getting very stingy. I had to keep an eye on my spending. My other three roommates and I moved to a low-rent apartment near Chinatown in lower Manhattan. The rent was $80 per month. But there was only one bedroom with no bed. We had to sleep on the floor. One toilet separated from a seat in the bathtub. You needed to use a water container to receive water for bathing.
Trying to save money, I bought a bag of apples which cost less than a dollar. The apple and water were my daily meals for a week time. The most luxurious meal was a piece of pizza which cost around thirty cents at the time. Some nights, when my friend Guang brought back some leftover Chinese food from his workplace, it became a heavenly treat for me.
More than a month had passed. I did not receive any reply from the immigration office. I had exceeded my one month of stay already. Officially, I was an illegal alien. Unfortunately, my pocket money had run out. I needed to find a job to sustain my living. I found a midnight shift busboy’s job in a diner, in Queens. I studied during the day and worked at night.
The fall semester is at an end. I still did not receive a response about my status. A schoolmate suggested to me to apply for New York University. He said the well-known University can help solve my problem if I was accepted as a student. I sent in an application and was accepted as a full-time student majoring in economics. The only requirement was that I needed to take an intensive English course in the spring semester. The University official who was dealing with foreign students issued an I-20 form and promised to submit the change of school for me with immigration. I then spent all my savings from the busboy’s job to pay for the tuition which cost about $500 at the time.
In the spring semester, I kept on my Intensive English course study at NYU during the day. I also changed my job as a waiter in the Junior restaurant in Brooklyn in the evening. My income was getting better. However, I still have not received a reply letter from immigration yet. My misfortune had also kept piling on me.
One night, when I came back from work, I walked from the Chinatown subway station to my apartment. At one dark corner of the street, three Puerto Ricans with a knife and baseball bat rushed toward me. They demanded my money. I was so scared and handed them my wallet. They took out all my money, which was about $80. One of the guys came close to me and searched for my other belongings. He took the Seiko watch from my left arm and a folded comb from my back trouser pocket. But they gave me back $2 and said that was for my subway fee back home. It was dark, they did not see a tiger eye stone ring which was on my right ring finger.
Enough is enough, I decided not to stay at this ghetto any longer. When I made enough money from my waiter job, I rushed to rent an apartment in Queens which was considered a safe area. I said goodbye to my three roommates – Guang, Pote and Dai. From that time on, I had to take the subway from Queens to Manhattan for study and to Brooklyn for my job. One day, when the subway train was crossing the Hudson River, I peeled off the tiger eye ring from my finger and threw it out of the train window to the river. I wished for all my bad luck to be gone with the ring.
During this time, when I wrote to my parents, I just told them everything was ok here in New York, for I did not want them to worry about their son. How could I tell them all the struggle I experienced in this city?
I went to an NYU official who helped me submit my I-20 form and begged them to help me on my case. I told them about my awful living situation. I lost my appetite and had a lot of sleepless nights. I also told them I dared not go to immigration myself with my unclear identity. They promised to find out the results for me. A few days later, I went to that office again. They showed me the reply letter which I was waiting for. I was approved to stay in New York from my first ‘Motion for Reconsideration’ request. But the official letter was not allowed to be forwarded, so I was kept in despair during these times.
Finally, I felt like dawn had just returned. I was not an illegal alien anymore!
American Dream
In 1984, I worked as a waiter at a small Chinese restaurant in West Hartford at the corner of South Main and Sedgwick Road. The restaurant had about 10 dining tables served by 2 waiters. In the fall of that year, Lin, a woman from Taiwan joined us as a cashier. The business was good. At dinner time, patrons would fill up the tables almost every evening.
One day, when Sung – another waiter – and I were busy serving customers, Lin came to help us with serving water and cleaning the tables. As an experienced waiter, I felt like she was crossing duties. I told her:
“We don’t need help. We can handle ourselves.”
She was stunned by my words and stopped helping abruptly. I felt ashamed of my behavior and went to apologize after dinner service.
“Sorry. I apologize for what I said to you.”
“It’s OK. I accept the apology,” she said.
Lin was 26, ten years younger than me. Her naturally poised and charming appearance attracted my attention. After a few months of working together, I felt like she was the one I was looking for as a companion. I started my pursuit and took her out on a date. I found out that she was divorced with three children. I also found out she was an excellent cook, which was my weakness. I didn’t mind that she had three children at all. After a few months of courtship, I proposed to her in my car at the South Main Street parking lot near the restaurant. She confessed to me that she might not be able to bear a child for me because she had had her ovaries tied. This is considered a taboo in Chinese culture, as for the husband, it means he won’t be able to have a son to carry on his family name. I told her:
“I don’t mind that. I just mind that I would lose the opportunity of a lifetime to marry the person I love. Besides, I can treat your children as my own.”
“I will perform another operation to untie my ovaries. There is still a chance that we can have our own children,” she answered.
When I was a bachelor I never worried about my future. I did not save any money at all. She did not take that fact into consideration in her decision. A little while later, I received an official recruitment letter from the New York Postal Service, noting that I had passed the test for the clerk’s position. I needed to report to the post office immediately. I asked for Lin’s opinion on the matter. She urged me to take the job right away because that position was a career and my job as a waiter had no future. Before I went to New York, we went to the West Hartford Town Hall to perform a notarized marriage without any celebration.
I left my newlywed wife in Connecticut and went to report for job training at the Flushing Post Office in New York. My wife paid my apartment’s rent while I stayed there. As a trainee on the job, for the first few months, I was given only a few hours of work per day. My income did not cover my expenses. I would drive back to West Hartford to work part-time as a waiter at China Inn and live in the dormitory that was provided by the restaurant for the employees. I had to travel back and forth to meet our needs.
A few months later, my wife went back to Taiwan, planning to do an operation to untie her ovarian tubes. She left $2,000 for my expenses in New York. She also paid for the expenses at the Taipei Hospital. In Taiwan, she stayed with an old neighbor she was acquainted with. The neighbor lady was so kind that she brought food on her daily visits to my wife at the hospital. The operation was considered a success. That gave us hope for our future. After she recovered from the operation and before she came back to America, she went to visit her children who were living at her former parent-in-law’s house. This is to compensate for a divorced mother of missing her own children.
After a month as a trainee, I became a part-time flexible clerk. This meant I could get at least four hours of work each day. In hopes of staying together with my wife, after three months in Flushing, I sent a letter to the Postmaster at the Hartford Main office to request a transfer. I got an answer after three months of waiting. In the fall of 1985, my wife and I rented an apartment on Farmington Ave in New Britain. I reported to work at the Hartford Post Office, and she found a waitress job at Great Taste Chinese restaurant in New Britain.
After several months passed by my wife became upset that she had not become pregnant yet. She went to consult with an OBGYN doctor and followed the doctor’s advice to perform another operation to clean up the fat around her oviduct. But we still did not get any good news after that. In 1986, we decided to take a trip to Taiwan to have an in vitro operation. The cost for this test tube baby procedure was one-third what we would pay in America. She could also visit her children again. We also considered the trip as our honeymoon, which we had not taken after our wedding.
In Taiwan, we stayed with her neighbor again. Besides the hospital visit, we went to have a wedding photo session to make up for what we missed out on with the town hall wedding. We also traveled to Thailand to visit my native country. During the trip to Thailand, we went to my parent’s graveyard to pay a visit. When we left the graveyard, my wife told me:
“I prayed in front of your parent’s grave that I was willing to give away 10 years of my lifespan in exchange for a son for you.”
I was shocked to hear her words. In our culture to pledge in front of your ancestor is considered an oath. There would be consequences for that oath. I stared at this woman who took several risks on operations, and who was willing to cut short her lifespan, just to bear a child for me. I wondered if I could pay her back at all.
The in vitro operation was not successful. When we came back to America, we contacted the University of Connecticut’s hospital and planned to do another test tube baby shortly. In the meantime, we also contacted a Chinese real estate agent, who was an acquaintance, to help us find a house for us. We looked at more than 50 houses with no success. One day in 1987, my wife saw an advertisement in the Hartford Courant, for a house for sale by an owner at South Main Street in West Hartford. This was a familiar area for us, so my wife went to look at the house. She told me later that she fell in love with the house at first sight. The next day, when we went to visit together, I also liked it very much. We made an offer on the spot. After negotiations, we settled on $140,000 for the house. We put down $50,000 and acquired a $90,000 mortgage with a 10% interest rate for the house.
When we moved into our new house, we had spent all our savings. We could not afford to buy any new furniture. We had to sleep on the carpet floor. We had to postpone the invitro operation appointment. However, we received some unexpected, good news. One night, when I came back from work, my wife told me:
“I am pregnant.”
“Really?” I asked surprised. I hugged her so tight. My eyes were watering. Tears had fallen from her eyes. There were tears of happiness. After so many operations were performed, she got pregnant naturally. This had to be a gift from heaven!
Now as a pregnant woman, she told me that she wished to eat Cantonese-style porridge (rice soup). Without a second thought, I drove more than two hours to New York’s Chinatown to buy the porridge for her. I also rented some Chinese movie cassette tapes for her, because there were no Chinese restaurants that carried the Cantonese porridge and no Chinese movie renting stores in Connecticut at the time. After a few weeks of this routine trip, she was still not satisfied with the situation. She told me she wished to go back to Taiwan again to see her children and to have all the Chinese foods she liked over there. I bought a round-trip ticket and sent her back to Taiwan to rest her body and mind.
During the time of her absence, I made a very bad mistake in my life – I got hooked on gambling. I bet on sports games with a private bookie. In the beginning, I was winning, but by the time my wife came back, I had lost about $10,000. All the savings prepared for my infant baby had gone. When she came back, I confessed to her and promised to quit and not touch gambling again. She chose to believe me at the time. For over thirty years, I have kept my promise.
To support the family, I applied and got a second job at Osaka Japanese restaurant at West Hartford Center. I worked at the post office and a Japanese restaurant for 14 hours daily when my son was born. My wife also worked in another Japanese restaurant for more than 10 hours a day. I volunteered to get up at night to bottle-fed my son and let her sleep. One night, my infant baby did not stop crying even after being bottle-fed. My lack of sleep and tired body triggered my temper and I shouted at him causing him to cry even louder. Suddenly, I felt so bad about myself - I wouldn’t ever yell at him again. I still wonder how I managed to get through the time before my son grew out of bottle feeding.
During those years, my wife’s ex-husband’s family had been approved for immigrant status by the US Immigration Office. Her children immigrated from Taiwan to the US with their grandparents. They lived in their uncle’s house in Wilmington, Delaware. We went to visit them and got their grandparent’s permission to bring the children back to stay with us for a week. The children wanted to live with their mother, and their father had a separate family with children already. When we took the children back to Delaware, we negotiated with their father to have the children stay with us. After I promised not to request any alimony from them, their father agreed to let them come back with us to Connecticut.
I love the kids like my own. They did not speak English at all at the time. When I played the video cassette of the movie “To Sir with Love,” I had to translate it into Chinese for them to understand. I helped them settle into their school. I sent and picked them up from the school every day. I helped them with their homework. The eldest helped babysit her infant brother when we were at work. We became a close-knit and happy family. We added another member to the family, my youngest son, who was born in 1992. My wife kept reminding me that South Main Street was our lucky street. We worked together at South Main Street. I proposed to her on the same street. We married, bought a house, and had our children all together on the same street.
My wife was an unbending lady; she would not take any of my suggestions. There was a period of almost half a year when we were without auto insurance. She wanted to save money, and we had no record of a car accident for a long time. One day, she called me from her work.
“I hit a motorcycle at a red-light crossing.” Her voice was trembling.
“Calm down. Tell me what had happened?” I asked.
“On my way to work, at a red-light crossing, when the light turned green, my foot just pressed the car gas pedal too soon and the car hit the motorcycle in front of me. I don’t know what I am going to do now. With no insurance, we will get sued and lose our property soon,” she said hysterically.
“Calm down. Did the motorcycle driver get injured?” I asked.
“He got some bruises, and the motorcycle got a little damaged.”
“Don’t worry. If the sky is falling, I will raise my two hands up to hold it for you.” I used a Chinese proverb to calm her.
After out-of-court negotiations, we paid the motorcycle driver $4000 to resolve the problem. She told me later that she expected me to yell at her for her mistake on the phone. Instead, she was surprised and grateful to hear my supportive, comforting words during her time of need.
My wife had another car accident a year later. A car rear-ended her car at a red light stop on Ridgewood Road in West Hartford. My wife got hurt when her neck hit the car’s headrest. We had to hire a lawyer to pursue the case. I had to drive my wife twice a week to New York City for acupuncture treatment. The pain was reduced but could not heal completely. The case proceeded for more than a year, and we ended up getting $50,000 in compensation. But after the lawyer fee, we took only $35,000 home. We applied that money to pay for the principal of our mortgage. For a mortgage of $90,000 with 10% loan interest, we might have had to pay about $300,000 over 30 years. Every month, we kept adding as much money as possible to pay off the principal of the loan. With the addition of the accident compensation, we paid off the loan in 7 years, finishing in 1994.
I remember the day we paid off the mortgage. When I came back from work, I sat in the car and watched the house in our driveway for a long time. I could feel the smile on my face thinking – this is the American dream!
When my wife came back that night, she told me:
“I sat in my car for a long time. I kept thinking how this was a dream come true. This is my own house”
We both smiled.