Listen to the Squawking Chicken: When Mother Knows Best, What's a Daughter To Do? A Memoir (Sort Of) (6 page)

Ma’s parents weren’t particularly responsible or loving. They compromised her repeatedly. They were neglectful and unsupportive. And worse still, they showed no remorse. By Western standards, it would have been well within Ma’s rights to turn her back on her parents. To forsake them and not forgive. To abandon them without regret. But while Ma survived her ordeal and became stronger for it, finding her squawking chicken voice because of it, she continued to observe the principles of Filial Piety. She never spoke ill of her parents outside the home. She continued to play the part of dutiful first daughter. She continued to look after her five brothers and sisters without complaint. She handed over a
majority of her earnings to her parents without resentment. When she married my father, she kneeled humbly before the village, in the presence of her ancestors, to thank her parents for raising her. And she kept bailing them out of trouble, over and over and over again, often at her own expense.

I spent the summer before my sixth birthday in Hong Kong with Ma. Every other day she’d take me to my grandmother’s to check in. One afternoon, there was debris littered along the corridor leading up to my grandmother’s apartment where she ran a mah-jong den. The door was already open. It was a mess when we stepped inside. There was glass everywhere. The television had been smashed and was lying on the floor. Mah-jong tiles were all over the place. The couch had been slashed. I remember slipping on a chopstick, my mother catching me by the arm before my head hit the corner of the coffee table. My grandmother was wailing in the bathtub. My grandfather was chain-smoking in the bedroom, the door closed.

It turns out Grandmother had been playing high-stakes mah-jong at one of the bigger mah-jong dens in town. She was carrying big losses and was behind on her payments. The mah-jong dens were run by local gang members and they’d
sent some of their thugs to collect. When Grandmother couldn’t come up with the cash, they gave her a warning by trashing her apartment. Next time, they warned, they’d come for something more permanent.

Ma knew these were serious threats. She also knew they could not be put off any longer and that the situation was beyond her negotiation skills. Ma took my hand and marched me out the door. We walked to the bank where one of her good friends, Auntie Lai, was the bank manager. She told me to wait outside. I could see her in Auntie’s office through the glass, smoking her cigarettes, waiting while Auntie walked back and forth between the teller and the vault. Eventually Ma signed some papers and zipped up her purse. We were on our way to pay off Grandmother’s debt. After Ma settled up at the mah-jong den, we headed back to Grandmother’s apartment. On the way, she stopped at a toy store and bought me a pop-up card game. I sat on Grandmother’s shredded couch, playing my new game, while Ma bathed her mother and put her to bed. I kept playing while Ma picked up the chairs and the overturned tables, while she swept the broken pieces of television into a trash bin, while she mopped the tiles on her hands and knees with a washcloth, her perfect long red nails pushing back and forth, scrubbing the dirt and the dust off the floor.

Two days later, we flew back to Canada, our trip cut
short by a month. Ma went back to work. She was already working two jobs, but she took on an extra job on weekends so she could pay off the loan she’d taken out to save Grandmother’s ass.

My ma repaid her mother’s debt. She did the same for her father when he fell ill. I was eleven that summer. Grandfather had been ailing for weeks. I was afraid to look at him. His eyes were yellow. His face was yellow. His breath smelled. Grandmother suspended gaming at her mah-jong den. It wasn’t fun anymore to go to my grandparents’. Before Grandfather’s illness, it was always boisterous over there. The mah-jong players gossiped. They were the entertainment. Now, without them, it was too quiet. Grandfather kept moaning from the bedroom and there was no one to play with, no one to talk to. People had started to write him off, saying it was only a matter of time.

Ma had a doctor of Chinese medicine come over to examine Grandfather, looking for a cure. The man had very long nose hairs. I was hesitant to greet him at the door. Ma scolded me for being rude. They disappeared into Grandfather’s bedroom for a long time, so long I started to worry that Ma would have long nose hairs herself when she came back out. When they finally emerged, Ma had that expression on her face I was beginning to recognize—determination. After Dr. Nose Hair left, she picked up the phone to call my
auntie Lai, making arrangements to have me stay with her for a few days because she had to go on a trip to help Grandfather. I started crying. I didn’t want Ma to take off on me because Dr. Nose Hair told her to.

But Ma was off to Mainland China. She said she was going in search of a magic turtle that could save Grandfather’s life. A magic turtle!? This made me rethink the grossness of Dr. Nose Hair. The dude was recommending magic turtles. He couldn’t be that bad. Many Chinese believe that turtles have healing properties. Turtle soup is said to be an effective cure for a number of diseases for those who are suffering and a longevity booster for those who are healthy. According to Dr. Nose Hair, the turtles from a small village in the Chinese province of Guangzhou were particularly potent. Ma was to buy a magic turtle from the village, bring it back and prepare it using the recipe that Dr. Nose Hair had prescribed. She told me it would be a rough trip, not suitable for children. I was to hang out at Auntie Lai’s until she came home.

It took her two days. She went straight to Grandfather’s when she returned. I insisted that Auntie Lai bring me over there because I was so desperate to see the turtle. Unfortunately, it had already been killed and taken apart and was boiling by the time I got back. Ma was standing over a steaming terra-cotta pot and when I rushed forward to look,
she shouted at me to get out of her way. Ma’s voice was even sharper than usual that day. And she looked tired. She hadn’t had time to have her hair blown out. It was lank, parted in the middle, stuck to both sides of her face. I knew not to bother her.

A few hours passed and the magic turtle soup was ready. Ma took a bowl into Grandfather’s bedroom. She sat in a chair next to the bed. I was terrified to go inside, but I was also really curious about whether or not the magic turtle would make Grandfather feel better. I peeked my head around the corner and saw Ma’s long red fingernails holding up a soup spoon to Grandfather’s mouth. His eyes were closed. She patiently waited every time he gulped. I was disgusted by the sounds and the dank stench wafting off his body and, at the same time, fascinated by those nails, that spoon, circling slowly around the bowl, skimming a layer off the top every time, then making its way back to Grandfather’s lips.

Ma fed Grandfather every three hours until every drop in the pot had been consumed. Three days later he was able to get out of bed. After a week he was walking around again. Two weeks later he was almost back to normal. The magic turtle totally worked.

Many years later, when Grandmother died, and
Grandfather had already passed away, I asked Ma about the debt and the magic turtle incidents. I asked her how she could go to such great lengths to help her parents, especially after the way she’d been treated. Ma explained that Filial Piety protects the future. She believes that Filial Piety is like depositing money in a bank account—the more good you do for your parents, the more bonus karma points you accumulate in your savings. Those savings are there for your own children. So that if perhaps they encounter challenges, or make mistakes, the goodwill, the good karma that’s been stored in the Filial Piety Bank Account, can be withdrawn to see them through the hard times, make their trials easier, make their tribulations shorter. Ma was good to her parents for me then. Sort of. More specifically, Ma treated her parents well so that I would eventually treat her well, and make all her efforts worthwhile. This is Ma’s particular spin on Filial Piety. Ultimately her application and interpretation of it benefits
her
.

For the Squawking Chicken, being born is a gift—a parent’s first gift to their child—and it’s a gift that a child must keep repaying, over and over and over again. Ma paid back her parents. And now I’m doing the same.

But is that selfish? Does that mean she’s a selfish person? Well, sure. Aren’t all parents selfish though? Honestly, aren’t they?

Why do people have children?

People have children to have someone to love. People have children because their children make
them
happy.

Is that selfless, or is it selfish?

For my ma, the decision was selfish. And she owns it. She had me to make her happy. In her mind, why would she go to such lengths to carry around a baby, to feed it, to worry about it, to hope for it if, in some measure, she would not be getting something out of it? This way of thinking is particularly effective in managing a rebellious teenager’s entitlement and outrage when mandated to follow household rules.

When I was sixteen my curfew was one o’clock for special occasions (birthday parties, etc.). This was not negotiable. There was an upcoming school dance I was really excited about. I had a boyfriend. He was popular, and because I was his girlfriend, I was popular too. The dance was the first off-site school event of the year where we would show up as a couple. A lot of other girls were jealous of me. So I really wanted to look great that night. I wanted to walk in holding hands with my boyfriend and live up to the envy. My dress was really cute. My hair was working for me too. And all the
cool kids were going to a house party afterward. The plan was to make out in the basement and stay out until dawn. I was convinced that my experience wouldn’t be complete if I had to be home by one o’clock and skipped the after-party. Besides, I had to be there to make sure no one else would hit on my boyfriend.

I waited until Ma was in a great mood. A few days before the dance, she came home from mah-jong after a lucky night. So I asked her before bed if we could make an exception. If I could stay out late after the dance to hang out with my friends. She said no. So I switched tactics. I told her that if I didn’t go, I would be an outcast, and people wouldn’t want to be friends with me. Big mistake. That only strengthened her resolve. “Why should I made adjustments to the rules just because you’re insecure?” she asked.

I decided to regroup and try again later. I was expecting a test result back the next day anyway. And Ma usually rewarded me for good marks. When I came home from school that afternoon, I showed her my test score. It was 93 percent. “Look, Ma, I got one of the highest marks in class. As a bonus, can we extend my curfew after the dance?”

“Why should I extend your curfew when it’s so obviously working and you’re doing so well in school? What if I extend your curfew and you start failing? No thank you.”

So I lost it. I railed and I raged. I threw down an epic
teenage tantrum. I accused her of child abuse. I told her I hated her. I said she was the worst mother of anyone I knew. I told her she sucked at being a mother. “I don’t understand why you even had me when all you ever do is make me miserable. Why did you bring me into this world?!”

These would be hurtful words to hear for some mothers. And some mothers, guilted by their child’s unhappiness, would relent. Because they prioritize their children’s happiness over their own, and ultimately most parents only want happiness for their kids. Parents are supposed to be selfless. This is how it is with my husband’s family. They are Polish. They would never dream of accepting gifts from their children. It feels wrong to be on the receiving end. To them, they should always be the givers. Unlike my ma and her cruise, when we sent my in-laws to Italy for their fortieth wedding anniversary, they desperately wanted to return the favor. They refuse our every gesture to help them, not out of pride, but because of their ethics. They consider it unconscionable for a parent to take from a child. Instead, in many ways, they put themselves at the mercy of their children, forever responsible for their happiness.

My happiness is a priority for my mother only if it leads to her own happiness. Which is why, when I tried to use the threat of my unhappiness as a weapon against her, it never worked. Guilting my ma has never worked. Remember,
according to the tenets of Filial Piety, a child achieves true happiness and enlightenment only when she has successfully secured the happiness of her parents. And according to the tenets of my ma’s customized brand of Filial Piety, her child’s happiness is simply a bonus to securing hers. After all, she earned it:
I brought you into this world and you get to go to school. You get to eat good food. You get to have friends. How lucky you are! How much luckier you are than Old Woman Choi down at the market? When I was growing up, her kids had to eat leftover chicken scraps and they didn’t know how to read and write! Why aren’t you thanking me that you are not Old Woman Choi? Why aren’t you thanking me for your life? I gave you such a good life. I gave you the best life. Did you thank me for your best life? Is this how you thank me for your best life? Is this how you thank me for having a life?