Gold Mountain Blues - Ling Zhang [70]
From a distance she saw Auyung sitting on a sofa in the hotel lobby, his eyes narrowed and with a foolish grin on his face. She waved at him but there was no reaction. It was only when she was up close that she realized he was asleep. Amy had never seen someone look so silly in sleep. She could not resist pulling out her camera and taking a close-up shot. At the flash, he woke up with a start. Wiping a drop of saliva from the corner of his mouth he put his head on one side and looked at Amy. “Yesterday you were a prof. Today you look like a student,” he said. “I prefer the student.”
Amy cocked her head and looked back at him. “Now you’re awake, you look like an old man. When you were asleep, you looked like a kid. I like you better asleep.”
Auyung put his finger to his lips. “Shhh. Best not to say things like that in a public place. People might get the wrong idea.”
They both roared with laughter.
“How come you’re sleepy at this time in the morning?” asked Amy. “One person’s morning is another’s midday,” he said. “I’ve already done two hours’ work.” He looked at his watch. “Right. We’re too late for the hotel breakfast. Let’s go straight to the diulau and then I’ll get the driver to go and buy some soy milk and a sticky rice cake for you.”
They got into the car. “What was my great-grandmother’s name?” asked Amy. “Her full name was Kwan Suk Yin,” he replied. “But when she was young, everyone called her Six Fingers, and when she was old, it was Granny Kwan. Hardly anyone knew her proper name.”
Amy thought for a moment. Suddenly, light dawned. “My great-grandfather was Fong Tak Fat and my great-grandmother was Kwan Suk Yin. The name of the diulau is Tak Yin House—they must have put the two names together.”
“Nowadays it’s no big deal to call a house after a woman,” said Auyung. “But in the countryside of Guangdong in 1913, it was considered very avant-garde. In those days, no one outside the family knew the names of unmarried girls. When a girl reached marrying age, the full name would be written out properly on a piece of paper, sealed inside a red envelope, laid on a gold-painted tray together with her horoscope and given to the matchmaker to take to the boy’s family. That’s why asking for a girl’s hand in marriage was also called ‘asking the girl’s name’.”
“Was she pretty, my great-grandmother?” asked Amy, remembering the eyes she had seen in the wardrobe mirror the day before.
“There should be a photo of her in Tak Yin House. You can see for yourself.”
Years twenty to twenty-one of the reign of Guangxu (1894–1895) Spur-On Village, Hoi Ping County, Guangdong, China
The wedding took place at the end of the first month of year twenty of the reign of Guangxu. For many years after, the elders of Spur-On Village still remembered that day, even though they had only been children then.
The banquet began when the sun had just risen to the tops of the trees and continued till midnight with guests dropping in and partaking as they pleased … a “running water” banquet, it was called. The chef and his assistants had been commandeered from the famous Tin Yat Tin Restaurant in Canton city. There were six of them and they were on their feet the whole time, alternately preparing and chopping the vegetables and cooking the food. As time went on, some of the children began to make a racket. Their mothers beat them over the head with their chopsticks, berating them: “This is Uncle Ah-Fat’s big day. Don’t you go spoiling it! Get a bowl of food and take it home to eat.” The children were quick to catch on: obediently they filled their bowls to overflowing with something from every dish. They did not eat at home, of course. Instead, they ran off to play on the muddy banks of the village river, before going back to the banquet again. When their foreheads felt the blow of their mothers’ chopsticks once more, the whole performance was repeated.