I Love a Broad Margin to My Life - Maxine Hong Kingston [15]
“Martial arts killed him.” Or “Bitter work
killed him.” Kung fu. Kung fu.
“Aiya-a-a,” chorused the Big Family.
Everyone listening, the widow told her life.
It went something like this: “Not so
long ago, a loon time, an era
of loon, this man, this very
man now ashes and bones, swam at night
from China to Hong Kong. A boat family,
who harbored in the Typhoon Shelter, gave
him bed on the water, and shared him 2 meals.
Day, they rowed him to a station for signing up
to live in a safe place / haven / sanctuary /
refugee camp. I.I.” Illegal Immigration.
“Aiya-a-a.” “O, Big Family,
hear me. For loon years, he—I too—
I was I.I. too—lived
up on top of the barbwired hill.
We met at the fence at the farthest edge. He
looked off the shores toward his lost country.
I looked off toward my lost country.
His was that dark mass that looms right there
forever across the Straits. Han Mountain.
He’d say, ‘They can see us. They can see us better
than we can see them.’ Hong Kongers
are rich, they waste money on electricity,
keep lights open all night long.
I could not see my country, Viet Nam.
Too far, and China in the way.
We married. We wrote: ‘We marry.
Free or in prison, forever, we marry.’
If only we could write ‘legal immigrants,’
and be legal immigrants.”
Why always
Illegal Immigration? Oh, no one
ought be made alien to any country.
No more borders. Nosotros no
cruzamos la frontera; la frontera
nos cruza.
The Vietnamese Chinese
woman addressed tout le monde, including
her husband, a ghost, who was standing behind
Wittman. He was a ghost in the listening crowd,
and he was the ashes and bones in the box.
“You were a good man, Old Rooster.
You worked hard. A farmer works hard.
He’ll always work hard, his life hard,
though he leaves the farm. Though farm /
ground / earth / floor be taken from him.”
The chorus intoned: “Aiya. Hai, la.”
“Taken by the government.” “Taken by business.”
“Taken by brothers.” “Deem the land.” “One
day mid-harvest, a middling harvest,
you, Old Rooster, gave up the fields,
and went to ‘seek your fortune.’ ” She said
in English, “seek your fortune.” A generation
had learned the language from fairy tales broad-
cast by loudspeakers across the commune
agricultural zone, across orchards,
furrows, paddies, dairies. “Farewell,
dear Father. Farewell, dear Mother.
The open road beckons me.” “Farewell,
my child. Go forth. Win your fortune.
Make money, my son. Find love.
Marry the princess.” The widow spoke addressing
her husband, telling him his own story.
“Following the waterways, you walked and swam,
swam and walked from duck pond and streams
and rivers to the Mouth of the Tiger. You had no
Permit To Settle. All through nights,
lights beckon Hong Kong Hong Kong
red red green green. Liang
liang. Ho liang. You swam
for those lights, and came to the ten thousand
sampans, the floating town gone now.
Free and safe for a night and a morning. Boat
people fed you and let you sleep, gave you
bed on the water, fed you twice, supper
and breakfast. JAWK!” She hit the box, caged
it with fingers and arms. “They CAUGHT him.”
Wittman jumped. She laughed; everybody
laughed. “Don’t be scared, foreign
Chinese person. They did not
torture my husband to death. He got
hit a few times was all. You know
the Chinese, they hit to teach you a lesson.
I saved him out of I.I. I got
out of jail because China and Viet Nam
became normal. Han and Viet same-same.”
“Hai, law. Hai, law.” Her American
listener chimed in: “Hola! Hola!
In California, we, Chinese and
Vietnamese, together celebrate Tet.”
Sing dawn. Tet nguyen dâ.
“I took you, my Chinese husband, by the hand,
and we left prison. I’m the one,
freed you, you Old Rooster. Woman
is better at living than man is. We
went to live in public housing just
like everybody else, the sampan
people, everybody. I made
money. All I do, each meal,
I cook enough for more than 2—
2 people eat very little.
The extra, I sell on the street. A hungry man
always comes along; he’ll buy