In Remembrance: Mrs.

She used to call me “Good Son”（乖仔）.

I was 17 when my mom died of cancer.
Since then no one called me Good Son, over half a century.
Only she.
Now she is gone.

But of course I am not her son.
Hers is in Michigan.
And then there was another son who died as a toddler, about whom later.

I felt bad for not visiting or calling her over the past year.
I have my reasons.
But none of them is valid excuse, given now that she is gone.
The only consolation is that she is in a better place now.

I am moved to write something to remember her with.
This is it.

I only came to know her, and her husband, when I was working in SF some years back.
They were retired and quite close to 80, but still healthy and independent.
By God’s grace they came to Christ, were baptised, and had decent church lives.

I was asked by their son in Michigan to look after them. He was my college housemate, also a Christian.
So of course I did.
Visited them often.
Had tea in restaurants.
Drove them to areas like Napa.

It’s not that I didn’t have rewards!
She saw me as Good Son.
So they cooked sumptuous meals every time: Dungeness crabs, steamed fish, roast duck, char siu, mushroom, on and on, each time.
Plus red wine, and Sierra Nevada.
I enjoyed thoroughly.

There’s another thing I enjoyed: hearing her retell her story——it gave me real life impression about Communist China.
More precisely, its evil.
Much more vivid and real, than what I had read from The Revenge of Heaven（《天讎》）.

Perhaps hers was stereotypical of the pains of our parents’ generation.

She was raised in a well-off family.
Her father healed people and were generous to many.
She had little need to work as a young lady.
Married a young man who served in the Air Force.
A dream life for many of us, with all the ingredients for a happily ever after story.

Tragic thing was, good ingredients in a wrong time!

A rally on Cow demons and snake spirits (牛鬼蛇神) during the Cultural Revolution (from Wikimedia Commons)

Communist China in Cultural Revolution exactly targeted folks with those ingredients!
As a result, her dad’s fortunes were gone, her husband imprisoned, and she was kept in China unable to leave.
Only a loyal maid assisted her.

She had to run around to locate and try to rescue her husband.
Enough pains just on that.

Salt was rubbed into wounds.

Her toddler elder son was seriously ill.
She had to take him to see doctors in a larger city. So she carried him on her back with a Chinese device like a sack called baby sling（孭帶）.
But then she was denied passage everywhere.
Her bourgeoisie background made it impossible to clear check points, life and death situation notwithstanding.
So she ran around with a seriously ill toddler at her back.
At some point she felt a chill on her back.

Later in her life she complained of back pain.
She told me that probably came from corpse cold（屍凍）.

My eyes welled up when I heard her recount her pains. As a parent, I could only imagine the pain, hurt and hatred.

There were more adventures about how she escaped from Communist China to Hong Kong.
By then her husband has died.
Suffice it to say that more layers of pain were needed to reach freedom.

Once in HK she worked in all sorts of labor to survive to raise her daughter and son.
Again layers of pain, but not untypical of all in her generation, who suffered through Communist China.

But HK did provide a free and fresh start, albeit tough.
Therein lies the contrast even of Chinese communism and British colonialism!

HONG KONG 1970 - panoramio (from Wikimedia Commons)

While in HK, her daughter and son went to USA.
Her daughter settled in Michigan.
Her son went to college in Texas where he and I met. And the goodies of mushrooms and others that came in the mail from her were highlights of all of us “imprisoned” at college dormitory!
Then ultimately he too settled in Michigan.

Eventually she got remarried in HK and moved to settle down in SF, worked till retirement, and enjoyed free and independent life in the best period of SF.

I kept in touch with her and her husband till 2021.

I remember one year after 2009 when HK gave every ID holder $6000, they came back to claim it and I spent a lot of time with them, not least taking them on day one to a Wanchai bank to cash their cheques!
We revisited classic eateries such as 樂口福 in Kowloon City and 龍華 in Shatin.
I did what a Good Son should.

Then in another year they came back but I couldn’t spend as much time with them, though we did revisit Kowloon City.

All these intervening years whenever I returned to SF, there was no better place to enjoy my Dungeness crabs.
And even while I was in HK, we kept in touch via phone calls.

About a year or so ago they had to move to Michigan.
By then it became necessary because of their advancing age and deteriorating health.

It was indeed a challenge for old folks to uproot and replant.
The adjustment was simply too much.
It’s a sad fact, indeed a warning to all of us approaching the timeline.

I got news that she went in her sleep.
A long life.
Eventful.
Painful.
Struggle-ful.
But a full life having raised son and daughter, now each with children of their own.
A kind and generous woman.

And finally a child of God.

No one would call me Good Son from now on.
But she can rest now.
Rest in Him.
Eternally.