Even though we were poor, my parents didn’t want me to miss out on North American traditions, such as Halloween and Christmas. For my first Halloween, I dressed as a garbage bag. You see, my parents thought that the point of Halloween was to be as ugly as possible. So they cut out some holes in a garbage bag, smeared my face with something black. and I was off. I was a six year-old girl. I could have been a princess, a fairy, a Disney cartoon character, but no, I was a garbage bag. I didn’t care, I was overjoyed that perfect strangers were giving me candy – for free!

At least my parents got the Santa Claus story right. They told me that I could write a letter to Santa, asking for what I wanted, and on Christmas morning, it would appear in my stocking. Since I had seen with my own eyes that people here give out candy for free, a fat jolly man coming around with free presents didn’t seem like a far stretch either. North Americans sure were generous! So, I wrote a letter to Santa, asking for toys that I never asked my parents for. At that age, I didn’t understand the concept of money, but I did understand the shadow that fell across my parents’ faces on the few occasions when I pointed to something I liked in a store. I was a smart kid, after the first few times, I never ever asked my parents for anything again. But Santa Claus was fair game, right? All the books and commercials seemed to make his generosity seem endless. I saw picture after picture of stockings filled with toys, and I could hardly wait for Christmas Day to check out my own stocking!
Christmas Day came, and I got up extra early. When I ran into the living room, I saw that the stocking was as it had looked the night before, flat. I felt around in it, but it seemed empty. What had happened? Did Santa Claus forget about me?
I woke my parents up and told them that Santa Claus didn’t leave anything for me. “Check again,” my mama said. So, I checked again, more carefully this time. And I found a shiny gemstone ring deep inside the stocking.

I was angry.
How come all I got was this one stupid ring? I thought heatedly to myself. All the pictures I saw showed stockings overfilled with toys. All the other kids must get tons of stuff. How come this was all I got?

I remember that moment vividly. Every time I think about that memory, I want to cry. Because, ten years later, after the Santa Claus myth had been dispelled, my parents told me how they had gone into a big department store to look for a ring for me. They didn’t know what I had asked from Santa, but they knew I liked rings. And I did, I loved rings (I still do). They spent $20 on that ring, which was a lot at that time – $20 could have bought a month’s worth of groceries for our whole family. When I remember how cheated I had felt, how angry I was when I found nothing but a ring in my stocking, I feel so utterly ashamed. I was six, I didn’t understand, I couldn’t know the lengths to which my parents had gone to make Christmas special for me, but I still feel so ashamed to have been ungrateful in that instant.

Our family has come a long, long way from those days. We moved from one room in a house shared with six other tenants to an apartment to a house in the suburbs with two cars and a dog. It’s a typical immigrant story, I’m sure.

I think my life could be a series of novels. And this entry would be the first chapter of the first book. And everything since then, elementary school, high school, and university – my life as a student – would be part of that first book. Now, it’s the summer after graduation, and I’m going to travel and see the world, that could be a second book. And four months from now, when I start my first real job halfway around the world, that will be the beginning of the third book.

So how would I like the first book to end?

I have achieved a lot in the first twenty-one years of my life. I have come a long way, and my future looks very bright. But there is nothing more humbling than to remember my beginnings, to remember how I got here, to remember what it was like to have nothing, absolutely nothing, except the love of your family.

As an infant, I was what one may call a vegan. I disliked meat – it was never tender enough – and I would chew a piece of meat in my little mouth until it was all fiber, and then spit it out. I never swallowed. I also disliked seafood – it was never fresh enough. Basic human instinct should tell us not to eat something that smells like ammonia. I would throw up if I even glimpsed dairy (my parents had to feed me milk when I was asleep).
Food-wise, I was a difficult child to raise, and I have been making up for it in other aspects my whole life.

My father, to his credit, was and is a great cook. When he made something I liked, I loved it. The thing about food is that it always tastes better when prepared with care and love. That is why the best restaurant-food will never beat great home-cooking, and that is why I am so confident that I know what good food tastes like.

As I grew older, I learned about things like respect and obedience, which softened my edges as a picky eater. Nonetheless, I was rarely chastised for not eating a dish I didn’t like, or picking out certain things in my food. For the most part, my taste buds dictated our home-cooking. I was not a spoiled as a kid, but my taste buds were.

So it comes as no surprise that I grew into an amateur food critic. I know what I like and what I don’t like, and on that basis, I know what tastes good and what doesn’t. I have not lost my infant stubbornness – I rarely swallow anything I don’t like. This is what I call the “food critic diet”, I am not restricted by certain ingredients, I am simply restricted by what I deign worthy enough to eat. As such, I will try almost anything once, but after that, I may seek it out or never touch it again.

What worries me is that after I have been to Europe, I will never touch North American food again.

1. This was in China in the late 80s, so supermarkets did not yet exist, and everyone bought their groceries from farmer’s markets. When it came to meat, for example chicken, you had to buy a live chicken and slaughter it yourself at home.

This year, things have really come together for me. I feel so unbelievably lucky that there is nothing more that I could wish for. The greatest gift that I want to receive this Christmas is love. And it is also the gift I want to give.
All I want this Christmas:

• Enjoy being with family. After this year, I’ll be flying the coup! I want to spend lots of time with my mom and dad, take them out to dim sum, go to see a play or something, help them prepare a Christmas feast and enjoy the Veuve Clicquot I brought back from New York together.
• Actually play with my Wii. I bought a Wii nearly two years ago and have barely used it. I only bought one game on it. Once I start working, I doubt I’ll have any time to play at all. I’m not even sure I’m going to take my Wii to Singapore with me. So this holiday, I’m going to buy a few more games and play Wii!
• Cook again. I have completely lost touch with my cooking skills. These days, everything I make is blah and tasteless. I don’t put heart into cooking anymore. In fact, I’m not even sure I enjoy food anymore (I know, blasphemous!). I really want to enjoy the wonders of food and taste again. Plus, I probably won’t be cooking much at all when I’m in Singapore. So, I definitely want to cook at least one memorable meal this holiday season.
• Reconnect with high school friends. The friendships I made in high school really are lifelong, and after this year, we may be even more scattered than we already are. I want to do the things we always do – karaoke, AYCE sushi (or some outing to an Asian restaurant), shopping, etc. On this note, I don’t know if I should reconnect with MFL. I mean, I know not being close friends with him was a good decision, but if I am leaving soon, I don’t really have to worry about that anymore, right? So should I take this holiday season as an opportunity to re-establish our friendship?
• Reconnect with “satellite friends”. These are the one or two friends I’ve kept in touch with from other places in my life, like Chinese school and summer camp and whatnot. I usually only see them once a year during the holidays, so I definitely won’t miss my chance this Christmas.

What do you want for Christmas this year?

My parents stayed at my apartment in University Town for the weekend (because it was near the provincial parks), but my roommate had moved out of my apartment, so I had no furniture (except the furniture in my bedroom), no internet, and no TV. My parents slept on the floor on an air mattress. We made makeshift tables out of cardboard boxes, we listened to the radio, we drank wine out of plastic cups, and I cooked with a rice spatula because my roommate accidentally took my stir-fry spatula. It was ghetto living, but it was fun. My parents laughed more this weekend than I’ve seen them do in a long time. And when they drove away on Monday, I cried.

I’ve never been close to my parents. I think the last time I felt emotionally attached to them was when I was 11. When I was 12, I spent three months away from my parents and I didn’t miss them once. I have never cried out of homesickness. And yet, after a mere weekend together, my 21-year-old self bawled cried as I watched my parents drive away and I was left, literally, in an empty apartment.

I cried because I finally realized the importance of family. No matter what, my parents will always love me, put me first, care for me, worry about me. They would die for me, but more importantly, they live for me. They are utterly devoted to me whether I recognize it or not, whether I thank them for it or not. A few months ago, I resented them for being emotionally closed off. They never said things like “I’m proud of you” or “You did good,” and I resented them for making me feel like I wasn’t good enough. Be that as it may, there were a lot of things I never said to them either. “Thank you,” “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me.” Perhaps my inability to open up emotionally is still “their fault,” perhaps I am very much the product of my upbringing, but all I could think was “I should have known better.” Knowing them, knowing myself, I should have known they were proud of me even if they never said it. I should have known they loved me even if they never told me.

I am so silly.

I was so focused on finding someone who cared about me, when I had two people who lived and breathed for me right beside me. Instead of embracing them, I was pushing them away and then desperately looking for a relationship (or friendship) to fill the gap.

I have so much growing up to do.

Speaking of filling the gap. in my last entry, I mentioned how the MFL situation made me want to run away. Apparently, I’m not the only one. I heard through a mutual friend that MFL had been staying in University Town this past week for no reason¹. He has no business here; in fact, he’s supposed to be in The City for job training. I guess he needed to run away, too.
I don’t know how this information makes me feel. Happy, that this is not easy for him either. Confused, because what does it mean if he feels the need to get away? Unhappy, for feeling anything at all.

I wish I could say all the things I say on this blog to the people who actually need to hear it. I think my life would be a lot less complicated that way. I’d tell my parents I love them, I’m grateful for them, and I’m sorry for the times when I made them think otherwise. I’d tell MFL a whole slew of things, but most importantly, that I need him to either love me openly or give me up completely. And I’d tell all my friends I’m sorry, for being inconstant in my emotions and in my commitment to them.
But it seems I’m incapable of frankness when it comes to my emotions.

Baby steps, I’m taking baby steps.

1. It’s ironic that in our rush to get away, we both chose to get away to the same place. But apparently he is supposed to be back in The City by now, so I doubt I’ll be running into him.

We all have secrets, from little lies that we tell, or what we don’t tell. We already know there are plenty of things I don’t tell. Here are some more.

Secrets from my boss:

• I told the CEO at Not-A-Real-Job that I wasn’t doing anything this summer other than this internship. Complete lie. As you all know, I am desperately secretly searching for another job.
• He is obviously going to find out when he receives a call from places I have applied to because I put him down as one of my references. I probably should have told him that he is one of my references. I also said I’d been an intern with him for two months. Slight lie, considering I started last month. Hmm…

Secrets from my parents:

• My parents think I have never bombed a single course in university¹ and that I am awesome at science. Neither of these beliefs are correct. I did bomb a course (Cell Biology), which just goes to show I am not awesome at science. I just left the field before it became obvious. My parents desperately want to believe I am awesome at science because 90% of the people in my family are serious scientists, and they want me to join their ranks. Imagine their disappointment when I went to business school instead.
• My mom thinks I am trying to lose weight. Not because I said I was on a diet or anything, just because she thinks I should. So it’s really her fault for making assumptions. When she is not home, I eat ice cream. Lots and lots of it. She also thinks I go swimming every other day. I do not.
• That stain on the bathroom rug that my mother loves? The dog peed there. But it was because I locked the dog in the bathroom when she was getting really annoying. My parents think the dog just went crazy on her own (which does happen sometimes) and I’ve never corrected their notion. It’s not like the dog is going to tell on me.
• One time, my phone dialed my home number on its own while I was out clubbing at 2am (it must have been pressed against something in my purse and hit speed dial). All my parents heard on the resulting answering machine message was “loud noise” (their words, not mine – my guess is it was very loud music). They called me back and when I saw that “Home” was calling, I didn’t answer because I was drunk and I didn’t want them to know I was still out clubbing. They thought I’d been kidnapped or something terrible had happened to me and the recording was all I could get out, so they called the police. I never told them the truth. I switched phones after that incident.

Secrets from my friends:

• I have not told WAF what I really think about the guy she’s seeing. He sounds sketchy as hell, and he is probably bad poisonous for her. But she has fallen pretty hard for him, and anything I say will fall on deaf ears or incur a slew of defenses. I secretly think she wants to be with these bad boys, some form of thrill-seeking or self-destructive behaviour. I mean, her last boyfriend seemed like an angel until he beat her up on my birthday. So who does she rebound to? A guy who is a player, a cheater (he has a girlfriend), and a drug dealer? This can only end badly.
• I secretly think WAF is exactly what I would have turned into had I had more neglectful parents or weaker moral boundaries (maybe the two have something to do with each other). That is why we are friends, and why I do not judge her for her bad habits or moments of weakness – because in another life, I would be her. I actually kind of admire her for being able to vent all of that out. I, on the other hand, might explode one day with all my repressed sinful thoughts and run away to be a prostitute addicted to hard drugs who eventually falls off a hotel balcony.
• OBF knows that I want her relationship with USG to end in their marriage work out, hence I am the first person she runs crying to every time they have a fight. What she doesn’t know is that I think she’s the cause of these fights, because she is needy and demanding and emotionally unstable. I mean, I love her and all, but seriously, this girl can blow up like Mt. Vesuvius.

Any secrets you’d like to share?

1. The Asian definition of bombing: getting below an 80 – or a 3.7 out of 4.0.

Which is all fine and dandy except… I am on a diet. Yes, I know, it’s the five most common words in today’s society, but it’s true. I’ve finally resolved to lose the weight I gained in first year university. So my cooking obsession is really quite untimely. But then again, I’ve always been queen of doing the right things at the wrong time.

So instead, I’m making my parents eat my elaborate culinary triumphs while I sit across from them salivating and firing questions like “How is it? Is it too salty? Too sweet? Is it tender? DO YOU LOVE IT?”

My parents, of course, have always been the harshest critics in all aspects of my life, so I can always count on them to give me their most honest opinon. “No, it is not tender enough. No, you did not put enough salt in. We like things flavourful, honey. What is this bland shit (well, of course they did not say “shit” – god forbid they ever learn to say anything remotely degrading in English – but that was the gist of it) you’re serving us. And why is everything so damn (see previous note) healthy? Where are the big plates of meat? What’s with all these vegetables? What’s the matter with you?”

Of course, they would say that since they are 1) anal as all hell, 2) the founders of the soy-sauce-and-salt cult, 3) unwilling to shower praise for anything ever period (which kind of explains how I turned out – dedicating my life to eliciting praise while appearing to be modest). Not to mention that they believe diets are the work of the devil and a healthy dinner is always a balance of 3:1 meats to vegetables and always twice as large as lunch and breakfast combined. In other words, no, they are not supportive of my diet. They are, however, supportive of my goal to lose weight, but how they fathom I’ll do that if I’m living by their eating habits is beyond me. My mom is always telling me I have no figure and I have “lumps in all the wrong places.” Look it woman, I am not mashed potatoes so please don’t ever describe me with the word “lumps”!

It’s a wonder I have any self-esteem at all.

But I digress. Back to the cooking. So yesterday, I finally won over my mom with a bowl of coconut and corn chowder. She was so pleased with it she nearly jumped for joy when I told her there was enough left over for another meal. My dad, on the other hand, hated the soup but loved the coconut shrimp alfredo. Nonetheless, he was not pleased. He wanted roast duck and barbequed pork! Where was all the game meat? “Why am I being subjected to these healthy Thai-infused dishes? And last night, what was that stuffed chicken dish? French? Stop being so international! I demand Chinese!” He cried. You’d think a guy who spent nearly 50 years eating Chinese bok choy with a bowl of white rice would appreciate some new culinary tastes, but no. “Patience, grasshopper. Chinese stir-fry and big game meat tomorrow,” I replied in a most zen tone.

It’s amazing that I’ve survived a week with my parents without pulling out any hair or chugging a bottle of wine. Particularly considering that I am always in a bad mood when I can’t pig out on my favourite food. They can’t even appreciate the culinary adventures that I have taken them upon this week! But I must not let my frustrations interfere with my diet.

So tonight, I am making my parents lemon chicken, black bean pork with peppers, and mushroom risotto, while I chew on the end of a celery stick. Ah, the injustice.