(1226) Visits to China

Mum's earlier visits to China were with my cousin, father or eldest brother.

In 1998 I saved up some money from home tutoring. With substantial help from my brothers, I went for my first visit to China with mum and my children. Since the early years of communist rule, China had come a long way by then. In 1960 my grandma had problem finding sufficient acceptable food to eat. That was the year she was 55 according to the western calendar. Chinese babies at birth were considered 1 year old. Therefore by the Chinese lunar calendar, grandma was 56 when she could apply to the Home Office to visit her youngest son for the first time. She bought a sewing machine and a bicycle vouchers in Hong Kong and my uncle collected the items in Kwangchow. Actually that was her first flight ever, thirty six years ago she arrived in Singapore by ship.

Grandma related how my uncle queued two whole hours to buy two miserable looking pineapples. While he was jubilant, she did not have the heart to eat any piece he offered. Uncle ate one whole fruit in record time. He saved the other for his buddies. The pineapples were sour, picked before they were ripe. Yet these were rare delicacies from Hainan Island. It was seldom seen sold in the tiny town two hours north of Kwangchow. There was one visit my grandma came back with only clothes on her back. She gave all her spare clothes away as she could not bear seeing her loved ones in tatters. Even her old battered cardboard suitcase was toted away as a winter clothes storage container. She related small incidences with tears in her eyes, my dad explained that years with no extras actually impoverishes the people to the extent they have nothing except a change of rags and daily food. He said it was not greed, it was a great need for daily necessities when folks are barely surviving.

By the time my mum was old enough to visit China, things were much improved from my grandma's days. Yet I still hear of door less public toilets in the rural area. President Nixon made his historic visit to Beijing. Dr Mahathir, the then Prime Minister to Malaysia befriended China the economic powerhouse. Finally China is opened to a relatively young person like me. When I first mooted the idea of visiting my uncle, I asked people if I need to prepare an umbrella for toilet visits. Folks had a good laugh and asked if I was planning to go to the countryside miles from the city. I said, of course not, if I wanted to rough it, I might as well go into Division Four of Sarawak to get close to nature.
So we departed and my children were dazzled by the huge four storey bookshop in Kwangchow. My youngest was excited about the first photo she captured of a long tail jungle fowl in a park reserve near my uncle's town. My eldest was happily occupied reading the English translation of all my bi-lingual selections bought as gifts. I had a smashing time selecting fitting presents for adults and children from those very economical range of books, from proverbs to folk tales to classics.

Quite a few years later, my youngest was no longer seven years old. She was a strapping young lady strong enough to carry my mum's luggage as well as her own. With my language skills (I had six years of Chinese elementary education) and her muscle power, we did quite well. This trip we did not eat a single home cooked meal, even though my uncle was still cooking for his own family before and after our visit. My aunt explained that the per capita income in China doubled and tripled through the preceding 8-10 years, my uncle and her still kept their thrifty way of life. They hardly spent a tenth of their combined income monthly. Hence every meal was eaten in some famous restaurants. Images of those banquets were in some computer's hard discs or external drives. Ever since hand phones come into vogue, every meal of significance was immortalised in digital form and stored away.  

After we returned, my mum declared it would be her last trip to visit her brother. Since then, my uncle and his son came to visit us on three separate trips. While I am not mercenary, I should mention that my uncle was dispensing cash like Santa Claus during his last trip. Just about every grand-niece and nephew each received RMB1,000. These days China dollars strengthened against the Ringgit and that meant on certain days, the exchange would be close to R$600 for 1000 Yuan. My youngest kept hers for a planned visit to her fifth grandaunt on my husband side, of course she would keep one meal that she would have with my uncle and family. After she handed in her Master's dissertation, she deliberately made up days in her part-time employment to allow herself a short visit to Kwangchow. I declined going on dietary grounds. My husband went with her and they had a wonderful time with the grandaunt's family. Matriarch Ho, eldest son, eldest daughter-in-law, eldest grandson and great-grandson. Unfortunately, the timing was such that while they were in China, the eldest grandson was in hospital because of an occupational eye-strain. Even the eldest grandson's brother -in-law who was waiting for results was pressed into night duty looking  after the critically-ill young man who needed complete quiet bed rest. 

Even though my youngest was "banana" through and through, her smattering of "Mandarin", gestures and mimes got her through the 5-day visit. They laughed and laughed over the language gaps. It sounded like a really fun visit. My daughter is a person with charisma and she received favours everywhere she went. Her grandaunt enjoyed her piano playing so much in her second trip that she was invited to visit again. During her third visit it was the eldest son and daughter-in-law who invited her to visit again and they said make it a longer visit so they could take her to more places of interest.
This is 2020. Sometime right before Chinese New Year, I was mooting about taking some savings to send my youngest and my mum back for a 4-day trip to Kwangchow. I was planning on business class tickets and 3 nights in a 3-star hotel close to my cousin's condo. Alas! Corona virus struck. I kept quiet about the outlandish idea. Only my eldest heard about it way before the lock down in Wuhan. He warned me that such a pandemic would make a social visit impossible for 2 to 3 years. Which by then it would be too late for my mum to fly, she is already 88 this year. Anyway, it was a wonderful brain wave while the idea lasted.