The House of Life 1

by Vann Chow

  “Wow wow wow! I never see no message or missed call. And please stop that girly “miss me” shit, man. You’re freaking me out. Having my girl on my back all the time is depressing enough.” Chad grunted. “Yo. Why don’t you and I go shoot some hoops in the court?”

  “Now?”

  “Yeah. And tell me more about what happened to that son of a bitch Mickey.”

  “’ Kay. I’ll be there in thirty.”

  “Dayum! We’re gonna play street ball not going to a black-tie convention. Don’t tell me you need to take a girl-shower now.”

  “Give me a break. ‘Magic Hairdressers’ is on.” Ian turned up the volume of the TV.

  “What the hell is Magic Mama Mia?” Chad bellowed into the speaker. “Is that some retarded Korean drama you are watching again? You know what, Ian, you really need to start toughen up and stop acting like a pussy.”

  “Well, you won’t say that when you see Mun Hyun Kim.” He was referring to one of the actresses in the series.

  “Does she have succulent ass and long lean legs?

  “Everything a man wants.”

  “Shit. Gloria, where’s the remote?!” Ian could hear Chad yelled in the background to his girlfriend.

  Ian and Chad were two such extremes personalities and most people around them could not figure out how they could stick to each other for so long. Ian was the white boy who loved Chinese culture and spoke perfect Cantonese. Despite that, his interest in Chinese culture did not really help him blend in well with the Asian groups in college. Somehow seeing a Caucasian spoke in colloquial Cantonese was always intimidating to some people and they couldn’t get passed that mental block that it was all an act. It sickened Ian sometimes because the people whom he had grown up with in the same city couldn’t take him as who he was and had to treat him like a foreigner. Growing up without a father and just a handful of friends had sculpted him into an introvert with distinctive shyness and self-consciousness. Unlike him, Chad was the Chinese boy that tried almost too hard to change the identity he was born into. He was always dressed up in oversized jerseys with a baseball cap skewed on the side his head and when he spoke, he spoke only in gangster jargons. His African American friends in college loved him. Chad was, according to some, was “more black than black”. Indeed, when Chad did his “Overnight Celebrity” tongue twister stunt, he was no less impressive than the original rapper. A stage-struck adolescence as he was, he loved to be in the center of attention. Being winners of couple singing contests and in the most vocal members of the breakdance crew in college, he had always been very popular with girls.

  Ian and Chad had been best friends since their La Salle days. They were both excellent athletes and the objects of desire for many younger school girls from the neighboring Catholic school. And the two boys had helped and encouraged each other through the grueling Cert Level, A-Levels, SATs and many more important events to their young lives together. For example, both of them were accepted into Hong Kong University and a few different colleges in the States but it took them no time to decide where to go: University of Texas at Austin, where they were both got accepted into its engineering department. The two of them stayed roommates throughout the first two years of college.

  They still proudly proclaimed their La Sallians background whenever there were chances. Like today, Ian wore his white basketball mesh short with “La Salle College of Hong Kong” embroidered above a thick red stripe that ran vertically on the two sides of the trunks. Even though his six-packs were long gone due to hours of camping in the computer cluster working on projects, just living off oily snacks from the vending machine, he still felt empowered when he was in his “power trunks”.

  Ian was dribbling the ball when Chad arrived at the Kennedy Road basketball court late some forty-five minutes later. Incidentally, Chad was also wearing the same white mesh shorts.

  “You tricked me, dawg. That’s wrong. That’s very wrong. I don’t know if I will trust you again next time.” Chad ran over from the across the court, stole the ball from Ian’s hand and did a layup.

  “Why? You don’t like Mun Hyun Kim?” Ian sneered hysterically.

  “All I can see was some girl throwing a hissy fit at her dad over a Barbie Doll and she’s not even ten yet. Man, you are sick. I like grownup women. Real women.”

  “That’s what you get,” Ian declared, “for being late.” Having retrieved the ball, Ian bounced it for several times. He squatted down, bounced the ball again, aimed it and shot a perfect 3-pointer.

  “Wooo! You are so much fiercer when you are angry!” Chad chanted. “But what the fuck, man. You blamed me for being late when I live like five miles away? And all you need to do is take a few steps down to your private b-ball court?”

  “It’s not mine. It’s Kennedy’s…it’s the government’s.”

  “You live in a fancy mid-Level two stories and you go in and out in Mercedes with a chauffeur. If you say the court is yours, the court is yours, man.”

  “I go by MTR, too,” Ian protested. “Public mini-van and MTR.” Ian made sure he stressed on the word “Public”. Chad snorted.

  “You want proof? I have my Octopus card with me.” Ian rushed towards his backpack, forgetting the ball. “I have proof.” He unzipped his black backpack and inserted his hand through the small opening. Just when he was groping around for his wallet his fingers touched the cold leather of the red leather bound notebook. He didn’t remember how it got in there. It must be mom, he thought. Mom still liked to pack his bag as if he was still going to kindergarten despite his age. “Ah-ha!” He exclaimed triumphantly while pulling it out of the bag. “I’ve found this today in the MTR.” And he threw it right at Chad, who was just quick enough to catch it.

  “What’s this?” Chad dangled the notebook by its golden elastic band between his thumb and index finger with an expression of suspicion.

  “I think it’s a diary. The girl who sat next to me today in MTR dropped it on her way out.”

  “Are you just totally making this up so I would believe that you are not a pampered rich kid? Ian, you are pathetic.” Chad sat down on the side of the court under the street lamp and Ian joined him on the side.

  They started to examine the cover of the notebook. Its saddle red leather looked very exquisite under the warm light. Now Ian noticed that it looked like one of the expensive English calfskin leather journals Uncle Johnny had bought him from Aspinal, the famous leather journal maker from London when he visited Ian and his mom in Hong Kong some years ago. Patches of reflective surface on it told them that it had once been carefully hand-waxed and polished. As sloppy and insolent a guy as Chad, Ian noticed that he showed considerable care in handling the notebook.

  “It surely doesn’t look like yours.” Chad said. “Can I open it?”

  “I am surprised that you actually ask for my permission. Normally you would have ripped it into pieces by now.”

  “This looks important, somehow.”

  “Ya, I thought so.” Ian agreed.

  “Why the fuck didn’t you give it back if you know it’s important?” Chad asked.

  And so Ian proceeded to recount what happened in the afternoon. It’s no surprise to Ian that Chad showed more interest when he heard that the girl was somewhat pretty. When Chad removed the elastic band to reveal the first page, he cried:

  “What in hell kind of language is this?”

  “Huh?” Ian cranked his neck to read the inscriptions more closely and let out a laugh. “It’s German.” He had taken an elementary German course a few years back from the Germany Culture Center near La Salle. Although his German was rusty, he had no trouble differentiating it from other Asian and European languages.

  “And I thought we have come across some extraterrestrial shit.” The short silence following that remark made Chad felt stupid for saying that.

  “Juni 2, June 2nd.” Ian translated.

  “I can see that too. Now give me something more useful.” Chad couldn’t wait to see what th
ey meant.

  “Ich glaubte nie an Tagebuch zu schreiben…I…never…believe in writing Tagebuch. Tagebuch. Oh, diary. I never believe in writing diary.” Then Ian went on translating the first page word for word, skipping only when he hit a difficult German word. “Ich habe keine Freunde…mit zu sprechen…she said she didn’t have any friends to talk to about her feelings.”

  “What useful information! Good job, Ian.” He padded Ian on the back. Sensing Chad’s sarcasms, he tried to scan through the first page as fast as he could to please his appetite.

  “’Kay, so basically what this paragraph is saying is that she is lonely and…she cried a lot because of someone called Maximilian, who obviously can’t be a Chinese. No one has English name like this in Hong Kong.”

  “Aww. A broken-hearted foxy. She is single and lonely, boy. You should see if there’s a phone number of something somewhere at the back.” Chad reminded him. Ian was somewhat pleased to hear the hint that she might be available. However, the heavy tone of the journal stirred his mind and soul and he yearned to know more about this girl through reading her diary. Unlike the forever ruthless Chad, he was a rather sentimental guy.

  “She said her heart was torn into million pieces and she thought it was stupid for crying over it but she couldn’t help herself.” Rereading the line again to make sure he’s got it right. “Oh, whoa. This entry is very beautiful. I feel like I could fall in love with her just because of this.”

  “Looks like this’s just another sob story. They made you depress, these things. I’ll try to shun out any emotions if I were you.” He had just finished watching what he thought was an impossibly boring romance movie with his girlfriend yesterday and he sworn to the heavens he would not let his girlfriend take charge of video rental for a very long time. Then he let off, “I was really expecting secret service operation info and important intelligence about the social security of our homeland China. You know all that competitions for intelligence among countries? On the appearance everything is normal but underneath the surface, the situation is tense as hell. Somewhere above our heads,” Pointing his finger to the air and squinted at the sky. “There are spying satellites taking in millions of pictures of suspicious persons per day. And don’t forget those hidden video feeds, mobile bugs and spywares in people’s laptop trying to record every suspicious movement online.”

  Ian snorted, hearing Chad’s far-fetch imagination. “You watched too many movies.”

  “Yeah, so you know what I am talking about. What really happened here is like in “Lust Caution” where Tang Wei got herself executed for falling in love with the traitor Tony Leung was playing.” Chad had watched that movie so many times he remembered everything about it down to the last detail. “And that shawty in the MTR is Tang Wei.”

  “Of course, it’s so obvious now. You are a genius, Chad! I knew that girl was a secret agent or else why would a Chinese girl write her diary in German?” Ian said acerbically.

  “Exactly. She has a forbidden lover. A German. And she hated herself for this because it was an impossible love. She has fallen in love with the enemy and now the Chinese government has to wipe her out in fear of information leak.”

  “She has to be neutralized, huh?” Ian added.

  “Damn right she has to be,” Chad said as he nodded. He held the backboned of notebook on his left hand and started to ruffle through the pages. Almost every single page was filled with words. Then he hit the page where there were envelopes clipped. Seeing the wrinkled yellowish envelopes that indicated its long trying journey, he stopped and plucked out a letter from one of it out of curiosity.

  “More German.” His inability to decipher the message within had made him impatient. “My Dearest Elise.” “The girl’s called Elise!” Ian shrilled with excitement. And he started pouring over the letter, trying to understand the most out of his minimal German vocabulary and read out loud from time to time to keep Chad from being bored. But he was already bored.

  “This is getting stupid.” Chad finally admitted to himself. Standing up, he said to Ian. “C’mon, just shut the damn thing and play some balls.” And he sunk the opened envelope and journal into Ian’s lap.

  That night, Ian tried to read the entries in the red notebook again. But his limited German didn’t take him very far. He gave up after the second entry and had forgotten about the letters. If he had read those letters at the time, things might have turned out differently for him.

  June 26th , 1914

  My Dearest Elise,

  Please forgive my late reply. The last days I had no time to write. Our division has been transferred to Russia. I fought a dozens of men in Aisne before that. They were strong. But we were stronger. Now everything here was relatively peaceful. We took over a sector in Postavy, it is located north of Lake Narotch, and we made camps by where the city used to be. There is no important operation here and I have a lot of time to myself to think. And I thought of you and our times in Tsingtao. Compared to the sweltering climate in here, I would much rather be there holding you inside my arms by the gate of the old water reservoir in the green island by the sea. Thinking of it now, I can feel the night breeze brushes against my face. Do you feel the same breeze on the other side? I have often thought it silly for man to be so sentimental but now I understand that it was only because I hadn’t met the right girl then.

  I made a friend in here. His name is Peter-Conrad Cladget from Frankfurt and he joined our division only three months before me. He is a big, tall fellow six years older than me but he has a heart of a baby. We were assigned to the same night-time patrol unit with two other poker-faces who are always very serious. They don’t like to talk about themselves so Peter-Conrad and I would sit by ourselves and share stories whenever we take our breaks. He told me he has a lover more beautiful than flowers that bloom in the springtime and to her, he had proposed in beautiful, extravagant prose before the war, which was accepted with a lot of happy crying. So I told him about my girlfriend from Hesse-Nassau too, who is of course a fictional character that I created with your images so that he will not get suspicious when I talk about you or write letters to you in the event of insurmountable lovesickness. And I told him that my girlfriend is not only more beautiful than the flowers in springtime; She’s more beautiful than the dawning sun that rises from the East every morning to renew our hopes. Don’t you think this metaphor fits you very well? I think that was the only time I have beat Peter in composition and left him speechless. Peter has a flare for the romantics and he would sometimes recite short love poems he wrote to his fiancée to me and he always have the prettiest phrase. I may end up stealing some of them and use them on letters for you. Not because I was lazy nor I do not think romantic thoughts when you come into mind. I just think you deserved better.

  My dear Elise, I cannot foresee how my life would be in the future but when this is all over, I will return to Tsingtao for you. I really will. I hope that in the mean time you would stay strong for me and take care of Heinrich. Tell him Papa will buy him a steam engine if he behaves. All little boys like mechanical toys that would make noises and moves and can be taken apart. That should keep him straight if all else fails.

  I have addressed this letter to a good friend of mine in Hesse-Nassau this time with some money. He promised, on the account of our friendship and the handsome fee, that he would find ways to get this letter delivered into your hands. As I have reminded you before, if the letter appeared to have been opened and resealed, please discard it quickly and do not reply. I worried about you and your family’s safety. Sorry to burden you with the language of a weary soldier.

  I love you.

  Yours truly,

  Maximilian-Werner Gottlieb

  The Chamber of Life and Nutrition

  On this Friday night, on the web of streets sprawling the heartland of the Kowloon Peninsula, herds of human traffic poured into Mong Kok. Mong Kok, or simply MK, earned its place on the list of ‘Top 10 Tourist Attractions in Hong Kong’ in the intern
ationally revered travel guidebook Lonely Planet because of its traditional Chinese undertone that contrasted sharply against the ever-growing number of construction sites and toppling skyscrapers that dominated the two sides of the Victoria Harbor and further.

  “Mong Kok’s most prominence tourist hot-spot of all, is called “Temple Street” and that’s where we are heading. Everyone please remain in one single file so we can get to our destination as a group. Then each of you will have an hour and a half to explore Hong Kong on your own. It is very easy to get lost in the crowd in Hong Kong and we certainly want to avoid that.” A short, chubby man in a neon yellow visor and matching outfit screen-printed with the name ‘Wing On Travel’ was holding up a small flag with the company’s logo as high up as possible while reciting the rights of his bewildered followers in English in front of the Mong Kok MTR station. They were a group of Indian tourists.

  Elise still had her hand in Michael’s firm grip, as if he’s afraid that she would wander around and lose her way in the intricate city roads like one of the fellow travelers from India, much like what one of them was doing now, mesmerized by the many neon signs hung proudly above the two-stories buildings on the two sides of the road, stunned by their beautiful light and humming buzz.

  “I am so excited to see your pharmacy!” Elise shouted through the cacophony of hoots, cackles, and wails coming from the approaching flea market.

  “I want to show you the store so that from now on you know where to get the best antidote for alcohol intoxication,” Michael said proudly. She had never been to this part of town at night. Mong Kok was a part of Kowloon rich in local colors. The food stalls, the flea market, the fortune teller, the alleged residence of many influential mobs and the famous red-light district with decadent brothels — everything seemed like they were in one of Jackie Chan’s action movies where he was inadvertently the cop or the good guy against a variation of criminals —were aligning themselves for Elise’s visit. This was a complicated part of town which she wouldn’t normally venture out to, but perhaps it’s out of gratitude for how nicely Michael had treated her during the wonderful date that she had kicked off with an incomprehensible fit of crying, she did not protest. Plus, she felt safe in his hands.