Mario ran his kitchen like a cruise ship diner, offering anything on the menu from grilled cheese to ceviche. When not in the kitchen or tending to his pugs, he shuttled his kids around in a VW van, depositing and retrieving them at various private schools, but more importantly, to endless activities scheduled by Tammy: tennis, violin, piano, fencing, ballet, equestrian training, landscape art, archery, language lessons, to name a few. No Wuya-Wada child was allowed to participate in what Tammy considered precivilized traditions like the gamelan, Filipino tinikling, ukulele, Peruvian panpipes, or congas. These folksy music traditions, she declared, might be mesmerizing but only because of their unstructured simplicity and repetitive nature, nothing close to the complexity of Debussy; it was the difference between a grass shack and Notre Dame. Similarly, arts and crafts like origami or pottery were sure to lead nowhere, although Tammy might’ve made concessions for tea ceremony or calligraphy; this stuff, however, was for old people, and therefore never came up. Furthermore, no Wuya-Wada child was allowed to participate in plebeian communal street sports like basketball, soccer, football, boxing, or even the national pastime, baseball. Kung fu was the singular exception; still, Tammy expected the attainment of black belt and the subtle ability to vanish. Each child was assigned a language in which to be fluent: French, German, Italian, and Russian, but everyone had to learn Chinese. Tammy considered Spanish a no-brainer since they lived in California on the border of Mexico; and besides, Mexicans spoke it. If this sounds shockingly elitist, it was, and Tammy made no bones about it. She justified her matriarchal position as the continuation of a long line of Chinese mothers. Chinese mother after Chinese mother had succeeded in molding the soft clay of their offspring into the best and brightest professionals of their generation, and now it was Tammy’s turn. There would be no coddling, no Dr. Spock nurturing of the individual. It wasn’t about self-esteem; once a child was good at something, self-esteem would follow. Her children, by the very fact that they were Chinese and Japanese, were superior to others, and in an unequal and historically racist world, they would surpass all expectations. Of course, they would have to work at it, succeed, and be the best in whatever “it” was. Failure was of course out of the question, but being second best was also not an option. As for Mario, he was an accessory to these matters and possibly enjoyed raising his pugs more than accompanying the intense competition and excruciating trauma his children experienced daily. And then there was Fanny.
Fanny seemed to come after the pugs and along for the ride. What Fanny did was of no concern to Tammy, who surmised that at age ten, it was probably too late to fix the damage of a public education, dysfunctional parenting, and an unfocused life purpose. The Wuya-Wada children came variously to complain about Fanny. “Mother,” Julia complained, “she has no knowledge of simple geography. Can you believe it? She couldn’t locate Asia Minor.”
Tammy sighed and replied, “Julia, how can you compare your education with hers? You knew all the world capitals by the time you were in the first grade.”
Mariko came to add her frustration. “Mother, shouldn’t Fanny be doing calculus by now?”
Tammy replied, “Oh Mariko, I know you were doing set theory at age five, but set your sights lower in Fanny’s circumstances. Perhaps you could give her your old algebra books?”
And Tommy queried, “Why can’t Fanny speak Mandarin?”
“Tommy, by the time you were three, you knew one hundred Chinese characters. But, tell me,” Tammy eyed her son sternly, “what about your German? Have you gone on to Book Seven?”
Only Eddy said nothing and quietly introduced Fanny to the grand piano. “Try this scale,” he suggested. “See the notes?” He pointed to a practice book. “A solid note for one beat each. The notes rise like this.” He played the keys. “Easy.” As it turned out, for Fanny, it was easy. She was some kind of human sponge, and as the years passed, willy-nilly and unnoticed by anyone, Fanny either caught up or surpassed her cousins. It was just what she was supposed to do.
Despite Tammy’s tiger fist, Fanny noted that the Wuya-Wada kids eventually all had ways of coping or escaping. Given the opportunity now as teenagers, they scattered from the hills of Monterey Park to the streets, to the beach, to the desert, to the mountains. What they did out there could only be surmised, and this drove Tammy crazy, but she wouldn’t lose control. For example, when Tommy and Mariko returned from a weekend excursion, Tammy interrogated them.
Tommy explained, “We drove out to the Mojave.”
“What for?”
“To see the wild flowers,” replied Mariko.
“Flowers?” Tammy sneered.
“Desert ecology,” Tommy said. “Scientific research. We brought back samples.”
“Right,” asserted Mariko. “Geologic rock samples plus flora and fauna.”
“I got a dead lizard.” Tommy wiggled the stiff thing in front of Tammy’s face.
Tammy screamed.
Eddy was more honest, being unable to lie. “Hollywood,” he said. “Whiskey a Go Go.”
“You’re too young to drink!” Tammy cried.
“I didn’t drink. We just listened to music.”
“What kind of music?”
“The Doors,” he suggested and added, “of perception?” since saying “rock” seemed like a bad idea.
Tammy was flabbergasted. From Suzuki violin to the Doors? It had come to this?
“What if,” Eddy pleaded with soft eyes, “it makes me happy? Don’t I get to be happy sometimes?”
Tammy was scornful. “The right to happiness is an American idea.”
“But we’re in America.”
“Not inside my house.”
Julia admitted, “I went to the beach to see the ocean.”
“So, if Tommy and Mariko went to do desert ecology, you were doing oceanic studies?” Tammy chided.
“No, I just wanted to feel the sand under my bare feet and to hear the sound of waves. I wanted to see the sun set over the Pacific.”
“Is that so?”
“I think I’m depressed.”
Tammy rolled her eyes. “Depression is a psychological disorder that only exists in the West.”
It was pointless to argue. Julia pouted. “I need to go west.”
Fanny wondered at these occasional lapses and escapes from the regimen, but her cousins all played their roles as excellent overachievers with their sights on the Ivies. The world order confined by Tammy’s Monterey Park seemed uncontested. Being the youngest, no one confided in Fanny. She could only imagine what they imagined. Only Eddy came occasionally to share his thoughts with Fanny, for they were bound by their love of music. Eddy brought Fanny LPs and tapes. “But what will Tammy say?” protested Fanny.
Eddy shoved the prohibited LP into the cover of Beethoven’s Fifth. “Dah dah dah dahh!” sang Eddy.
Then, one day, two more teenage cousins, Merry and Harry, were deposited in Monterey Park at the Wuya-Wada household. This time, these were the kids of a second cousin of Tammy’s in Manila. Their parents had sent them away, hoping to prevent them from getting any political ideas and before President Marcos did anything preposterous like declare martial law. Mario welcomed the addition of two more to his brood of five, plus the pugs, and used their arrival as an excuse to hire a sous chef and a driver. Fanny marveled that Merry and Harry, unlike herself, settled easily into the comforts of a large household with a housekeeper, tutor, driver, gardener, and sous chef. Merry and Harry were used to doing nothing for themselves. But they came with excited stories of violent protest, bloody assassination, and Marxist-Maoist revolution and spoke of themselves as exiles. Fanny felt genuinely sorry for them. At least her mother was on the other side of the city in Gardena, in a two-bedroom apartment within walking distance of her favorite Italian delicatessen, Giuliano’s, and her brother was studying law at UCLA.
Tammy listened to these accounts of political turmoil, made a quick assessment of her offshore holdings in Asia, and booked a plane ticket to Mani
la. In Manila, she had inherited a plastics factory from her grandmother. Years ago, Tammy’s grandmother had started the business by supplying cheap toys like kewpie dolls for curio shops. Tammy had repurposed the factory machinery to produce molded plastic bases for Bic lighters. These disposable lighters were selling like hotcakes among American soldiers in Vietnam. No revolution, unionizing, or anti-Marcos politics were going to disrupt her lucrative operation. If necessary, she’d move the entire operation out of Manila to Singapore. In the larger historic picture of the global economy, she would raise her children in America, where the profession of democracy, pluralism, and tolerance would open avenues to their obvious superiority. But when it came to her money, tightfisted intolerance and homogeneity were absolutely necessary.
Business trips of this sort weren’t unusual, and the Wuya-Wada kids could be sure that any trip meant detailed instructions about work progress, with hell to pay if it wasn’t completed to Tammy’s satisfaction upon her return. A business trip was business as usual. However, as soon as the door closed behind Tammy, the deCuervo cousins were immediately disposed to test this assumption with the cliché that it was about time to turn the Wuya-Wada house—with its twinkling hillside view of L.A., its kidney-shaped swimming pool, its tennis courts, expansive gardens, professional kitchen, dog kennel, and spacious rooms—into the best party ever. That evening, Harry appeared at dinner in a bow tie and white jacket, announcing, “I think we should dress up for dinner. After all,” he bowed deferentially to Mario, “it’s a way of honoring the chef.”
Mario smiled over a platter of barbecued teriyaki chicken, staring at Harry’s outfit and thinking back to his days as a cruise ship waiter. “If you get this shoyu sauce on that, it could be a problem.”
“Uncle Mario,” Merry explained, “Harry wants to be James Bond.”
Could’ve fooled Mario, but he wasn’t one to squash youthful dreams.
“Double-o seven,” inserted Mariko, in case her father didn’t know.
“Actually,” replied Harry, “my dream is to make movies.”
Julia jumped up from the dinner table. “Yes, Harry’s right. We should dress up,” she exclaimed. “I’ll be right back.”
Suddenly there was a scurry away from the table past Harry, past Mario and his chicken. Only Fanny and Eddy were left seated, confused and hungry.
“The food will get cold,” Mario said predictably, serving the rice.
Like quick-change artists, the three girls and Tommy returned in the fancy, uncomfortable outfits, elegant gowns and suits they wore at recitals and weddings.
Mariko looked at Julia and said, “Next time,” she pointed at Julia’s bare neck, “we’ve got to complete your look with a necklace and earrings.”
Harry said, “Diamonds.”
Merry drawled with emphasis, “Dia-monds are for-ever.”
By the end of the evening, it was decided. They would stage a 007 casino night with a dance band. The three-car garage would be cleaned out for the casino, and they’d roll out the grand piano to the pool and plug in the equipment for the rock band on the tennis courts.
Fanny watched the cousins spin into high gear, Harry directing everything from the lighting to the rental of sound equipment and tables. Tommy was busy learning magic and trying to invent a way to disappear one of Mario’s pugs. Fanny rescued the poor pug from the compartment in Tommy’s contraption, and Tommy wandered around amazed that his magic actually worked. Mariko practiced her blackjack and poker moves, though Fanny assumed she was probably counting cards. Harry came around to stage a practice round. “Mariko,” he praised her, “you’re a natural dealer.”
“The correct terminology is croupier,” Mariko sniffed haughtily as Harry put his chips down.
Eddy was inspired to take his electric guitar out of hiding and plug it into a speaker system. Then, he and Merry came looking for Fanny in the study, and, prying her away from Tammy’s workbooks, got her to play the piano while Eddy improvised chords and Merry belted “Goldfinger.” Fanny played watching Eddy play while watching Merry sing as if she were Shirley Bassey. At some point, Julia entered in gold tights and a shimmering gold chiffon skirt, providing her dance interpretation, which amounted, Fanny thought, to slinking and rolling around histrionically over the floor.
Even Mario became enthusiastic at the possibility of creating canopies, fruit and ice sculptures, and exotic tropical (he assumed virgin) drinks to complete the atmosphere.
Predictably, Tammy finished her business in exploiting cheap Filipino labor earlier than expected and arrived on the very night of the grand 007 extravaganza. Her limo pulled up to the house and competed with dozens of cars emptying kids in prom outfits into her front doors. She wandered into her house, which had been transformed by low lighting, rotating strobes, and lava lamps, and meandered through crowds of girls with thick makeup, exposed bosoms, and martini glasses posturing haughtily and moving lasciviously to the live music pumping from the rock band playing on a platform at the far side of the pool. She could see Eddy on guitar, random other kids on drums and bass, and Merry belting vocals into a handheld microphone, modulated through a sound system Harry controlled on the other side. And through the glass doors, Tommy, dressed like Dracula, was lit up on an inside stage placing a pug in a black box and tapping it with his magic wand. Fanny, looking up from the keyboards, was the first to see Tammy. Julia was barefoot, dancing precariously on the diving board over the deep end, and when Tammy screamed her recognizable scream, the shock tossed Julia into the pool. Splash. That, Fanny would remember, was the beginning of the end. The final blow to Tammy was to find Mariko in the garage in the middle of an intense and cheering crowd, presiding over a table of blackjack.
Most immediately, Merry and Harry were sent packing. Fanny watched them leave with trepidation over their courage, but anyway, they were already exiles. Merry left merrily for San Francisco to be, she said, a poet, and Harry tipped his hat to the Wuya-Wadas and headed for Las Vegas to begin his career in show business. Soon after, Mariko followed Harry to Las Vegas. Fanny discovered that Mariko and Tommy’s excursions to the Mojave weren’t really ecological desert investigations. From the Mojave, Mariko crossed the California border into Nevada to test her exceptional math skills, and Tommy raced cars on the salt flats. When the deception was finally revealed, it turned out Tommy had been keeping a car in a friend’s garage, street racing and hanging with low riders for the past two years. With Tammy shouting epithets like “ungrateful,” “spoiled,” “worthless,” “failure,” and “bum,” Tommy got in his car, and once he started driving, he didn’t stop.
One day, as usual, Eddy came to confide in Fanny. “I really miss her, Fanny,” said Eddy.
“Merry?” Fanny heaved a sigh. She missed her too.
“I’m going to leave in a few days. I’ve made up my mind. My only concern is you.”
“Me?” asked Fanny.
“Are you going to be all right here by yourself?”
Fanny didn’t answer.
“Look,” Eddy said. “I’m going to leave you with my entire collection of LPs. It’s all yours. You know where they are. Just don’t let Tammy know, or she’ll throw them away.” He kissed Fanny on the cheek and left with a duffel. Eventually he’d find his way to SF, compose songs, and do backup for what would become the Merry Gang.
As for Julia, she simply danced out of the house. Presumably she traveled south along the coast with a surfboard, then west across the Pacific. Occasionally Fanny received postcards from surfing spots as far away as South Africa or Australia or Asia Minor.
Fanny had nowhere to go except maybe Gardena, but her mother’s new boyfriend had moved in with all his golfing equipment. So Fanny continued to faithfully produce her workbooks for Tammy and enjoyed the spacious house with all its amenities, even as it was emptied of everyone except herself and the pugs. On the fateful night of the 007 disaster, Mario had made detailed arrangements for catering and cleanup, then took his pugs, sans the one trained f
or Tommy’s magic show, and left for a quiet rental cottage on Catalina. When everything cooled down, Fanny telephoned him to let him know the coast was clear, so to speak. Mario represented, after all, the perfect triad of arrogance, insecurity, and self-control. That is to say, he felt himself to be too brilliantly endowed and too ambivalent to be involved, and nothing Tammy said made him lose his temper. Similarly, Tammy, Fanny, and Mario formed a model unit, the triple whammy Tammy had so embraced. And as if to prove Tammy’s theory, Fanny Rice excelled at tennis and fencing, went on to win accolades as a concert pianist, got into Harvard, then MIT, did postgraduate astrophysics research in France and Germany, spoke five other languages, including Chinese and Japanese, wrote a best-selling fictional immigrant memoir, and from time to time had the subtle ability to vanish.
Emi
Mukashi, mukashi, Emi Moriuchi, intelligent, headstrong, privileged, and cheerfully positive, came of age in the sixties. O.K., no big deal. You boomer sansei all came of age in the sixties, give or take a decade. And intelligent, well, that was a given. Headstrong, meaning stubborn and outspoken, you could certainly be; that’s what nisei complained about. Privileged depends on what you mean; slipping past the barbed wire of wartime incarceration into the third generation could be construed as privilege, especially since no one told you the truth until much later. That might be the reason for Emi’s cheerfully positive attitude. Never mind the Cold War. The world was her bubble.
Sansei and Sensibility Page 14