The Melting Pot

by Christopher Cheng

While we all talked and listened and ate, all at different times, my cousin remained silent. I thought that she might not be able to speak.

  And then I found out why my Mother’s sister and brother-in-law and my cousin were here, and I lost my excellent manners. Elizabeth, my cousin, was coming to visit, to spend time with us. Her parents are bringing her here so that she gets to know her other family now that grandfather has died. As soon as I heard that statement I choked on the water that I was swallowing and spat out in front of me. I was surprised.

  ‘Oh Edward,’ sighed Mother.

  With a half-chewed mouth of food I offered my apologies blaming it on filling my mouth with too much food. Mother was holding back the tears, but not because of my appalling manners. She is so thrilled to see her family.

  The visitors left soon after lunch but not before they were presented with a gift. We often present gifts from the store to visitors, maybe a fruit package or maybe some special good that Father has imported. This is what Father and Mother like to do. Important visitors might even receive silk cloth. This was silk cloth time, but Uncle refused the gift even though it was not for him. He was quite boisterous when he said ‘No. We don’t need that.’ Mother was disappointed, even more than her sister.

  They spent time talking together and hugging while we children cleaned up after lunch. My uncle left without shaking hands even though Father tried. It has been a very strange afternoon.

  Monday, 7 September

  I am still so very surprised at having lunch with my cousin and her parents. It has never happened before. Mother told me this afternoon when I returned from school that since her father’s death last year, her sister has been extremely anxious and nervous and felt a deep need to re-establish contact with the family. They have even met without her husband knowing. When she told Uncle that she was going to see our family they had an argument. He said that it would not happen. She threatened that she would leave him. He submitted. ‘But I won’t like them and I won’t be civil.’ ‘You will and you will do it. No discussion.’ Those are the exact words Mother said to me. Her sister had always been very, very strong willed growing up and she was surprised that it had taken this long for her to stamp her foot down.

  My cousin Elizabeth seems very nice, if girl cousins can be nice. But she hardly talks. She is older than me and has nearly finished school. At least being a girl she won’t be pestering me. She will spend time with my sisters. It is strange having a cousin nearly my age living in the same city but who I have hardly ever seen. I remember that they would not stand next to our family at the funeral.

  Mother said that Elizabeth will be coming to visit again on the weekend—or maybe sooner. Her father or mother will bring her over. I think it will be her mother. Her father will see us as little as he can I am sure. He did not like being here. She will stay for the day and catch the tram back to her place in the afternoon.

  I am safe because I know that Father won’t let that interrupt my Chinese lessons.

  Tuesday, 8 September

  Elizabeth arrived with a package for Mother. Yesterday she said nothing. Today she wouldn’t stop talking, asking about store business and the family. I explained that Chinese stores in Sydney like ours are essential, providing goods and foodstuffs that Father imports from China which are then sent to the other traders, even to other states.

  ‘I’ve never seen so many jars. What’s in them?’ she asked, but before I could tell her she opened a jar. ‘Oh that stinks!’ she screeched as a lid came off a jar containing sweet-smelling fruit. She spilt some onto her hands. She dropped the jar causing more to splash onto the floor and her shoes. Luckily it didn’t break but some of the juice ended up on her shoes and fruit splashed on the floor.

  ‘Why didn’t you warn me you stupid boy,’ she squawked. ‘Now my shoes stink and I will have to wash them. Pa will be mighty annoyed. He paid good money for them and now they are ruined.’

  ‘Your father will be annoyed?’ I questioned. ‘What about my father. You have just wasted a jar of fruit that comes all the way from China and now we have to clean up the mess,’ I uttered grabbing a rag from the shelf and mopping the floor. I threw one at Elizabeth but she just stood there with her arms folded. She made the mess. She should clean it up. She didn’t.

  I threw a pair of Chinese slippers from a shelf to Elizabeth and told her to wear them while she washed her shoes at the sink. Our voices grew louder.

  ‘I’m not wearing those China shoes. What do you think I am, Chinese?’

  ‘Well if it is good enough for the Queen to wear a pair they are good enough for you. And if you don’t want to wear them, then walk in bare feet. I don’t care.’ Elizabeth took the slippers and put her shoes aside. My voice hurt. Nothing was said for a while. I kept cleaning. She just watched.

  After some silence I explained to her that some traders will only buy from Father as they are from the same clan in China. I could see Elizabeth was confused. ‘A clan is like a big, big family. Father might do special deals for them or lend them money, or arrange for couriers. He even arranges for money to be sent to family interests or banks in China or Hong Kong—around New Year, it is really a busy time for him. Sometimes other traders also bank with Father.’

  ‘That is sooo silly’, said Elizabeth. ‘Your Father is no banker,’ she added, clumsily knocking some papers at the door.

  ‘True, but he can act like a bank and mind the money for other Chinese people. It is very important.’ I told her that they trust Father. The big banks here can’t take the money and deliver it to the village back in China but Father can. Sometimes they might want to travel back to China and Father with his contacts will assist them in doing this.

  ‘Anyway, those people should be buying goods that we all buy.’

  I was getting annoyed again. She doesn’t know that there are some Chinese foods that cannot be grown here. Father imports those. She would be surprised too that Father has many customers who are not Chinese, they eat the Chinese food and wear the clothes that Father imports. ‘And these incense sticks only come from a Chinese importer,’ I said poking one right in front of Elizabeth’s face.

  ‘Those stink. Who would want to have that smell stinking out their place? I hate that smell. It smells like sick.’

  ‘We do, and so do many other Chinese people. And besides, it is not just the smell. These have special significance for Chinese people.’

  ‘Well my Pa says that Chinese people should be like everyone else and live like us. This is not China.’

  I raised my voice. She was sounding just like some of the boys in my new school. ‘When people travel to another country, to England or America, they should become like that the people already there?’

  ‘Well of course.’

  ‘Then why did your father’s ancestors come here and not live like the aboriginals?’ Elizabeth had no answer and collected her shoes and rushed off in bare feet to rinse the smell. She returned with Mother. She kissed her. She left … after I had finished cleaning up her mess.

  Wednesday, 9 September

  King Woo and his family are moving to the country, today. In fact right now they are on their way. This was so sudden, even King Woo did not know they were moving till last night. His father has been very secretive about leaving the city. He thought that it would be better for him to attend to his studies right until the last moment. His father has purchased Sing To’s store in the country, that’s what the secret meeting was about. Sing To has to return to China. I know that we will still see each other and I can always send him notes when Father sends the supplies to the store. That is the end of my Chinese language lessons on the walk to school. I hope Father does not increase my Saturday class time.

  ‘So you will not be walking to school with me.’ I stated.

  ‘No need now. You old enough to walk yourself,’ he giggled. ‘BaBa say I might come back to city to boarding school if school not work out. He might send me back to China like you.’

  I like having
my cousin around, to spend time with when I am not with Father in the store. Now who will teach me chess? Father does not know how to play well. Now I will be spending all my time in the store—when I am not at school.

  Thursday, 10 September

  Why was it a secret? I blurted to Father this morning at the breakfast table. He was at the wharf all day yesterday and last night. Now I know.

  Sing To has to go to China to attend to family affairs, his father and mother are both dying and they have no other children. Other men do that and have people supervising while they are away. That was impossible. Sing To has been refused re-entry into Australia.

  ‘But he lives here,’ I spat as I was drinking cha.

  Government rules say that Sing To is permitted to leave Australia but he can’t come back. Like Father he mined for gold and then established a trading store. He has money in the bank, letters of good character from other traders and he’s never been in jail, but he can’t return without risk of being jailed. Like Father, Sing To was born in China, but he was never naturalised like Father. Now, with the changed laws it is too late for Sing To. He kept putting it off. So now he can’t come back.

  I don’t know why the government does not want him here.

  Friday, 11 September

  I knew it would happen eventually. I think that this is good. Father has asked me to assist him in the store straight after lunch. No school this afternoon. But there are no more games in the lane at the back of our store with my cousin either.

  Sunday, 13 September

  I was going to visit King Woo today as I sometimes do on Sunday afternoons. I even said so to Father as we walked into the store after church. And then I remembered he is not there.

  Tuesday, 15 September

  I learnt a new word today, well actually two words. Both small words, both words alone that have simple, insignificant meanings, two words, ‘half’ and ‘caste’ but put them together and they are two powerful words.

  I was walking back from school past shops on George Street. Two men were sitting outside Nock and Kirby’s. I hate the smell of smoke as it makes my head ache and I have trouble breathing. Father used to smoke but Mother made him stop.

  The men wanted me to hear every word they said because their voices were so loud.

  ‘He’s one of them, this one comin’. White mother, celestial father.’

  I know what celestial meant. The Chinese were called moon-faces and celestials on the goldfields. But as I came close to the stinking smell, one man spat on the ground and said ‘Yeah. Half-caste,’ and spat again. I knew that it was a word of hate by the way they said it.

  ‘What’s a half-caste?’ I asked Mother when I dropped my satchel on the floor.

  ‘Who called you that?’ she questioned, really quickly she spoke. I knew they were nasty words. I told her about the two old men.

  ‘Those are words of hate, about children from mixed marriages. Children like you. My beautiful children. People, especially English people, even some of my family, think that children like you, with a Chinese father and a white-skinned mother are less perfect just because you have mixed parentage. They are so very wrong.’ Mother’s voice was straining. ‘What makes an orange an orange, Edward?’ I have heard that question from Father often. And he adds ‘Is it the colour of the skin of the orange (for not all oranges have orange-coloured skin)—or what is inside that makes it an orange?’

  ‘Never be ashamed of who you are. You are part of your father. You are part of me but most importantly you are completely and wholly and perfectly and uniquely you. Have you work to do?’ she questioned. I shook my head so then Mother guided me into the store to spend time with Father but she told me not to mention what happened. ‘I shall talk to him about this later tonight. And remember oranges.’

  As I walked into the store I heard my mother drag out a chair (she always tells us to lift the chair and never drag them) and ease her body onto the seat. She sighed and sniffled. I turned around and was going to see her but she looked up and told me that she was fine. Her words that she would say were in my head, ‘it takes more fortitude to ignore those spiteful comments than respond to them with other forms of hatred.’

  Those words were meant to hurt me; they were barbed arrows that hurt my mother.

  Wednesday, 16 September

  At school today we had team sports. I was the last one picked. I do not think that the boys want me on the team. No-one threw the ball to me. I did not touch the ball once. The teacher did not notice.

  Thursday, 17 September

  A little rain today—about an inch. That’s all to write down. The sun came up and it goes down. And now I am going to bed.

  Friday, 18 September

  While I was at school today and Father was in the store, Mother met her sister. It was decided that Elizabeth will be coming to spend time with us, on Sunday and maybe during the week. Mother says that this is wonderful. She will go to church with us (her family does not go to church so this can only be to her eternal benefit, Mother said) and she will learn about our family. Father says that this is good too. Elizabeth is family but she is much like her father. He does not approve of the Chinese, so maybe Elizabeth, by spending time with us, will not be so influenced by his thoughts and attitudes. Family is vitally important, family bonds are not to be broken. That’s what we are taught.

  I still am not sure what there is to learn. I have a father and a mother and there are sisters and a brother and Father operates a store. To me it is not unusual.

  Elizabeth’s mother must be very strong to demand that Elizabeth be permitted to spend time with our family. I hope she is not as strange as last time she was here.

  Saturday, 19 September

  ‘There’s no way I am cleaning up her mess,’ is what I told Father. Of course they don’t expect me to but because she is family she is to be treated appropriately. When I told Father that she was a girl he wittily replied that I had made an astute observation. He giggled, ‘… they do teach you well at that school.’

  And because she is closer to my age than my sisters she might spend more time doing things I do, that’s what they also said.

  ‘Not if I can help it,’ I mumbled returning another bundle of slippers to the correct place on the shelf.

  Sunday, 20 September

  She was here today. Elizabeth. We were walking back from church, our family and Elizabeth. She looks so different to my sisters. They do not wear the frilly clothes and the bonnets that she does. And they do not flick and pick and toss and preen their clothes the way she does. As we walked past the stores, closed for trading but open for friendly Sunday visits, we introduced Elizabeth to the people we knew. She was very courteous and shook any hands that were offered.

  Father is adamant that when we meet other Chinese people that all conversations are maintained in English as the only polite thing to do. Because Mother can’t speak Chinese and we can only speak a little he says that it is an insult to him and his family to be speaking a language that we can’t understand. Speaking English is a way everyone can be part of the conversation and that everyone can understand.

  ‘It is like whispering about someone behind their back,’ he says. ‘It is very bad manners and not acceptable.’

  Mr Lee was outside his store cleaning. Father encourages him to come with us to church but he prefers Sunday mornings ‘attending his own worship’. Mr Lee immediately started speaking to Father in Chinese. He should know better. He was just greeting the family; I recognised the words and the bowing. Father immediately continued the conversation in English with Mr Lee. That’s the way it often happens when we are around.

  Back at the store after church, I heard Elizabeth ask my sister what was the China yabber she was hearing.

  ‘What do you mean Chinese yabber?’ I responded.

  ‘You know the words that Chinaman, that Mr Lee man spoke to your Pa.’

  ‘He was greeting us and you might have noticed that they immediately continued the conver
sation in English.’

  ‘Yeah well it sure sounded funny.’

  I left. This conversation was ended. I think that she is just being like her father. I was going to tell Mother and Father about this too but it was not important. And maybe it will not happen again and if it doesn’t then I would have stirred up trouble for no good reason.

  Elizabeth spent most of her time with my sisters after lunch. Then she caught the tram back to her place.

  Tuesday, 22 September

  I wonder about Elizabeth. Is she like her father or is she like her mother? I think she is like her father.

  I remember too that I think I heard her say you Chinese to my sisters too. They did not hear the words. Maybe I was not hearing correctly. But I am sure that this is what she said.

  Wednesday, 23 September

  Another day for Father not to be disturbed. His door was closed again. Mother told me that one of the other traders sent a relative to assist Father in the store for a few hours. I could do all the assisting … but only if I spoke Chinese fluently I expect is what Father would say.

  Saturday, 26 September

  I tried to avoid Saturday classes by starting my chores before he arrived. No such fortune. ‘More time for learning,’ he announced as soon as he walked in.

  Reading the paper is very, very, very difficult. I do not recognise many characters but Father says that I will with practice. I can read the numbers and some words that I hear all the time and I see in the store but today he pointed to some really unusual ones. He wants me to understand the Chinese characters because our family business relies on the Chinese trade and most of the goods and the invoices are scripted in Chinese. But I don’t think he realises how hard it is to learn the Chinese script.