Paper Sons: A Memoir

by Dickson Lam

  Jordan sat in the chair, and I didn’t even say anything right away. I wanted him to feel awkward. “Why are we sitting like this, Saam Sook?”

  “You’re not a baby, so we’re gonna stop treating you like one. The way you opened Yi Goo Jeh and Uncle Eric’s presents was rude. They had to drive to the store, pick out what they thought you might like, stand in line to buy it, bring it home, and then wrap it up. And they bought you a card. They had to write a message for you. It took hours to do all that, just for you, and you didn’t even look at their gifts. Hey, look me in the eye when I’m talking.”

  His eyes shot up.

  “Do you know what respect means?” I asked.

  “Being nice to people?”

  “It’s also what you think of someone. If you respect a person, you think they’re a good human being. I’m not sure—at least from what I saw yesterday—that you’ll grow up to be a person I’ll respect. I’m always going to love you, but respect, that’s different. I don’t have to respect you. I don’t respect rude people.”

  His eyes grew watery, but I continued with the lecture. If I could get a student to cry, it was a good day. Progress was made.

  “OK,” I said, “now how can you make it up to Yi Goo Jeh and Uncle Eric?”

  “Say sorry?”

  “That’s a start.”

  guayabera

  It was summer, and I was staying at my brother’s, visiting from out of state. In the mornings, I’d get my nephew and niece ready for school. Make sure they were fed and dressed in time. When Alana would have a bad hair day, I’d comb and blow-dry her hair. In return, one morning, I let her shave my head with a disposable razor, her little hands wiping shaving cream around my head. Goh Goh would’ve already left for work and Dai So would be asleep, her nocturnal work schedule.

  I’d climb on the cable car with the kids to Chinatown where their summer program was held. When the kids in Alana’s class were given nicknames, Alana, who was tall for her age, was named Humongor. My brother didn’t find that as funny as me. I’d also pick them up after school. It was risky—Bah Ba lived blocks away.

  When we’d return home, Alana would grab her hammer made out of paper and tape. “Beetle!” she’d say. She’d walk around smashing bugs on the floor. My brother, along with Jordan, sometimes would join in using scraps of tissue, the three of them hunched over searching for an insect to squash.

  I’d sleep on the sectional. They’d gotten rid of the old sofa from Bah Ba, but our father’s taste in furniture was still present in my brother’s living room. Goh Goh had made the mistake of allowing Bah Ba to pick out the coffee table. It was an oval lacquered table, cumbersome, too big for the room. I had to squeeze through to sit on the couch. During dinner, everyone else sat on small chairs. I’d broken two of them. One was a tiny plastic one, made for a child. I cracked the seat trying to sit on it. The other chair was a cheap stool, and that flimsy thing fell apart as I was sitting on it.

  My brother had turned our father’s former room into a dumping ground, mostly relics of Goh Goh’s bygone rebate empire. He’d find rebates for electronics, order them online, and sell them for full price. There was hardly space to walk in the room. It was crammed with stacks of boxes, stuff that never sold, also things he’d accumulated over the years but couldn’t part with: cassette tapes, video game systems, Bah Ba’s old mahjong table, and my brother’s childhood desk, the one our father had bought for him, made from maple wood.

  It was my summer project to clean out the room. I found in the closest a bag of old clothes, my father’s. The bag was filled not of clothes that Bah Ba had left from his last stay, but these clothes were left behind by my father when he’d first moved to Minnesota years ago. They’d remained in the dresser in Mom’s room, untouched, but when the old North Beach was about to be torn down, Goh Goh threw the clothes into a garbage bag. It’d been unopened since.

  I pulled out from the bag a guayabera-style shirt, something Bah Ba probably had brought over when we emigrated from Hong Kong, when he was younger than I was then. I didn’t remember my father wearing the shirt before, or even the shirt itself. It was too stylish for him. I tried it on, but it was too tight. If I arched my back, the shirt would’ve ripped. This was probably for the best, else I would’ve kept it. I didn’t examine the other clothes. I tossed the shirt back into the bag, slung the bag over my shoulder, and went down to the courtyard. I pictured where I stood in relation to our childhood apartment. The sounds were the same, the hum of the cable car tracks, the electricity surging through the poles of a bus trolley in the distance, but nothing else was familiar. Surrounding me were townhouses, neighbors who were strangers to me. I threw the bag into the garbage chute and listened to it as it slid into the dumpster.

  tethered

  I pass by my father’s apartment often, whenever I’m in town. I ride by on the bus, on the way to my brother’s house. Bah Ba’s neighbors include bars and strip clubs but also an elementary school and a museum dedicated to the Beat Generation. At every stop in that neighborhood, I check out the window to see who’s about to climb on the bus. I have to be ready to step off if I see my father, but the chances of me instantly recognizing him are slim. I haven’t seen him in a decade. When passengers board, I shield my face.

  I walk by his place when I meet up with my homie who works at a nearby hotel. There are other routes to reach the hotel that don’t involve having to pass Bah Ba’s apartment building, but this way is the most direct. That’s what I tell myself. In truth, this path, which places me across the street from my father, must be a guilty pleasure, one I haven’t admitted to myself: sneaking a peek at the house of a lost love.

  Still, the idea of bumping into Bah Ba terrifies me, in spite of how I put myself in situations to do just that. I don’t know how I’d react if I saw him. I might flip out and go off, put hands on my father, or worse, the opposite might occur, some feeling of pity or mercy.

  I don’t stare at Bah Ba’s SRO building. It’s on a side street. I glance at it, but knowing that it’s there is enough. This is as close as I am willing to get to my father, as close as we’ll ever get, unless he finds me first, and that’s not likely. I don’t believe he’s looking for me. He hasn’t called or written since I visited him in Minnesota. He knows from my brother that I don’t want anything to do with him, and I guess that’s all he needs to know.

  For my part, I’m not done yet with Bah Ba. Probably never will be. In writing this book, I’d hoped to be freed from my father, that I’d exhaust my obsession with him, but our bond has only strengthened. He’ll remain a permanent character in my story. We’ve become pieces on a board game that will never end.

  spirit

  They say when an ancestor dies they become a spirit, capable of molding the lives of their descendants. A former girlfriend believed it was her grandma in the afterlife who had brought us together, two lovers joined by a supernatural matchmaker. When we had rocky times, we’d pray to her grandma and ask for guidance.

  One day, Bah Ba will leave this world. Declaring that I’ve disowned him will mean nothing. Spirits don’t take orders from the living. He’ll follow me around like all good ancestors do. He may hold a grudge against me for what I’ve written in these pages, and he’ll have the power to exact revenge. The ability to shape my story will be in his hands.

  postmortem

  Players conduct a postmortem of their chess game once it’s finished. The two former opponents now work together as one. They return to key junctures of the game and consider alternative moves. They test the merits of these moves by playing them out and evaluating the resulting positions.

  In chess books, moves from a game are recorded along with variations to the main line. This allows the reader, using their own board, to not only reenact the original but also to diverge from the original, to explore an alternate timeline.

  time travelled

 
I was at a jazz club in North Beach with some guy named Fred. Apparently, we were best buds. “We’re back in 1985,” he said. His mom was playing the piano. We didn’t know who she was until later, when we were back at her apartment. Her boyfriend was hanging out with us too. “Yo, these are going to be my parents,” Fred whispered to me. I thought I was in a Back to the Future remake and that Fred might start disappearing, but we learned the couple already had a wedding planned. All me and Fred had to do was get out the way. We left them alone and hit the streets. For all we knew, that night could’ve been Fred’s night of conception.

  We found another club but it was last call. We downed shots of whisky. We stepped outside. It was sunny somehow, a warm heat. I saw my mother up the hill. She was wearing a red scarf and headed our way. We didn’t want to disrupt the time-space continuum, so me and Fred ducked back into the club as she sauntered by.

  This couldn’t be why we’d traveled back in time, to be neutral bystanders. Maybe we’d been sent back to fix something that had gone awry, like Kitty Pryde of the X-Men, who’d also time travelled,

  but from the ’80s. She had to prevent the assassination of a senator by fellow mutants, an event that would eventually lead to a mutant genocide, a dystopian future.

  I thought about the year, 1985, what tragedies occurred that I could prevent. It was the year my father began creeping into my sister’s room.

  I could go to Ga Jeh’s school and warn her, but I wouldn’t be able to get past her teachers. They wouldn’t let a stranger talk to a child in private. I could work my way into the school as a volunteer, but that would take too long. Paperwork had to be cleared.

  I decided to find my father. I told Fred I had to do this alone. I waited for Bah Ba outside Tea House. I stood where I could see both exits, the front door and the back door in the alley. My father left through the front entrance. He still had his apron on.

  “Bah Ba,” I said, “it’s Dickson.”

  He ignored me like I was asking him for change.

  “Tai hah ngoh goh yeuhng,” I shouted. Look at my face! Look at me, I’m your son.

  “You’re a man.” He stepped toward me, furrowing his brow.

  “Don’t try to figure this out,” I said. I had the feeling that at any moment, I’d be jerked back to my time. “In the future, your kids are going to abandon you, but you can stop this from happening. No, don’t leave! Please, just listen. Just listen to me.”

  And he waited to hear what I’d say next.

  * * * * * *

  Notes

  Epi. “My aunt haunts me…” from The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts by Maxine Hong Kingston. Alfred A. Knopf, 1976, p. 16.

  Epi. “You must take your opponent…” from Chess for Success: Using an Old Game to Build New Strengths in Children and Teens by Maurice Ashley. Broadway Books, 2005, p. 191-192.

  Ch 1 Quotes from homicide inspector and district spokeswoman from “SAN FRANCISCO/Hunters Point Killing Called Result of Running Clash between Gangs” by Jaxon Van Derbeken. SFGate, 12 Apr. 2005.

  Ch 1 Deng Xiaoping’s evaluation of Mao from Mao: A Biography by Ross Terrill. Stanford University Press, 1999, p. 471.

  Ch 1 Book of sculpted scenes from Rent Collection Courtyard: Sculptures of Oppression and Revolt by Revolutionary Chinese Art Workers Group. Athena Books, 2004.

  Ch 2 Tea House as “arguably the best dim sum restaurant in the country” from “Where the Twain Meet-Deliciously” by Eileen Yin-Fei Lo. New York Times, 5 Dec. 1982.

  Ch 3 Demographics of North Beach Housing Projects from “The Impact of Perceptions on Interpersonal Interactions in an African American/Asian American Housing Project” by Patricia Guthrie and Janis Hutchinson. Journal of Black Studies, vol. 25, no. 3, Jan. 1995, p. 383.

  Ch 4 “The Chinese people have stood up!” from Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung: Volume V by Mao Tse-Tung. Foreign Language Press, 1977, p. 15.

  Ch 4 “Oppressors are people…” from Mao Zedong by Jonathan D. Spence. Viking, 1999, p. 36.

  Ch 4 Mao generation poem from “Generation Names in China: Past, Present, and Future” by Li Zhonghua and Edwin D. Lawson. Names, vol. 50, no. 3, Nov. 2002, p. 4.

  Ch 4 “The outstanding thing…” from Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung by Mao Tse-tung. Foreign Language Press, 1972, p. 36.

  Ch 4 “If I could drain away…” from The Autobiography of Malcolm X: As Told to Alex Haley by Malcolm X. Ballantine Books, 1987, p. 232.

  Ch 4 Angel Island poem from Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island, 1910-1940 by Him Mark Lai, Genny Lim, and Judy Yung. University of Washington Press, 1991, p. 92.

  Ch 5 Parent survey results from “Children Left Behind Face Tough Road.” China Daily, 2 June 2004.

  Ch 5 Children survey results from “Paying the Price for Economic Development: The Children of Migrant Workers in China” by Aris Chan. China Labour Bulletin, Nov. 2009, p. 10.

  Ch 5 The quotes “If I hurt my hands…” and “I used to miss my parents…” from ibid., pp. 14-15.

  Ch 5 “What’s the big deal…” from “Left-Behind Children of China’s Migrant Workers Bear Grown-Up Burdens: About 61 Million Chinese Kids Haven’t Seen One or Both Parents for at Least Three Months” by Andrew Browne. The Wall Street Journal, 17 Jan. 2014.

  Ch 5 Statistic that ninety percent of sexual assault cases involve left-behind girls from “The Vulnerability of China’s Left-Behind Children” by Maura Elizabeth Cunningham. The Wall Street Journal, 21 Mar. 2014.

  Ch 5 “Many of these tragedies…” from “Paying the Price for Economic Development: The Children of Migrant Workers in China” by Aris Chan. China Labour Bulletin, Nov. 2009, p. 12.

  Ch 5 “Just ’cause you…” from Malcolm X: “Democracy is Hypocrisy” Speech. Educational Video Group, 1960. Transcript.

  Ch 5 Asian American magazine was Giant Robot, issue 10, 1997.

  Ch 5 “I know you two guys are crazy…” from “Richard Aoki Interview.” APEX Express. KPFA, Berkeley, 30 Apr. 2009.

  Ch 5 Article about 3F written by Robert Capp. “Taggers, Bangers, and the Battle for SF Graffiti,” dated 1993 but went unpublished until self-published on personal website. Accessed 27 Mar. 2013.

  Ch 5 “The game of chess…” sampled in “Da Mystery of Chessboxin’” by Wu-Tang Clan. Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), Loud, 1993.

  Ch 5 “These days…” from Mao: A Biography by Ross Terrill. Stanford University Press,1999, p. 339.

  Ch 5 Ninety-five percent of cadres redeemable and “touch men’s very souls” from Mao’s China and After: A History of the People’s Republic by Maurice Meisner. 3rd ed., Free Press, 1999, p. 307-308.

  Ch 5 “Bombard the headquarters” from Mao: A Reinterpretation by Lee Feigon. Ivan R. Dee, 2002, p. 158.

  Ch 5 “If the father…” from “The Role of the Red Guards and Revolutionary Rebels in Mao’s Cultural Revolution” by the CIA Directorate of Intelligence. CIA, Nov. 1968, p. 15.

  Ch 5 “Sharing the Blue Sky” campaign from “Paying the Price for Economic Development: The Children of Migrant Workers in China” by Aris Chan. China Labour Bulletin, Nov. 2009, pp. 19-20.

  Ch 5 Eligibility to attend Robeson Rivera Academy from “The Repeat Offenders Prevention Project (ROPP) of the City/County of San Francisco: A Final Evaluation Report” by the California State Board of Corrections, June 2003, p. 7.

  Ch 6 “His rap style…” from “Nas’ 25 Favorite Albums” by Insanul Ahmed. Complex.com. 22 May 2012.

  Ch 6 Quotes from Long Night’s Journey into Day: South Africa’s Search for Truth & Reconciliation. Directed by Frances Reid and Deborah Hoffmann. Iris Films/Cinemax Reel Life, 2000.

  Acknowledgments

  First and foremost, I would like to thank my sister for her unwavering support throughout this project. Your courage gave me the strength to write this. Thanks to my mom for always be w
illing to answer questions, including all the random questions about Cantonese. To Willie for his patience and understanding. To my father for giving me permission to use his emails. To my brother for showing me what it means to be a loving father. To my aunts, uncles, and cousins, I hope for your understanding. To my grandparents, who have passed on, we miss you each day. And to our next generation, I wrote this for y’all.

  To the homies who’ve been there from day one of this journey: Maritez Apigo, George Alonzo, Eric Bastine, Sherilyn Tran, Tiffany Saechao, Han Fan. To Ken Ja and Dave Maduli, who I turn to continuously for pretty much everything, next drink’s on me. To my oldest and best friend, Koitt Robbins, let’s go for another one of those rides. To my brother Rob Santos, rest in power. Wish you were still here so you could read the stories of us and tell me, “That ain’t how it happened, man!”

  Shout-out to all the students and families I’ve had the privilege to work with. Keep grinding, keep shining. Rest in power to Javon King, George Hurtado, and Joshua Cameron, stars who had so much more to give. Rest in power to Randy and Keino. We remember.

  To Urban Academy, especially my mentor Avram Barlowe, for teaching me how to listen, how to create questions that make a classroom pop, and how to organize the chaos. To the co-founders of June Jordan School for Equity, Kate Goka, Matt Alexander, and Shane Safir, thank you for your visionary leadership and the years that y’all put into laying the foundation. To the other JJSE teachers and staff that I had the honor to work with, so much love and admiration for each of you.