‘Chye Hoon,’ he said, ‘you must learn to control your temper.’
‘Father, but—’
‘Listen to me,’ Father said. His baritone voice that night was like deep-fried tau foo: creamy on the inside, but with decidedly hard edges. His Adam’s apple throbbed. ‘We aren’t rich, and you will need to get married soon. If you become known for your temper, it will be hard to find a husband for you.’ As I listened to Father, I fretted about the future and my actions of the morning.
Father, in turn, looked at Mother. Her hands had stopped fidgeting, but she wasn’t her usual bundle of energy. Instead, a gaunt, tired woman looked at me with shoulders hunched and eyes tinged with sadness. Mother sat still for what seemed a long time.
‘I not know what to do with you, Chye Hoon,’ she finally said, letting out a sigh. ‘I know you good girl, but so impetuous! You have to be calmer.’
‘Mother, I hear that man say what,’ I pointed out. ‘He . . .’ I stopped, unsure I should repeat his phrases in the presence of my parents.
‘I no hear, but I can imagine,’ she replied quietly. ‘So what? Let him say what he want.’ Mother paused for a minute, adding in a low voice, ‘Don’t forget, you now a woman, Chye Hoon.’
She was alluding to the recent moment when, on discovering a damp red patch on my sarong, I had run to her in panic. Ever since, knowing looks had been exchanged between Mother and the other Nyonyas who visited our house. I was given to understand that I had come of age – although I had done nothing – and their glances made me proud yet uncomfortable at the same time. ‘Not long now you will marry,’ Mother continued. ‘You not watch your tongue, man also not want you.’
‘Chye Hoon,’ Father said, screwing in the final nail with his voice, ‘you’re not as pretty as Elder Sister, but you are a better cook. Also your sewing isn’t bad. We should have no problem finding you a husband – provided you don’t become known as a dragon.’
I swallowed. I knew I wasn’t the best-looking in our family, having inherited Mother’s dark skin and Father’s coarse hair, strong like a man’s. After my eyes, my hair was the next most popular topic along Ah Kwee Street, because it was as unruly as a labourer’s. Even when swept over my crown like Mother’s and held by five outsized pins, stray strands inevitably escaped. ‘Look, look!’ people would whisper, pointing their fingers. ‘Pins so big, hair also fall. Stubborn, just like the owner.’
When I walked beside Elder Sister, the whispers became vicious. Some found it hard to believe we were sisters. Elder Sister’s hair was fine and smooth, her complexion fair – a quirk of nature, aided by her preference for feminine pursuits and staying indoors. To make things worse, she was demure and petite. I, in contrast, am sturdily built; slim in those days, but definitely solid. I had known for many years that Elder Sister was considered beautiful while I was not, but Father was the first to say so to my face. A lump made its way to my throat.
Before the lump could settle, Mother spoke. ‘Elder Sister already got fourteen years. We look for husband for her soon. What you do also affect her future. You no want to be selfish, is it?’
I didn’t want to be selfish, of course.
But I also knew I couldn’t live the life that Elder Sister would. I had to remain true to myself. Except I didn’t know what that meant, or how to do it. Yet what was there to say in the midst of this onslaught?
I went to my room, numb from the shock of hearing the truth spoken so baldly, numb too from the imminence of marriage in my life. In my innocence I had no idea what actually took place between a man and a woman. ‘Your husband, he know what to do’ was all that Mother would whisper. There were times, while chewing betel nut leaves with her friends, when I could hear Mother and the other women giggling. From the little I could deduce, marriage was both a thing to be desired and a burden to be borne – and I didn’t want it.
Yet the time was at hand for Elder Sister to make a match. I knew that my turn would eventually come. It seemed as inevitable as night following day.
5
When I look back, it feels as if my life has flown by at the speed of Penang’s waterfall, as if it were only last week when a rickshaw arrived outside our house on Ah Kwee Street, bringing with it a short woman with narrow eyes whom I recognised as a matchmaker.
By then seven years had passed from the time of Elder Sister’s marriage. As a child I had not wished to be married, but when the matchmakers did not call at our house for years after Elder Sister’s wedding, I began to be afraid. The fate of a spinster is pitiful, possibly worse than death, and I didn’t relish becoming one. It was a fear which worsened over time as first my third sister, Chye Phaik, was chosen and then my fourth sister, Chye Lian. Being spurned was painful. I sometimes woke up in a sweat, imagining myself at fifty with both my parents dead and me alone in a world where my siblings were scattered far from Penang.
When the matchmaker arrived, only two of us remained within the family home: my youngest sister, Chye Keat, and me. Being already accustomed to disappointment, I assumed she had come to make enquiries about Chye Keat.
On receiving the visitor, Mother called for coffee and her sireh, or betel nut–chewing set. With Father’s increasing success and fewer mouths to feed, we had become wealthier, and Mother had acquired a betel box with silver inlays. This was no simple box but a box within a box. Snugly tucked inside was a removable container divided into four compartments, each with its own lid, which could be lifted out and placed on a table. The betel box felt heavy in my hands. While carrying it, I admired the curves on its surfaces. They intertwined gloriously, ending in two circles in the middle that looked like a pair of knowing eyes.
I took the box into the hall, where Mother sat chatting amiably with the matchmaker. When I entered, I noticed the woman’s oval face and thick lips, heavily rouged. In turn the matchmaker gave me the once-over with her inquisitive eyes. For a minute I wondered whether she could have come to enquire about me, but I quickly dismissed the idea. After the incident of the clog, my reputation on the island had gone from bad to worse. Words like ‘uncontrollable’ and ‘dragon’ were used. Outwardly, I shrugged them off; inwardly, I could not help thinking that if my brother Chong Jin had done the same, he would have been lauded as a hero for defending his mother’s honour.
As a result I remained unmarried at the age of twenty. In my era girls were married by sixteen, and those still single at eighteen were called old maids. Spinsterhood was a fate everyone assumed would befall me.
I thought the same. I knew it would require an exceptional man to contemplate marrying me.
The matchmaker spent a long time with Mother in the hall, chewing betel nut leaves and sipping coffee. After she left, Mother continued chewing on her own. That was unusual, because despite her beautiful sireh set, Mother had never fully taken to this Malay custom. She didn’t indulge unless she had company.
I spied at Mother from a secret peeping hole behind the partition separating the inner and outer halls. She looked deep in thought. She picked up a betel leaf absent-mindedly with her tweezers, opened the lidded container, which held the white lime, and spread the chalky substance on her leaf. All the while there was a distant look in Mother’s eyes, as if she were dreaming. She took a piece of dried gambier cake from another lidded container and then sat still, not doing anything. After a few minutes, remembering where she was, Mother crumbled the brown powder between her forefinger and her thumb. I could tell she wasn’t paying attention, because she started to peel and cut up betel nuts with the guillotine knife, before noticing the pile of nuts already prepared and laid aside. Selecting several, Mother placed them on her leaf. She then wrapped the leaf carefully and put the package into her mouth.
I watched as Mother chewed. She was oddly nervous, rubbing her hands constantly. She looked beautiful in a distracted way, her cheekbones made more prominent by the rotation of her jaw. When she could no longer contain the juices inside her mouth, Mother spat into a brass jar, exposing red, bl
ood-coloured gums. Afterwards her eyelids drooped while she moved the cud inside her mouth.
I wondered what was worrying her. Perhaps the matchmaker had come on a mission from a towkay, one of the wealthy bosses, with an express interest in Chye Keat for his son. I thought it unlikely Mother would consider such a proposal, since her opinions about the sons of the wealthy were well known.
On the other hand, could it possibly be that a towkay had become interested in me? I chuckled. The more I mused, the more I realised my parents would be in a difficult position. I wondered how they would react. If, on the one hand, they had me, their problematic single daughter, and on the other they had a rich towkay proposing marriage, what would they do? I reminded myself not to be silly. No towkay would want his son to become entangled with a woman known to speak her mind and who threw clogs at stallholders.
I watched Mother for a long time, sorry I was no longer able to go and hold her the way I used to as a child. We were close then, Mother and I. I remembered how she would lift me on to her lap. I adored her smells, that slight whiff of Javanese face powder mixed with the fragrances of garlic and lemongrass, which were always on her clothes. Those times seemed an age ago; whenever I felt lost, I longed to be four again, despite the friction I had caused in my headstrong childhood.
After Father came home, he and Mother conferred late into the night. I heard them even when I was preparing for bed. Over the following days neither gave anything away – nothing was said and nothing happened. Mother went out as usual – to the market, to visit her friends, to play her card game, chiki. She made a trip somewhere out of the ordinary one afternoon, disappearing for several hours. When she came back, she looked more satisfied than usual. Once again she and Father had a long conversation after he returned from work.
A week later the matchmaker returned. This time it was our servant, Ah Lai, who served them coffee, along with Mother’s sireh box. The matchmaker’s second visit was brief, lasting barely fifteen minutes. After she left, Mother did not remain in the hall chewing betel nut leaves. Instead, she bustled about with renewed vigour and then went out without saying where she was going.
As soon as Mother left, I cornered Ah Lai. ‘That matchmaker twice come here already. My mother, she tell you something-ah?’
The maid smiled wryly, shrugging her shoulders. ‘Young miss, you really think Mistress tell me anything?’
Beneath Ah Lai’s dark eyes there was the hint of a twinkle. ‘Ah Lai, you really nothing know-ah?’ I asked a second time. ‘You must tell me-lah.’
‘Young miss, believe me, I really not know. But if you marry next, no surprise to me. Matchmaker come to same house two times, must be reason.’
‘Chye Keat not yet married,’ I countered. ‘Who want me anyway?’
‘Ah, that I can’t say,’ Ah Lai replied, eyes now sparkling. ‘I tell you,’ she whispered. ‘I take coffee in that time, I hear them say your name. Sure one.’ At that my cheeks burned and my heart beat faster. I wondered if it could possibly be true and who the man could be. Hadn’t he heard about my reputation?
For the next while my parents seemed on edge. I walked around in suspense, watching them closely yet not daring to ask what I was dying to know. One day Father enquired out of the blue, ‘Are you all right, Chye Hoon?’ He tried to sound casual but could not conceal his simmering excitement. Something was about to happen, and he knew I suspected as much.
My parents eventually called me into the hall, and every second of what took place remains ingrained in my mind.
Father and Mother were seated when I entered. Their eyes followed me as I walked, and they would have noticed how nervously I clasped and unclasped my hands. Clearing his throat, Father spoke. ‘You’re a smart girl, Chye Hoon,’ he began. I stared at that familiar wobble of his Adam’s apple. ‘I’m sure you’ve guessed that we have news for you.’
I nodded.
Father went straight to the point. ‘A recently arrived Chinese worker, a Hakka man by the name of Wong Peng Choon, has been asking about you . . . It seems he’s heard of your Nyonya cooking.’
Father paused to let this pronouncement sink in. I, meanwhile, asked myself a thousand questions. Who was this Wong Peng Choon? What was he looking for?
‘The man wants a healthy, good-looking girl, a wife skilled in cooking, homemaking and sewing,’ Father continued.
‘You already see the matchmaker, of course,’ Mother interrupted.
‘Yes, Mother.’
‘Hah!’ Mother said airily. ‘You know what they like. She sing Peng Choon’s praises . . . so good-looking . . . got smooth skin-lah and fine teeth and look like a prince! But me, I must go see for myself.’
Mother paused to catch her breath. ‘Well, Chye Hoon, no joke-ah – he is really handsome. And tall – taller even than Husband,’ she continued, beaming proudly at Father.
My heart thumped. So, a good-looking man wanted to marry me. I tried to picture his face but failed.
‘And he’s well educated,’ Father said. ‘He’s fluent in Hakka as well as Hokkien and has taught himself English since arriving in Malaya.’
‘Now, normally we no tell you now, so early on,’ Mother added quickly. ‘Like your sisters, everything done only, they know about their marriages.’
I waited. What was about to come?
Mother looked me directly in the eye. ‘Wong Peng Choon already got wife and son in China . . .’
Her words hung in the air. ‘This good of course,’ she continued, voice lilting to emphasise her point. ‘Means he already know what to do.’ I blushed, embarrassed at having the delicate matter of my wedding night referred to.
When I recovered, I asked, ‘He want to live in Malaya?’
‘Yes, Wong Peng Choon is doing well here and wants to make Malaya his home.’ It was Father who replied. ‘Do you understand?’
I nodded. At the time few Chinese women were allowed to leave China. If this man wanted to settle, I knew it was unlikely his wife and child could follow.
‘Chye Hoon, you very lucky girl!’ Mother interjected, her mouth curving into a crescent-like smile. ‘You have man who want to marry you . . . good-looking, have education, successful. What more any woman want, hah? I ask you?’
Thus on a moonless Malayan night my destiny was sealed.
The news brought relief. Yet marriage worried me too. It wasn’t being a second wife which was the problem – this was common enough, and China seemed a long way off. But what if my husband hadn’t yet seen me and was disappointed on our wedding night? What if he drank? Or gambled? Or was a wife beater? What if he turned out to be a womaniser? In looking to marry again, he undoubtedly wanted a new son. What if I failed to bear him one?
Those were the thoughts which plagued me. I would soon enter a new world, one I knew little about, a world spoken of in whispers here and there in what appeared to be equal degrees of embarrassment and thrill. I was curious too about the man who was to be my husband. Why was he undaunted, treading where other men feared to come? I decided that this Wong Peng Choon must be very unusual. I was excited and nervous at the prospect. It made me feel young again, like a child waiting for the ting-ting man.
6
A traditional Nyonya-Baba wedding is no straightforward affair, as my husband Wong Peng Choon was to discover. First, our horoscopes had to be checked to ensure there was no clash. If our horoscopes were incompatible, any hopes for marriage would have been dashed. Fortunately, the temple priest who was the expert in geomancy settled the matter easily.
What followed next was a snag which could have led to a different outcome. For months Mother parried my questions – ‘Chye Hoon, we only talk about details. No need for you to worry.’
But I grew anxious. ‘He changed his mind-ah?’ I wondered aloud.
‘Ai-yahh! Don’t be silly-lah,’ Mother would reply. ‘Of course not. What for change his mind?’ I in my nervous state could think of a hundred reasons. Perhaps, having set eyes on me, the man wanted to call things
off. ‘But you not bad-looking girl,’ Mother assured me. ‘Anyway, more important to him is you know how to cook. Your health also, because he wants sons.’
As it turned out, the truth was more complex. Knowing what I do now, I’m sure my bridegroom would have acted more decisively if the argument had been about a purely trivial matter. Unfortunately what he wanted was to take me away immediately after marriage – to Ipoh, a town at the heart of the tin-mining region in the Kinta Valley. Ipoh was 180 miles south-east of Penang, in a state called Perak, part of the Federated Malay States. In Mother’s mind this was so remote he might as well have suggested taking me to China. Ipoh, a town I had never even heard of before, presented an obstacle which nearly derailed our marriage plans. The town remained a sticking point with Mother for weeks, because she did not want me to move so far away. In today’s world, where people move hither and thither and there are large steamships and even flying machines, her reaction may seem strange, but back then we moved about only on elephants and in rickshaws and gharries, horse-drawn cabs.
The compromise between my parents and Peng Choon, when it was finally struck, would also appear exceptional today. Peng Choon agreed to a chin-chuoh marriage: he would move in to our house immediately after our wedding and live there with me for six months before we went to Ipoh. This was a Nyonya-Baba custom, and it eased my parents’ minds considerably.
Peng Choon’s willingness to accede to a chin-chuoh wedding spoke volumes. It showed he was prepared to brave the raised eyebrows of his fellow countrymen out of consideration for Mother. In his mind, living side by side for six months would allow us to spend time together while Mother got used to the idea of our leaving.
Of course, there was another side to the whole question, and I’m sure that Peng Choon, being no fool, understood at once. He was a Hakka man alone in Malaya, contracted into a traditional wedding in a culture that wasn’t his. By agreeing to a wedding in chin-chuoh style, he at once handed all responsibility for the wedding arrangements to my family. The compromise was ideal.
The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds Page 5