Talking about the New Year and about fish,
in China every New Year’s Eve we ate fish
Because of a pun on the pronunciation yu-yue
Meant abundance, wealth and fish
Nien-nien you-yue Every year, a surplus
I remember the big fish & the whole family eating
We’d bow to the ancestors first and then we’d eat
And we’d say yu-yue, a surplus, more than we need.
—Lee Kwong
When I was 24,
it was a very good year
I met my husband in China
He was a heart surgeon,
I was a student of his
We were married that year
when I was 25, the baby came
The whole family was there
it was a very good year
When I was 34, we moved to Taiwan
with our four children
We hat little money
but he was not an ordinary doctor
he was a surgeon
I was a child doctor
when I was 34
When I was 54, I moved to New York
to be a doctor in this country
They say it'd be hard to make a living
but it was a very good year
Now I remember
all the good friends I made there
We still keep in touch
They'd call on me & come to my home
When I lived in New York
New Yorkers were so warm
they made me feel at home
I made a lot of friends
—Lee Kwong
In China, we don’t have April Fools Day. I was working at the hospital, waiting to see my patients. Suddenly somebody came into my waiting room saying, “Hurry, there’s been a bad accident with your son at home.”
I dropped everything & immediately went home. Then I see my son working in the yard. I saw he was fine. I thought , what? And then they all said “April Fool!” I saw that he was all right and I relaxed. But I was so worried, I was almost perspiring—my child! I was so scared April Fool? What’s this, I asked. That’s how I learned about your April Fools Day.
—Lee Kwong
HARBIN
I was born in a cold place. I remember ice skating to music. I remember many years of ice skating in Northern China, a cold place. In medical school I met my husband. He wasn’t my husband yet. He was chasing me. He didn’t like ice skating, but he wanted to be together with me so he learned to skate. He was falling in love and he wanted to be with me. Besides, another boy was skating with me and he wanted to make sure that boy wasn’t skating with me. Later he said, “Lets do something else. I don’t like skating.” We had fallen in love. After I had fallen in love with him I stopped skating though I loved to skate. Now I’m a great grandmother. Can you imagine that? This is my secret story I never told anyone until now.
—Li Kwan
When I was a child, I lived with my grandmother. I was born in the year of the dragon in a small village in the northern part of China, near Siberia, close to the border of Russia. My father and my uncle were given to my grandmother to raise. When the brothers married they all lived together in one household. My father had four daughters. I am in between…my elder sister. I only have one sister left. We all lived with my grandmother.
When I was about 10, I was sent away to school. When I was 10, my mother gave birth to my brother. When I was 10, I was very small, my mother died. I came back home from school. I didn’t know my mother was very sick. I was in primary school. I came home and found my mother dying. I was so scared, I was shaking all over. I was shaking. I came home from school and the next day my mother died. I guess that’s why I studied medicine. I guess it was an infection. No antibiotics in those days, Nothing. In those days, childbirth was dangerous. My whole life, I cannot forget it. That’s why I took to doctor training. My mother, she should not have died. When I became a doctor, I always checked the placenta, I made sure it all came out.
My father had a good job. He was a handsome man. A tall man, very European looking for a Chinese man. The people in the north are different looking. Very tall, some with blue eyes. They all wanted to give him beautiful girls to remarry. But he said, “No, I want to remember my wife. I love only my wife, not others. I want to wait a year.”
My father was a graduate of Beijing University. My own mother didn’t go to school, she didn’t know how to write, she only knew one poem by memory. She was taught how to read and write classical poetry by an old woman. She knew how to read and write poetry, but no science, no mathematics. Nothing practical. After a year my father remarried and I had stepbrothers. My father had a good job at the Tzu Jao railway. He took us to another town called Tzu Peng Je. He had a good job and a house with servants, a cook and a telephone. Before that we lived in a small village with no phone, no running water, no automobiles, only a horse and cart. We used steam for heat. The first village was called Qwan Satchue Yuen—a kind of river.
My stepmother was very educated, she graduated from high school. My father went away with his young wife to a place to have a honeymoon vacation, Ya Lu Jiang on the river, a famous hotel there, the river name means love. She got pregnant there and my sister is named after the river. But I was so insecure, I was afraid my stepmother would hit me… maybe I was jealous? I don’t know.
My father didn’t treat her good. It makes me sad to remember. In my whole life I can never forget all those things. I came home from school. My mother died. I was shaking all over like a leaf. There was the new baby. My father got a wetnurse but after a year the baby died. The wetnurse didn’t have enough milk and she hid it from my father. She didn’t want him to know or she’d lose her job so she bought powdered milk and made milk in the night and pretended it was her milk. She didn’t know how to read the formula. The poor baby died of diarrhea.
I became a doctor, a pediatrician. My mother, she should not have died. A child never forgets these things. I remember it every day. I never forget. This is the nature of it. I grew up and for this reason I became a doctor. My sister became a doctor, another became a pharmacist. All my brothers are professors of science. My father didn’t want us to be in politics. It sad, you know, I don’t even remember my own mother’s name.
When I was a child, I lived with my grandmother. I was born in the year of the dragon in a small village in the northern part of China, near Siberia, close to the border of Russia. My father and my uncle were given to my grandmother to raise. When the brothers married they all lived together in one household. My father had four daughters. I am in between…my elder sister. I only have one sister left. We all lived with my grandmother.
When I was about 10, I was sent away to school. When I was 10, my mother gave birth to my brother. When I was 10, I was very small, my mother died. I came back home from school. I didn’t know my mother was very sick. I was in primary school. I came home and found my mother dying. I was so scared, I was shaking all over. I was shaking. I came home from school and the next day my mother died. I guess that’s why I studied medicine. I guess it was an infection. No antibiotics in those days, Nothing. In those days, childbirth was dangerous. My whole life, I cannot forget it. That’s why I took to doctor training. My mother, she should not have died. When I became a doctor, I always checked the placenta, I made sure it all came out.
My father had a good job. He was a handsome man. A tall man, very European looking for a Chinese man. The people in the north are different looking. Very tall, some with blue eyes. They all wanted to give him beautiful girls to remarry. But he said, “No, I want to remember my wife. I love only my wife, not others. I want to wait a year.”
My father was a graduate of Beijing University. My own mother didn’t go to school, she didn’t know how to write, she only knew one poem by memory. She was taught how to read and write classical poetry by an old woman. She knew how to read and write poetry, but no science, no mathematics. Nothing practical. After a year my father remarried and I had stepbrothers. My father had a good job at the Tzu Jao railway. He took us to another town called Tzu Peng Je. He had a good job and a house with servants, a cook and a telephone. Before that we lived in a small village with no phone, no running water, no automobiles, only a horse and cart. We used steam for heat. The first village was called Qwan Satchue Yuen—a kind of river.
My stepmother was very educated, she graduated from high school. My father went away with his young wife to a place to have a honeymoon vacation, Ya Lu Jiang on the river, a famous hotel there, the river name means love. She got pregnant there and my sister is named after the river. But I was so insecure, I was afraid my stepmother would hit me… maybe I was jealous? I don’t know.
My father didn’t treat her good. It makes me sad to remember. In my whole life I can never forget all those things. I came home from school. My mother died. I was shaking all over like a leaf. There was the new baby. My father got a wetnurse but after a year the baby died. The wetnurse didn’t have enough milk and she hid it from my father. She didn’t want him to know or she’d lose her job so she bought powdered milk and made milk in the night and pretended it was her milk. She didn’t know how to read the formula. The poor baby died of diarrhea.
I became a doctor, a pediatrician. My mother, she should not have died. A child never forgets these things. I remember it every day. I never forget. This is the nature of it. I grew up and for this reason I became a doctor. My sister became a doctor, another became a pharmacist. All my brothers are professors of science. My father didn’t want us to be in politics. It sad, you know, I don’t even remember my own mother’s name.
—Li Kwan (2/17/06)
MISSING ESCAPE TO SIBERIA STORY
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