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Dreams of Oriental Romance

ON JUNE 8, almost two months after we arrived in Los Angeles, I cross the street at last and enter China City for the Grand Opening. China City is enclosed by a miniature Great Wall-although it’s hard to call it “Great” when it looks just like cardboard cutouts placed on top of a narrow wall. I pass through the main gate and encounter a thousand or so people grouped together in a big open area called the Court of the Four Seasons. Dignitaries and movie stars give speeches, firecrackers spit and crackle, a dragon parades, and lion dancers frolic. The lo fan look glamorous and fashionable: the women in silks and furs, gloves and hats, and shiny lipstick; the men in suits, wing tips, and fedoras. May and I wear cheongsams, but as sleek and beautiful as we look in them, I feel we appear outdated and foreign compared with the American women.

“Dreams of Oriental romance are woven like silk threads through the little fabric that is China City,” Christine Sterling proclaims from the stage. “We ask Your Honorable Person to see the brilliant colors of its hopes and ideals and to forget the imperfections in its creation, because these will fade with the passing years. Let those who have peopled the generations of China’s existence, who have survived catastrophes of every kind in their motherland, find a new haven, where they can perpetuate their desire for collective identity, follow in the footsteps of their ancestors, and ply the trades and arts of their heritage in all tranquillity.”

Oh, brother.

“Leave the new world of rush and confusion behind,” Christine Sterling goes on, “and enter the old world of languorous enchantment.”

Really?

The shops and restaurants will open their doors for business as soon as the speeches finish, and those who work here-Yen-yen and me included-will need to hurry to take their positions. As we listen, I hold Joy in my arms so she can see what’s happening. With the undulating crowds and all the jostling, we get separated from Yen-yen. I’m supposed to go to the Golden Dragon Café, but I don’t know where it is. How can I get lost in just one block surrounded by a wall? But with so many blind alleys and narrow paths that twist and turn, I’m completely confused. I walk through doorways only to find myself in a courtyard with a goldfish pond or in a stand selling incense. I press Joy tight against my chest and squeeze up against the wall as the rickshaws-emblazoned with the Golden Rickshaws’ logo-haul laughing lo fan through the alleys, the pullers calling, “Coming through! Coming through!” These aren’t like any rickshaw pullers I’ve ever seen. They’re all dolled up in silk pajamas, embroidered slippers, and brand-new coolie hats made from straw. And they aren’t Chinese. They’re Mexican.

A little girl costumed like a street urchin-only cleaner-wiggles through the crowd, handing out maps. I take one and open it, looking for where I need to go. The map shows the big sights: the Steps of Heaven, the Harbor of Whangpoo, the Lotus Pool, and the Court of the Four Seasons. At the bottom of the map, two men dressed in Chinese robes and slippers drawn in black ink bow to each other. The caption reads: “If you will condescend your august self to enlighten our humble city, we greet you with sweetmeats, wines, and music rare, and also objets d’art that will delight your noble eyes.” Nothing on this map shows any of Old Man Louie’s enterprises, each of which has Golden in its name.

China City isn’t like Shanghai. It isn’t like the Old Chinese City either. It isn’t even like a Chinese village. It looks a lot like the China May and I used to see in movies brought to Shanghai from Hollywood. Yes, it’s all exactly as May described during our walks together. Paramount Studios has donated a set from Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife, which has now been converted into the Chinese Junk Café. Workmen from MGM have meticulously reassembled Wang’s Farmhouse from The Good Earth, right down to the ducks and chickens in the yard. Behind Wang’s Farmhouse winds the Passage of One Hundred Surprises, where those same MGM carpenters have converted an old blacksmith shop into ten novelty boutiques, selling jewel trees, scented teas, and fringed and embroidered “Spanish” shawls made in China. The tapestries in the Temple of Kwan Yin are reputed to be thousands of years old, and the statue was supposedly saved from the bombing of Shanghai. In fact, like so many things at China City, the temple was constructed from more leftover sets from MGM. Even the Great Wall came from a movie, although it must have been a western in which a fort needed defending. Christine Sterling’s determination to repackage her Olvera Street concept into something Chinese has been matched by her total lack of understanding of our culture, history, and taste.

My brain tells me I’m safe. Too many people mill about for anyone to try to trap or hurt me, but I’m nervous and scared. I hurry down another blind alley. I hold Joy so tightly she starts to cry. People stare at me as though I’m a bad mother. I’m not a bad mother, I want to shout. This is my baby. In my panic I think, if I can find the front entrance, then I’ll be able to find my way back to the apartment. But Old Man Louie locked the door on our way out and I don’t have a key. Agitated and apprehensive, I put my head down and shove through the people.

“Are you lost?” A voice addresses me in the pure tones of the Wu dialect of Shanghai. “Do you need help?”

I look up to see a lo fan with white hair, glasses, and a full white beard.

“I think you must be May’s sister,” he says. “Are you Pearl?”

I nod.

“I’m Tom Gubbins. Most people call me Bak Wah Tom-Motion Pictures Tom. I have a shop here, and I know your sister. Tell me where you need to go.”

“They want me at the Golden Dragon Café.”

“Ah, yes, one of the many Golden enterprises. Anything that’s worth five cents around here is run by your father-in-law,” he says knowingly. “Come along. I’ll take you there.”

I don’t know this man and May has never mentioned him, but perhaps he’s just one of many things she hasn’t told me. Still, the sounds of Shanghai coming from his mouth give me all the assurance I need. On our way to the café, he points out the various shops my father-in-law owns. The Golden Lantern, Old Man Louie’s original store from Old Chinatown, sells cheap curios: ashtrays, toothpick holders, and back scratchers. Through the window, I see Yen-yen talking to customers. Farther along, Vern sits by himself in a tiny shop, the Golden Lotus, selling silk flowers. I’ve heard Old Man Louie boast to our neighbors about how little it cost him to open this business: “Silk flowers cost almost nothing in China. Here I can sell them for five times their original price.” He scoffed at another family that opened a live-flower stand. “They paid eighteen dollars for the icebox at the secondhand store. Every day they’ll spend fifty cents to buy a hundred pounds of ice. They have to buy cans and vases to put the flowers in. Altogether fifty dollars! Too much! Too wasteful! And it isn’t hard to sell silk flowers, because even my son can do it.”

I see the top of the Golden Pagoda before we reach it and know that from now on I can always look up to get my bearings. The Golden Pagoda is housed in a fake pagoda five tiers high. From here, Old Man Louie-dressed in a midnight blue mandarin gown-plans to sell his best merchandise: cloisonné, fine porcelains, mother-of-pearl inlay carved teakwood furniture, opium pipes, ivory mah-jongg sets, and antiques. Through the window, I see May standing a little to his left, chatting with a family of four, gesturing animatedly, and smiling so broadly I can see her teeth. She looks different and yet very much the sister I’ve always known. Her cheongsam clings to her like a second skin. Her hair swirls around her face, and I realize she’s gotten her hair cut and styled. How have I not noticed that before? But it’s the old radiance that shines out of her that really surprises me. I haven’t seen her like this in a long time.

“She’s very beautiful,” Tom observes, as if reading my thoughts. “I’ve told her I could get her work, but she’s afraid you won’t approve. What do you think, Pearl? You can see I’m not a bad man. Why don’t you think about it and talk it over with May?”

I understand his words, but I can’t take in their meaning.

Seeing my confusion, he shrugs. “All right then. On to the Golden Dragon.”

When we get there, he glances in the window and says, “It looks like they could use your help, so I won’t keep you. But if you ever need anything, come see me at the Asiatic Costume Company. May will show you where it is. She visits me every day.”

With that, he turns away and melts into the crowd. I pull open the door to the Golden Dragon Café and enter. There are eight tables and a counter with ten stools. Behind the counter Uncle Wilburt, wearing a white undershirt and a paper hat folded from plain newsprint, sweats over a sizzling wok. Next to him Uncle Charley chops ingredients with a cleaver. Uncle Edfred carries a load of dishes to the sink, where Sam rinses dirty glasses under a steaming tap.

“Hey, can we get some help over here?” a man calls out.

Sam wipes his hands, hurries over, hands me a notepad, takes Joy from my arms, and places her in a wooden crate behind the counter. For the next six hours, we work without stop. By the time the Grand Opening officially ends, Sam’s clothes are smeared with food and grease, and my feet, shoulders, and arms ache, but Joy’s sound asleep in her crate. Old Man Louie and the others come to fetch us. The uncles head to wherever it is Chinatown bachelors go at night. After my father-in-law locks the door, we set out for the apartment. Sam, Vern, and their father walk ahead, while Yen-yen, May, and I stay a proper ten paces behind them. I’m exhausted and Joy feels as heavy as a sack of rice, but no one offers to take her from me.

Old Man Louie told us not to use a language he can’t understand, but I speak to May in the Wu dialect, hoping Yen-yen won’t tell on us and trusting we’re far enough from the men that they won’t hear.

“You’ve been keeping things from me, May.”

I’m not angry. I’m hurt. May has been building a new life in China City, while I’ve been locked in the apartment. She’s even gotten a haircut! Oh, how that burns now that I’ve noticed it.

“Things? What things?” She keeps her voice low-so we won’t be heard? So I won’t raise mine?

“I thought we decided we would wear only Western clothes once we got here. We said we would try to look like Americans, but all you bring me are these.”

“That’s one of your favorite cheongsams,” May says.

“I don’t want to wear these anymore. We agreed-”

She slows, and as I pass her she reaches for my shoulder to hold me back. Yen-yen keeps walking, obediently following her husband and sons.

“I haven’t wanted to tell you, because I knew you’d be upset,” May whispers. She taps her lips hesitantly with three knuckles.

“What is it?” I sigh. “Just tell me.”

“Our Western dresses are gone. He”-she nods toward the men, but I know she’s referring to our father-in-law-“doesn’t want us to wear anything but our Chinese clothes.”

“Why-”

“Just listen to me, Pearl. I’ve been trying to tell you things. I’ve been trying to show you things, but sometimes you’re as bad as Mama. You don’t want to know. You don’t want to listen.”

Her words stun and wound me, but she isn’t finished.

“You know how the people who work on Olvera Street have to wear Mexican costumes? That’s because Mrs. Sterling insists on it. It’s in their rental agreements, just as it’s in our leases at China City. We have to wear our cheongsams to work there. They-Mrs. Sterling and her lo fan partners-want us to look like we’ve never left China. Old Man Louie must have known that when he took our clothes in Shanghai. Think about it, Pearl. We thought he had no taste, no discernment, but he knew exactly what he was looking for and he took only what he thought would be useful here. He left everything else behind.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“How could I? You’re barely here. I’ve been trying to get you to go places with me, but usually you don’t want to leave the apartment. I had to drag you out just to sit in the Plaza. You don’t say anything about it, but I know you blame me and Sam and Vern and all of us for keeping you inside. But no one’s keeping you inside. You won’t go anywhere. I couldn’t even get you to cross the street to go to China City until today!”

“What do I care about these places? We aren’t going to be here forever.”

“But how are we going to escape if we don’t know what’s out there?”

Because it’s easier not to do anything, because I’m scared, I think but don’t say.

“You’re like a bird that’s been freed from a cage,” May says, “but doesn’t remember how to fly. You’re my sister, but I don’t know where you’ve gone in your mind. You’re so far away from me now.”

We climb the stairs back to the apartment. At the door, she holds me back once again. “Why can’t you be the sister I knew in Shanghai? You were fun. You weren’t afraid of anything. Now you act like a fu yen.” She pauses. “I’m sorry. That sounded terrible. I know you’ve been through a lot, and I realize you have to give all your attention and care to the baby. But I miss you, Pearl. I miss my sister.”

From inside we hear Yen-yen coo to her son. “Boy-husband, it’s time for you to go to bed. Go get your wife and go to bed now.”

“I miss Mama and Baba. I miss our home. And this”-she gestures around the dark hallway-“is all so hard. I can’t do it without you.” Tears roll down her cheeks. She wipes them away roughly, takes a breath, and enters the apartment to go to her room with her boy-husband.

A few minutes later, I lay Joy in her drawer and get in bed. Sam rolls away from me, as he usually does, and I cling to the edge of the bed as far from him and as close to Joy as I can get. My feelings and thoughts are confused. The clothes are yet another unanticipated blow, but what about the other things May said? I hadn’t realized she was suffering too. And she was right about me. I have been afraid: to leave the apartment, to go to the end of Sanchez Alley, to enter the Plaza, to walk down Olvera Street, and to cross the street to China City. These past weeks, May had offered many times: “I’ll take you to China City whenever you want to go.” But I hadn’t gone.

I grab the pouch Mama gave me through my clothes. What’s happened to me? How have I become such a scared fu yen?.

ON JUNE 25, just a few blocks away and less than three weeks later, New Chinatown has its Grand Opening. Big traditional Chinese carved gates stand stately and colorful at each end of the block. Anna May Wong, the glamorous movie star, leads the parade. A Chinese all-girl drum corps gives a rousing performance. Neon lights outline gaily painted buildings decorated with all manner of Chinese froufrou on the eaves and balconies. Everything seems bigger and better there. They have more firecrackers, more important politicians to cut the ribbons and make speeches, more sinuous and acrobatic crews to perform the dragon and lion dances. Even the people who’ve opened shops and restaurants there are considered better, wealthier, and more established than those of us in China City.

People say that the opening of these two Chinatowns is the beginning of good times for Chinese in Los Angeles. I say it’s the beginning of hard feelings. In China City, we have to do more and make a better effort. My father-in-law uses his iron fist to make us all work even longer hours. He’s relentless and often cruel. None of us disobey him, but I don’t see how we’ll ever catch up. How can you compete when others have a larger advantage? And with things the way they are, how are we ever going to make our own money to leave this place?