December 5, 2010

• Until the next meal, I wait.

  There must be a special kind of connection amongst us, from person to person, that intertwines our appetite for food and our appetite for life.  The food we gather, share, and devour triggers the outpouring of our memories, both haunting and humorous, harrowing and humbling.  So many of my family's stories are dished out only in the kitchen, at the stove or upon the table, and only at designated hours: breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Some of them I swallow, others I digest, and others I remember only faintly.  

  At that very moment, when our stomachs grumble with hunger... is when my parents or elder relatives slip into nostalgia.  And their hearts become ajar.  

  ~  ~ ~ 

  A feast of raw beef topped with an uncooked egg, baskets full of fresh vegetables, and a plate of rice noodles awaited us as the flat iron grill began to heat up.  Being Thanksgiving, my cousins did not forget the turkey, and they brought it out hot from the oven, steam rising from the tin foil serving platter.  Rather than the usual breadcrumb stuffing, it was stuffed with ginger, lemongrass, and other Southeast Asian herbs, of course. 

  As I began to sear my meat on the grill, we talked about the recent bridge stampede in Cambodia and how many of the dead were young adults from the countryside.  And somehow, it led us to talking about death within our family.

  "One of your cousins... he was riding his motorcycle, and we suspect that one of his friends was jealous of him for some reason and they stole his motorcycle. We couldn't find him for days and days, and then eventually the police discovered his body, dead.  He had been killed, tossed into a large bag, and then thrown into some random field in the country side."

  And then, one of my uncles.

  "He was driving one of those carriages, you know, the carriages with the oxen in the front, and he just went missing.  He never came home that day. We searched and searched, but couldn't find him.  The police claimed they knew were he was, and we'd pay them money to take us to him, but when we'd arrive, he wasn't there.  And it'd happen again, and again.  Each time we'd follow the police's lead, but we never found your uncle.  No one know where or why he disappeared."

  While my aunt spoke, she hardly flinched.  She shared these stories simply, with little drama and little emotion. No waver in her voice, no tears in her eyes.  Maybe it's because unexplained deaths had become a normal, cruel reality for so many Khmer people, back in the day, and even now.

  I paused occasionally, between mouthfuls, to ask questions, to grasp what I had learned.  Had I been alone, I would have preferred to mourn in silence.  But it was anything but silent -the drone of TV voices and the cries of my nieces and nephews interrupted our conversation.  We turned the heat off on the grill, began munching on dessert, and talked about sweeter things.    

  ~ ~ ~

  A few days passed, and I had almost forgotten the Thanksgiving lunch.  I had almost forgotten my family's stories, as if my memory had been completely erased of them, as if my cousin and my uncle had never even existed.  (But I vaguely remembered, straining my brain to produce this post.)

  And until the next family meal, I will wait.  

  Eagerly.  

  Not just for the inviting food, or the presence of my relatives.  But for the door of history to open, where family memories will become alive once again.

  • 2:03 am
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