Vancouver rendez-vous

In a popular television series in Hong Kong, the hero of the show had this famous saying, ’How many ten years does a person have in his life?’

I may not know how many ten years there are in our lives but after forty years, the passage of time seemed to have stood still when my secondary schoolmates and I reunited in Vancouver. They are all extraordinary women living ordinary lives in a foreign country they now call home. None of them have been in close contact with me and only one did hang out with me when we were no more than thirteen/fourteen years old. None of these matters. Our destined encounters were every bit as sweet as the sounds and sights of the city. I now have four ‘ready-made’ girlfriends in Vancouver!

The day I arrived Vancouver from Swartz Bay in Victoria, it was cloudy and rainy. Martha Hau Chak-mei was the one I contacted from the downtown Fairmont. She told me she had told Sarah Wong Lai-fun of my impending visit and that she was all excited about it. I had not met the pair since our last dim-sum meeting in August 1989 and had not kept up with any correspondence since, so upon learning they were to meet me for dinner that evening, I was partly excited and partly anxious. The anxiety stemmed from a lot of emotions. Sarah and I dated back many years. After we had left secondary school and gone on our separate ways to continue our education, we lost contact. There was news from time to time about her whereabouts but we had no chance to connect. Then in our secondary school reunion in Cupertino, California in 1989, Connie Yip Pui-yee gave me Martha’s phone number. In all the summers I had spent in Vancouver, I had not known I had a friend there. In that dim-sum meeting, Martha brought Sarah. Imagine my delight and joy in having reunited with old friends. But since that amicable get together, almost ‘zero’ contact was made afterwards. I subsequently sold my condo in 1999 and stopped going to Vancouver. I sat and pondered why we allowed ourselves to drift apart one more time since finding each other. Would the dinner make up for time lost between us?

Another phone call confirmed the time, venue and participants for the dinner. Ada Chan Wai-fong, whom I had not seen for forty years since 1971, would join us and she would drive Martha and Sarah to pick me up at 7 pm. In preparation for our reunion, I had brought four loaves of fresh bread made especially for me by my friend Heather Campbell in Salt Spring Island. In the hotel room before the appointed time, I relaxed in bed with a facial mask to prep my face and mind for the meeting.

My gregarious laugh greeted my friends as soon as I got into Ada’s car. They said they all remembered my happy demeanor. Another schoolmate Brenda Lau Pik-ting was unable to join our outing, as she had to attend an evening class. The four of us got inside Le Crocodile, a French bistro located only a couple of streets up the Fairmont. Ada could not have chosen a better spot. Bistro in France is supposedly noisy and rowdy, diners could chat at the top of the voices and no one would turn a head to stare. As it turned out, Martha and Ada saw a lot of each other, whereas Sarah didn’t. Luckily we still could look at the menu and order because conversations went back and forth and they sometimes felt like rushing waters.

Like Martha, Ada is a music teacher using her home as studio for her work. She is married with a son. Her sisters also live in the same city with families of their own. Her family pictures gave us a glimpse of her healthy and beautiful life. Although we had not tried to remember which class we were together, I was positive our paths did cross, as her face after forty years was still familiar to me. Sarah knew her sister but had not had a chance to meet Ada. In reuniting me with Ada and Sarah, Martha had made it possible for them to meet up.

On closer look at Martha in the dim restaurant’s light. I saw, in front of me, the same person I had known all these years. Her hair might have gone grayer and there might have been a few more frown lines, but her voice- the sweet, quiet but firm sounds when she spoke, soothed and calmed by nerves. All the worries about whether or not my friends would accept me vanish in thin air. The last time we met I was told of her accident in the playground in Stanley Park and now she recounted her other car accident and how she now suffered from its aftermath. Apparently her car was stopped at a red light and the truck which came behind did not stop and ramped into it pushing it further off the road. It was just after lunchtime and Martha suspected the driver might have taken a beer or two. That was why he persuaded her not to call the police. Feeling woozy at the time, Martha went home instead of checking herself out at a hospital. The impact might have caused some kind of whiplash and now from time to time Martha feels a kind of dizziness that sometimes induces vomiting. She also said she could not do any swimming as lifting her head up from the water caused discomfort. Inside her strong exterior lies a vulnerable body but that does not stop her from caring about her old schoolmates. I was invited to share Thanksgiving dinner with her and her husband on October 10 Monday but unfortunately we could not attend because of prior engagement. I met Martha two more times before my departure. The day before I left I took the sky train to Aberdeen Center, Richmond to have lunch with her in Guru, a Japanese eatery. She told me she had a spell of dizziness just over the long weekend and she had to be bed-ridden. Her acupuncture masseuse was luckily available even on a public holiday so she could get relief for her neck and shoulder. Again her own discomfort did not forbid her to think of her friends. She once again offered to take us to the airport the next day. She said she had an eye exam downtown the next day at 10 am and would be finished by 10.30. Since we would have to leave the airport by 11, it would be perfect for her and her husband to take us to the airport. How could anyone refuse such a lovely gesture? How lovely to have met Ray, her hubby and to have let her meet Thomas! Too bad we had to see another friend at the airport because he only arrived back in town the night before, otherwise we could have a lovely dim-sum meal with Martha and Ray. We promised to keep ourselves healthy for our next reunion.

Sarah rang to set a date for us to meet. She said she would not mind including others in our outing but at the same time she wanted to have more time to talk with just the two of us. I suggested meeting early before dinner but she had a golf engagement with her husband, George. So we agreed to meet at 7 in the evening. I went swimming early in the morning and missed her phone call. She called to say her golf date was cancelled on account of the bad weather and she would swing by the hotel at 3.30. During our dinner the other night, I was surprised by her remarkable memory of past events. Several gaps I missed were revealed. The restaurant the girls had lunch in was called Heung Heung and it was in Lion Rock Road and not in Hau Wong Road. There was another one they frequented and it was called Lung Sing restaurant.

Sarah went to University of Western Ontario. I was admitted in 1972 to the same university but failed to turn up for registration. The allure of Montreal was too strong to resist so after visiting for a day I decided to stay for a year. We missed each other by forty years!
She said she was married right after she graduated at a relatively young age of 23. Her husband George is dentist and she has two beautiful children, one son and one daughter. Tall and athletic looking, Sarah plays golf, tennis, swim and ski. With these activities, her life in Canada is made.

Among the eight children growing up in the house on Grampian Road in Kowloon City, she was the second youngest. She kept repeating how because I am the youngest and only daughter among the three children, I have always been supper confident, whereas she felt her father might not have remembered her name. Sitting across from each other in the market in Granville Island with the cloudy and rainy weather outside, we swapped our envious anecdotes with each other. If there were a camera filming us, we would be surprised by the calm exteriors on our faces as we shared our most intimate life histories. Dinner afterwards was more sharing and good food. Since she first cancelled her table but decided to return later, we were given a corner table by the door. The crowded place did not deter us in our deep conversation. We had so many years to catch up in one night. Even without wine, I felt intoxicated.

I managed to email Brenda from Starbucks. We were to meet on Thanksgiving Day for lunch. I suggested a half way mark and asked her to meet me outside Yaletown-roundhouse station. The morning was not a pleasant one as it was drizzling quietly. I chose to walk over from the Fairmont to Mainland and Helmcken with my umbrella. It was a good half an hour walk if I did that slowly. Feeling nostalgic, I thought the walk would prepare me for a meeting with someone I had not seen for forty years. Approaching the station I saw in the distance Brenda anxiously checking her phone. We hugged and greeted each other.

We were seated in a booth in the Cactus Club Café, the kind of eatery that is a mixture of east and west. There is won ton soup in the menu and barbeque burgers with all kinds of sauces. There is even a huge color photograph of Nathan Road, Hong Kong in the ladies room. Yaletown is my favourite spot in Vancouver and what better place to meet an old acquaintance who would soon turn into my old friend.

Brenda and I quickly gave each other a run down of our lives. Her son and daughter have all grown up and both have careers they love. She is the finance manager of an organization for autistic children called Reach. Although relatively new to this position, she is enjoying both her work and the people involved. The most amazing thing is the fact she has worked with troubled youths from her church for quite a while. When she told me her house is always open for them to come in to sleep or to go through her fridge for food, I could not have been prouder to have her as a friend. Her desire to help these young minds has led her to take more counseling courses in the evening. These courses do not lead to certain significant qualifications for she is through with qualifications. She told me she enjoyed the process more and looking at her contented face, I realized the competitive Brenda I had known when we took History together in Ms Ma’s lessons had been replaced by an easy going and compassionate lady.

The walk back from Yaletown to Granville City Center station was like a romantic movie. It was raining and we shared the large Fairmont umbrella and she had her arm entwined with mine. We talked softly and walked slowly. I counted my blessings to have this opportunity to reconnect with old friends. Our walk ended with bumping into a man selling calendars with photos taken by the Eastend homeless. The calendar was sold for charity and the gesture of buying one was a fitful event for the kind and charitable spirit we were both carrying in our hearts. Big hugs followed as I sent her down the sky train station.

Advertisement