December 30, 2009
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Losing Touch
Have you ever lost touch with someone and then every once in a while, perhaps on a quiet evening, you wonder where they are?
In 1994 my family and I made our one and only visit ever to where I was born–a little village in the southern province of China called Guangdong. I’ve been here since I was two so I really have no memory of where I was from, but my parents wanted to make that trek halfway around the world because my maternal grandfather was dying.
I was at the height of my teenage angst back then, and was extremely resistant about the whole idea of going to some foreign, third world country, and upon our arrival I was in shock that people still lived in such horrid conditions. People literally urinated in a hole in the ground, and many people still lived in primitive mud huts with no running water or electricity.
Upon our arrival the village had some huge banquet where the children drank “pineapple beer” and loud firecrackers were lit. It was a celebration of some sorts but in my teenage mind I could barely stand the mosquitos that were eating me alive.
My parents had also decided to go do some trek in the mountains the next morning, and since I was covered in swollen mosquito bites they left me with some strange family they didn’t even know. The thought of more excruciating pain while being knee deep in overgrown weeds just seemed like sheer torture compared to spending a day with this unknown family, so I planted myself down on a stool and acquainted myself with strangers.
I don’t remember much from this day except this family had a daughter my age named Li Juan, who later adopted Aileen as her anglicized name. Somehow she managed to entertain me that day, and our parting was somewhat bittersweet when my family came back to retrieve me many hours later. My parents convinced us to exchange addresses even though we didn’t speak or write the same language. Upon my return to Canada we exchanged many letters and cards, and my parents even sent red pockets which is customary during the Lunar New Year. My dad would help me translate and transcribe, and with the advent of the internet and Aileen’s ever improving grasp of the English language we even exchanged emails until May of the new Millennium. I know this because I still have the last email I sent saved in my drafts, having never received a reply to it.
I can only wonder and imagine where Li Juan/Aileen is these days, and what this young woman has accomplished. Did she ever learn to swim like she wanted to? How is her English these days? And did she ever get married and move away from that tiny village? In the back of my mind she is still this young girl, like me, thirteen going on fourteen, and barely cognizant of how small this world really was.
