1

ETHNIC STORY

Stimulus B: Imaginative

I glanced at my bowl of oily take-away noodles and grimaced. Swirling the pale yellow,

overcooked strands of wheat dust around, I sighed and stood up. There was no point

trying to eat something that only made me feel more hungry. I grabbed the cold plastic

container and walked over to the kitchen bin to dispose of it before I stopped. Nǎinai

would’ve hated it if I wasted food like how she would hate it when I called her grandma in

English, always berating me with her favourite Chinese proverb.

Bǎocún wénhuà de jīngsuǐ : Preserve your cultural spirit to its final breath…

But no! No! I was thinking of her again. But now I couldn’t stop. Couldn’t stop myself

from looking at her favourite wok with its red handle that sat unused on the bench,

making my heart compress. Couldn’t stop my emotions as they started to spill from their

time-hardened cocoons. And couldn’t stop them as they, just like that, burst into flight in

a flurry of beating autumn wings, undusting the bittersweet memories I had longed to

suppress.

✧✧✧

2
I was woken by the dull thluck thluck of the rainstorm against our tin roof. The sultry

morning air was slowly being steeped with the gentle fragrance of lightly toasted garlic

that rolled me out of bed and drew me into the kitchen where Nǎinai stood. Jumping onto

the bench-chair, my legs not long enough to touch the floor, I watched as she tossed the
handmade vermicelli around the wok, the intense aroma of soy sauce knocking over my

senses like some sort of child-safe booze. Drunkenly mumbling in a hunger-driven stupor,

I soon heard the click of the gas flame being switched off. I looked up to a steaming bowl

of noodles being set before me and a pair of cherry-red chopsticks being placed into my

hand alongside a scalding cup of chrysanthemum tea. My heart fluttered at the sight and,

knowing how fast I ate would reflect my appreciation, I dug in.

However my eyes never left Nǎinai, whose energy seemed to have been extinguished

along with the stovetop flame. She leaned back onto a stool opposite me and rolled up her

sleeves. As the thin material slid up her arm it revealed a stream of scarlet rashes that

razed her skin, as if it had been dragged through a field of glass. And in that moment, as

her panicking eyes met mine, a leaden string of silence tied my mouth closed, forcing the

questions it had begged to ask to be forever sweetly blent in with the falling summer
3
rain .

✧✧✧

I sat in a warm and steamy tea house, basking in the rippling background chatter and

the faint clinks and clanks of cookware from the kitchen. From the window seat, I could

see that it was a gentle winter day that seemed to burst with the occasional sunlight

which washed over me in moments of mellow respite. A harshly cleared throat told me my

tea, chrysanthemum as always, had arrived. After the waiter set down the pot, not

bothering to fill up my cup, I covertly pulled out last night’s leftovers and tipped them
onto the plate in front. A little rude I know, but Nǎinai was never one to give up a chance

to save some money, and nor was I. Chewing on the cold noodles an unusual sight, in

open defiance of the icy weather, caught my eye. A flutter of butterflies were serenely

drifting over the black and braided river outside, appearing to taunt the large, bulging
4
blisters of ice that had formed on the surface. I took a long draught from my tea and

watched as they spiralled upwards, taking with them my distant memories and leaving in

their place a faint golden light etched into the skylit blue. An amber afterglow that finally

answered the questions I’d never got to ask.

References
1. “Ethnic story” from Love and Honour by Nam Lee
2. “dull thluck thluck” from Love and Honour by Nam Lee
3. Forever they sweetly blent with the falling summer rain from Little Women by L.M Alcott
4. Adapted from “On the brink of freezing, it gleamed in large, bulging blisters. The water,
where it still moved, was black and braided.” from Love and Honour by Nam Lee