The Year of Finding Memory Read Online Free Page A

our mother to attain Canadian citizenship in order to sponsor her immigration.
    Then one day my mother purchased a large, hard-sided suitcase with metal clasps, and without being told, I knew that our life in Hong Kong was about to end. I watched as she filled it with dried herbal medicines; a warm, brown woollen blanket with a shiny satin binding; new clothes for me, yards of fabric; and skeins of wool. She had heard that Canada was a cold country, where the people were large, and that it would be hard for her to find clothes to fit her small frame. My mother consulted a tailor and had a navy-blue travel suit made, and she went to a beauty salon, where someone permed her hair into a nest of tight curls. All these things my mother did in preparation for our journey across the Pacific. She approached her chores methodically and without complaint. But she never smiled. On the day we left Hong Kong, she wore her new suit and a gold necklace with a heart-shaped pendant that had the word HAPPY embossed on it. I wore a gold bracelet with the letters L-U-C-K-Y linked in a chain. At the time they were only a collection of lo fon ABCs.
    When we left for the airport in Hong Kong, my mother wept, not letting go of Ming Nee until we had to board the airplane. A tall lo fon stewardess ushered us into line; my mother held my hand the entire time, but her head was turned away from me. She was staring at her oldest daughter, who remained on the other side of the gate, tears streaming down her face, shoulders heaving. We stood to the side for a few moments, allowing other passengers to embark. Auntie, who had been waiting beside Ming Nee, finally led her away, and my mother and I walked through the portal. I looked up and saw my mother’s face all twisted. She gripped my hand eventighter. It wasn’t until I was an adult with children of my own that I began to have a real understanding of the anguish my mother must have been feeling; she was leaving behind her thirteen-year-old daughter.
    My mother never touched any of the food the flight attendants brought. But for me it was an adventure, and when I first tasted tiny cubes of soft fruit floating in a small bowl of clear, sugary syrup, I thought it was delicious. There were other Chinese women on the airplane, some of whom seemed to be about my mother’s age. And, like my mother, they were about to join husbands from whom they had been separated for many years. But there was one woman who I could tell was younger. Her complexion was smooth, and there was a nervousness about her. She reminded me of Ming Nee and was probably not much older. My mother said she was a mail-order bride, that she would marry her husband once she arrived. I noticed that all the women, even the mail-order bride, had their hair permed into curls, just like my mother, and that every one of them was wearing gold necklaces, bracelets and earrings.
    It was night when the airplane landed in Vancouver. I remember only bright-coloured lights against a dark sky. A smiling Chinese man took a group of us on a bus, first to a hotel and then to a restaurant, where my mother ate almost nothing. The next day, we boarded another flight. This time there were fewer Chinese people on the airplane. Everybody was going to a big city, my mother told me. We were the only ones bound for a hand laundry in a small town.

    The Cathay Pacific airbus was crowded with overseas Chinese. My brothers and their wives sat together in the middle aisle. The four of them had brought out their U-shaped foam supports and adjusted them around their necks in preparation for the long flight. Doon’s voice kept rising with excitement, and every so often his wife, Yeng, would give him a gentle jab, telling him to lower his voice. Though it was past midnight when the airplane lifted off, the laughing and chattering did not subside for at least another hour. I was excited, but my anticipation paled next to their jubilant mood. As I sat next to my husband, I