Journey Home 3

YY's apartment, located in the western part of the town, should be, as the name of the building suggests, the "light of the city." Indeed the security-guarded entrance, the marbled ground floor, and the front-mirrored elevator were quite imposing, but when we were taken in by YY's wife, we were a bit surprised by the scanty-furnishment there. Other than a plain couch, a small wooden table in front of it, a marble-surfaced table to its right, and a TV stand to its front at the other end, the living room was bare. Not that it did not send off some elegance and taste of luxury from its fancy lights on the ceiling; it was just that for our undertanding of the scale of YY's business, the apartment looked a bit undeserving. We were soon to learn that this was just a dwelling place for his wife, whose working unit was nearby, and that they had bought a house somewhere else. Still, this supposedly three-bedroom luxury apartment was a bit disappointing, especially after we had used the bathroom, which was a bit smelly even as the western-styled toilet looked decently clean. There was a white porcelin tub, too, two feet away from the toilet, unlike in the usual Chinese water closet. The bathroom floor was wet, though,because there was no curtain to the tub and indeed no possibilty to install one due to the crude way the shower head was connected to the water tank above the toilet. While I was managing to shower L, she whispered: "Mom, why some part of Auntie's place is so dirty?" At her first comment after landing, I had to invent something: Auntie's place would be much nicer once we woke up in the morning when we were less tired." And that's all my eight-year American PhD training could invent upon an urgent call.