Just Passing By

I spent a great Sunday afternoon with Joey, my super duper BFF, who’s visiting from the Philippines. So what’s great about that Sunday with her? It was the simplest things really.

The train ride

House of Nanking lives up to its name.

My family and I picked her up from her in-laws where she and her hubby were staying. The moment we pulled in front of the house, she yanked me out of the car and pulled me to meet her mother-in-law. When we got out of the house, we just faced each other, shrieked and hugged each other tight, happy to see each other and excited to have been given a whole day to hang out. We took the train to bring us to San Francisco and basically spent all day alternating between talking,giggling, taking pictures and riding the tram up and down the San Francisco streets. When we were in Union Square and passed by Victoria’s Secret, we debated whether we’d go in and have our bra size measured. Shy that she was, we decided to walk on by.

It was the non-stop talking and laughing that I missed most about her. Sure we talk to each other almost every month by phone and we email two or three times a week, but it’s different when you actually spend time with someone face to face. The internet is a wonderful thing in keeping in touch with the people you love. But nothing beats the chance to spend the day and explore the world hand in hand.

PS. Shoutout to my other BFF, Lana, I miss you! Looking forward to visiting you or you coming over for some serious bonding time.

My drives to and from work were usually spent in deep thought and contemplation. Well, maybe that’s fluffing the truth a little. I don’t always have profound thoughts during these half-hour trips. If you’re following this blog, you’ve read quite a few entries where the people and events that made it to my posts came from me being a full-fledged “usisera.”

I’m still as nosy as your next door neighbor but I’ve been preoccupied lately. As soon as I hop on my car, I’d turn on the CD player and “read” whatever book that’s in there. This week, I join Wan Lung and O-Lan’s tumultuous journey. I found myself heartbroken when they and their children starved during the famine. My heart warmed when Wan Lung carried all three children and his ancient father over the great wall that separated their small Chinese village from the town, even when he himself was weak from not having eaten in weeks since the winter started. I cheered for him when, despite his poverty, he chose to pull a rickshaw and earn a pittance instead of beg in the streets, like most of the able-bodied refugees in the city that embraced them during the drought.

I admire this man, Wan Lung, for his integrity and hard work. I am inspired by the hope he held within his heart that got him through the roughest, most difficult time in his life. I am in awe of his wife O-Lan who as a little girl, was sold as a slave. She toiled the land alongside her husband even when her babies were due. She gave birth to all her children alone, and hours later, would cook for the whole family, like the slave she was brought up to be. She was the quiet but steady force in the Wan Lung household.

I’ve never been so poor as to live in similar circumstances as this family. But there is one thing that reminds me about what makes a man or woman. Poverty alone does not ruin a man’s character nor do his riches make him great.

I have a few more chapters (5 CDs) to go before I finish this book. And for the first time since opening “The Good Earth,” I can say I don’t mind this Friday afternoon’s commute at all.