Yup. Pay Now.

The tone has shifted.  I’m now in ascendency and I don’t really want to be.  I’ve won some ground in an argument, but the larger need to set something up for myself has failed.  There are many times in China when having to rely on a local person to do something is infantilizing.  One decides to take something on by oneself and the effort fails.  To get whatever it is done that needs to be one, a person must ask for help.  This process over years, engenders a sense disconnectedness with the society one lives in. 

“What do you want to eat?”  She asks.  I’m not really hungry.  I consider pouting but it is more practical to eat.  She is trying to reach out and suggest an apology.  It won’t last long if I mishandle it.  I’ll justify a new anger that will leave me wishing this moment right now, could be recovered, by that time it will be too late.  Old couples understand all this. 

“I don’t want to go to Kung Fu.”  “Neither do I””, she responds, on the edge of fatigue.  “Let’s just get noodles”, I offer.  I know she will jump at this.  I have no interest in noodles, which sounds like an unnecessary starch load, but we head into the noodle place regardless. 

The picture of the cold noodles does looks good.  It’s draped in shredded chicken.   I order one.  My wife orders a big bowl of steaming hot lamian.  We revisit the topic that had lead us to this mall, but the waitress interrupts us:  “That’s one hundred and thirty renminbi.”  “Now? “  “Yup.  Pay now.”  She takes the money and goes off to get change.

Neither her noodles nor mine, taste as good as the picture.  I complain about feeling like an non-adult in China.

Sunday, 11/05/17