It's more than five years ago but it seems like yesterday. I had arrived in Taipei two days after Christmas. Fortunately, I had some good friends with a large house in Tien Mou, not to mention two cars. They were very kind to a stranger in their adopted land, and the warmth of their hearth was most welcome. I was quickly to find out that Taiwan has a winter that would send some Southern Californians rushing for their mountain-going longies. On a few days' trip to the offshore island of Matsu, I almost froze. Dolores really had enough bedding only for their bed. So I concluded that the best way to keep warm would be to get my own pad and my own blankets. Besides, friends are friends, but permanent guests are something else.
The house hunt was quite a thing. Henry and Dolores helped, and so did their Chinese friends. But the choice wasn't so extensive at that time, and I wanted to be in Taipei itself, not one of the suburbs. Apartment building had scarcely begun. The few units available were of Chinese style—partitions running to about seven feet and then an exposure of a foot or so, which is not exactly conducive to privacy. We looked at just enough apartments to tell me I didn't want one.
However, as we pulled up to one block of apartments - row-houses, they sometimes call them out here - a little snip of a girl approached the lumbering station wagon, and smiling brightly, her black eyes sparkling, asked:
"Suh, you want amah? I very good worker."
I had been warned that there are amahs and amahs, and that you have to be very careful. Besides, I didn't even have a house yet. So I said no thanks. We started up the hunt again, and I thought no more of the girl for several days.
This particular search was never really successful. Oh, I found a house, but it wasn't really satisfactory, and I found another, where I have lived ever since, a few months later. But after 100 or more prospects down the drain, the Hsin-yi Lu dwelling didn't look so bad at the time. It had three bedrooms, living and dining rooms, screened porch, passable kitchen and bath, and two amah's rooms with separate shower and toilet. The yard was small and wouldn't be much bother, and there was a fireplace to ward off the chill. I signed with the landlord, paid the rent, and went off in several directions to find such amenities as power, telephone, bottled water, and a few sticks of furniture.
At this point duty called. I would have to be away from Taipei for a week. Who was to take care of my manse? The amah quest could not be avoided longer. Henry and Dolores didn't know of anyone. Neither did the landlord; neither did the house agent. Then I remembered the little girl. If she wasn't still interested, perhaps there would be other unemployed maids in the neighborhood. The Plymouth Gray Moose found its way back to the apartment area just off Canal Road. Following our noses, we pulled up in front of the place we had seen her.
My hunch had been right, it turned out. This was at least a street of amahs, if not a district. The practice was for several of them to go together in renting an apartment. That gave them some place to go on a day off, to meet their friends, and to live in between jobs. The mortality rate for both amahs and master-mistresses is high. Occasionally a girl will work at one place until she marries or the people leave Taiwan. But this is the exception.
Not only did our little girl rally round the car, but several others jointed her. Our girl was democratic minded.
"Take you choice," she said, striking a kind of pose.
The others were prettier but somehow not as pert and not as glib.
"Well, we are old friends," I said. "You can have the job, if you want it. The pay will be $20 a month and your board and room. You can have a day off a week, and if you do well I'll give you a raise later." It was a deal. She took about 30 seconds to round up a bundle of clothes. The other girls seemed happy for her and not especially disappointed. One had seemed bothered by the fact that I was a bachelor and we would be in the house alone together. The girl I had hired didn't even blink an eye. She hopped in the car and we were off.
Putting out her hand, she said: "My name is Sookie." And we shook on it. Just that first day was sufficient to teach me Sookie was a genuine character. On the way to the house, we had to stop and buy her a bed and some pots and pans and other essentials of housekeeping. Big items would have to wait. I would set her up in business and then take off on my trip.
At the first stop, I turned to Sookie, who was sitting in the back, and said: "All right, you can help pick out some of the things we'll need." But she was holding her head and looking almost green.
"Suh, I don't feel well," she moaned. That was obvious. It turned out that she was habitually car sick-whether by intention or inadvertence, I was never to discover. But it was something of a nuisance. To take her any place in a car was a miserable experience. She had to be sent by pedicab. However, when she went out on her own, buses didn't seem to bother her, and at our final parting she vanished-together with her girl friend-in a taxi.
So we took Sookie home that day, and she was able to buy most of our immediate requirements in the neighborhood shopping district. The amah's room displeased her. There were two of them—but the toilet bowl was fouled with brown scale and there was no tub. I told her that I would take the front bedroom for a study and use the back one for sleeping. That left a small bedroom opposite mine—and next to the bath.
Sookie lost no time in undertaking her campaign.
"Suh," she said. "May I sleep the little room? No one else use."
Well, why not? I would often be away. From the viewpoint of security, it might be better for her to be in the middle of the house than out behind the kitchen.
"All right," I said. I didn't know what an awful start I was getting off to.
That cheered her up. Her bed arrived, she found sheets and a comforter she liked in the neighborhood, and then went off to buy food. I had given her an allowance and told her I would check the accounts every week or ten days. When she came back from the market, I said that I had to get started on my trip, and that we would get a refrigerator and furniture when I returned.
"Suh," she wheedled, "it's such a big house and I'll be afraid. Is it all right if my friend stays with me?"
She was a little girl, and it was a medium-sized house, and two girls wouldn't eat very much. Again, why not?
"I guess so, Sookie," I answered. "But only when I am away. I don't want the house full of girls when I am working."
Sookie was happy again. She was always happy when she had her way.
The trip went well. But I was glad to get back to Taipei, and I thought, "My own place at last!" For years I had been living in a hotel room—nice enough but on the claustrophobic side. Sookie's girl friend was still there—a cute trick, too.
"This my friend," Sookie said. "Maybe you don't mind she stay little longer."
The time had come to get tough. "Yes, I do mind, Sookie," I said. "All right for tonight but not longer." She wasn't too downcast. A night was a long time, and I heard them talking late. But there was no further campaign. Next day the girl was gone. Maybe Sookie finally found the bed too narrow for two, I thought.
So we finally got down to housekeeping. A bed and chest for me, a chest for Sookie (of course), a four-burner range and tank gas, refrigerator, desk and bookcase for me, dining room set, and some chairs and a couch of what we used to call wicker in the States.
Oh, yes, and a floor waxer, not electric. The living and dining rooms had parquet flooring that had been long neglected. Some thing had to be done about it. So I bought a heavy metal-backed polishing brush with a long handle attachment—and a couple of cans of wax.
"Tomorrow," I told Sookie, "I want a nice wax job on this floor."
Sookie looked at me as though I were out of my mind which it turned out I was.
The next morning I looked out from my work and into the front room. There was Sookie, on hands and knees, buffing at the floor with a piece of rag the size of a doll's washcloth.
"No, no, Sookie, not that way. I bought a waxer yesterday. It will do a better and faster job."
"Sookie cannot, suh; too heavy."
"Oh, nonsense, Sookie," I attested, bravely. "Here, I'll show you." I recovered the waxer from the unused amah's room and showed her how to use the hinged contraption, making the weighted brush do the work. Where I had polished, the floor looked beautiful.
"Now you do, Sookie," I said encouragingly.
She looked at me, she looked at the waxer, and then reluctantly took the stick in her hands. Maybe I didn't mention it before, but although a wisp of a girl-maybe 4 feet 10 inches—she had hands like Ali Mohammed, who used to be known as Cassius—and feet like ... feet like, now how could one have feet that big ... well like Primo Camera, if he had been smaller in other measurements and of the female persuasion.
So help me, her hands were bigger than mine, and I used to cuddle a football in one of them pretty easily. But when Sookie took a batsmen's hold on the handle of that waxer, the head scarcely moved. The waxer's head didn't, that is; Sookie's did, vigorously, as she protested vehemently, "Sookie cannot, suh. You see, too heavy for Sookie."
Well, I didn't see, and so I showed her the technique, and by the time I finished showing her-amidst an occasional try on her part and protestation of "Too heavy, suh, too heavy for Sookie ... Sookie too little"—I had the whole floor polished. The sheen was lovely, like an old Stradivarius. I was so proud that I forgot who had put out to get it that way, and I also forgot that a polish job like that would last three or four months. Of course, it would need brushing up once in a while, but Sookie would see to that. Talk about Tom Sawyer!
Sookie turned out to be a pretty fair cook. She had a taste for the rich cookies I bought, and the ice cream, not to mention the Coca Cola, but when it came to gut-hard victuals, she had no use for Western cooking or Western food—or Chinese, for that matter. Sookie was a Taiwanese—which is to say that she was born on Taiwan—and the Taiwanese eat a food that is all their own ... not quite Chinese, not quite Japanese, and a million miles from being Western. Well, I learned to like it, although it was hard to get used to the strong proclivity for soups and the absence of seasoning, including salt.
But Sookie was happy. Usually she made three dishes and rice. Sometimes all three were soup, or so it seemed to me. We ate together. I mean I ate—if I did—and she nibbled. But after I was through she really put it away. I had insisted on making my own lunch, and what with tuna sandwiches and such, I didn't lose much weight. Breakfast? I didn't eat any. But Sookie did. Where she put all that food—without gaining an ounce—is a mystery to me still.
After dinner, Sookie drew my bath. Why not before? Well, in those days—and still, despite the government's battle against smog—most of Taipei's hot water is heated by a coal fire made under a boiler. If I bathed before dinner, the water would be cold for Sookie's bath. At that time of the year, Buddha Forbid! After trying a few pre-dinner cold showers with the temperature in the 40s, I gave up and did it Sookie's way. Whether she drew a bath, or I showered, the ablutions were performed after dinner. While I was at it, Sookie was washing the dishes, and you can bet that she didn't use any of that hard-heated water. Never happen! Her dish water was heated on the gas stove. Thus when I got out of the bathroom—man-quick—the place was ready, nice and warm and steamy and with plenty of hot water—for Sookie.
That girl loved her bath. Sometimes I went to sleep, two or three hours later, to the lap, lap, lap of the water in the tub. Maybe she slept in the bath. I never knew. Nor did I know whether she had an accomplice to keep the fire going under the boiler. It is hard to believe she could have made so much water hot without blowing us up.
Her love of the bath led to one of my favorite remembrances of Sookie at her best—or worst? My friend Ed was in from Tokyo and was staying with us. He had a screwball maid up yonder, too, and we swapped stories, got drunk on Saturday night, and had a royal time. But Sookie was in a bad mood. Some time before, I had bought a new bed, given mine to her, and put hers in the Amah's room. So to make room for Ed, she was—perforce—shunted to the nether regions. Oh, she didn't complain much. It was just that the bell rang three or four times during the night, and she didn't answer it, but I did—and there was nobody there. That sort of thing—nothing I could put my finger on.
Sunday was Sookie's day off. I thought I'd take a chance on slickie boys and take Ed out, leaving the house empty (but full of light, necessarily). This I had told Sookie, adding that she could have her day of rest, if such it was, without interruption. Usually Sookie was gone on a Sunday morning before the sun came over the clothesline. Not this time. Whether she had eyes for Ed, who was young and handsome, or whether everybody at the apartment was away, I don't know. But she was there for breakfast and bathing.
We had skipped the showers the night before, what with the imbibing and good talk. So upon waking, I had hide myself to the hot-water-maker, which I hated, being a poor firemaker. Nevertheless, on this Sabbath I outdid myself. The fire roared and the water got as hot as water can and not be steam. At last maybe I could pass the Tenderfoot test! So we had our bacon and eggs and toast and coffee—all of which I made, natch—and became so engrossed in whatever we were discussing (I guess it was either girls or Laos, in 1961) that we retired to the porch and went right on like a couple of Korean girls who haven't seen each other for 12 hours.
Somewhere along the dialogue, I heard a door close and a lock snap. But you know how it is, I didn't give it any thought, and we went on talking for another half an hour, or was it an hour? Then I thought of the boiler and my triumph. "Ed," I said, "better take your shower now. The water is good and hot. Don't worry, there's plenty for both of us."
"Sure," he responded, and got his clean underwear.
He tried the bathroom door, but it seemed to be stuck, and he put his hefty shoulder into a good shove.
"Suh," came a voice, triumphantly.
"Sookie here. Sookie take bath."
"Oh," said Ed. "I am sorry," which only goes to show that he hadn't yet sized up Sookie.
He came back to the porch. "Sookie's in there," he said. I looked up and shrugged. To have Sookie in the tub no longer surprised me. We fell back into our conversation and time passed, maybe an hour.
Again I heard a lock click, and this time a door opened. A moment later a scrubbed, fresh, impish face peered at us from the front room, sort of insinuating itself onto the porch so as not to reflect all the hot water that went into the lavaging of the body.
"Suh," said the face, "Suh, Sookie sorrie. All hot water use up." The half laugh, half giggle, that followed left me responseless. Besides. I really didn't believe her. Never in my life had I made a better fire.
When Ed and I took our cold showers, we found out that she spoke the truth.
Then there was Sookie's Sister. That almost got me into trouble.
Somewhere along the line I had taken unto myself a girl friend. She tried to be-friend Sookie, and succeeded to some extent. However, Sookie—while not having designs on me herself (behind my back she called me the Old Man)—seemed to have me in mind as a possession of the amah clan. After all, hadn't they discovered me?
Well, with this in mind—or coincidentally, I shall never know—prettier girl succeeded pretty girl, until the final advent of Sookie's Sister.
Now in the order of Taiwanese amah-hood, the expression "Sister" does not necessarily imply any blood relationship. Maybe members of the amah tong open a vein and write their pledges in blood. I don't know, but they don't need to have the same father and mother to be Sisters. The only resemblance between Sookie and her Sister was in size, except that Sister didn't have big hands and big feet. Sister was small and cute, and an ever-lovin' doll, as the boys used to say somewhere in my distant, younger past.
One night when I got home Sister was there. Sookie was nonchalant. "My sister come see me," she said. "This my sister."
"M-m-m," I said, or maybe I only thought it. Sister was all right. Maybe only 5 feet, but arranged in the right places. Later I saw her in shorts and halter. My first judgment had been correct.
"Pleased to meet you, Sister," I said.
"Why don't you stay to dinner?"
"Oh, I couldn't," she responded, which meant, "Why, of course, I'd be so delighted, just ask me three or four times more—well, anyway, two times."
"How about some music while we are waiting?" I suggested.
"Oh, I love music," she responded, which was the right answer.
Maybe I forgot to mention that my girl friend liked music, so we had also acquired a hi-fi. I put on "Peggy Lee Goes Latin", or whatever the title may be, anyway that fine album in which Peggy puts out with some wonderful tunes—such as "The Party's Over"—to a great Latin beat.
This was a mistake. The album was my girl friend's favorite.
Sister could cut a mean rug, not to mention doing a terrific Taiwan cha-cha-cha. What's a Taiwan cha-cha? Well, it might be called a cha-cha with a quick promise.
Then the door bell rang. I was expecting a message from the Ministry of Economic Affairs, so it didn't bother me.
Sookie answered, and Sister and I were getting real involved with Peggy's next tune.
Out of the night, I could hear Sookie's penetrating voice, "But Miss Li, he isn't here. He go party." And I could hear Li's voice, too, "No party outside; party's here, I think so."
Sookie could have chopped her down with one of those ham-like hands. But Sookie was intimidated. Miss Li was Missie, and for the time being Sister's status was amorphous.
Miss Li got in, Sister got out, I got a hard time, and I didn't find Sookie for almost· a day. I still think of Sister sometimes, too. She was quite a dish. But Sookie was afraid of Miss Li, and the only time I saw Sister again was when I was looking for Sookie—to give her some money some body had brought to the house. This was after my separation from Sookie, and—unfortunately—Miss Li was my guide. I daren't even smile. Two days before I had been through hell in the recruitment of a new amah. A friend had recommended this girl, and I had asked Miss Li to be present for her interview. The girl turned up wearing 3-inch heels (on red shoes), lots of make-up, a tight dress, and bearing an American bachelor's recommendation-for her cooking, naturally. She asked double the going wage for an amah, and I got her out the gate quickly to save her life. Never have I held anything quite so much against Miss Li.
But back to Sookie.
The Chinese New Year came not long after Sookie came to me. Her family lived in Taichung, a hundred miles to the south, and it is the Chinese custom to give servants time off and extra money for this biggest of all holidays. Sookie said she would be gone three days and came back in seven. When I charged her with overdoing the holiday, she said, "Oh, no, suh, Sookie was sick." Because I accepted the story, she had found a new work-escape valve. Whenever she didn't want to do something, she came down with a splitting headache. But if a girl friend showed up, the coke and cookies came out of the refrigerator and the ailment was instantly forgotten.
What Sookie really enjoyed was dusting. She did it with moistened sponge and cloth, and I could never persuade her that this took off the paint along with the dust. She dusted everything every day with great precision and unbelievable slowness. One windowsill might take her five to ten minutes. On a morning, I usually would have to pull her bodily off my desk so as to get to work myself some time before noon. What with all this dusting, Sookie didn't have much time for anything else, and above all not for polishing floors. Soon she was pleading that she didn't have the time or energy for the washing, and urging me to send it to the laundry. We compromised—sheets and spreads and shirts went out, which left her only underwear.
The dusting syndrome led to a crisis involving the fireplace. It was still bitterly cold, and I happily bought coal and wood, and whipped up our first fire, looking forward to a pleasant evening basking in the delicious warmth of the hearthside. Some fireplaces are better left unbuilt. This was one of them. It drew badly and it smoked—oh, how it smoked. Sookie was horrified. For three or four days afterward, she washed and washed at the soot. When I determined to try again, and fetched wood and coal, she pleaded with me, tears in her eyes. "Oh, suh, please no make fire. Smoke make dirty and Sookie too tired." But I was not to be dissuaded. It was so damned cold! For once she was right, though. The fire produced very little heat but lots of smoke and soot. Sookie retired to her room to sulk. The next day she had a headache and went off for three days to nurse it with the help of her girl friends. I didn't try to make another fire. Anyway, spring was coming.
Sookie had a warm place in her heart for children. Pretty soon she was spending as much time babysitting the little boy next door as working for me. In flats on the other side lived a schoolboy and his sister. Their mother worked and they were without tea and hot food when they returned from school. So Sookie stepped into the breach and I started feeding another family.
In social situations, Sookie always conceived of herself as the lady of the house, never as an amah. She was a terror with tradesmen, repairmen, and other such menials. For guests, she had an outstretched hand, and when she brought their tea, she brought her own, too, and plunked herself down to partake of the conversational feast. When Miss Li came, Sookie look charge of romance. She especially liked our dancing and constituted an unfailing cheering section. In fact, when Miss Li was around, I could never get Sookie farther than the kitchen, from where she could see both dining and living rooms. Well, there was one exception—bath time.
Some of the fault may have been mine. During my absences, and there were several lengthy ones. Sookie ran the show—and probably a boarding house for girl friends. I soon gave up checking her accounts. Everything cost about twice the going rate and nothing could shake her. "But we didn't eat two catties of peppers," I would say. "Sookie, we didn't eat any peppers at all" She wasn't impressed. "Sookie eat peppers for lunch," she said. It was true she had an appetite like a water buffalo—probably to replenish those big hands and feet.
The beginning of the end came with our move to the new house. Spring rains had made the lane of Hsin-yi Lu almost impassable. The house agent found a much better place on a paved street and we moved in. Everything went well until I showed Sookie her quarters. This time I was not going to be an easy mark. There were two detached amah's rooms and that was where Sookie was going to stay—using her own bathing facilities, too. I wanted my bath room and my privacy. To comfort Sookie a little, I had bought her handsome wardrobe and installed it in her new quarters. She wasn't impressed. When I showed her the rooms, praising them to the skies, she balked.
"Sookie no like," she said. "Sookie stay in house like before. Much better."
"No," I said. "We are going to have many house guests from Tokyo and Hongkong and other places. You can't stay in the big house any longer."
Five minutes later the sabotage started. As the unpacking began, a quart bottle of cooking oil was smashed on the dining room floor. The stain is still there. In the next few days we went through a small set of dishes and I had to buy new glasses. Then Sookie decided that the house was too big for her, and that we needed another amah. When I disagreed, her mother developed a serious illness, and Sookie took off. She was gone 10 days and returned with a girl friend.
"Friend come help Sookie," she told me. I explained that we were not going to employ anyone else. She took it better than might have been expected. "All right," she said, "but people next door need amah. You tell them about my girl friend, please." So I did, and fell to talking with my neighbor. It turned out that they had just hired a girl. So there was no vacancy. When I returned to my own house, Sookie and her girl friend—another stunner—were sitting in the dining room drinking cokes and eating pastry. She had been gone two weeks and the house wasn't exactly a model of cleanliness and neatness.
"Sookie," I said, "maybe you had better find another job." I think she was relieved. In fact, I am pretty sure that she came back merely to weedle me out of two months' dismissal pay, her bedding, and some other gifts. She cried a little, and then, happy as a little girl, she disappeared in a red taxi, bound for the headquarters of the amah tong, I guess. She came back a few times, and for the first couple of Christmases I had a gift for her under the tree. But I haven't seen her for three years now. Maybe she got married and has started having the babies she loves so much. I hope so. We had our differences, but Sookie had a mind of her own. She was not a cipher. My next amah was a woman in her 40s, efficient and hard-working. She served long and faithfully until she had to go home to take care of her own family. The present girl is a hard worker who now takes care of three people, does all the washing, and some of the cooking, and who likes her living quarters and her two days off a month. We pay her well by local standards and she is a good amah.
But I miss Sookie, her impishness and her stubborn determination to have her own way. Somewhere in Taiwan there is a dustless house and lots of hot water for bathing every night. I hope she's leading a good life there.
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The Chinese say: Chi niu chao ma—to ride an ox to find a horse or to accept an unsatisfactory situation as a stepping-stone to something better.