Homeseeking

by Karissa Chen

For many people in the world, learning more than one language is a necessity, either because of migration or simply because the place they live in is a global one and survival dictates it. It is a skill that requires an ability to adapt and challenge oneself, and for many immigrants, it’s one of the most difficult, humbling, and uneasy parts of coming to a new country. If you, the reader, find yourself confused, I hope instead of giving up, you might take a moment to imagine what it must be like for those who have to navigate this on a daily basis, and then forge onward.

trying to remember what was when and never quite seeing the full picture.

His and Linyee’s marriage had not been perfect by any means; it had survived their different backgrounds, her father’s disapproval, his gambling problem, immigration to a foreign country, financial uncertainty, and more. There’d been moments when he wasn’t even sure he still loved her. Yet, by the end, they were bound by their history, by the pain and laughter that could never be understood by anybody else. He missed her companionship above all.

“We must always be brave and meet what scares us head-on, even if it is hard. But still, you must not forget who you are. You must always remain proud.”

Linyee had been his best friend, the person with whom he’d shared the details of his days, the person who had listened and helped him untangle his frustrations, the person who had exclaimed over all of his minor victories as if they were her own.

how the actions of a few powerful men affected the lives of millions.

Ming is the inherent nature of your life as given to you by the gods. It’s a destiny that can’t be changed, the way the innate characteristics you are born with can’t be changed. But what is yun? Yun is where flexibility comes in. Yun is fortune that changes with the seasons of the universe but can also turn depending on the actions you take, the choices you make. Together ming and yun make up a river, one that wants to carry you to a particular destination but moves fluidly, possibly diverging if a tree falls along its path or a large rainfall swells its banks. You, too, can change the path of the river; you can even swim upstream if you want to. Just expect it will be tiring, not as easy as moving with the current.”

“You’ll find yourselves pulled toward each other again and again,” the fortune teller said. “Like you’re tethered to each other with string.” She folded her hands. “It’s a predestination more than anything. But like I told you earlier, this is meaningless in the scheme of your own actions. You have destiny with many people in this world. Perhaps your friendship is the fulfillment of that destiny. I’m just telling you what I see.”

About the person she wanted to be in this life. The only answer she’d arrived at was that she wanted to be a good person. Beyond that, what shape that life took, she didn’t know. There were so many things she wanted from her future.

Life was dynamic and vast, and she wondered if she’d ever be able to experience enough of it to feel satisfied, if she could die happy knowing she’d only gotten to rub up against the small corner of the world she lived in.

It was something she both envied and respected—the purity, conviction, and single-mindedness of his devotion.

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad becoming nothing more than a wife, she thought, if I’m his wife. Maybe she couldn’t change the world, but she could change one person’s world.

The way she prodded for his thoughts when he was too silent or took too long to answer a question.

Her love of fruits, any kind of fruit, and the voracious, unladylike way she bit into them.

The air between them was a gap he wanted to close, wanted to spend a lifetime trying to close—he wanted to consume her, to know her wholly.

“We don’t get to be greedy,” Suchi said. “We get to be content.”

In Haiwen’s arms, it was easy for her anxiety about the war to melt away.

He had known, of course, that his homeland had gone on without him; he had seen evidence of its development and change through the images that trickled out of the country and appeared on the news. But in his dreams, this place was as he had left it, so burned into his brain he believed he could have given turn-by-turn directions had someone asked. Now he found the old knowledge leaking away, uncertain and tenuous.

He longed to bridge the gap between them, but after the initial outpour of emotions, they reverted to a distant civility, the way one might treat a guest in one’s home, an outsider to be shielded from overstuffed closets and dirty underwear.

He loved them both, but this rift was not his to repair.

“It’s easy to be brave when you are young and don’t know better,” Suchi said. “I think it’s harder to be brave when you’re young and have little control over anything,” Momo said.

You protected me, you loved me. You are the reason I ever had a chance at my own happiness. That’s not nothing. That’s everything.”

“Even if we can’t change the past, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter.

What matters isn’t what was or what could have been. What matters is this. You knowing me. Me knowing you. That’s what I want in my life.”

You were the first person apart from my family to care for me like that.”

She was hungry for memories now; she wanted to replay them over and over again with him, to recover from him all the things she had forgotten or had never known. They were both old, every day growing older. Someday he might forget her; someday she might forget him. But that was someday. Today, they still had time.

This quiet love was something Suchi had been too young and impatient to see.

Suchi knew now that home wasn’t a place. It wasn’t moments that could be pinned down. It was people, people who shared the same ghosts as you, of folks long gone, places long disappeared. People who knew you, saw you, loved you. When those people were far-flung, your home was too. And when those people were gone, home lived on inside you.

What can a mother do but be steadfast in her love and hope?

She wants to tell them people only die when there is no one left to remember them, but if they hold each other tightly, they can keep all the ghosts of their family alive.

You were the first person to believe I had something important to say through my writing. I hope I did you proud.

To my family for a lifetime of love and support. My grandparents, from whom I learned strength, audacity, and a capacity to dream. My aunts Lily, Cassia, and Sen. My brother, Jonathan, the first person to inhabit the stories I created. My sister, Kailene, my best friend and confidante. My father, Yen-Jo, who has always been proud of my writing despite not being much of a reader himself. And most importantly my mother, Violet, who helped me with many of the translations of verses in this book, whose love, sacrifice, and support has made all of this possible. The love I have for you is threaded throughout this book.

as a daughter who couldn’t fathom being separated from her own mother. But as I worked on revisions with the awareness of your tiny life only a few rooms away, this book transformed into one about my love for you, a love neither time nor distance nor circumstance could ever diminish. Thank you for making my world bigger and more remarkable every day. I love you to the moon and back.