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Roman, My Teacher, My Mentor, My Friend

Roman is the current-day Aristotle. He is also my mentor and champion. Illustration by Ahmara Smith.

Growing up is hard. Growing up when your parents are thousands of miles away is even harder. Lucky for me, I had a champion.  His name is Dr. Roman Onufrijchuk.

I met Roman in the spring of 2001. He was my professor in a class called “Sociology of Leisure.” We became close when I told him that I couldn’t do my presentation in class because I was hungover from doing cocaine the night before and hadn’t done my reading.  Since that class, I followed him around like a shadow.

At any given time, Roman was parked at a table on the spacious and shaded patio of Tree’s Café on Granville Street in the business district of downtown Vancouver, a mere two blocks away from campus. In front of him on the table was a worn black plastic case filled with Gauloises cigarettes, an ashtray half full of orange filter tips with yellow flecks, a full cup of foamy café macchiato and an empty porcelain cup stained with coffee sediments.

Roman was a distinguished looking gentleman with a neatly trimmed grey beard. His usual attire is a black fisherman’s hat, a khaki button-up shirt, cargo shorts and sporty sandals. Though he looked like he might be going fishing, he was not the type to do so. His blue eyes were deep, indicating many lifetimes worth of stories. The way he sat in his chair slightly slouching with a cigarette between his nicotine-stained fingers, he looked wiser than his 51 years.

A current day Aristotle,  Roman is a sage-like character who enjoyed retelling the Greek mythologies to any student who would listen. Like Aristotle’s Lyceum, Roman had his Tree’s Café where he counseled students, the members of his so-called “tribe.”  Gregarious in nature, he was fond of adopting “strays,” those troubled students on whatever brinks they were on. He took these directionless souls under his wings and nurtured them with his infinite wisdom and generous attention. I was an active member of this tribe and saw him about everything, from research papers to unfortunate romantic encounters.

Thanks to Roman, I graduated with honors in 2005.

Roman put out his cigarette and waved me over as I approached the patio. He had a bad habit of smoking only two-thirds of his cigarettes. He wrapped up the conversation with the student in front of him. “Thank you so much, Roman.” The student said as he stood up to leave.

Roman lit another cigarette as I took the seat across from him. “You okay?” he asked in his gruff but modulated radio voice, one that had been soaking up tobacco and whiskey for years.

“Ugh.” I moaned as I dug through my massive, bottomless purse for a lighter. Roman leaned over the table and lit my cigarette. “Thanks.” I exhaled.

“That bad eh?” Roman chuckled, “So, what now?” Roman asked, his blue eyes twinkled with a hint of laughter.

I began to narrate the most recent episode of my boy drama. Roman smoked and listened patiently as I told my woeful tale.

When I finished, he took a puff from his cigarette, “Well my dear,” he exhaled, “You should never go to bed with someone who’s got more problems than you.”

“But how do I know he’s got more problems than me?” I whined. 

“You learn, kiddo, by paying attention.” He winked and took another puff from his cigarette, “In the meantime, this guy sounds like a bozo. Lose him.”

His attention drifted to something behind me, “My next date is here.” He announced as he stubbed out his cigarette, “You’ll be okay. Don’t go around breaking too many hearts.”

“But I still need to talk to you about my paper!” I wailed in a panic.

“Fine, come back in about an hour.”

All day long, when Roman was not in class, he sat on this patio smoking his cigarettes, sipping on his café macchiato and advising students on all aspects of their lives.

Everybody needs a champion. With Roman’s guidance and constant encouragement, I eventually graduated with honors. I went to graduate school, and after graduation started my career as an academic librarian. In my career in Dubai, Bahrain and Hong Kong, I met plenty of students who needed that extra push and a pat on the back. Everywhere I worked, I tried to channel Roman— it’s only fair that I give back what was so generously given to me.

Roman was my teacher, my mentor, my friend. In June 2015, I was devastated to learn that Roman passed away. I never had a chance to say good-bye.  I was heartbroken that Roman never met Derek, my now husband, after hearing so much about my boy drama over the years.

Derek held me tight.  “I understand what Roman means to you.” He whispered, “And I get to meet him every day through you.”

 

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A Story of an Immigrant Kid: Growing Up Without Parents

As satellite kids, My brother Davis and I had to take care of the house, and each other. Illustration by Ahmara Smith.

I would like to think that I was an average teenager. I always wanted to hang out with my friends. I had a part-time job in the new movie theatre. Sometimes I skipped school with my friend Chelsea to smoke cigarettes in the food court at the mall.  Deep down, I also knew that my life is more complicated than the average. I am Canadian. I am Taiwanese. Some might call me Chinese, and others argue that I am Japanese, since I was born in Tokyo.

Also, typical teenagers didn’t have their parents move out on them when they were still in high school. My younger brother Davis and I became what is known as “satellite kids”— Asian children whose parents went back to their countries of origin to work while leaving their children in Canada or the U.S.

Before Mama left, she cooked up a storm and filled the deep freezer with all sorts of traditional Taiwanese treats, like marinated chicken wings, braised pork, and fried rice. After a couple of months of her absence, my brother Davis and I looked at the empty deep freezer and agreed that we needed to go grocery shopping.

In the past, we had gone shopping with Mama when she was around, but we had never gone shopping for ourselves.  In the grocery store, we pushed around a giant shopping cart and didn’t know where to start. We pushed our way through aisles and aisles of stuff— everything from spices to cleaning detergent. After we looked around for a while, we decided that frozen dinners would be our best option— we didn’t know squat about feeding ourselves but we were experts at using the microwave.

Here are Davis and me in my very 90’s bedroom.

We ate our way through every single frozen dinner brand and got tired of eating them. So, we experimented with the stove and learned to make Kraft Dinner. However, the powdery, cheesy Styrofoam got old pretty fast, which motivated us to call Mama to asked her how to cook basic things. Through these informative long-distance phone conversations, we learned how to stir-fry broccoli with garlic. We learned how to make omelets with tomatoes. We learned to sauté garlic and onions with ground beef and adding pasta sauce to make it more flavorful. Unlike other Taiwanese kids who had their parents around, Davis and I had to grow up fast.

Also, we had to learn how to keep our house and ourselves safe, through trial and error.

When I was seventeen, I threw a Halloween party and invited my friends from school. I also invited my new friends that I met from my new part-time job, kids my age who lived in different parts of Surrey and the neighboring city of Langley. I was naïve and didn’t expect that these new friends would invite their friends, people I didn’t know. Within hours, the party was entirely out of control. I ran to lock the front door someone had opened, only to have others unlock the back door, allowing uninvited guests into my home.

Eventually, I called 911 in a desperate attempt to shut down my own party. Several hours later, when the blue and red lights flashed outside of my house along with the blaring of the police siren, everybody scattered. My home was trashed with bottles and spilled beer everywhere. The unruly kids stole Baba’s cherished antique sword, my CD player, Davis’ CD player, the DVD player, and all my CD’s.

Of course, my parents found out about the party. Their insurance covered the damage and the lost property, but as a result, their premium went up.  They yelled at me on the phone, but what else could they do?  They were the ones who left their teenaged daughter to her own devices in a faraway country.

Thinking back, I was a lonely and scared kid. When Mama first left, I relished the freedom— there were no more curfews, no more rules, no more sneaking around.  But the feeling didn’t last long. Eventually, I started to miss my Mama. When I was eating the rubbery microwave dinner, I desperately wanted Mama’s comfort food. When those stupid assholes robbed us, I wished she was there to make everything go away. When someone broke my heart, I wanted to cry in Mama’s lap. I needed her, though I would have never admitted it at the time.

Davis doesn’t like to talk about this period of our lives. However, we agreed that we were never angry with our parents. They love us and did what they thought was the best to provide for us.

And, as satellite kids, we grew up and turned out pretty okay.

 

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A Story of an Immigrant Kid: They Called Me a Banana

Banana: yellow on the outside, white on the inside. Illustration by Ahmara Smith.

My family moved to Canada when I was ten. We settled in Surrey, which is a sprawling suburbia about an hour from Vancouver. I didn’t speak a lick of English, but luckily, I didn’t pee myself when moving to a foreign country this time.

When we arrived, Baba had to come up with new names for my younger brother and me.

He gave my younger brother the option of “David” or “Davis”. The little eight-year-old boy chose “Davis,” so Davis he became.

With me, Baba said that I should be “Kayo,” the Japanese pronunciation of my Chinese name. I wanted a fancy English name like Davis, but Baba was persuasive.  So, Kayo I remained.

However, when I got to school, the other kids butchered my name. They called me “Kay-yo” when it was supposed to be “Ka-yo”. I tried to correct them with my limited English but to no avail.   So, “Kay-yo” I became. Now, everybody calls me Kayo, even my parents.

Remember that Day-O Banana Boat song? My classmates used to sing their adapted version: “Kayyyy-yo! Kayyyy-yo! Daylight comes and me wanna go home!”  My face would go beet red and they would howl with laughter. I hated that song.

Despite that, I learned English and became a typical teenager. I met my friend Chelsea in a math and science split class in grade eight. On Sundays, we went to the flea market to look for Sailor Moon Cards. In grade nine, I bought my first CDs: No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom and Smashing Pumpkin’s Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. I saw Gwen Stefani when No Doubt was touring with Weezer—I was a very excited fourteen-year-kid.

Back when pagers were cool.

In grade ten I smoked my first cigarette. By grade eleven, in addition to my smoking, I also had (still have) a book addiction. Remember those Scholastic catalogs we used to get from school? Mama bought me anything I ever wanted from it, unknowingly created a book-devouring monster. To pay for my smoking and book habits, I got a part-time job at the cinema that opened the same day as Star Wars: Phantom Menace. I made friends outside of school. I met my first boyfriend.

I have known Chelsea since we were 13. This picture was taken shortly after our graduation, on my 18th birthday.

Luckily, the kids in secondary school didn’t sing the stupid Day-O song. Instead, Chelsea gave me a cool nickname: Knock Out, aka KO.

Everything was trucking along in my teenage life. I almost felt cool—  until a new Taiwanese kid moved to my school. His name was Rodney.

Every time Rodney saw me walking down the hallway with my friends, he greeted me in Mandarin.  I was mortified each time. I always replied to him in English and kept the conversations as short as possible.

He reminded me of my foreign-ness, my otherness— and all I wanted was to blend in, be like everyone else.

I avoided him at all cost.

Back then, I didn’t want to be Taiwanese or Asian. I tried to minimize any perceived differences between my friends and me. For instance, I refused to bring Taiwanese food to school for lunch. Instead, I ate the mush and Jell-O at the cafeteria or munched on chips from the vending machines. Also, I wouldn’t associate with Rodney or the other Taiwanese kids.  They thought I was a snob and called me a “banana”—yellow on the outside, white on the inside.

I realize now that I’ve carried that label around for most of my life. The first time my husband Derek went to Taiwan with me for Chinese New Year’s, he asked me why I wasn’t in the kitchen learning to cook all the amazing Taiwanese dishes Mama was making. I shrugged. Now I understand that underneath the exterior of the worldly 30-something Kayo, there is a teenaged Kayo who felt humiliated by her otherness. Buried even deeper is the ten-year-old Kayo who was taunted because of her weird name.

Perhaps this why I get upset when people only see my Asian face and not my Canadian-ness.

Derek suggested that my Canadian-ness is keeping me from my Taiwanese-ness. He is absolutely right.

I will not subject myself to this “banana” label anymore. Next year, I will be in the kitchen with Mama during Chinese New Year.