dismissed because he was serving dishes obscured by lemongrass and straw mushrooms. He also slipped pieces of rambutan and jackfruit into the sorbets. "The clientele was outraged, demanded that the natives in the kitchen be immediately dismissed if not j ailed, shocked that the culprit was a harmless-looking Provençal,' incensed enough to threaten closure of the most fashionable
hotel in all of Indochina, and, yes, the Continental sent the man packing!" said Anh Minh, delivering another lesson in the shortest amount of time possible.
Anh Minh believed that if he could save three minutes here, five minutes there, then one day he could tally them all up and have enough to start life all over again. Even then, I knew that every night those minutes saved were squandered away in a deep sleep from which my brother awoke with nothing but the handkerchief in his pocket. But in the kitchen with Minh the Sous Chef, I was content just to listen. Anh Minh, being the first, had inherited the voice that we, the three brothers who followed, coveted. If I closed my e yes, the Old Man was there with his river tones, low and close to the earth, a deep current summoning me from ashore. He was there without the floating islands of sewage, the half-submerged bodies of newborn animals, the swirling pools of dried-up leaves and broken branches. Making its way through Anh Minh's parted lips, the Old Man's voice, purified, said, "I believe in you." In the kitchen of the Governor-General, I learned from my brother's words and found solace in the Old Man's voice. I received there the benediction that I would otherwise never hear.
"Stupid! Hey, Stupid, get me my box of chew."
The Old Man was talking to me all right, but he could have been talking to any of my brothers instead. By the time we were able to walk, we had learned our name. "Stupid" was shared by us like a hand-me-down. We were all the same until one of us redeemed himself, collecting small tokens, brief glimpses of the man whom the Old Man wanted us to be.
One became a porter for the railroads, second-class, but he hoped to see the interior of first before too long. The French had tattooed the countryside with tracks, knowing that mobility would allow them to keep a stranglehold on the little dragon that they called their own. Every day, mobility pounded on the shoulders of my second oldest brother. Every day, Anh Hoà ng was shoved into the ground by the weight of the vanity cases of
French wives. They, with their government-clerk husbands, were touring their colony, forgetting who they were, forgetting that they had to cross oceans to move up a class.
My third oldest brother worked at a printing press. He cleaned the typeset sheets, ready to be dismantled, voided by the next day's news. He removed each block and cleaned the letters while they were still warm and cloaked in a soft scab of ink, getting his brush into the sickle moons of each "C," the surrendering arms of each "Y." In his hands were the latest export prices of rubber, profitable even though the natives had delayed the caoutchouc harvest with their malaria and dysentery. In his hands were the numbers of heads guillotined for a foolhardy assassination attemptâthe lone Nationalist did not even reach the gates of the villa, but justice demanded that an example be firmly set. Anh Tùng looked down and saw only the "O" roar of a lion's mouth, the "T" branches of a tree, the "S" curve of the Mekong. Anh Tùng smiled to himself thinking how the heat of the presses was not as bad as his friends had warned him, how the taste of ink
can
be washed away by a cup of tepid tea, how he would just hide his graying fingernails in his pockets when he went courting.
Minh the Sous Chef was the undeniable success. He should have been born in the Year of the Dragon, the Old Man said. A dragon in a long white apron was an irony forever lost on the Old Man. To him, the apron was a vestment, embroidered, consecrated by the
hotel in all of Indochina, and, yes, the Continental sent the man packing!" said Anh Minh, delivering another lesson in the shortest amount of time possible.
Anh Minh believed that if he could save three minutes here, five minutes there, then one day he could tally them all up and have enough to start life all over again. Even then, I knew that every night those minutes saved were squandered away in a deep sleep from which my brother awoke with nothing but the handkerchief in his pocket. But in the kitchen with Minh the Sous Chef, I was content just to listen. Anh Minh, being the first, had inherited the voice that we, the three brothers who followed, coveted. If I closed my e yes, the Old Man was there with his river tones, low and close to the earth, a deep current summoning me from ashore. He was there without the floating islands of sewage, the half-submerged bodies of newborn animals, the swirling pools of dried-up leaves and broken branches. Making its way through Anh Minh's parted lips, the Old Man's voice, purified, said, "I believe in you." In the kitchen of the Governor-General, I learned from my brother's words and found solace in the Old Man's voice. I received there the benediction that I would otherwise never hear.
"Stupid! Hey, Stupid, get me my box of chew."
The Old Man was talking to me all right, but he could have been talking to any of my brothers instead. By the time we were able to walk, we had learned our name. "Stupid" was shared by us like a hand-me-down. We were all the same until one of us redeemed himself, collecting small tokens, brief glimpses of the man whom the Old Man wanted us to be.
One became a porter for the railroads, second-class, but he hoped to see the interior of first before too long. The French had tattooed the countryside with tracks, knowing that mobility would allow them to keep a stranglehold on the little dragon that they called their own. Every day, mobility pounded on the shoulders of my second oldest brother. Every day, Anh Hoà ng was shoved into the ground by the weight of the vanity cases of
French wives. They, with their government-clerk husbands, were touring their colony, forgetting who they were, forgetting that they had to cross oceans to move up a class.
My third oldest brother worked at a printing press. He cleaned the typeset sheets, ready to be dismantled, voided by the next day's news. He removed each block and cleaned the letters while they were still warm and cloaked in a soft scab of ink, getting his brush into the sickle moons of each "C," the surrendering arms of each "Y." In his hands were the latest export prices of rubber, profitable even though the natives had delayed the caoutchouc harvest with their malaria and dysentery. In his hands were the numbers of heads guillotined for a foolhardy assassination attemptâthe lone Nationalist did not even reach the gates of the villa, but justice demanded that an example be firmly set. Anh Tùng looked down and saw only the "O" roar of a lion's mouth, the "T" branches of a tree, the "S" curve of the Mekong. Anh Tùng smiled to himself thinking how the heat of the presses was not as bad as his friends had warned him, how the taste of ink
can
be washed away by a cup of tepid tea, how he would just hide his graying fingernails in his pockets when he went courting.
Minh the Sous Chef was the undeniable success. He should have been born in the Year of the Dragon, the Old Man said. A dragon in a long white apron was an irony forever lost on the Old Man. To him, the apron was a vestment, embroidered, consecrated by the
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