A BEAUTIFUL LIFE IN A SWEET-SMELLING HARBOR (Part 2)

As I strolled along the Aberdeen promenade, an old woman steering one of the remaining sampans flagged me down. Did I want a tour?

Well, why not?

For seven bucks she sailed me away. We cruised past trawlers and other sampans. Their boat decks were as domestic as house porches, with potted trees providing shade. Laundry hung on lines strung from mast to stern. Family pets snoozed in the sun. A young boy in his school uniform rode with us until we dropped him off at his sampan home.

After the tour I traveled to Stanley Market, yet one more shopping spot notable for shoes, souvenirs and linens, but lunch was on my mind and I found a small French cafe. From my window table I soaked in the street activity and noticed an old man smoking a cigarette and chatting with his buddies. It was two in the afternoon and the man was dressed in his pajamas. Here was a guy after my own heart. I see no good reason why PJs aren't as perfectly acceptable for daywear as they are for bedtime.

In Beijing I'd seen the same thing. Men and women gathered on street corners in their silk slippers, robes and pajamas. Didn’t we used to be like that? Wasn't there a time in suburban North America when we stepped outside, picked up the morning paper, struck up conversations with neighbors, shared coffee, checked our gardens and enjoyed life — all in pajamas?

If the whole world spent a little more time in its pajamas, we'd be a heck of a lot nicer to each other. Thank you, China. I intended to return home with a credo that wearing pajamas in the afternoon was A-OK. I finished my sandwich and promptly bought a new set of pink silk PJs at the market.

My idyllic trip to this other side of Hong Kong Island brought to mind how long I'd been sunk in urban crush. It was time for a quiet, sparse experience and one of the outlying islands answered the call. A mere half-hour ferry ride from Hong Kong, a fishing village on the island of Cheung Chau was my destination. Cars are barred on the island; everyone bikes. Firemen drive around in bright red golf carts.

Do you know what Cheung Chau is famous for? Jason had asked me earlier.

The Bun Festival, of course. I gloated because I'd done my research.

Suicides.

Shut up.

Seriously, sometimes you see people carrying bags of charcoal on the ferry. They go to the island, light up and asphyxiate themselves.

Seriously, Jason, shut up.

Just saying.

Guys can be so morbid. I put the myth aside and sailed on.

A BEAUTIFUL LIFE IN A SWEET-SMELLING HARBOR (Part 1)

There were only a couple of weeks left for me to finish my sightseeing. I made a list and set out to check off the sites one by one.

On Sundays and holidays the streets of Hong Kong filled with thousands of Filipinas. These women crowded overpasses, stairwells, curbs and all available park spaces. Sitting on blankets, they shared picnics and photographs, strummed guitars, chatted on cell phones and played card games.

These are the maids and nannies of Hong Kong. Each worker earns an average of $230 a month, typically sending a portion of this income to family back home.

One of William's assistants, a local named Jason, showed us his apartment. The main room was big enough for a loveseat, television and table with three chairs. There were two small bedrooms: One fit a single bed, the other a double. The kitchen could accompany one person at the two-burner stove. There was also a half-fridge and a small washing machine.

Jason explained the layout of his apartment was exactly the same as the one across the hall, where a couple and their young daughter lived with their Filipina nanny. The parents slept in one bedroom, the girl in the other and the maid on the small couch. Because both parents worked, they needed the childcare, but for everyone's sanity the employee had to get out one day a week and joined her friends on the streets.

Is this what Christmas Day looked like in Hong Kong? Where did these women go for cover when it rained on a Sunday? Would they ever go to school and advance out of this? Would they marry and have families of their own? These thoughts rolled around my head as I sidestepped row upon row of women, young and old, enjoying a reprieve the best way they could.

I heard the story of a little girl who, for her school's costume day, brought her maid on a leash. As the family cat. I pondered this scenario as I traveled on a bus, chugging over hilly terrain. I was on my way to the spot where the English discovered South China.

Aberdeen conjures images of sweaters, sheep and bagpipes, but this was not Scotland. The bay of Aberdeen is where the British first laid eyes on Hong Kong. Oh yummy, let's take it. The whole kit and caboodle...lovely.

And so they did, and did, and did.

Less than thirty years ago, Aberdeen's harbor was populated with over a million trawlers and sampans. As of 2004, there were about 250.

To the British, the harbor had become an eyesore, with its ragamuffin sea craft bearing extremely poor inhabitants. Entire fishing families lived on these boats. Some of them had never laid foot on terra firma. In a clean sweep, the boat people were taken to government housing in Kowloon and on Hong Kong Island. That lasted until those tenements grew distasteful and the residents were moved to state housing in the New Territories.

BEIJING: April-May, 2004 (Part 10)

Near the end of the tour we visited the Summer Palace, a park of nearly three square kilometers, most of which is water. Beautiful buildings of ancient architecture surrounded a large lake where an empress dowager liked to fish as recreation. Indeed, her version of the sport consisted of sitting in a boat with rod and line while her servants swam underneath and stuck fish on her hook. Got another one!

Beijing. Big, bold, breathtaking Beijing. My desire for pagodas and red-tiled rooftops was sated as was my yen for local food. I could go home satisfied that I was able to touch on a portion of China's vast history and rich culture.

Our final morning was spent in — guess what — a shopping mall. I bought a purse. A bubblegum-pink purse. I don’t know what I was thinking. I never used it. I chalk the purchase up to vegetable deprivation.

Mr. Leung was excited about this particular mall because the top floor housed a food court where one could find excellent meals at very low prices. I wandered the many levels of the center, then passed through the restaurant area, where my friends happily lunched. I couldn't do it. I needed a salad and the idea of one more chunk of pork was beyond comprehension.

Later in the Beijing airport I was certain I would find a salad. I came upon a cafeteria with a showcase featuring synthetic replicas of their menu items. A plastic hot dog with plastic mustard. Plastic spaghetti with plastic red sauce. And then...there it was. A plastic Caesar salad, with little brown plastic croutons. A server raised her eyebrows as a way of asking my order and I pointed to the salad.

The what?

She came around the glass case and studied the thing. She called her co-worker over and the two of them gawked at it like they'd never seen such a thing. They looked at me and shook their heads. They had no idea what that thing was but would I like a hot dog?

When we arrived back in Hong Kong I turned to my group à la Dorothy saying farewell in Oz. In five short but long days I'd become fond of each of them. I loved that they had taught me how to wash all my dishes with hot tea. I developed such affection for the lady who regularly chatted with me in Chinese as I nodded and smiled. We had a nice hug at the airport.

Bye to Mr. Leung and his wife. Bye to Leonard and his mom. And then Bryan, who actually managed to pick up a few English words unrelated to the Lakers. Certainly more than I accomplished, language-wise. Ni hao was all I had learned, but I would never forget it.

*****

Home is where you make it, and during our Hong Kong adventure we had made our home there. Now I was ready to get back to base camp in Los Angeles, reclaim our pets and jump-start my life. I was unsure what that would entail. After four years of following William around the globe I had no idea what my future held back home. I dreamed of writing more than the unsold screenplays I had labored over. As William's career was gaining traction, mine had slipped into nowheresville.

Who was I? What was I supposed to be doing? And where had my artistic life disappeared to? Purpose and creativity eluded me. William would follow me home in a couple of months, but until that time I would live alone with the weight of those questions. It was time to sort this stuff out and I needed to do it back home.

My final days in Hong Kong started to feel nostalgic. I viewed the malls and street life with seasoned eyes while remembering my initial impressions. After almost two months in the territory I imagined myself a local. As ready as I was to get back to Los Angeles I still wanted to savor the tastes and smells of our Hong Kong adventure.

BEIJING: April-May, 2004 (Part 9)

Every morning we dined on Western-style breakfasts. Lunches and dinners, however, were another matter. Our bus would pull up to a Chinese restaurant with waiters lined up outside to greet us. We were then seated at a large round table with a lazy Susan in the center.

No doubt English-language tours were suffering American-style hamburgers while I was getting the real thing. I was feeling pretty smug about this aspect of my trip...until dining protocol knocked me down a peg.

The one point of etiquette I knew was a rule of tea service. In Chinese society it is considered impolite to grab the pot and pour one's own tea before first serving those around you. In a pathetic attempt to show off I reached for the pot and started to pour when distress signals flew at me from around the table.

The pot was carefully removed from my ignorant hands. The ladies at the table showed me what was what. They poured the tea into a large empty bowl and began to wash their cups, bowls, plates and chopsticks in the steaming brew. The gentlemen joined in and washed their utensils as well. A new pot of tea for drinking was delivered as the cleaning ritual was completed.

After tea is poured the receiver raps his or her knuckles on the table as a thank you. Mr. Leung told me the story: An emperor of the Qing Dynasty wished to mingle with commoners and made a sneaky getaway from the Forbidden City. He traveled in disguise throughout Beijing, accompanied by his servants. Because the attendants were in the presence of undercover royalty, they devised a clever form of kowtowing and let their fingers kneel in obeisance.

Our meals were predominately meat. Huge platters of pork, beef and chicken filled the table along with large bowls of rice and soup.

Most days, one lonely plate of bok choy served as the vegetable quotient. After five days of carnivorous mastication I developed a bordering-on-crazy craving for vegetables. The dish of bok choy would whiz past me on the lazy Susan. I'd try my best to snatch it but often missed as the plate spun out of reach.

Leonard, next to me, described what we were about to eat at each meal.

Hot and sour soup.

Love hot and sour soup, I said as I scooped a huge ladleful.

Do you know what that is? Leonard asked, pointing at something in my bowl.

Looks like a noodle of some kind, I answered, and slithered it into my mouth.

That's blood.

What?

They spin blood really fast into that long skinny thing.

So, what happened to the bok choy?

We did enjoy a special meal of Peking Duck, or more accurately, Beijing Duck. It was crispy, fatty, delicious and jam-packed with MSG.

Back at the medical institute, when a doctor lectured our group about good health, I wanted to throw my hand up and ask, Did you ever consider cutting back on the MSG, or trying brown rice and hey, what about your colleagues outside smoking their brains out?