Reasonable people would be grateful and kind to the few people who subject themselves to the formidable 14-hour flight across the Pacific staffed with flight attendants recruited from SuperMax facilities. But I was more like a wounded wombat than a reasonable person. Embittered or simply innately sadistic, I began developing guest itineraries that were directly proportional to the vexations guests visited upon us.
Clogging a toilet earns a guest an express trip to the local wet market; even better in the summer when the food starts cooking under the hot sun before it ever leaves the food stalls. Whether or not an offense was committed, this is a mandatory excursion for any vegetarian guests. Wet markets communicate to a more primitive version of our selves. Large chunks of red and white striped meat hanging on hooks above bloody cutting boards seems one step removed from running it down on the veldt ourselves. Even better if they have left a little fur on, or a hoof. Once guests start craving familiar food from back home I patiently admonish them. Feigning distress, I claim that I would be remiss in my hostess duties if I neglected to provide exposure to all nine of China’s regional cuisines. I further proclaim that I cannot allow them to return home without experiencing the local delicacies such as fish heads and chicken feet. I assure them these items will not be on the menu at the Peking Garden restaurant back home.
Republicans. It just does not get much better than leaving them at the museum of the First National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. To prevent international incidents we pick them up after about an hour.
Any of my siblings who visit automatically rate the most diabolical tour I can devise. I have a lifetime’s worth of payback stored up after the childhood hell I endured at their hands. When my sister and brother-in-law timed their first visit to Asia when I was seven month’s pregnant I was not deceived for a moment thinking they were actually concerned for my welfare. No, they wanted to see my massive maternity-clothed body waddling through the Forbidden City.
However, even my warped scheming could not have conjured up the maltreatment that lay before them at the hands of a Beijing cab driver. Prior to the Beijing Summer Olympics, most cabs in Beijing were dark red Jettas. The driver sat behind a plastic and metal cage. On the dash were the driver’s registration and the fare meter. Usually the shocks were shot and the the interior reeked of cigarette smoke.
Due to my expansive girth relative to the modest confines of the cab interior we decided to take two cabs when we went out to dinner our first night in Beijing. We communicated to the driver via the hotel doorman our destination and sent my sister and brother-in-law off in the first available cab. Our wait was no more than a few minutes and we were off in the same direction, or so we thought.
Beijing has heavy traffic spurred on by increasing car ownership. This heavy traffic load is exacerbated by tremendous construction projects throughout the capital. Keeping everything exciting are the skills of the Chinese drivers. That night our journey took forty-five hungry minutes. We expected to find our relatives waiting for us. That they were not there was not at first a cause for concern. Different routing, driver’s skill, and luck could account for different arrival times. The minutes ticked by. I visited the facilities, several times, as pregnant women often do. Minutes turned into an hour, which turned into another hour.
Perhaps it is worth noting that both missing relatives were former military members and currently employed by a sensitive department in the US government. While I had never heard of Americans getting nabbed in China, my inherited paranoia was just kicking in. Just as we were debating whether or not to contact the authorities, which began with a discussion of whose authorities, a red Jetta careened into the parking lot and came to an abrupt stop at the restaurant entrance. My relatives wearily emerged from the back seat. Their mouths started to move and nothing came out. My husband suddenly became fluent in Putonghua and embarked on a spirited debate with the driver. The driver claimed that he was told to take them to a university on the other side of town. Since my relatives spoke no Chinese, it was unclear how he managed to then find his way to the restaurant he claims he was never told about. In the end he settled for what the fare would have been had he taken the correct route.
Some time after the first round kicked in the relatives regained the power of speech. Because we had not told them how long the drive was supposed to take they had no idea anything was amiss until the driver attempted to drop them off at darkened and deserted university campus. Apparently a lively discussion ensued, they speaking English and he Chinese. His already enthusiastic driving was kicked up a notch and they sped back into traffic until they arrived at the restaurant, all the while being tossed about the back seat of a well-worn Jetta with parts of seat belts that did not connect.
I could not wipe the happy, goofy smile off my face. I secretly wanted to give that driver the tip of his life. Thank you Beijing cab driver for inadvertently participating in a younger sibling’s long term revenge scheme.
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