Crossings

Roads

In the afternoon, no cars pass, and the roads are lonely. A grey fixture of landscape that swivels and swerves through the bush. The road is different. It is straight, it curves, it is high, it is low. It is taken from somewhere else and placed into the chaotic uniformity of the bush without a second thought. This road in particular sits next to a park. Children play rugby there in the daytime, but now as the sun sets, and the air starts to cool, it is empty. The cockatoos and kookaburras sing to each other and the crickets join in too. A tangerine sheen gradually envelopes the clear blue sky and the streetlights flicker on as a purple haze sets in. On the side of the road a boy and his Grandma watch from their front yard.

“Ok Daniel, it’s time for dinner. We’ve got to get back now,” she says in Cantonese. The boy’s tongue is not fully developed. A few broken words of Cantonese stumble out of his mouth. She laughs as she picks him up again and his tiny little hands grab hold of her hair.

Motorcycles

Grandma and Grandpa’s room is smaller than Mum and Dad’s room. I like their bed, it’s soft and it has just enough room for the three of us. I sleep on Grandma’s side of the bed because Grandpa gets grumpy when I play games with him. Grandma wakes up early. In the mornings, she lets me climb on her back and I pretend that I’m riding a horse. Or a motorcycle.

“Vroooooom reeeyyuuuuuummm I’m riding a motorcycle! Look how fast I am!” I grip onto her short, permed hair and I sway side to side.

“Wow you sound just like one,” Grandma tells me. “You know your Grandpa used to ride a motorcycle to work every day.”

“Really!” I stop and roll down next to her side.

“Yes, he would go very fast too.”

“Why doesn’t he have one here?”

“We had to sell it when we came to Australia, Daniel.”

“Oh. Well when we go back to China can I ride one?”

“Of course.” She smiles at me. “I have to go make breakfast, Daniel, your Mum and Dad have work soon.”

“Ok Grandma.”

Grandpa snores away and we get up to go to the bathroom.

Japanese Chinese Lebanese

“Japanese Chinese Lebanese!”

“Japanese Chinese Lebanese!”

“Japanese Chinese Lebanese!”

I stand and stare as Jonathan moved his eyes up and down with his fingers, singing his song as we pack up our bags to go home. I don’t get it but he looks like he is having fun.

“What are you doing, Jonathan?” I ask.

“I’m pretending to be Japanese, Chinese Lebanese!” he sings like before. “Look. I’m Japanese!” He pulls his eyes up. “Look. I’m Chinese!” He pulls them to the middle. “Look, I’m Lebanese!” He pulls his eyes down. “Look Daniel, I’m you!” He gets all in my face with his stubby fingers stretching his eyes as far as they’ll go.

“I don’t look like that, Jonathan.” Jonathan laughs at me and does it again, sticking out his tongue and making his face weird this time, as he walks off down the corridor.

Vegemite

The little bell of the toaster rings and I go to grab my breakfast. Two slices of toast with Vegemite. Two dollops of butter for one dollop of Vegemite. Spread the butter first before the vegemite or else you get the butter dirty and nobody wants that. But wait until the toast cools down a bit before spreading the butter or else it melts it all away and the Vegemite has nothing to mix with on the toast.

I don’t think I remember the first time I tried Vegemite. I just remember Dad telling me it’s good for me. He also said that Aussies love it when you tell them you eat Vegemite. He eats it without butter but I reckon it’s too salty without butter. I don’t think he really likes it, he just eats it to fit in with his mates. I once heard a teacher at school say “To be honest mate, you’re not really Australian if ya don’t eat Vegemite, go down to the pub once a week, and watch the bloody footy!” I like Vegemite though, with butter. Mum doesn’t because she reckons it’s way too salty. She and Grandma like to eat congee for breakfast instead. Grandpa likes eating Vegemite with peanut butter on toast, which I reckon is pretty weird. He says it reminds him of this Chinese pastry. Something called ham sui guo. It means salty fruit in Cantonese. I think he got it for me one time at Yum Cha but it was yucky as.

Lunch

“What are you eating?!” Harry is a boy in my class. He’s friends with Adrian and he’s always picking his nose and eating it in class.

“They’re noodles.”

“They look like frickin worms dude. Like big fat ones.” He laughs.

“They’re not wo-

Harry get’s up on the bench and yells.

“Look! Everyone! Daniel’s eating worms!”

“Actually it’s called udon, and it’s pretty yum.”

“No way! He calls it dong dong!”

More people are watching now, some of them are laughing but some don’t really know what’s going on. Suddenly I lose grip of my thermos as Harry snatches it from me. My noodles are all over the ground. I look at them on the asphalt. They do look like little worms, but they’re my favourite food so I’ve never thought about it that way before. The little crowd steps back.

“Can I have it back, I’m hungry.”

“Oi Jono! Catch!” Harry yells. He throws my empty thermos across the playground like a rugby ball. I watch it fly through the air and really I just want to eat my lunch.

“Why are you eating dong you weirdo?” Jono yells.

“They’re just noodles. My grandma makes them for me.”

Yum Cha

Grandpa loves going to Yum Cha. It’s his favourite thing to do. I ask him to take me every time but he goes super early in the morning, like at 6, so I never wake up in time. He says it takes really long for him to drive to the Yum Cha places to see his friends, but also because he wants to ba wai, to make sure he gets his favourite table. The first time I went with him, it was the first time I had seen so many other Chinese people in the same place before. It was so weird because nobody spoke English so I had to speak Chinese the whole time. Grandpa and his friends always laugh at me because I don’t know what any of the names of the food are, so I have to keep pointing at stuff on the carts and just keep on saying gor gor yea yea, which means “that thingy”. And then when we get out of the Yum Cha place, it’s always so weird because everyone is white again.

Maths

“Alright 3B, once you’ve finished all the exercises on page 32, you can go to morning tea. And don’t forget your hats! Remember, no hat, no play.” Mrs Morris announces. I look down at my page. I finished already but I’ve been double checking for a little bit to pretend like I’m still doing it. I wait for a while and stand up. I walk over to Mrs Morris’ desk and hand my book to her. She smiles at me and I look at the rest of the class. They’re still working on it. Some of the girls in the back are making funny noises. I wonder how long it’ll take until someone else finishes. I don’t want to eat all by myself and the seats outside are cold right now.

Maths is easy for me. It always is. Right now, we’re learning the times tables and all the people in my class can’t remember them that quickly. Dad made me remember all mine off by heart already when I was 7 so all the homework is super easy. He called it ‘previewing’, which means that when we learn it in class it’s like I’m just reviewing it. He thinks maths is the most important subject. He told me that there’s no job in the world that doesn’t need maths. Even garbagemen use it.  Also, he told me it was very important to get into a good high school, once the Selective Test comes around when I’m in Year 6. He said that the Selective Test is the most important thing for me in primary school, and that’s why I have to do extra homework and go to tutor. I don’t mind doing the extra homework because Dad always says that if I don’t get into the right high school, I won’t make it to the right uni, and then I’ll be dirty and homeless and begging for money. I don’t want to do that when I grow up, so I just do what what he tells me to do.

I walk back into the classroom after getting my morning tea, so I can get my hat and a few more kids have finished. They’re all walking to get their morning tea too. Everyone else is still trying to finish as quickly as possible except Adrian and his friends. I can hear them making fun of me. I have a quick look at them. They’re pulling up the corner of their eyes.

“Look I’m Daniel and I’m good at maths.”

Why do I get made fun of for being good at something?

Orientation Day

I walk up the stairs to my classroom and see the bright orange banner across our door. ‘Welcome to Orientation Day’. Orientation day is when our parents come to see how we’ve been doing at school. Some parents are inside already. I put down my bag and sit down at my desk. I already know nobody’s going to see them, but I take out my work books and my tests and put them on the table for show like everyone else. My friend Kevin sits next to me. His parents are here already, both of them.

“This year so far, our class worked on our writing skills and also learnt about the gold rush. We’ve also been getting into some long division as well as our fractions,” Ms Kelly tells them proudly. She doesn’t stop smiling during these days. She loves teaching.

“Wow, what did you write about Kevin?“ his mum asks.

“I wrote about a secret spaceship that flies kids to the moon so they can taste moon cheese!”

“Aw, good onya’ son. That’s bloody incredible mate.” His dad slaps him on the back and laughs.

“Kevin’s writing has shown lots of improvement. He seems to really enjoy it. But one thing he doesn’t like is maths. He is improving, but slowly,” Ms Kelly tells them.

“Well, Ms Kelly, let’s be realistic when’s Kevin gonna’ be using improper fractions when he grows up? He wants to be a businessman. All he needs is some good networking skills, and a good work ethic like his old man.” He smiled down at Kevin warmly.

“Well, basic mathematics at Kevin’s age is fairly important to their education, Mr Campbell. You never know what Kevin will do in the future. That’s why I have him sitting next to Daniel, so he can learn from him. Daniel’s already doing high school level maths so he’s a great help to Kevin.”

“Yeah, well ya’ probably can’t speak a word of English, can ya’ champ?” He slaps me on the back this time. He smiles down at me and I sit in silence.

Saturday Soccer

“Mark up! Mark up!” screamed our coach from the sideline. “Stay on your man!”

I tagged behind number 7. He was a tan, skinny boy a bit taller than me. As the bright yellow ball swerved into the box towards us, I jumped as high as I could, looking for the ball. I feel a push behind me and hear the ball fly past my head and into the net. As I landed, the cheers and cries of the family watching on the sideline erupted. I followed the rest of my team out of the penalty box.

“Sorry guys, my bad.” I raise up my hand to signal to the rest of my team. My friend Ryan patted me on the back.

“Don’t worry about it man, I heard their number 7 plays for, like, Soceroos under 15s or something. He’s in some academy.”

“Hey ching chong, maybe stick to ping pong!” a voice from the other team’s sideline pipes.

“Hah, yeah good one Dave-o.”

“Hey come on mate, theres no need for that here.” One voice stuck out.

“Aw come on mate, it’s just a bit of banter mate don’t get ya screws tight about it.”

“Yeah nobody asked you mate, just have a fuckin’ laugh!”

I pretend not to hear anything and keep running.

Sophie

Ryan and Damien coast out in front of me by a little bit as I pedal quickly to catch up. The road from the shops back to Ryan’s house are smooth so we always go back to his after we buy stuff to eat. We race each other back to his place, but I’m always last because I’m smaller than them.

“Dude who are you gonna ask out to the farewell dance?” Damien asks us while he’s chewing on his sour worms. Ryan’s got a huge backyard so we usually just lie on his grass till we’re not tired anymore.

“Aw man I reckon Anna Meadows is so hot,” Ryan says.

“Dude as if she’ll say yes to you, you’re an idiot,” Damien says. We all laugh and Ryan punches Damien a few times till we stop. “Alright, Daniel, who are you gonna ask?”

“I dunno yet. I think Mia Wright. I think she’s hot dude. She’s a really good dancer too”

“Nah there’s no way she’ll say yes to you, she’s too hot bro. Plus, everyone knows you’re already going with Sophie Chang anyway, right?” We laugh together for a bit. Well, I laugh along with them but stop after a while.

“Aw come on, Daniel, you guys would have cute kids, they’d look just like ya” Ryan quips

“Ok alright, I get it, yeah good one.” I try to calm them down.

“Dude didn’t you tell us one time that your grandmas know each other? You won’t even have to meet the family dude!” Damien and Ryan laugh even harder. I throw them a bit of a laugh.

“Fuck off Damien,” I say quietly.

“Oi! Boys, language!” Ryan’s mum yells at us from inside the house.

“Yeah nice one dickhead,” Ryan chuckles at me, grinning.

Highways

In the heart of the city, the streets and alleyways are a concrete maze. The highways here stretch and intersect like a pile of grey snakes. Monotonous like trees in bushland, but for some reason they look more familiar to him. They feel safe but he has never been here before. The roads all fit together, the roads are where they are meant to be.

The boy stares out the window of his apartment from the 64th floor.

“This is it, son. This is our new home in Hong Kong. I know you weren’t sure about the move, but I promise it’ll be fine. You’re going to have to work on your Cantonese if you want to get around, but don’t worry, school’s still going to be in English, ”  his Dad says to him, chuckling.

“Home huh,” the boy replies.