In one weathered hand she cups a folded bamboo leaf, the other scoops raw sticky rice into the cone-shaped space formed by her palm. A spread of ingredients lies before her on the kitchen table-sticky rice, pork sausage, chopped water chestnuts, peanuts, rich fatty pork, and salted duck eggs, with twine to tie it all together. Her fingers, while knuckles knobbly, still slender; old, yet still deft, fold the bamboo leaf closed into a perfect little package with five corners. She wraps the package with twine and fastens it with a bow. One after another she makes them, with efficiency and mastery learned from her mother, and her grandmother, and her great-grandmother.
Zòngzi, her granddaughter's favourite.
The front door opens, an intruder quietly slipping in, hoping to get up to her bedroom without her grandmother noticing. However, no sound, no matter how quiet, could possibly escape her grandmother’s detection.
“Who goes there?” She calls out, a smile heard riding on her voice.
“Just me, Pópo.”
She drops her book bag by the door, defeated once again. She peers into the kitchen, her nose detecting the smell of bamboo leaves before her eyes see them.
“What are you making, Pópo?” She asks.
“Zòngzi. They’ll be ready for you to take to school tomorrow for lunch,” she replies. “Won’t you help me make them?”
The girl frowns. “I have homework to do today.”
“Well, at least come sit and chat with me for a while.” She pats the chair next to her. “What's with the long face?”
“Nothing! It’s not!” The girl says. She flops down into the chair.
“How was school?” Her grandmother asks. “How was your first week?”
“Boring. We learned fractions in math today.”
Her grandmother nods sagely. “Yes. Fractions are boring. What else?”
The girl lays her head on the table, the frown still clinging to her face. “Not much.”
“Ai-sh! That's not very lady-like!” Her grandmother swats at the girl's forehead with her free hand. “Is something bothering you?”
The girl dodges the question and the admonition of her grandmother’s knuckles. She watches as she folds another zòngzi closed, fingers smoothing the leaf down gingerly.
“Do I have to have zòngzi for lunch tomorrow?”
Her grandmother’s hands stop mid-way through folding a bamboo leaf. “What do you mean? Zòngzi are your favourite. I’ve left out the egg in some, just how you like it.”
The girl shrugs, but her frown deepens. “I just want something different. A pbandj. Or something.”
“What's a ‘pea bee an jay’?” Her grandmother asks, sounding out the foreign letters.
“It's a sandwich with jelly and peanut butter. My friend Jamie brings one every day.”
Her grandmother begins her zòngzi making again, the creases in her forehead traced in skepticism. “Whatever for? That sounds terrible.”
“I think they taste fine,” the girl mumbles.
Her grandmother sighs. Her hands falter for the first time as she reaches for the pork sausage. “Well. Don’t just lay there. You said you had homework to do.”
The girl’s chair squeals as she pushes it back. “Okay.”
“Bring your lunch box to wash up while you’re at it!”
The girl returns, but her lunch box is nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s your lunch box? Don’t leave it in your bag to rot, silly girl,” her grandmother says.
The girl fidgets, cheeks turning pink.
Her grandmother’s hands stop moving, one comes to a rest on her hip. “What did you do?”
The girl mutters something under her breath.
“Come on, speak up.”
Before she can answer properly, a loud rumbling from her stomach breaks the silence, giving her away.
“I didn’t eat it,” she says finally.
Concern marks her grandmother’s face. “Well what did you eat then?”
“My friend gave me some of her baby carrots.”
Her grandmother looks at her incredulously. “Now what in the world is a baby carrot? How can a carrot be a baby? Ai-sh!” She’s abandoned the making of zòngzi entirely now. Rice spills out of an unfurled bamboo leaf onto the table.
“Pópo you-”
Her grandmother waves her hand towards the door. “Go get your lunch box. Let me see.”
A dejected weight drags the girl’s shoulders down. She returns with her lunchbox, evidence showing nothing was eaten.
“Beef, radish, cabbage… Don’t you like all these things?”
The girl’s eyes stay firmly trained on her feet. She sniffles, and manages to say: “My friends say my food smells weird, and that it makes them sick.”
Her grandmother’s palm slaps the tabletop, causing the bowl of salted eggs to almost tip over. It wobbles on the tabletop, trying to regain its balance.
“Food is food! When I was a kid, we ate whatever we had and didn’t complain.” She scowls, a bony finger accusing the air. “What right do they have, huh? Saying your food smells! Ai-sh! Kids these days have no idea what it’s like to be hungry.”
The girl wipes her nose on her sleeve, which earns her a slap on the wrist. Her grandmother sighs, and leans back in her chair. Her fingertips rub at her temples.
“Can I just have a sandwich tomorrow for lunch?” The girl asks.
Her grandmother scoffs. “And what? Give them the satisfaction?” She sits up straight and grabs her granddaughter by the shoulders. “Look at me. Don’t you ever be ashamed of your food, got it? Got it?”
The girl nods half-heartedly. Her grandmother’s calloused fingertips pinch her ear.
“Ow!”
The girl makes eye contact with her. Soft eyes look back.
“You can have a sandwich for lunch tomorrow, but you’ll have to teach me how,” her grandmother says. She holds her granddaughter’s face in her hands. “And you help me make the rest of this zòngzi. Deal?”
A hesitant smile appears on the girl’s face. “Deal.”