Not All Fires Burn the Same

I met the perfect girl. Her name was Mandy. The only problem was that she was the BFF of the girl I was dating.

I suggested the three of us do something together. Janis, the girl I was dating got excited, probably because she taught I wanted to get to know her friends. Well, I did, but it wasn’t my fault that Janis was so gullible. It was the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival long weekend, so we decided to go out for dinner and drinks.

“I heard you’re a photographer,” Mandy said. “Don’t believe everything you hear on national news,” I said. Mandy laughed. Janis rolled her eyes. “You know there’s a National Geographic exhibition in town,” Mandy said. Brownie points, I thought, Janis would’ve never thought of that. “So let’s go check it out,” I said, “we still have an hour before dinner.”

“It’ll be a huge hassle to find tickets now,” Janis sighed. I stared at her, shook my head, and then looked at Mandy. She was on her phone, clicking away. “Got it,” Mandy said. I saw Janis raised her eyebrows, and so did I. “Bā líng wǔ sān” (eight zero five three,) Mandy said, and stepped onto the main road. “What are those numbers?” I asked. “It’s Didi, you dumb ass,” Janis said. A car pulled up, I saw the number plate: LC-8053. It was the Chinese Uber. We got in, and made our way to the exhibition hall.

When we arrived at the entrance, Mandy pulled out the electronic ticket barcode on her phone, the host scanned it, and gave each of us a bunch of goodies. There was an information booklet, pamphlets related to future exhibits, a keychain of Panda (not sure why people still give out keychains in this day and age,) and a wooden frame with yellow borders. I raised the wooden frame in front of Mandy’s face, “how does it feel to be on the cover of National Geographic magazine?” I asked while holding an imaginary mic in the other hand. “You’re such a dummy,” Mandy laughed. “He’s just lame,” Janis said.

The exhibit was nothing spectacular, same old images recycled. The portrait of the Afghan girl taken by Steve McCurry, a photograph of the renowned primatologist Jane Goodall with a chimpanzee, and a landscape of the Arctic. You get the idea. But every time we moved from one image to the other, I gasped, and I saw Mandy smile. Then we came across a photograph of the Twin Towers burning. “Wow, what are the chances?” I said. Mandy raised her eyebrows. “Today’s date,” I said. “Oh yeah,” Janis widened her eyes, “today is September 11th.” The three of us stood there in silence. I recalled the day it all came down, two decades ago, but I still remembered where I was standing, and the people that were around me. “You know,” Mandy said, “in the Chaoshan region, we burn towers during the Mid-Autumn festival.” Then she further explained the significance behind it. “Like real towers?” I asked. “Of course not,” she smiled, “we burn towers made of paper.”

“I’m getting hungry,” Janis said. Mandy and I looked at each other, and smiled. “Okay, let’s get out of here,” I said.

Mandy took us to her favorite restaurant that served food from her hometown. We started with rice porridge that came with a myriad of condiments ranging from pickled cabbage, radish, cold steamed fish, dried shrimp, marinated baby squid and fried tofu. “We usually eat this for breakfast,” Mandy passed me the chili sauce, “but wait for the main dish, you’ll love it.”

The server brought a wide tray covered in marinated meat. Both Janis and Mandy picked their chopsticks and dove in. “What is this?” I asked. “Just eat,” Janis passed me a pair of wooden chopsticks, “you ask too many questions,” she said. I broke apart the chopsticks, rubbed them together, but no splinters came off. “It’s marinated goose, a delicacy from the Chaoshan region,” Mandy said. “Is that where you’re from?” I looked at her. She nodded, and passed me the goose. Every time the server brought a new dish, Mandy explained its origin, the cooking method, and signs to tell how fresh the ingredients were.

Mandy hadn’t accepted money for the exhibition tickets, and she even paid for the cab, so I went to the front of the restaurant, and cleared the bill. When I returned to the table, the server was cleaning up, but the girls were missing. I scanned the restaurant, but couldn’t see them. “xǐshǒujiān” (washroom,) the server smiled. “Oh, I see,” I nodded, and picked up the booklets and the brochures that we got at the exhibition. I didn’t want to keep them, so I did a gesture for dumping papers into a recycling box. The server noticed, and offered to throw them in with the discarded food. I shook my head, how do you say recycling in Chinese? I wondered. As I walked away from the table, the girls returned. “Let’s go,” Janis said. “I want to recycle these,” I fanned my face with the booklet. “I’m sure we’ll find one of those boxes outside,” Mandy said, as we walked out.

There wasn’t much traffic on the road, but pedestrians walked the pavements outside the street shops. The air smelled of cigarettes, roasted duck, and papers burning. As I looked around for recycling boxes, I noticed that some people were burning garbage in small piles. Perfect, I thought, and walked towards one of them. I checked all the papers in my hand one more time, kept the yellow bordered wooden frame, and threw the rest into the fire.

“What the fuck!” Mandy shouted.

I turned around, “oh, did you want them?”

Janis put her hands on her mouth.

“That’s the tower burning,” Mandy said, “not the garbage, you dumb fuck.”