The first day back at the ballet, I cried at being parted from my baby. However, I also felt comforted that Sophie was in the best of hands – Li’s parents completely doted on her. And Sophie was happily contented with them and didn’t have separation anxiety at all.
Niang and Dia enjoyed having their own little home next to us. Eventually, Li installed a satellite dish so they could watch some Chinese television, and they created a vegetable garden, picking out all the weeds and planting Chinese vegetables. Delicious! They did all the cooking for us, which was wonderful and healthy, and so good for helping me get back into shape. They were incredible.
I was now able to do a full class with the company. I started putting on my pointe shoes and doing more strengthening exercises. I was still breastfeeding and was always desperate to get back to Sophie after class. I managed to communicate with Li’s parents quite well despite only having a few words of Chinese. If I needed to convey something important, I’d just call Li to translate. As long as Sophie was happy, I was fine with whatever they were doing.
Niang was the most sparkling and adorable woman you could ever imagine. She had personality plus and was full of fun. Dia was quiet and thoughtful. It was so lovely to see him with Sophie. He adored her and carried her proudly everywhere. If she was awake, she was in their arms. I am sure he had never had that time to hold his own babies back in China. Dia made her a little swing and put it up under one of the big pecan trees in the backyard. They would often take Sophie for a walk in the stroller, and soon discovered a love of garage sales where Niang bought old dresses and curtains and made amazing patterned dresses and quilts for Sophie. We still have one of the quilts, which is quite a work of art. She also made a puffer jacket and bib for Sophie, but it was a pillowcase that Sophie became very attached to. She sucked her thumb and held onto her nana’s handstitched silk pillowcase at the same time. It became her security ‘silkie’ – her comforter.
I knew how much they loved Sophie and they were fond of me, too. I did learn some basic Chinese – things like ‘How are you?’, ‘Is it time for her milk?’, ‘Let’s eat’ and ‘Good morning’. I was excited that Sophie would learn Chinese too, and probably more quickly than me, considering her grandparents spent all day chatting happily with her. Then, when she got a bit older, she could help me learn to speak the dialect and translate between the two cherished languages in our home.
I continued to meet with my Mad Mother friends each Monday morning. It was a happy time with the other babies and mothers – they all had such interesting and fun personalities. We enjoyed chatting together as we watched our babies. It was a chance for me just to be a mother. Li got to know their husbands as well. Ours was a friendly neighbourhood. If I needed to pop in and see someone, I just had to walk down the street to their home.
Every Sunday we went shopping with Li’s parents. It was quite a drive to the Chinese supermarket in Chinatown. We’d arrive home with big bags of rice and gallons of soy sauce. Sometimes we’d go with Charles and Lily Foster. They had a baby boy, Zachary, around that same time and Lily’s Chinese parents were staying with them as well, so we’d take Li’s parents and meet up with them, and all go to yum cha and on shopping expeditions. Sunday night was often dumpling night – everybody’s favourite.
Soon Sophie was four months old. The only difficulty we had was feeding her. She wasn’t interested in food at all – not regular baby food anyway. Niang would dip little bits of her homemade steamed Chinese bread into tasty sauce from a vegetable dish, and peel the skin off grapes, before popping them into Sophie’s mouth.
Sophie liked the royal treatment at mealtimes. She didn’t care for bottled baby food and had already demonstrated quite a strong will. Almost every time I gave her a spoonful of nutritious baby food, her face would cringe at the bland taste and texture, then she would turn her tiny head to the side and spit it on the floor. Niang would just laugh and say, ‘Ta tai chong min la!’ She is too smart!, and would then give her the same food the rest of us were eating. It didn’t matter what I thought – Niang would just keep on laughing and exclaim, ‘Sophie only wants to eat my food!’ It was hilarious to watch and I let them be. My in-laws were the best thing for Sophie.
Niang was such a good cook. She would produce the most delicious food almost every night: rice, Chinese bread, noodles, stewed chicken and baby pork ribs, broccoli, asparagus, fish and even pig’s head and trotters sometimes, and of course delicious dumplings. We rarely went out to restaurants because there was such variety at home.
Niang and Dia delighted in Li. As soon as he walked through the door each night, he was the centre of their universe. They had waited for him all day. The chatting never stopped. They had lots to tell us about Sophie and their day, and what might be needed the following day. They weren’t huggers. They showed their love by doing everything they could for us – cooking, cleaning, washing and caring so beautifully for Sophie. After dinner, Dia always did the washing-up for Niang while Li and I had some special time with Sophie.
Li would regularly give his parents money to spend around town. They would do massage and pressure point acupuncture for each other to ease their aches and pains. They were both in their sixties after an extremely hard life, so no doubt had quite a few aches and pains – especially carrying Sophie all day. She rarely went in the stroller!
Li and I had been invited by Garry Trinder, the director of Hong Kong Ballet, to guest-perform The Nutcracker with Hong Kong Ballet in December. I was to dance the Sugar Plum Fairy to Li’s Prince. I only had five months after Sophie’s birth to get back into shape. It was hard to leave her for work, and I felt incredibly guilty, but Li’s parents treated Sophie as the daughter they’d never had.
After four months of exercising, Pilates, swimming and doing class every day, I started to rehearse. My comeback was proving to be much harder than I’d anticipated. I felt I was about a month behind schedule but was very motivated to make the performance in Hong Kong.
How would we manage it? We couldn’t leave Sophie with Niang and Dia – not with the language barrier, in case they needed something urgently and couldn’t get help. Hong Kong was still a British territory at that time and getting them visas would be tricky. It all seemed too much, but then I had an idea and excitedly called Mum.
‘Mum, I wonder if you and Dad would consider coming to help us with Sophie in Hong Kong? I think it’s only a nine-hour flight from Brisbane, isn’t it?’ I asked hopefully. ‘Maybe that’s not too long a flight for Dad? I’d love him to see Sophie. And we really need someone to look after her.’
Coralie was excited now. ‘Sounds like a wonderful idea, darling. Let me talk with Dad.’
Soon Mum delighted me with the news that not only would both of them come, but Brig would come too. I hadn’t seen Dad since before Li and I were married. I knew that taking this flight was a big effort for him. So Hong Kong would be an extra-special time with my parents, Brig, and Niang and Dia too, as Li had managed to get their visas after all. It would be the first time our parents had met. Li really wanted to take his parents as he wanted them to experience Hong Kong. This economic powerhouse held enormous fascination for many Chinese people. Everyone on the mainland wanted to go there.