I AM NOT AH SOOK!

She used to work at the store around the corner. Because one has to be a certain age even to work part-time, she must have been at least sixteen when she started. But she didn't look it at all. Forgive me for saying it, but rather than suggesting a young lady in the first blush of woman-hood, she reminded me of nothing so much as a bug - a delicate creature with iridescence, poised awareness, bright eyes, and thin elegant limbs.
As well as a face that reflected a remarkable sense of humour and a keen intelligent character.

She was extremely attractive - people look so much more exciting, appealing and desirable even, when they are bright and have an active interest in things around them.

I once surprised her at the check-out stand while she was stuffing her face.
She looked utterly charming at that moment - blushing, stuttering, embarrassed, and guilty as sin.
I never knew that noodles being shoveled in with chopsticks were a wicked pleasure.
I learned something then.

[She indulged in the naughtiness of noodles several times over the years. Not a constant, but on lucky evenings I would see her inhaling long slirts of pasta with a blissed-out look on her face, eyes half-closed, smiling...... and there's something innocent yet enchanting about feminine hands wielding chopsticks.
Fortunately I am a very sober man.]

The smallest women always have the biggest appetites. It's probably the sheer buzzing energy level which keeps them from growing, as it must take immense amounts of noodles to fuel that frenetic activity, spark the constant intellectual curiosity.

She worked there for nearly six years. I'm guessing final years of high-school and all the way through college.
No, I didn't go to the store more often because of her, as I've always been blessed with a great lack of foresight.
Every evening I needed something that I ran out of.

Smoked clams, that's it - I am desperate for some smoked clams.
And another bottle of hot sauce. A man can never have too many bottles of hot sauce.
As well as a five pound bag of sugar, I'm collecting the set!

All of the check-out clerks who work there now are married women.
Married women do not inculcate a need for hot sauce.
Even though I used up my reserves of sugar (five pound bags, multiples) years ago, there has been no need to acquire another stockpile.
It is unlikely that there will be another sugar crisis like there was in the mid-nineties.

She understood me when I spoke Cantonese. One of the few people who could automatically grasp which crucial word was being mangled.
It's a talent.

Married women lack that skill. Or the curiosity that spurs perspective.
Even the round-faced one who works there now, most evenings, just sticks to the normal phrases of interaction. Ney ho. Mai mat-yeh? Go-di ho kwai ga! Ney chan chong-yi ni di ah?
Thank G-d she doesn't address me as 'ah-sook'.

The cute little one who ate noodles didn't address me as ah-sook either, even though she had much more justification to do so if she had. Age difference and all.

It is VERY endearing when a young miss entirely unselfconsciously does NOT address one as ah-sook. Charming, in fact.



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