THE RADIATING MAN

The karaoke joint was peaceful when we passed on the way to the hamburger place, but quite the opposite when we passed by afterwards. So we went to Miss Vivien's, where Ah Yee exclaimed that he hadn't see me in a long time (好耐冇見 'hou noi mou kin'). Which was correct. We've known each other since I first started carving seals. Which is why I exactly remember his name. And his surname (鄺 'kwong'). The sealscript version given in some dictionaries is, in fact, a later construct. Unfortunately there is no reliably attested original bone or bronze engraved, or Zhou dynasty (周) version.

Kwong is a surname that originated with exiles in the south more than two thousand years ago, and still found mostly among Cantonese or Toisan speakers. I would not be surprised if there are more Kwongs in North American than, for instance, Peking. The Louie (雷), Fong (方) and Kwong (鄺) clans are related by reason of a common ancestor. In North America they are united in the Soo Yuen Benevolent Association (遡源堂), whose headquarters building is at the intersection of Grant Avenue (都板街) and Clay Street (企李街).

In Toishanese Kwong is pronounced as Fong, by the way.
Some dialects have it as Kong.

AH YEE OCASSIONALLY SMOKES A PIPE. HE DOES NOT LOOK LIKE THIS.

While I was smoking my pipe this evening in Chinatown a few people stopped to compliment me on how swell I looked. I must be radiating bonhomie or something, which is disturbing, because I am not bonhomous; I lack bonhomity. Or I prefer to think so.
Oscar The Grouch is my spirit animal.

It must be the enchanting aroma of Atalaya.
A very pleasant broken flake.


For the second week in a row the bookseller's dinner was actually his breakfast. The bakery where he gets his morning pastry on the way to work has become too hip and popular. So other than a coffee beverage bought elsewhere he had bupkes to nourish him all day. Which is not good; a man needs to keep his bloodsugar level up to deal with the querulent public, lest they run all over him. He cannot, like me, snap and growl at them all day.

For me that would be easy. I'd just regurgitate the phrase utilized by the subcontinental clerk at city hall years ago: "whatever you are wanting, we are NOT having!"
And then slam the window shut.


I'm just not a people frog.



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