These thirty-eight years

All empty now.

Can the rest be full?

I felt a rush of feelings. Did I want to fill this man’s life? I stared at my Ph.D. dissertation and could not come up with an answer.

The next morning the ringing of my alarm clock startled me awake. It was seven-thirty and my oral defense was scheduled at two. I bathed and dressed, then glanced through my dissertation one last time. At eleven, I walked to the Cité canteen and ate a small lunch of cheese, fruit, and coffee, then took the Metro to the Sorbonne.

Since my purple floral dress had survived the fire, I deemed it very lucky. So I wore it again today to bring me more luck. And it did. Not only did I pass the exam, my dissertation got an unanimous “très honorable” from the three professors. After the hour-long ordeal, they all came to shake my hand and wished me the best of luck. My supervisor, always cool, distant, and too busy to grant me more than five meetings during my five years of study with him, hugged me and whispered pleasantries. After more felicitations and small talk, they all went back to their seats to get ready to interrogate the next candidate.

Outside the exam hall, I felt sad that none of my friends had been there. In fact, I had not told any of them. Because except for Dai Nam, the others were really only casual acquaintances, and most of them had left Paris before I did.

Feeling a bit sad, nostalgic, and sentimental, I went straight to the café a few blocks from the Sorbonne’s main entrance-the same one where I’d had my first meal on my first day in Paris.

I sat down in the front row and a gray-haired waiter came to take my order. Wondering if he’d waited on me on that first day, I smiled generously and asked for an espresso and a croque madame-exactly what I’d had during my first visit here five years ago.

A few minutes later, the waiter came back with my order. Waiting until he’d left, I raised my glass and whispered to myself, “Congratulations, Dr. Du.”

Then I softly recited the Song dynasty poet Su Dongpo’s poem:

A cup of wine amidst colorful blossoms,

Sipping all by myself,

I raise my cup and invite the moon to join me.

With my shadow,

There are finally three parties here!”

As I was enjoying my espresso and my croque madame, I looked about. There was always something magical simmering in the air of Paris. Even the smallest corner seemed to wink at me and whisper, “Come, take a look; it’s fun in here.” The shop windows of the clothing stores opposite the café were decked with the colors of fall-chocolate brown, khaki, camel, cadet blue, navy, black, gravel black. As always, I was impressed by the refined French eye, which selects colors that compete and complement all at once. I watched a shapely, red-attired woman dash across the street to hail a taxi; her silver scarf lifting in the wind resembled a wisp of incense or cursive calligraphy.

I dropped two sugars into my espresso and slowly stirred it with a spoon. With pleasure, I listened to the sound of metal hitting against the rim of the ceramic cup. Then I took a lingering sip, savoring the coffee’s bittersweet taste. After that, I cut a big piece of croque madame and put it, slowly and sensuously, into my mouth.

Pedestrians walked, talked animatedly with friends, or window-shopped while munching crepes, nibbling sandwiches, or licking ice creams. I watched leaves shiver in the early autumnal breeze and the intense but blasé expressions of the Parisians, somehow feeling a Zen-like tranquility amidst the hustle and bustle of the city.

Scenes of my first day in Paris five years ago flashed across my mind…

The morning after my arrival, I had awakened in the dormitory of La Maison d’Asie with the sun gently touching a corner of my bed. I flicked and warmed my toes in the patch of light, then stretched, yawned, jumped off the bed, and went to look out the window. Although there was nothing much to see outside except other dormitory buildings, I still felt thrilled to be in Paris.

Bonjour, Paris! Comment allez-vous?

I took several deep breaths, inhaling as much of the Parisian morning air as my small lungs could take. Then, when I saw a young couple pass under a tree munching crepes, pangs of hunger stabbed my stomach. I flounced into my sweater, slipped on my jeans, and went out.

My feet thudded eagerly on the cobblestone street as I twisted my neck, looking in all directions, trying to take in all the scenes: a gray stone building covered with crawling vines; a window with an intricately patterned decoration in the shape of lilies; a young girl with a lavender scarf and violet boots. After passing a cigarette store, a florist, and a newspaper stand, I spotted a supermarket and plunged in.

Walking around and looking at the huge varieties of produce, I felt impelled to look for a simple meal-something cheap. With my mother back in Hong Kong for me to somehow support, plus unknown years ahead in Paris, I had to stretch my small scholarship as far as possible. I looked at the rows and rows of food arranged neatly on the shelves, until my eyes landed on a package of craquelin. I did not know exactly what was inside, but the cover picture looked very appetizing, with a colorful display of biscuits with shrimp, ham, cheese, sausage, lettuce, tomato, olive, pepper, onion. My eyes caressed the different items of food while my mouth watered. The price-one franc fifty-seemed unusually cheap for a hearty meal like this. I grabbed two packages, hurried to the beverage section to get some instant cocoa, then went to pay at checkout.

Back in my dormitory room, I cooked myself a cup of hot chocolate to go with the craquelin. I sucked back the saliva flooding my mouth. Then, with great anticipation and affection, I opened the package.

Alas! As if struck by an anti-magic wand, all the shrimp, ham, cheese, sausage, tomato, and onion were gone! What lay in front of my eyes were a few stacks of wrinkled, paperlike biscuits, completely bare, like the miserable and weathered face of an octogenarian. Anger welled up into my throat.

I was cheated by the supermarket! Or, I almost cried out in despair, somebody had opened the package and ate all the delicious toppings!

But what should I do? I didn’t think I could go back to the supermarket and complain to the checkout person. Anyway, who would care? Making a fuss over one-and-a-half francs, I would be the one who would become the laughing stock, not the checkout person nor the owner. Stuttering in my insufficient French, I would sound pathetic and ridiculous.

After a long mental struggle, I finally sat down submissively and started to nibble my first Sunday brunch in Paris, à la Zen.

Not to my surprise, the so-called craquelin tasted terrible. I felt like an old woman chewing on tree bark during a famine. How I missed my mother’s delicious cooking: soy-sauce chicken, steaming fish with black bean sauce, sweet and sour pork, crispy salt-and-pepper shrimp…

Then, as I was about to throw away the rest of the biscuits, I suddenly spotted a line of small letters at the bottom of the package, hidden among the pictures of shrimp, ham, cheese, sausage, tomato, and onion: “Proposer de servir”-serving suggestion. A joke at my expense!

Still hungry, I began to unpack.

As I was pulling out items one by one, a cockroach crawled out from the suitcase. How incredible that this little ugly thing had traveled with me six thousand miles-all the way across the Pacific Ocean from Hong Kong to Paris! Poor creature! I studied the dazed-looking brown bug for long moments. Was he starved after all these long hours in the airless dark trunk? Was he now lonely and miserable like me? Would he be able to make friends in the future? Then suddenly I realized he was at this moment my only companion in the whole world. A gust of loneliness swelled up in me.