A Toilet Cleaner

by May May (2-2004)

My oldest sister is totally insane.
She went on a cruise last November, and met a guy. The guy works on the boat. He is from Puerto Rico and he cleans her room and her toilet. My two other sisters were on the cruise with my oldest sister. You can believe what my oldest sister did: once my younger sisters passed my oldest sister’s room, and saw that guy was buttoning his shirt while walking out of my oldest sister‘s room!

What a shame! I mean I feel sorry for my sister. She is 43 years old, never married. She has a beauty salon, and been busy all these years. When my family came to this country, we were poor. We were poor to dirt. We are eleven siblings, ten sisters and one brother; we are a big family but no money. My older sister opened her beauty salon and put a Buddha on the wall. She prayed every day for our family to earn lots of money; for her sisters to have husbands; her parents have a good life. She is the oldest child in my family, and the most attractive girl out of the ten of us. However she worked hard, harder then a dog. Twenty years later, we have lots of money, we all got married except her, and my parents have their own house and retired with more money then they need. They have thirty one grandchildren and all these kids are in the Palo Alto’s best schools.

Now my sister is trying to destroy my family!
I mean there are people on this cruise from Germany, England, Canada and all over the U.S. You see, my sister Mary could meet any of them from these countries with decent jobs, right? But, she met a guy who was from Puerto Rico and you can’t believe -- he works on the boat as a janitor. The more unbelievable thing was he cleaned her room and her toilet! having an love affair with a guy who cleans her toilet? Come on! She said this is “love at first sight !” Give me a break! She even told her costumers in salon “it was a miracle!” because you know why, “ Oh my birth mark is on the inside of my left knee, and his birth mark is on the inside of his right knee!” Come on, wake up, how about that was just a scar from a bicycle accident! I mean, that Puerto Rican guy doesn’t even speak English! My sister’s name is Mary, and he called her “Mo-rry!” Give me a break, Mo-rry! I mean, Mary, get life! There are tons of great guys in China; they are engineers, professors, Lawyers, doctors...at least, they have identity! And this guy, God, a toilet cleaner! Think about it. This is not discrimination, ok, I’m just saying, you are not in Love, you are Lost!
You see what I mean!

Think about it, the guy is going to end up marring Mary, and come to this country to get his green card? My sister would have to put him in school for his education! When they have baby, the baby wouldn’t be pure Chinese, is that scary! I mean my family doesn’t have racial purity thoughts, we just have concern about her. What if two years later she finds out it‘s a mismatch? What if that guy takes away all her money and let her live on the street? What if the shame that she brings into our family would make us unhappy for the rest of our life? We love her; we care about her; we just don’t want to see her foolishly rush in the relationship with this guy who only spent three days on a cruise with her. A toilet cleaner! That would be a joke!

She calls him every day now, or he calls her everyday to “cook soup on the phone.” Mary said to us, “He plays guitar to me on the phone!” How romantic! Come on! Get real. Mary’s costumers suggested her to fly to Puerto Rico to check up on this guy. I said to her, Mary, if a guy has been cleaning toilets and rooms on the cruise for over five years and never was promoted, think about it. Think about how unnecessary one have to take a trip to his country to find out! If he was a... for example, an engineer, even if he lied to you, even if he has a kid that he didn’t mention to you, he is still an accomplished man. But, a toilet cleaner, who has been on the cruise over five years? What do you expected to find out, Mo-rry!

You know we respect our parents a lot, culturally, personally. However, Mary is destroying this esteemed value right now. My father said to her, “Mary honey, when the prostitutes have to sell themselves, they are forced by circumstance, and they make good money. And you, I don’t understand it, you let somebody sleep with you, and you paid the person!” Can you believe what my sister said to my father, she said, “He made me feel special.” My mother said to my father, “She must be too horny!” When Mary overheard that, she was mad. She screamed this to our Mom, you know, her own mother, “ If you weren’t horny, how can you have had eleven children!” Aah, what a shame.

What? Why Mary didn’t get married like the rest of us? Well, I tell you, when she was younger, I mean when she was in her twenties, she only was our second set of parents, not a young girl or a individual person. Her life was our life, as well as our life was hers. She didn’t have her own life because all of us needed to be take cared. You know in our Chinese culture, the oldest child always has to help the parents to raise siblings, no matter what. Mary is the oldest child of our family, and she spent all her time for all of us: Baby sitting, earning money for our parents’ expending, fill out all the paper work for immigration office, helped me and my brother to lean how to drive. Worked and saved money to help my parents paying our weddings. So, she was busy. She didn’t have time to date. The funny thing was, since she couldn’t go out much, she turned to be interested in boys much younger then her, you know, like my brother’s friends. My brother was embarrassed. He didn’t even want to bring friends home any more. Mary looked at those kids and acted weird. And then, she got older; we introduced so many men to her, they were all Chinese with degrees and success. But she thought they were too hick, too nerdy, they didn’t reach her standard. Now with this Puerto Rican boyfriend , my brother is the only one that is on her side. He said to us, “It’s better to have this Puerto Rican boyfriend then let Mary be a lesbian.”

The worst thing about this whole thing is that our customers now look at us like they are looking at ET. Mary told them her side of story, people think, oh come on, Mary is an adult, it is her business to date whoever she wants to, Mary knows what she is doing, this is a free country, family can’t control a daughter’s marriage. Don’t get us wrong, we want Mary to be happy. Can she just change her mind, find someone that we can trust, and feel comfortable to let Mary marry with? It’s close to the Chinese New Year, we have been playing Mahjong every night. Mahjong is a such a good game, it exercises my hands, my mind, it helps me to relax, to bond with my family. But Mary told customers that we like to gamble. Come on, we are only playing inside our family, sister to sister, brother to father, why you say such thing like this? She started to come home later recently, as late as one o’clock, ,two o’clock in the morning. When she comes home we turn on the lights and ask her what time it is. She told the customers that we have been watching her. We had put curfew on her. Hey, come on, with that kind of late hours, everyone would check on what is going on. It could be someone trying to break in the house, and trying to steal or something!

One day this customer came to salon; he is an divorced normal guy who has two kids but somehow became a gay recently. He has been our client for over 18 years. And after he listened to Mary’s story, guess what this gay guy said to her, “Hey Mary, good for you. I’m so proud of you. Don’t let your family control over you. You know I have been dating a guy who is only 37! I’m so...over whelmed!” I was there when he said this, I told my six year old daughter not to talk to this guy any more. I said in Chinese to my daughter, “Sweetie, never call that guy uncle again! He is a dirty man!”
You can’t believe what Mary did to me, she immediately translated that to the client like this, “Joe, guess what, Elisabeth just told her daughter we are dirty people!” Joe asked me with anger, “Can you tell me what you mean by dirty?” I was nervous, but my younger sister wasn’t. She immediately said this to him, “You don’t need Elisabeth to tell you what dirty means, you can just ask Mary what that means!” Oh! what a relief. I tell you, that was the first time I thought about leaving Mary’s business. We have been very supportive of each other all these years. I worked for her without any complaints. But that day, when she ordered me to wash a costumer’s hair for her, I said, “No.” No, Mary, you wash your client’s head, I don’t want to help you any more. Indeed, my three sisters and I are thinking of leaving, and opening our own business on the other side of street.

Aah, such a mad story. You know. She is buying the house my parents are living in. You can’t believe she propose to pay only twenty seven thousand to buy the house. It was the price my parents paid for twenty years ago. Because it was under Mary’s name, now she want to buy it back. But that house is worth a million dollars those days, she wouldn’t care, it’s her house, my parents must move! Such a sad story. The Puerto Rican guy, I tell you, I think he must know my sister has lots of money; she does. He just wouldn’t leave her alone. He might have few private kids in Puerto Rico, who knows, a guy who is 45 years old and never married, and is a cruise toilet cleaner? Who believe in the love shit? My family is falling apart. Aah, such a sad story.

What if Mary had never gone on that cruise? Would this preserve the family peace? What if few years from now, Mary is happier then us? How do I figure out the rest of my life?

Last Updated: August 3, 2004