The Ghosts of Shanghai

I am haunted by eighteen generations of my ancestors

Shanghai, 1988.

In the lane there are some raucous crows perched on low rooftops and overhead wires. They call out, dark heralds of mourning. Snow falls quietly. In doorways a few people stand and stare. They know why we are here, what we are doing. I am wearing a dark grey suit with a black band attached to my upper left arm. My mother is wearing a black dress with a high mandarin collar, no make-up and flat black shoes. She grips my right arm tightly. We walk down the alley towards my father’s mother’s house.

Then we hear her voice.

Cutting through the sounds of the city, the calls of the crows and the cadence of our footsteps on the gravel path. It is my grandmother, calling for my father. She cries out, “Be a good boy, wait for me. How can you go ahead of your mother like this? Wait for me. Be a good boy. Don’t go ahead of me.” Her tone is desperate, powerful and gut-wrenching to hear. My mother grips my arm tightly and falters in her steps. I put my arm around her and give her a moment to gather herself. A young mother sits with her child on a stool nearby, watching us. She bows her head slightly in respect.

We make our way down the lane and my grandmother’s cries grow louder, clearer. More people gather in the lane as we get closer. They stare at us, which is not rude, just a Chinese way. They all know. I can hear a lifetime of loss in my grandmother’s voice now: the babies who died in childbirth, the houses abandoned during the wars and famines, the Japanese, the Communists, the Cultural Revolutions, the surviving sons and daughters who fled for America and beyond.

She was finally allowed to move back into her Shanghai house at the age of 75, but only after the government partitioned it into five separate apartments and moved families into the new quarters. She was given a few rooms on the second floor, which were becoming difficult for her to climb up to now. A strange maze of added entrances, stairways and plaster walls made the house seem more like a puzzle than a home. The smell of old oiled woks, endless drying laundry and aging wood was strong.

According to tradition, when a man dies his wife should make the journey to his mother’s house and tell her in person. In this way there is both an implied apology for not taking care of her son from the daughter-in-law and an atonement and forgiveness from the mother-in-law because fate and fortune are mostly out of our hands anyway. Then the mourning can be shared in person, as it should be.

When we entered the room where my grandmother sat, my mother went quickly to her knees and begged forgiveness. My grandmother stood, tottered to my mother and collapsed on the floor with her in sobs. The various neighbors and relatives who had also gathered gently lifted my mother and grandmother from the floor and helped them to seats, where they could gather themselves and cry together. There were few words at that point. It was a time for tears.

In the days that followed, a routine set in. My mother and I would walk from the hotel to my grandmother’s house, climb the stairs and sit while people came and went offering condolences. Food was prepared, meals were taken, conversation flowed. Then we would walk back to the hotel, and fall asleep exhausted. Sometimes on the way to my grandmother’s house we would stop and buy some oranges, candies, snack foods or tea to bring with us. This was an important thing to do when visiting someone’s home, no matter the circumstances.

When we finally said our goodbyes a few days later, we all knew we would never see each other again in this lifetime. My grandmother had settled into her life in Shanghai in her old family home and was going to remain there with her memories until the end. I was in the middle of graduate school and couldn’t imagine any reason I would ever return to Shanghai. My mother was preparing for life as a widow with financial concerns and very little idea of what life would be like without her husband. My father was 59 when he died, leaving behind his wife in early middle age and three grown children. We would be there to help her along, but this was not the world she thought she would be living in after coming to America so long ago.

My grandmother held my arm tightly as she said: “ You must look after your mother. This is the most important thing for you to do now. Promise me that.”

I assured her that I would, over and over, as she kept admonishing me. My mother and I walked down the lane while my grandmother stood by the gate, waving after us. It would have been better for her if we said goodbye upstairs so she wouldn’t have to struggle with the stairs, but no one dared refused her the tradition of seeing off her visitors in person.

Many years later I would regularly ask my mother to go into the house when I left her after a visit, but she would pretend not to hear me, waving until my car was out of sight. This was our way, rain or shine. You had to see your guests off properly, always.

When I looked back at my grandmother as we approached the end of the lane, I saw the snow, the crows, the people in their doorways, watching. I heard the sounds of Shanghai and the steps we made on the gravel. I saw generations standing behind my grandmother. Ghosts of a family I did not know. Ancestors I could not hope to understand. Somehow their lives led up this moment: an American born Chinese taking his mother back to China to inform his grandmother that his father had died suddenly at the age of 59. I became aware of my own age: 29.

I saw a land I did not recognize. I saw a hundred thousand moments in time I could not even dream of. I saw the gods of the Chinese compass and zodiac splendorous and frightening. I saw the dragon and its breath, misting around the mountains and lakes and river and towns and villages, spreading the spirit of ancient knowing across time. I heard the jangled call of the shepherd abiding by the Yangtze river calling out a dissonant song of love and longing. I tasted the star anise and the ginger, the green onions and the sesame oil. I felt the yellow earth beneath my feet and the gaze of the god of heaven on my head.

Then the numbers appeared to me: I was 29. My father was 59 when he died. I was born in 1959. My father was born in 1929. Thirty years between life and death a strange symmetry of numbers. His death in 1988 rang out again when my mother died in 2018. 30 years again. I also fell quite ill that year, suffering both a serious injury and a heart ailment. As I underwent treatment, I could not help but think that I was destined to live and die in the weird symmetry of numbers that informed my father’s life and mine. However, I recovered. I am still alive. I can’t help but believe that every year I live through now is a gift of sorts.

As my mother and I boarded the plane back to Seattle from Shanghai, I began to understand something about time: our ancestors, for better or worse, are there. They have always been there. Just as our descendants will always be there. We exist on a tightrope line that extends we know not how far into the past and future. Perhaps at either end of their arc they meet again and form a circle. We are a moment, a breath, a wink and a nod in this grand panoply of moments. This is where is all begins. This is where it all ends. That is what the dragon teaches us: everything contains its opposite and one becomes the other in an eternal rotation.

There is traditional Chinese belief that eighteen generations of relations resonate in your lifetime: nine that came before, nine that will come after. Your life should be dedicated to making sure both sets of relations approve of your life choices. A heavy responsibility. When I think back on that trip I made with my mother to Shanghai, I think of all those generations and their hopes and dreams. I will forever be haunted by the ghosts of Shanghai.