An Ordinary Day in a Not-So-Ordinary Way: Life in Beijing

The smell of bacon was wafting under the door to my room.

No … not bacon … then what was it? Of course. Not bacon, but incense.

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I smothered my face with my pillow in repulsive defeat. The eastern sun penetrated the thick, tan drapes and pervaded my eyelids. The clock ticked 8 a.m., and I had to get up. Darn sunlight.

I managed one leg over the edge of the bed and stuck my foot into my straw slipper, and then my other foot followed obediently.

No one was home. I had the whole apartment to myself this morning. A moment’s jubilation washed over me and I slid all the way out of my room and into the kitchen. It took me a few seconds to locate my breakfast: a pot on the stove filled with bean paste buns and tiny eggs. I fished these out with chopsticks and set them carefully on a square plate, making sure the eggs wouldn’t roll out of my grasp. On the counter, I found a packet of milk, and I poured this into a cup and stuck it in the microwave.

Then I remembered the incense, a strong smell my nose had become accustomed to since visiting China’s many Buddha tourist and religious sites. I wandered through the living room where clothes hung to dry on wires installed in the ceiling. To the right of the laundry sat a small altar with a strong smell.

A white, glossy, ceramic, woman Buddha figurine sat with her arms spread in the middle of the carved, chestnut table. Five fresh apples were stacked neatly at her feet, and a tray of recently burned incense sat in front of her. Older sticks were becoming white with ash at the ends. I marveled at the bits of gold and flowery decorations scattered about the display that created a modest, but pretty rendition of the grander sites in the Forbidden City. For a while, I considered this, and then I heard voices.

Grandpa had come home to watch the house while the housekeeper cleaned. He looked just like his daughter, and after coming in, he mimicked the cross-cultural burden of losing the remote. We found it together in a pouch on the side of the sofa. I established that my Chinese was bad, and he asked if I wanted coffee.

He settled down to yell at the TV. Something on the news upset him. I peeled the tiny, speckled bird eggs and popped three of them in my mouth before work. Buddha and the incense were forgotten.

Just a regular day.