Shi (rock)

(My fourth assignent for my HUMOR WRITING class)




Lucy. That was her name. and I had lost her in China.

It was already late afternoon and the rain began to pour. On one hand, I had an unbrella, and on the other, a crying 3 year old. Smoke wafted through the air. There are 1.3 billion people in China and 99 % of them smoke. I guess they never heard about lung cancer.

“Mama! Lucy! Lucy! Lucy!” My daughter stomped her feet and wailed. Her face red from the effort and her long hair plastered to her face from the tears.

Panic raced through me as I flipped through options in my head. I could retrace our steps and try to see if we can find her, or try in my very minimal knowledge of Chinese, ask somebody if they have seen Lucy.

It would have been easy if Lucy was something easy to describe. But I had to have the daughter with a pet rock, - a pink, bejeweled pet rock. She picked up the rock one day while we were vacationing and decided it would be her pet rock. She brought it over to her art class and made a face complete with eyes and jeweled earrings. (with the help of glue and glitter). It went with her EVERYWHERE.


There was 7-11 type convenience store on the corner of the building where our hotel was. I remember we dropped by there on the way back to the hotel to buy my daughter some juice. I also remember the woman who mans this store who had the same thing on TWO days in a row.

“Wei?” I asked cautiously. The woman was busy looking at her text messages. “Ni yao can tao… (Have you seen…)” I mentally flipped through the English Chinese dictionary in my head, which for the moment, seemed to have pages missing. The 7-11 lady looked at me and then looked at my tear stricken child with puzzlement. I mentally slap myself as I bemoan the state on Chinese education. Why didn’t I pay attention when I was learning the language in school?


“A.. che ke…(a.. this…)” I gesture to indicate a small, round object. “hen siao de (a small…)” By this time, even my daughter was looking at me strangely. I was doing pantomime in a convenience store in China. Rock…rock.. How do you say rock??

I look outside and pick up a pebble. Point to it and excitedly say “ Che ke! Che ke! Ni yao can tao ma?” (like this, have you seen anything like this?) My daughter also gets into the action.

“Ta Ta Ta!” she makes a big round and makes her eyes wide. “jiao Lucy!” ~ “big, big, big… named Lucy” By this time, the woman’s teenage daughter, small son, old father and husband come over to see what all the fuss is about.

“Fun hong sze… (pink)” I say this time, I snatch some paper and draw a circle, with a face, point to the rock and gesture like it fell out of my pocket.

The son smiled and ran to his box, pulled out something and approached me. He took my hand and placed a round thing in it. My heart raced as I took a look.

It was a smiley button. The boy was looking at me. My daughter was looking at me. I hold up the smiley and shake my head.

“Bu.. je she bu. (no, this is not it)”

My daughter wailed. The boy wailed. The whole crowd looked at me like I’d run over them both.

“Hey, what”s going on?” all heads turned. It was my husband. In all the years of marriage, he never looked as good to me as that moment. “I’ve been lookng for you two everywhere!”

“Papa!” my daughter shouts and in between niffles tells him Lucy is missing.

My husband, dark, handsome man that he is, wipes my daughter’s face, rises up and announces “You mean, this Lucy??” In his hand was the most wonderful rock in the world. It seemed like I was looking at the HOPE Diamond as he held the pink glittery thing out. My daughter squealed in delight.

“The tour operator came over the hotel room earlier. It seemed she found it on the bus after we got off. It was only because Amy was showing her pet rock off that she remembered”

The boy looked at it, the 7-11 woman looked at it, the husband and teenage daughter looked at it. It was like show and tell. They ask my husband some questions. (He is more fluent than I am- thank goodness). My daughter was pointing details out (eyes, nose, ears)

The grandfather on the other hand, was looking at me as he sat on the corner of the store quietly puffing away at this cigarette. He rose up and walked to me. He took the smiley pin, pinned it on my shirt, pats me on the back and winked.

I know grandpa. I KNOW.