This is the first weekend in over a year since I’ve been alone, though I’m not technically alone. My aunt (mom’s sister) is still here but she spends most of the day sleeping and goes to work at around 2 PM. After that, it’s just me. So far, my mom has communicated either to complain about the conditions in China – mostly about her insomnia and the mosquitoes – or needing me to check or do something for her. She hasn’t asked how I was doing or what I was doing. To be honest, I’m glad she didn’t asked the latter because I wouldn’t have good answer for that question.

Yesterday morning, I sent her a picture of some dim sum I made – shrimp rice roll and frozen Ha Cao (shrimp dumpling). “It’s not bad,” I told her. She replied, “Of course, there are so much shrimp in it.” I felt disappointed by such a response but then, what was I expecting? A praise? A thumb up? No, my mom would never do that. Even when I made her rice rolls a few weeks, she criticized, that it’s not thin enough. Inside, I thought, it’s rice paper, it will never be as good but did she have to judge everything I make like a critic?

Without my mom and her YouTube videos playing 24/7, the house is silent, almost eerily silent. I was standing outside my bedroom the first night after she was gone and tried to search for noise, there was none. So, this is what silence feels like, I thought. It’s been a long time since silence has fallen upon the house. I have also been able to watch movies and TV shows without needing headphones, which, wow, what a change!

One thing for certain, I am not eating dinner at 3:30 PM. I’m eating at around 5 PM, which is still quite early, but I don’t want to have a big adjustment when my mom comes home and dinner is back to 3:30. So far, dinner has been sauteed garden-fresh veggies with the beef my mom had prepared and frozen beforehand and a pantry staple.

Last night, it was quinoa from 2022. The night before was some elbow macaroni from probably 2022 or 2023. My mom doesn’t like quinoa but she doesn’t give the opportunity to ever cook any either, so the large bag of organic quinoa has been sitting in my pantry. I quite like quinoa, I like that it cooks faster than rice – 15 minutes and it’s done.

Last night’s veggies was a mix of burgundy brocolini and an Asian Mustard Spinach hybrid. I coarsely chopped it and sauteed it in oil and salt. The salt is more or less to bring out the taste of the greens. Is it weird I find the things I cook is more tasty than what my mom makes? Often times, I find her food bland and tasteless because she doesn’t use enough salt. I don’t know about you but I like my food to taste like something.