Flying Home

This past weekend, Chad (my husband) and I flew to California for his sister's wedding. It was a beautiful wedding, gorgeous weather, lots of family and friends...on the way home, on the flight from L.A. to our layover in Houston, I made two new friends.

Chad and I both had aisle seats, so while he worked some/napped some on his side of the aisle, I chatted with my new friends on my side. I think I had more fun! These two men in the seats next to me were businessmen on a trip to Belize, to meet with investors there. They were both from Hong Kong, and had immigrated to the U.S. in 1955. "We came over when Eisenhower let 6000 Asians in," they told me.

Over the next three hours, man! Did I get an education! (Warning: Not everything I'm about to share is politically correct, so if you offend easily either 1. Blame these two men or 2. Stop reading now. I personally don't get offended easily so I found them hilarious.)

One of the men had a newspaper and our three-hour or so conversation started when he saw me reading over his shoulder. "Look at this Obama, you vote for him?" I told him "No, but my husband did." Then he said to me, "Smart girl, he a communist." (I'm trying to capture his accent with punctuation, use your imagination to fill in the blanks here...) I giggled and asked him, "How do you know that?" The man shrugged and said, "We from China, we know communist when we see one."

Later, he spoke of Obama again, and this time he called him a socialist. I saw an opportunity here to get knowledge straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak, and asked him the difference between a communist and a socialist. He answered, "Socialist, communist, basically same thing. Socialist is ideal, what's yours is mine, what's mine is mine...that's socialist. Communist is socialist with ideal and with gun."

After I calmed down from laughing, I asked, "Well then, what's a fascist?"
He must've seen me coming....he smiled. "You are funny, girl... Fascist is other side. Socialist is crazy, it never work...fascist and communist: either sides of crazy."

He asked what I did for a living, and I told him I owned a chocolate store. He said to me, "See? You have chocolate, people buy chocolate, you make money, simple...capitalism. That works." I told him I don't really consider myself to be a capitalist, I'm so small and all. He said, "No matter how small, you part of the wheel." Hmmm...

So, there you have it, ladies and gentlemen. I made a little joke next and told him, "Glenn Beck would probably get a kick out of you!" He looked at me for a moment and asked, "Glenn Beck?"

"Yes," I continued, "you like Glenn Beck?"
"NO! He crazy!" The old man was on a roll now. "But he has a point! And, he good teacher. I watch him, I think, he stupid, but sometimes I think maybe he not stupid at all. He say look for yourself, find out for yourself, I like that."

I held my tongue, since the only person that gets on my nerves more than Glen Beck is that Nancy Grace woman. Geez, can you imagine if they had a love child? Wow!

We talked about so many things, as much as you can possibly fit into three hours on a plane...I asked about his work, he asked about mine...he gave me sooooo much advice. He said, "People always say you gotta diversify....that's crap! Diversify! You stick with chocolate! Everything chocolate!" I told him that I get so much advice how do I know what to keep and what to ignore? He said, "Test is, you ask them if they make money...if they make money, take their advice but if they no make money, it's crap!"

Turns out this man and his wife raised three kids who are all now grown with kids of their own. He asked about my kids, and how public schools are in North Carolina. I told him that so far, we've had pretty good luck, that I stay involved and I think that's key. He told me, "That is very smart. Some parents not involved at all, wonder why their kid is dumb." At this point, the other gentlemen piped in and did a little rant about parents not caring, dumping their kids off and saying, "See ya later," then complaining about the system. I listened and nodded. I loved the part at the end of his speech. He finished with, "We don't present college as option. We brainwash kids when little, tell them you no finish school at high school...you finish school after four years college. Then you want more, okay. Don't want more, okay." Makes sense, huh? There was a time when one could drop out of school, or even finish high school and go to work. But I feel like that time has mostly passed. I know I certainly want my kids to go to college, for sure.

The two gentlemen asked me if I hired help to make my chocolate. When I answered, "No, I make everything myself," they told me again that I was smart. "Yes, you must grow, but never leave business in hands of someone else. I once had a french bakery. I bought it, I know nothing about bakery, I just like eating bread. So, I hire chef to come in, make the pastry, make the cakes, make the bread. He see everyone happy, everyone like his pastry, he asked for more money. Few months, he ask more money. Few months, he leave, go some other bakery. Now I am in kitchen, making pastry, making the bread. That's not me! Eventually have to close bakery. That's not smart. But you. You the owner, you the baker. See? That smart." The quieter gentleman asked me if I lived close to New Point.
"New Point? You mean, New Bern?" He said, "No, furniture, New Point."

"Ahhhh, High Point."
He replied, "New Point, High Point, same thing."

The conversation shifted back to politics. I told him what really scares me is North Korea and what they might do. The talky gentleman laughed. "They not do anything. Forget them. Don't worry about them."

The other one agreed. "They too far away. They don't mess with us." We had a long talk about U.S. foreign policy. "We need to leave people alone!" It was very enlightening. The two men shared with me what life was like growing up in Hong Kong, and a little of the history there, that Hong Kong was under Great Britain's control for 99 years, then, as these two tell it, "Margaret Thatcher says we want to extend our lease...you don't do that! You don't negotiate with landlord; you just stay there til evicted." We talked about the difference between showing respect and showing weakness. "I bow to you, you bow to me, that's respect. Obama bows to Japanese emperor...show weakness! You see emperor bow to Obama? No!"

We talked more and more, more than I can remember to write here. I so enjoyed seeing the world through their eyes. By the time the plane landed, I'd had the most fun conversation I'd had in a long time! I was actually sad the flight was over. We said goodbye, they took my card, "Nice card, very pretty, look you up when we come to Durham, not far from you?"

"Not far," I said, "Bout an hour or so."
"Good," they smiled. "We come get goooood chocolate." The other man smiled too and said, "You going to do well, you going to be famous!" How's that for a vote of confidence? Then we said goodbye and as I turned to get off the plane, one of the men told me, "Now, get home, get back to work, make lots of money!"

And I replied, "Yes sir."