not quite undercover

 "Mom," my son reported, "I have to bring Chinese doughnuts and soy milk to Mandarin class on Tuesday."

"Oh -- okay. I know what Chinese doughnuts are, I think, but what kind of soy milk is it? Just the regular kind I can get at the grocery store?"

"Uhhhhm, I don't know."

"I'll send the teacher an email," I say, letting him off the hook.

"Okay. Thanks, Mom."

My son is at a distinct disadvantage in Mandarin class, all because his mother is ... Japanese. Most of the kids whose parents aren't immigrants at least have a mother of Chinese ancestry. Except for my son. I think it is a source of amusement for the teacher, since my son has a Chinese surname, and she seems to appreciate my effort to get the food assignments right. She is always careful to try to give us food assignments that we can handle, and explains things to my son as much as possible. This time, I was familiar with half the assignment -- the Chinese doughnuts, which I learned to enjoy because of my love of jook, that savory, soupy, comforting concoction that my roommate, Alice Wong, introduced me to the day after Thanksgiving back in college. Turkey jook. That's what turkey leftovers become in a Chinese American household. And Chinese doughnuts are the perfect partner to a bowl of jook.

The soy milk, though, had me confused. My cousin (actually, my husband's cousin, but I have adopted all of his relatives as my own) told me that there is actually a soy soup that is commonly eaten with the doughnuts, and it is different from the standard soy milk I might buy at Trader Joe's. I emailed the teacher and asked her to send me the name of the type of soy milk, with the Chinese characters, just in case I needed it. 

Okay, who am I kidding? I knew I would need to go straight to the email when I went shopping for this. I walked into the market in Chinatown this morning, holding my phone up tentatively and asking, "Excuse me ... do you have soy milk? Dou Jiang?" I say, in my best invented Mandarin pronunciation. I point at my phone to the characters: 豆浆. The clerk nods her understanding. "Ohhh ... yes, dou jiang. I'm sorry but the delivery is not here yet from San Francisco. They make it fresh everyday. I'm sorry. You can come back later."

I have to explain that I cannot come back later, because I need it by 9:30 am for my son's Mandarin class. Plus, I need Chinese doughnuts, which they will dip into the soy milk. Does she have the kind of soy milk I would dip a Chinese doughnut into?

"Doughnut? In soy milk? Hmmm. Doughnut is very sweet. You don't want sweet soy milk," she gestures as if eating a round, American doughnut.

"Oh -- no, not that kind of doughnut. Chinese doughnut --" I gesture what I think indicates a long, tubular object, "-- like you eat with jook."

"Ahhhh! Okay. Soy milk. Uhmmm, this kind is good."

She directs me to a vacuum sealed box of soy milk with pictures of black beans on it. 

Okay, looks good to me. I scan the nearby shelves to see what else I might want to buy, as long as I'm here, since I don't come to the Chinatown markets very often.

The clerk notices my gaze, and apparently has noticed something else about me, too. "Do you want anything else?" she asks, pointing to the shrink-wrapped confections on the counter, "Do you want some mochi?" she says with a smile, "It's good." 

Of course, mochi. The only Japanese thing around. Try as I might to blend and at least come close to seeming ABC (American Born Chinese), my cover was apparently blown, no need to perpetrate. How did she know? Do I just look Japanese? Whatever the case, I found it amusing. I very politely say, "No, thank you, but they look very good," and make my purchase, thanking her and bowing my head slightly as I leave.