Janice Ma:  

Hi! After I left high school I went to S.I.U. to study linguistics. It was there I met my husband, Yen-Tien, who is Chinese. I didn't finish college because there didn't seem, at the time, to be any need. My husband's father was a Senator in Taiwan's government and he owned lots of businesses, ships and land. We lived in Taiwan for 2 years, part of the time with my husband's family. It was a very fun type of life. We played every day. We went to the movies, swimming pools, some of which also had their own entertainment, people walking out on a stage singing. We went to nightclubs & parks. There were live-in babysitters, housekeepers, a chauffeur (not that any sane person would have risked their own life by trying to drive there). For the rest of the family there was also mahjong every day. I don't gamble & anyway these women had years of experience on me. They would have ended up doing me the way they did my mother-in-law--"Oh, you low on money? Go play mahjong with Ma Tai-Tai (Mrs. Ma)". While they played Mahjong, I took classes in Chinese at Shr Fen Da Shwe (Normal university), went shopping & went to movies. Sometimes I'd see 3 movies in one day. One time this cute little Chinese boy, about 7 years asked if he could go in with me because then he could get in free (he just wouldn't have a guaranteed seat). I got a kick out of that. He sat beside me on the stair step. I used to go to used bookstores which were basically a hole in the wall of a building. They were the only place I could find fiction books in English. Those 2 years I went through every genre of book there was, just to have something to read. (All my life that's what I've spent my time doing--reading. Even when I was in high school. If I didn't have a date, which was most of the time, I'd get a book & park on some street corner & read. I didn't want to read at home because my father would find some chore for me to do. I liked to roller skate but there was this one other girl, Kay McCarter, who'd been harassing me since the 5th grade & if I went & she & her mother were there they'd spend the whole evening harassing me. Explain to me why an adult would harass a child. Well, anyway......) I met lots of nice people in my explorations of Taiwan including a cab driver (who wasn't nice) who tried to cheat me by taking me home the long way around. He didn't get away with it & I gave him heck for trying. Good shoppers ALWAYS know the roads. With papa being a important man those were also lots of social functions. On papa's 60th birthday there was a great big party for him with a great big beautiful cake with beautiful big pink roses. They looked quite yummy. I was determined that my piece of cake would have one. I've always loved icing. So I got one & slowly put the rose in my mouth.....and discovered it was soft wax! WHY??!! I never did that again. I mean I knew that Chinese didn't use much sugar but give me a break--the icing & stuff on a cake is all supposed to be edible! (The rest of the icing was edible.) But then, through mismanagement, papa lost most of his businesses and we had to move back to the states. Eventually all of my husband's family, except for 1 brother who managed what was left of the businesses, came to this country. My husband had 3 brothers & 3 sisters. When that brother died his widow & children moved here too. Now 1 of his sisters & her husband are back in China doing business there. I loved Taiwan. I still miss it. I'd like to go back someday but my family worries about me taking a plane trip for that long. Due to 3 medical traumas (bad reaction to medicine, etc.) I developed post-traumatic stress syndrome although it has been improving. This is a few years later. We also found out my stupid doctor had me on the wrong medicine for my blood pressure. I have to say--before my daughter became a dr. I had absolute confidence in them. After she was admitted to medical school & I began getting the inside scoop--my god!!! Don't trust them any farther than you can throw them! They're stupid! They're arrogant! (Except for my daughter & she's a genius but very nice & down to earth. One of a kind. Truly. And that is why Baltimore Magazine chose her as the best Radiologist in the Baltimore area.) The fact is that except for my daughter & possibly a few others doctors are not the smartest people on the college campus. Engineers & so forth are. (She did a post-doc in EE.) But most Dr.s act like they're god. I just don't get it & it drives me nuts. I went to Vancouver, Canada (from Maryland) with my son this summer without any problem. My son went to see the scenery. I went to Chinatown to buy Chinese CDs. I bought 19! Yes, I know they can be bought on I-Tunes & I've bought a lot of every type of music there, but with my favorite singer, the only songs on I'Tunes are his newest ones & I have all those. When we returned to the states we lived in the Chicago suburbs since my husband's sister & some of his other relatives lived there. There my husband became a Chicago school teacher, teaching physics, math, algebra & geometry. When we returned our kids were 4 & 5. Our son at this point spoke no English, our daughters' was kind of a hodge-podge, but they learned it quickly. Children do. It took them 3 months in Taiwan to learn Chinese & 3 months here to learn English. I worked at Loehmann's for 5 years, drew a lot of store posters for them too, using Disney characters. I can draw whatever I can see--but not much else. Just cartoons & things really, but they are really good cartoons. And in the spring & summer I bought in bouquets of flowers regularly to put in the office & lunch room. My son was a splendid gardener. We had way too many flowers. I had thousands of lilies, not day lilies, but the bigger ones. Once the stems grew too high & broke & I had to cut them all & bring them into the house (I wasn't working then). Lilies smell wonderful but not that many inside a house. I was sneezing constantly. We Moved to MD when my husband retired because my daughter & her husband needed 24/7 babysitters since their careers often involve a lot of traveling, especially her husband's. Her husband is a medical researcher at Johns Hopkins. He travels constantly everywhere. Hurray! Better than having him at home. Our daughter got her MD & her PhD in Bio-physics at U of I. She's now a radiologist in Maryland & quite possibly the best in the state, or so some doctors that I go to tell me. They call her 'the voice of god'. She says they exaggerate. She was on FOX TV once explaining MRIs. I taped it & then my son-in-law took it & has never given it back to me. I'm quite annoyed. Oh, he's from the Netherlands & honestly, most Dutch people are very nice. He's just the exception. Update on that--my daughter is finally divorcing her husband! Thank god! Everyone, including their kids, are happy. Our son is an elementary school teacher & just recently moved to Seattle in search of more out- doorsey stuff to do. He bikes, kayaks, camps, etc. The large number of Asians there was also an extra incentive. I think Chinese is the 2nd most spoken language there. In Vancouver they do signs & things also in Chinese. An update on him also. He just got married but not, as one might have expected, to a Chinese girl. He married a white girl who is as nuts as he is about outdoors activities. These days we take care of our granddaughters, which now mostly consists of driving them around. They're 13 & 16 now. The older one resembles her grandpa. She's almost a copy of her mother. The younger one, well, I don't know who she looks like. She's got the chinese golden skin but I don't know where she got the blond hair. She's 4" taller than her older sister. For fun I mostly read sci-fi/fantasy novels. Sometimes I like to try to write books. I've written 2 which I've never actually even tried to have published. I think they were just for me. The first was a romance novel. I hated writing that so much that I've never even read any since. The other book...Expand for more