Page 18 of Dial A for Aunties

Meddelin Chan: Oh yes! Very interesting!! What do you do?

Jake1010Hotelier: As you might have guessed from my screenname, I’m a hotelier. I own hotels. Many of them, actually.

Meddelin Chan: Wahhh! So impressed!

It goes on like that for a while, Jake bragging, describing in great detail each and every one of the hotels he owns, and Ma replying in the most bimbotic way that’s humanly possible. Anyone reading this would think I’m desperate for Jake’s approval, but I know that this is Ma being polite. This is how she’s raised me, to encourage others to talk about themselves, and then findthe good things in what they say and show appreciation. I can’t tell whether it’s a Chinese thing or an Indonesian thing, but whatever it is, it worked on Jake. After only a few days of messaging back and forth, he sends this message:

Jake1010Hotelier: I feel so comfortable chatting with you, Meddy.

Meddelin Chan: Me also!

Jake1010Hotelier: It’s so hard finding someone I really click with, you know? I feel as though I’ve known you for a long time.

Meddelin Chan: I agree!

Jake1010Hotelier: Sooo wanna meet up?

Meddelin Chan: Yes! So happy you ask now! Yesterday my body not taste so delicious, but today is better.

Oh. My. God. Noooo. In Indonesian, the phrase “tidak enak badan” means “not feeling well,” but its literal translation is “body not delicious.” Behind me, Fourth Aunt resumes cackling, while the others go, “What? What’s so funny?”

I read on.

Jake1010Hotelier: Oh. Wow, okay. Damn, girl, you’re even thirstier than I thought.

Meddelin Chan: Haha! No, no, not thirsty! I have a lot to drink. Quite wet now.

Jake1010Hotelier: Wow. Damn. If I’d known, I would’ve asked you out sooner.

Meddelin Chan: Wah! How you know eggplant my favorite??

Jake1010Hotelier: It is, huh? Well, I’ve got a real big one for you.

Meddelin Chan: Oh! I can’t wait! LOVE eggplant!!

I slam the phone down and stare at Ma. Fourth Aunt is literally lying on the floor, laughing.

“What? What is it?” Big Aunt says. “He sound like very nice boy, offer to cook eggplant for you.”

“Right?” Ma cries, gesturing wildly. “I read that and I think, wah, this boy is so lovely, so caring for my daughter, even ask her, is she thirsty?”

I bury my face in my hands. “Nooo! Ma, those emojis—the water droplets and the eggplant—they’re sexual innuendos!”

Three pairs of eyes stare at me in utter confusion while Fourth Aunt howls with laughter.

“Sexual... what? In-you-when-what?” Second Aunt says.

I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with my aunts and mom right now. “Sexual innuendos. You know, like, sexual wordplay. The eggplant symbolizes the—um—the male uh, the um.” This is ridiculous. I’m twenty-six, for god’s sake, and yet I can’t say the word “penis” out loud in front of my mom and aunts because part of me is sure they’d scold me for saying it. Instead, I use my index finger to air-draw the universal symbol for penis.

“Eggplant,” Big Aunt says. “Yes, he say eggplant, we know that.”

“No—”

“She means PENIS!” Fourth Aunt howls, and then doubles over again, laughing.

“What?” Ma gasps. “No. But—”

“That sound not right. I think you wrong,” Big Aunt says stridently. She snatches the phone from me and frowns at it again. “See, he say, ‘If I’d known, I would’ve asked you out sooner... I’ve got a real big one—’ Oh.” She drops the phone on the counter as if it’s turned into a cockroach.

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