An Old lady in Shamian

The late afternoon sun had just broken through the crumpled rag of clouds that hung over the Pearl River, sending shattered light through the leaves of the banyan trees. It had just rained biblically for half an hour, cooling everything off, and now just as suddenly the sun beat down on the rooftops and steaming walkways. From where I sat on the veranda of the cafe I could see a small, crooked Chinese woman collecting trash. She used a stick with a nail at the end of it, and was slowly, methodically going through the public bins, leaving nothing unchecked; and nothing spilled in her wake. Given her line of work, she struck me as a very neat and meticulous old woman.
With the change of weather came a lovely breeze creeping through the mossy lanes of Shamian Island, barely rustling the leaves of the large cinnamon trees near me. The old lady stood upright momentarily and adjusted the faded red scarf that fastened the straw fisherman's hat to her head with a knot below her leathery chin. She looked up, and with a quickness that belied her age, produced a threadbare jade cardigan and quickly buttoned it up to her neck. Her pants were blue checked and ended at her ankles, where she wore very white socks and small black Mao slippers. She was a clean old woman, and oddly fashionable in her way.
As I sipped my tea and wrote postcards I couldn't help looking up from time to time to watch her progress. Up and down the unkempt rows of the pedestrian mall she went, discovering a bit of food here, a half full juice carton there. Looking up, she would neatly wrap her findings in old newspaper or cellophane and place them carefully in a patterned burlap bag. Finally when she was just opposite my cafe, she took a seat on one of the marble benches beneath a great banyan tree, hanging the bag over one of its crazy tri-pod branches. She proceeded to unwrap a banana and eat it slowly, washing it down with an oft-used plastic bottle of water. No movement was wasted, and nothing spilled. Her motions were elegant and poised. When she finished eating she daintily dabbed at the corners of her small, straight mouth before putting everything away. Closing my notebook, I left a few coins on the table and walked over to where she was still sitting. I had noticed a small sign nailed to the trunk of the tree, and decided to get a closer look at it, and at her. I approached the bench where the old lady sat, looking up at the tree the whole time. From behind my sunglasses I saw the sign was the banyan's Latin name, Ficus Microcarpa. I also cast a sideways glance at her, and was wondering what, if anything I would say when she looked right at me and asked, in perfect English, 'Are you by chance an Englishman?' Her English was impeccable, but with that particular Cantonese accent that you find in Guangzhou and Hong Kong. Surprised, I replied that I was in fact American. She seemed slightly deflated by this news, and continued in her flawless way to explain to me that she liked to talk to English people particularly, as she found their accents to be lovely. She further lamented the lack of opportunity to practice her French, but was happy to speak English with me anyway. There was nothing left to do but sit down and have a chat with this slender, lively woman.
Among the many things she told me over the next half hour or so were these: She was the widow of a former compradore (go-between) of a large Canton British trading firm. She had gone to the Shamian normal school for Chinese and Indian staff, where she had studied English, French, and German (but the German she had mostly forgotten now). She was eighty one years old. She had once lived in one of the imposing, thick columned buildings that she now collected trash around, and despaired that many of them had been turned into official party offices. I shared in her sense of sadness over this point, as quite a few of the lovely old facades had been defiled with ugly glass and industrial tile.
As she spoke I noticed that she would surreptitiously tug at a few rogue white hairs that sprung out of her pointed chin. She also had the habit of pushing her white hair back behind her ear when she laughed, constantly patting it down and under the red scarf she had holding her hair in place. Her habits were those of a European lady from the last century, down to the smallest detail, and every bit as feminine. In fact she reminded me of my own grandmother. I came to realise that I was talking to a great lady of a western tradition that is fast disappearing; separated by oceans, but nonetheless European in almost every aspect.
Looking up at the clear early evening sky through the kaleidoscope of over-arching branches, I tried to imagine her world here in 1949, before everything changed. She must have lived very well. Compradores were some of the wealthiest Chinese in places like Canton, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. I wondered where she slept now, but I never asked and she didn't say. Realising that I had a train to catch, I got up and felt a wave of melancholy. I didn't want to go. She caught my mood and laughed. 'You Americans are very sensitive' she said. I smiled and got up to leave, and then she added, 'But very optimistic!'
You know, she's not half wrong either, at least in my case. I walked away from her with a feeling I often get when I meet people in disparate places - that I've met them before, somewhere else. Quite possibly not in this lifetime.