Chapter 15
The only thing that has always cheered Mebel up when she feels this way is to binge-watch Sex and the City.
These women’s lives are so far removed from Mebel’s that it is a complete escape from reality for her.
And she loves knowing that even with the freedom that comes with being a career woman in New York City, Carrie and her friends’ lives remain disastrously messy.
Mebel likes to imagine Samantha growing up as a CHIP and being told no sex before marriage.
Now, as Mebel watches her eighth episode of Sex and the City in a row while eating a caramel Cadbury bar and sipping a glass of white wine, she imagines herself as one of these women.
Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte, Samantha, and Mebel.
Why not? Their names even go great together.
She imagines confiding in them about sleeping with Alain and thinks of how each woman would react.
Samantha would nod at Mebel over her martini glass and give her a proud wink.
Come to think of it, even Charlotte would be proud of her.
In contrast, her friends back in Jakarta would be absolutely horrified.
Their mouths would drop open, aghast, and then they’d catch themselves and force polite smiles onto their faces.
Then, one by one, they would come up with some excuse to leave the gathering, after which they would furiously gossip about Mebel the hussy over WhatsApp.
Mebel watches forlornly as Carrie learns to eat at a restaurant on her own.
She snorts. What’s the big deal about eating on her own?
Mebel does it all the time. People do it all the time.
But then she watches as Carrie sits down at a table and tells the waiter that she is there alone.
She doesn’t take out her phone or a book or a newspaper or anything.
She merely sits there and eats on her own, enjoying her own company, and that’s when it hits Mebel that although she has eaten on her own plenty of times before, she has never done it without the aid of a book or, in recent years, her phone to distract her from the fact that she is eating alone.
And when she thinks back to all the people she’s seen eating alone in restaurants, they too have always been immersed in their phones.
And it is very different, isn’t it, to sit there and be on one’s phone versus sitting there and being fully in the moment.
Mebel checks her watch. It is seven o’clock.
She didn’t plan on doing anything for dinner because everything that’s happened today has killed her appetite, but now, she sits up, puts aside her half-eaten chocolate bar, and gets out of bed.
She throws on a pair of jeans and a comfortable sweater.
A glance in the mirror tells her that she looks haggard, most of her makeup wiped away, and she doesn’t bother reapplying it.
Why bother when she’s only got herself for company?
She picks up her phone and is about to slip it into her handbag when she pauses.
Why tempt herself? Drawing a deep breath, she places the phone carefully on her table, then with one last look at it, she leaves her room.
Minutes later, Mebel is out on the street, breathing in the cold night air and making her way to Cowley Road.
Without her phone to look at, she is forced to pay full attention to her surroundings.
For the first couple of blocks, Mebel’s mind rebels against the boredom.
Maybe she should turn around and grab her phone.
What if Sammy messages her? What if Gemma tries to call her?
The urge to go back to the dorm and snatch her phone off the table is almost overwhelming, but Mebel forces herself to keep going.
You can be without your phone for an hour or so, she tells herself.
If anyone tries calling you, you will see the missed call when you get back and you can call them back then.
No one is going to die while you are away from your phone, and even if they were and you were at your phone, there’s nothing you can do about it.
The realization that the world won’t fall apart just because she doesn’t have her phone on her for an hour releases a tension that she didn’t realize existed inside of her.
She looks around her and takes in a deep, slow breath.
The houses are still as gray and gloomy as the day she arrived, but now, she notices the plants.
She notices how one house on this street has a huge rosemary bush in their front yard that has grown so large that it hangs heavy over their fence.
Mebel reaches out and snaps off a tiny sprig, and as she walks, she brings it to her nose and inhales.
The spicy scent of rosemary fills her nostrils and soothes her mind, and she smiles to herself.
How had she not noticed this house before?
Another house has a gorgeous hydrangea bush growing in their front yard.
Mebel doesn’t snap any off, but she pauses for a second to admire the purplish-blue flowers, marveling at their simple beauty.
By the time she reaches Cowley Road, she’s in a far better mood than when she first left the school.
She steps inside a casual Taiwanese restaurant and is seated at a booth.
The place is only half-full, and after ordering herself a bowl of spicy beef noodle soup and a boba milk tea, Mebel looks around, taking in her surroundings.
Taiwanese pop music plays softly in the background, and the decor in here reminds Mebel not of Indonesia but of LA, particularly San Gabriel Valley.
When she moved to LA for college, she’d sometimes get homesick, so she and her other Chindo friends would make the drive east to SGV, where they’d get dim sum and then hang out at a local boba tea place.
It’s been decades since Mebel has thought of LA, and she smiles at the nostalgic feeling it’s bringing back.
A couple tables over, one of the patrons, dining on her own, happens to glance up from her phone and meet Mebel’s eye.
The girl, who looks about in her early twenties, studies Mebel for a moment, probably feeling sorry for her.
She gives Mebel a small smile, then she goes back to staring at her phone.
The moment is over, just like that. But there is a newfound peace in Mebel.
Being out here without her phone is a whole new experience that she hadn’t thought she’d be able to go through, but here she is, doing exactly that.
The food arrives and Mebel slurps up her noodles, marveling at how good they taste.
She hasn’t realized just how much she’s missed Asian food after weeks of cooking creamy, rich French food and eating heavy British fare.
She’s missed spice, and clear broths that are not cream-based, and springy thick noodles that can be slurped up easily.
The boba milk tea is strong and sweet and comforting, and without her phone, Mebel is forced to pay attention to every bite, every slurp of her food and drink.
She can’t remember the last time she’s been so aware of what she is eating.
Every mouthful is a revelation of flavors, and the classes at Saint Honoré have made Mebel more appreciative of how chefs use different methods to bring out the best flavor profiles from each ingredient.
When she finishes, she feels like she has nourished not just her body but her soul as well.
She’s just had a meal with nothing else to distract her from her food and the pleasure of her own company, and Mebel is delighted to find that, in fact, her mind isn’t as intrusive as she’d thought it would be.
When she gives it the time and space to revel in its own thoughts, the usual frantic anxiety quiets down and mellows out into a steady stream of thoughts that are actually bearable and not always self-destructive.
You’re not so bad, Mebel tells herself.
Thank you, her mind responds, neither are you.
The next few days, Mebel dives into doing the research necessary for her to come up with a duck course that would blow everyone’s mind away.
She likes the idea of a Peking duck–inspired dish, but by now, after hearing bits and pieces from her fellow classmates, she also knows that she needs to do something truly special to ensure that her dish lives up to expectations.
It isn’t that Mebel wants to steal the prize away from her more deserving classmates, but for once in her life, it’s no longer enough to simply get by. She wants to excel. In between classes, she goes to Chef Clarke’s office and runs her ideas by him.
“I have decide the duck needs to be aged,” she announces one day.
Chef Clarke smiles and nods. “Excellent idea. I quite agree. Duck meat is absolutely divine when it’s aged. Now, have you thought of what spices or herbs you might want to age it with?”
Beaming from his enthusiastic response, Mebel says, “I am thinking maybe orange peel and ginger.”
Chef Clarke tilts his head to one side and ponders this. “I fear the ginger might be overpowering. Ginger is something that strengthens over time. No, it will ruin the duck.”
Mebel sighs. She was so close. She tries asking him for a suggestion of what to use instead of ginger, but Chef Clarke gently reminds her that this is something she needs to think up on her own.
They end the discussion with her agreeing to put more thought into the aging process.
She spends the rest of the day walking aimlessly, muttering to herself and rejecting various ingredients.