Beyond Ta Lo

During the days he spent at home with his parents, Lin Hai got a firsthand taste of the standard "treatment cycle" Huaxia children received after returning home.

For the first day or two, Mother Lin had been the very model of a loving mother. She fussed over every detail, piled the table with his favorite dishes, washed fruit and placed it right in his hands, and before bed merely reminded him gently, "Go to sleep early. Don't wear yourself out." Her eyes had been full of the tender affection of My son has suffered so much out there.

Although Father Lin was more reserved in how he expressed himself, he would occasionally chat with Lin Hai about college life and what he had seen at the California Institute of Technology. Every word carried concern for him.

However, this "honeymoon period" usually did not last very long.

Starting around the third day, his parents' enthusiasm had begun to decline steadily, switching from extreme concern to normal day-to-day coexistence.

The food was still delicious, but it had returned to ordinary home cooking. The concern was still there too, but far less frequent, becoming routine remarks like "Drink more hot water" and "Go to bed early."

By the fifth or sixth day of Lin Hai's stay at home, things had taken a sharp turn for the worse. The "everything you do annoys me" stage had arrived right on schedule.

"Lin Hai! Look at this room of yours! You've only been back a few days, and it's already such a mess! Why haven't you cleaned it up?"

"What time is it, and you're still not out of bed? The sun is already shining on your ass!"

This sort of nagging became endless. Lin Hai keenly noticed that the way his mother looked at him