The Landlady

Strangers on the road would often say hi when they passed by our house. As a result, the warmth and openness of the Kiwis helped to coax me out of my shell. I now can strike up a conversation with a stranger without my ears turning red and often recall my first experience with the kindly couple in the McDonald's who led the way.

The Landlady

I vividly recall our landlady, Julie, her perfectly filed nails, the ones that had always poked my back as she leaned forward to give me a hug. Something I never had the heart to tell her about. Expensive and cloying perfume, a fragrance I could recognize from a mile away that announced Julie’s presence, the comforting smell of vanilla and firewood enveloped me as she wrapped her arms around me in a warm hug. The little stray pieces of Boo’s white fur that stuck to her fancy clothes; due to my allergies, made my nose itchy and runny, but I didn’t mind because Boo was Julie’s pal. The small yet wide dimples that spread across her cheeks whenever she smiled, the little indentations that she would let me gently poke before bursting into laughter along with me. Her gentle yet loud laughter that was never malicious, the kind that resonated throughout the park as her dog Boo dragged me across the park, almost like I was tubing, except through mud and without a tube. Her ring-clad hands, the ones that she used to hide water balloons behind her back, encouraging me to join in the fun as we ambushed her sons. The leather handbag that she kept with her at all times. The one that she grabbed the tickets for Disney

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on Ice from when she wanted to surprise me. Her wavy blonde hair that fell in folds over my face as she bent down, noticing my untied shoelaces before tying them for me.

As time went on, my time with Julie has receded further and further in the distance, but my appreciation has come into increasingly sharper focus. We rarely reflect on a moment while we are experiencing it; it is only in hindsight that we truly are able to “see” the experience for what it is; experience precedes meaning. So when I close my eyes and try to re-see Julie, these sights, sounds, smells, and moments come into focus. When I moved to New Zealand, I had no conception of the challenges that lay before me. Moving from one’s native country, leaving one’s family and friends at the age of seven to start over in a different country, learning a foreign language was something I had no time or ability to make sense of at the time. But looking back, as I think about Julie’s unfailing kindness and generosity to that scared, overwhelmed seven-year-old Chinese girl, I’m filled with an overwhelming sense of gratitude. I cannot be sure if she realized at the time what a difference her actions would make in my life. For me, she was one of the few faces that consistently greeted me with a warm smile. The raised eyebrows and sidelong looks from my classmates that made me feel so out of place vanished along with that shrinking, anxious feeling whenever I was with Julie. While most memories fade over time, my memories of Julie remain as bright and colorful as ever.

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