Dancing in the Dark ✓

18 | theo

Keeping her word, Sasha ordered Malaysian for dinner, and sat opposite me at the dining table. 

"Ready for your first lesson?" She asked, subtle excitement lifting her voice. "This is Char Hor Fun, a Cantonese dish. It's rice noodles, egg gravy with the usual Asian sauces -- oyster sauce, soy sauce, garlic, ginger, sesame oil -- topped with prawns and bok choy. You know bok choy?"

"It's this green, right?" I asked, poking at the vegetable with my chopsticks. 

"Yeah," she confirmed. "Ready to dig in?"

I briefly closed my eyes and said my grace quietly. When I looked back at Sasha, she was watching me sheepishly, her spoon halfway to her mouth. "Sorry, I didn't know you did that." 

"Praying before eating?" I laughed. "It's alright, you definitely can start eating first." 

She wolfed down the spoonful. "Mmm. The taste of home." 

I grinned and took a bite out of my own plate, the flavour of the egg gravy bursting in my mouth. I raised my eyebrows. "Ma'am, you may have just changed the trajectory of my life."

She rolled her eyes. "Duh."

We both deadpanned before bursting out in low chuckles. 

"Just wait till you try nasi lemak or roti canai. Does your family eat any Cree cuisines?"

I had to pause to think for a beat. "Hmm, not the traditional way, of course. But we do use herbs we can find like wild plantain, wild pea shoots, juniper berries, in a salad. We also do love a good trout or goose, and we don't shy away from moose meat either. Doesn't that just sound stereotypically Canadian, though? I'm unfortunately unsure how Cree cuisines differ from other First Nations cuisines, but I know jellied moose nose definitely originated from the communities in the northwest."

"Jellied moose nose?" She echoed. 

I grinned and leaned back in my seat. "One thing's shared for sure amongst us First Nations communities -- the principle of respecting nature. Not wasting any food -- which means preserving any part of the animal that's edible -- and never taking more than what is needed. My grandparents used to talk about seasonality as well, to take advantage of what each season offers us and following the rhythm in which it offers." 

She went quiet for a bit. "Noelle was saying how she doesn't really speak Cree. Do you?"

I shook my head regretfully. "My parents themselves didn't get to learn much of it, but we're already pretty lucky that there's websites and stuff that are preserving the language because of our numbers. It's nothing compared to the dominant white Canadian population, but relative to the rest of the First Nations..."

"I know apologising won't change anything," she murmured. "But I'm sorry all the same. You know what, I'll learn Cree next." 

I cracked a smile. "Thank you. And hey, we have to learn it together or you're gonna outshine me." 

She chuckled. "Lei said something similar when I told her I'd try learning Hawaiian." 

"You really are gifted with languages," I mused. 

"Interested, not gifted," she corrected. "I'm not like those polyglots who can pick it up from just talking to people and stuff. It takes me a really long time to learn a language -- it's honestly all grit and discipline. But the reward of understanding more people always makes it worth it." 

I dipped my head. "I've always seen you as another STEM kid who did stuff outside to fill up the university resumés, but you really seem to enjoy it genuinely."