The Gift of Rain

My 15 highlights

• Although the bungalow was built in the typical Anglo-Indian style, with wide wooden verandas and large airy ceilings, it had been decorated strictly by a Japanese hand. The rooms were partitioned by paper shoji screens, scrolls of calligraphy hung at well-lit positions and a faint smell of incense cleansed the air as we passed. Stark, skeletal flower arrangements stood on low tables. “These are Saotome-san’s personal arrangements,” Endo-san said. “His ikebana has won prizes in Tokyo.”

• We were served dinner, which came on little porcelain plates, each with just one or two pieces of food. I enjoyed the marinated eel, the sweetened chicken and the little rolls of raw fish wrapped in rice and seaweed. The two Japanese men ate daintily, examining their food in the chopsticks, commenting on the taste and color and texture, almost as though they were making an artistic acquisition. I was famished and had to restrain myself from eating too much, too fast.

• My father walked to the center of the crowd, which opened for him. “Anyone who wants to go with these troublemakers is free to do so,” he said in Malay, which the workers used. “Just don’t come in to work tomorrow.” He repeated his words in Hokkien and turned in a circle, looking into the eyes of each worker. “Those who have decided to throw in their lot with this monkey, get off my property now. Your names will be circulated and I will make sure no one else hires you.” There was an angry wail from the workers.

• “Bloody Germans,” Edward said. “Over seven hundred lives were lost. British lives,” he added, as though those had a greater value.

• The most rewarding way to see the place one lives in is to show it to a friend.

• Aunt Yu Mei had never told me her precise age, although I guessed she was about forty and running to that certain plumpness so common in Chinese women.

• He finished his drink and said he had to go home. “Hate these parties,” he said.

• She was quite beautiful, in the way only Japanese women can be—demure on the outside, yet with veins of steel within.

• they never knew that I felt no connection with China, or with England. I was a child born between two worlds, belonging to neither

• His voice turned bitter. “Duty is a concept created by emperors and generals to deceive us into performing their will. Be wary when duty speaks, for it often masks the voice of others. Others who do not have your interests at heart.”

• The Dutchman met us on deck, his face burned to a wooden brown, his eyes the color of the sea, only clearer, brighter. When he took off his cap his bald scalp had the hardness and glossiness of a nut. He appeared to be in his fifties and looked quite strong, an impression heightened by a big hard stomach that seemed to come between us as we spoke.

• We sat without speaking. The sea sighed each time a wave collapsed on the shore like a long-distance runner at the finishing line. I have always felt a greater affinity with the sea at night. It is magnificent during the day, the waves strong and loud, slamming onto the beach, propelled by the force of the entire ocean behind it. But when night comes that force is spent, and the waves roll to the shore with the detachment of a monk unfurling a scroll.

• The Japanese consul, Shigeru Hiroshi, saw me and came over. He was a thin, sickly looking man in his fifties, ill suited to the climate. His head was shaven bald, like many of the Japanese I had seen. He was too small for his dinner jacket, his shiny scalp matching the gleam of his lapels. “You must be Endo-san’s deshi, his pupil. He has described you well.”

• “These principles apply to your daily life as well. Never meet a person’s anger directly. Deflect, distract him, even agree with him. Unbalance his mind, and you can lead him anywhere you want.”

• took the gloved hand she offered. With its scarce flesh and thin prominent bones it felt like a bird, a sparrow with its wings wrapped around itself. I nodded, smiled sadly, and led her through the house, pausing to put the lights on as we passed each room