2.27 Interview with Gao / Gao’s mother

There is a communication routine

Published in

Team Rice

2 min readMar 2, 2017

wechat/facetime/skype, 1–2 times everyday, both parties take the initiative: if Gao doesn’t call his mom, mom would call him.
The communication usually happens after work, because Gao’s mom is afraid of bothering him when he is at work. Gao’s mom thinks the kid does a good job, because he is easily reachable all the time. Even though the times he asks for cooking guidance becomes less, Gao’s mom does not have negative feelings.
The topic can be anything, and can be as short as “Did you eat well?” “ Yes.”

Gao does not feel much of a difference between eating with parents vs. eating alone. He just eats simpler because his parents can’t cook for him and he is too lazy to cook fancy dishes.
At the begining, Gao’s mom walks around Gao’s room once everyday after she finished teaching classes. The food portion she makes is still for three people, and there is always leftovers. Gradually, parents are used to the fact that there is one person missing. They still sit at their designated seats, and leave their kid’s seat empty.
When Gao’s mom came to visit him in Seattle, she would secretly take a lot of pictures of him. She says she wants to have something to look at when she misses her son in China.

Gao thinks if he cooks something at a high quality, that would make his parents proud. He would make phone calls and take pictures to let his parents know. His dad loves the Hongshaorou he makes.
Gao asks mom for recipe because he knows for sure that the outcome would have the taste he likes.
Gao’s mom thinks that guiding Gao cook equals to cooking for him. Although she can’t physically cook for him, she can still show her care through teaching him cook.
She would ask gao what’s in the fridge, and gives Gao ideas of what he can make out of the ingredients he has, and how to cook the dish. She guides Gao through phone how to make Hongshaorou: meat needs to be chopped in chucks and boil in water, then sugar needs to be stir fried for a bit until the sugar liquid becomes dark brown. She would ask how food tastes after her guidance. If Gao tells her that the meat turned out taste too sweet, that means the sugar step needs to be longer, and the color is probably too light.