A sunny afternoon in Southern California. Grandma's rice porridge and oranges eaten. Dishes washed. Tea drunk. The old Chinese ladies sit at the square table, representing the North, South, East, and West winds. "You watch. Learn how play Mah Jong," Mrs. Yee says. I was three and knew nothing of the hieroglyphs engraved on those cool opaque tiles. They lay all the cubes face down. Their jade-colored backs, the clack of 140 tiles clinking against each other, soothing as rain. They shuffle and stack them, hoping to draw the lucky triple, gambling for pennies. After five rounds and a teaspoon of gossip they retire to their homes and start dinner.

The old ladies don't come to play Mah Jong anymore. One of them died, my grandma's best friend. Her stomach hurting chronic fatigue. The doctor found nothing wrong and sent her home. Months later, too tired to work in her garden, she got a second opinion. Cancer had spread throughout her stomach. Three days later she died alone in her house.

She was the baby sitter who took care of me everyday when I was 3. She could peel an apple in one long curling strip, slice it into small chunks and feed them to me off the tip of her knife. I would cry when her husband beat her or when the emergency sirens drove by and she would pick me up and tell me, "Moa nout. Moa nout. Aiy ahm. Aiy ahm." ("Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. Big courage. Big courage.")

That generation is dying off now. They die with their mouths shut, taking their history with them. Their language lost along with unspoken memories of the famine and war, when Japanese soldiers invaded their farms. Those young women, now grandmas, fled to the rice fields only to be found and raped at gunpoint, watching soldiers bayonette their babies, toss them in the air, and shoot them.

No wonder they didn't speak of the past at the Mah Jong table or anywhere. They held it in their stomachs. The lucky ones die with their mouths shut, their grandchildren close by.

Students interested in submitting works for this column should contact Ron Price in the Liberal Arts Department at etc. 368, or by e-mail (ronprice@juilliard.edu)