Each person is made of five different elements, she told me. Too much fire and you had a bad temper. That was like my father, whom my mother always critized for his cigarette habit and who always shouted back that she should feel guilty that he didn't let my mother speak her mind. Too little wood and you bent too quickly to listen to other people's ideas, unable to stand on your own. This was like my Auntie An-mei. Too much water and you flowed in too many different directions. like myself.

Hardships can harden even the best person.

Words to me were magic. You could say a word and it could conjure up all kinds of images or feelings or a chilly sensation or whatever. It was amazing to me that words had this power.

That was a wonderful period in my life. I mean, I didn't become an artist, but somebody let me do something I loved. What a luxury, to do something you love to do.

I have always known a thing before it happens.

On the third day after someone dies, the soul comes back to settle scores. In my mother's case, this would be the first day of the lunar new year. And because it is the new year, all debts must be paid, or disaster and misfortune will follow.

If you are greedy, what is inside you is what makes you always hungry.