["Alina's Place" by Fredrik]
- Kay: I wasn't very nice.
If I make a mistake, my mother, she made me apologize.
In our custom, when you apologize to your mother,
you have to bring a cup of tea and say, "I'm sorry."
But I purposely dropped the hot cup of tea on my mother's lap.
And I wasn't a good student.
I always lie to get out of school
because lots of boyfriends after me.
That time, I was still young.
I was not bad-looking then. [Cheng laughing]
So, what else?
Hurry, hurry, I wanna go home.
- Chen: How'd you meet Grandpa?
- I was a training nurse in a hospital.
He was there for hemorrhoids operation.
So when your grandpa see me,
your grandpa keep on asking me to get married.
And I said, "I don't like you!
"You have bald head!" [Cheng laughing]
I didn't like him because he's ugly.
But one thing about your grandpa, he's very smart.
That's it, no more questions. - Chen: Grandma...
- Cheng: Just a couple more questions?
- Short ones.
- Cheng: Short ones. - Chen: Short ones.
Tell me about working at Bloomingdale's.
What did you do? - You know what I do!
I'm not gonna tell you. - No, you have to...
You have to talk about it.
- I am a detective. [Cheng laughing]
I got the very famous designer.
I better not mention her name.
She stole a dress, 3,000-some dollar.
So I walk out the store, I said,
"Would you like to pay me that dress?"
She said, "Do you know who I am?"
I said, "Yeah, you're a thief!" [all laughing]
So that's my life. [all laughing]
- Chen: Do you have any regrets?
- No, why should I regret?
I think I'm old enough to do whatever I like.
And that's it. [Chen and Cheng laughing]
["Hei Hei" by Frederik]
- Cheng: You know, there's a line
between independent and stubborn,
and my mom crossed that a lot.
- Chen: She liked to complain about things,
but she didn't really mind.
Like, she took care of Grandpa
and she did a lot of that on her own.
You knew because she complained about it, but she would do it
even though she complained. - Cheng: Yeah.
I don't know how willing she would have been
to do StoryCorps if she actually did know
she had so little time left.
It was kind of like one of her last gifts to us.
My mother was cremated,
and the original plan was to put her in the same cremorial
as my father. - Chen: Next to Grandpa.
[both laughing] - Cheng: But she said you know,
"Keep me at your place for a while."
So right now, I have the ashes at home.
And I talk to my mom every now and then.
I tell her "Good night," or "I miss you,"
or something like that.
So I'm kinda happy she's with me.
["Morr" by Fredrik]