One from the heart.
PHOTOGRAPH: INDIA WHILEY-MORTON. FOOD STYLING: POLLYANNA COUPLAND
It is 1984. I’m five years old. We have left my grandmother’s farm in Taiwan for another farm in a foreign land and a family who speak a language we don’t understand. They feed us strange food: dried bits of tough meat ( biltong) served with a sort of cornmeal congee (mielie pap – a maize porridge) and wobbly things in plastic pots that my mother complains taste of ‘off’ milk (yogurt). Everything smells different. We’re a million miles from home and from my grandparents, Ah Kung and Ah Ma.
It’s been only 24 hours, but already I miss the aroma of oranges on their farm, chasing chickens around their farmyard and the comforting rustling of bamboo trees in the wind. Who is this strange man (Uncle Robert)? Why are we now living on his land? And why is his wife (Aunty Susan) feeding us plants with a big seed inside (avocado) that they smash and serve on bread?