The Happy City Read online

  The Story of the Restaurant

  1

  While they all acted naturally and automatically, nothing was natural or automatic for him. Whatever he did, he always had the impression he was out of place. Maybe his wondering continually what everything meant gave him a sensation of meaninglessness; even so, he was already feeling a lack of physical adaptation before even beginning to question it—a lethargy in his arms and legs, a constant impression that he would rather be anywhere other than carrying dirty plates to the kitchen. He found it incredible that this, the place where they spent so many hours, functioned as a restaurant and a rotisserie, and that occasionally someone would come to have a coffee at the counter with the chipped slab of marble that served as a bar, when it was obvious that this was not a restaurant, or a normal roast chicken business, or a bar to drink coffee at. The thought that this was not at all what it seemed to be judging by how it operated gave him great pleasure, and once when his mother had asked him to “go down to the restaurant,” he replied, “What restaurant? Do you mean that thing downstairs?” He said it not in a cruel way but delightedly, as he didn’t have that many opportunities to question the existence of the business aloud. Most of the time, when he wasn’t at school, he was at his table doing his homework or in the kitchen or serving chickens. It wasn’t that he wanted the place to have a different appearance that might make it, at the very least, less bizarre. If they had had a restaurant that looked like a restaurant, or a rotisserie that looked just like a rotisserie, he would have found it just as infuriating and would have refused to accept it, in exactly the same way he refused to accept the news in the papers.

  The truth is that the business did have a strange, ramshackle appearance. The windows at the front were the same as when the premises had been a watchmaker’s, and his family had decided not to replace them, since they weren’t cracked, despite the mucky, grayish coating that adhered to the surface and wouldn’t go no matter how much they scrubbed. Before the remodeling, his father and grandfather could be seen going to and fro behind the counter through this window, which had now been decorated from the inside with some red curtains made by his step-grandmother. The idea was to create the air of a Chinese restaurant without spending any money modifying the façade. His father and grandfather could still be seen moving around behind the counter, although now they were framed by the curtains, which were pulled back like in a puppet theatre so as to make the most of the daylight. At night, when the curtains were drawn (his grandfather didn’t like his customers to be seen eating from the street), the effect was even gloomier, suggesting something prohibited and distasteful. Meanwhile, the bar his father stood at to sell the chickens looked extremely odd. It was not a bar, in the same way that the curtains stitched by his step-grandmother were not the façade of a typical Chinese restaurant, and made it look even less like one. The bar was the old display counter from the watchmaker’s shop, which had not looked entirely out of place in the roast chicken business before. The counter-cum-bar came up to the customers’ waists, and if someone ordered a coffee and wanted to have it there, which was unusual but not unheard of, they couldn’t lean on it or stay standing up without feeling out of place. The very notion of being able to have a coffee at a display counter masquerading as a bar—where roast chickens were being dispensed—was inconceivable, and yet in their restaurant one could do just that. This sense of possibility that hung in the air, the freedom to do what one usually associated with establishments of a different nature, meant that whenever a customer from another neighborhood came in when the curtains were drawn, he would stand there not knowing exactly what it was he’d read outside, perhaps even forgetting why he’d come in. “What can I get you?” his father would immediately ask. Outside was the yellow neon sign with red lettering that read “ROAST CHICKENS”, and then a picture of a chicken winking. Above this sign they had hung another, larger one in the same colors but the other way around, that is, yellow letters on a red background, that announced “HAPPY CITY RESTAURANT”, in Spanish and in Chinese. There was no way of knowing what the new customer had come in for, or even if he had read both signs. Generally speaking, the new customer would be confused by the very aspect of the restaurant’s interior: on one side the counter-cum-bar with the rotisserie machine slowly turning round, the coffee machine, and the shelves where the drinks were kept; on the other, the tables, separated from the rest of the room by a series of wooden screens that formed a narrow passageway leading to the kitchen. At night, the section with the counter-cum-bar was bathed in white neon light, while the tables had small, red lanterns to create the atmosphere one expects in a restaurant. It must have been off-putting for those people who arrived wanting to eat out and first saw this fast-food light, appropriate for the roast chickens but not for the restaurant. The faces of those who showed up in the evenings looking for Chinese food darkened in those first few moments when confronted with this light, but it was also clear that the ones who came back again and again had very quickly grown accustomed to the contrast. Over time they even grew used to the outlandish look the restaurant had from the outside, and his father’s “What can I get you?” had become second nature.

  2

  His grandfather was the architect of their being there. Thanks to his money, they had been able to establish themselves on their own, without mafia-like organizations acquiring documents and work for them in exchange for slave labor conditions. His grandfather bombarded them with stories of Chinese people who arrived in Spain and were kept locked up by other Chinese people in cellars where they slept crammed together. The Chinese were only allowed to leave the cellars to go to work in kitchens, cleaning and waiting tables. If they hadn’t seen news items about this sort of thing on TV and heard other Chinese people tell similar stories—his mother and step-grandmother would say under their breath—they would have thought it was just a tale to frighten them and make them more willing to wait their own tables. As time went by, however, both his mother and his step-grandmother were inclined to deny the whole thing—what their compatriots and his grandfather told them and what was said on the television was a lie. Nothing that reached them from the real world was fit to be believed.

  His grandfather had made enough money in China. He hadn’t planned to still be running a business, although spending a long stretch abroad when he retired had been on his list of things to do. Six months before his grandfather was due to retire, his father had been arrested. Chi-Huei knew from his mother that his father had spent two weeks in prison and that despite the fact that “it was nothing serious and they had even admitted their mistake,” his grandfather had decided to take them all out of the country. His mother would say that they had to look on the positive side of his father being put in jail, which was that his grandfather had set them up in business, as on their own they would never have escaped the fate that awaited them. What his mother didn’t say was that this was only potentially true. The restaurant did not belong to his father, or his mother, or even his grandfather, but to his step-grandmother. His grandfather was twenty years older than she and had married her before coming over. By putting the business in her name, he had ensured he wouldn’t lose the money from his pension or the power over his family. It was not inconceivable that, before he died, he would get his step-grandmother to hand the restaurant over to Chi-Huei’s father, but this was only an assumption. Besides, what would happen if he died suddenly? He said he had more money, and in order to allay their fears, he had made a point of letting them know that this money belonged to Chi-Huei’s father. It said as much in his will. However, they had no idea if this meant his properties in China, such as the house where Aunt Li lived, which they doubted they could make much use of once he was dead, given his father’s situation.

  Before the Remodeling

  His grandfather had paid for the premises and half the mortgage on the apartment. For the remodeling they’d had to knock down part of the partition wall in the back of the place, put up a new one to make the kitchen, and put in the kitchen itself, as well as setting the whole place up to look like a restaurant. His mother had told him that his grandfather had said it was better to wait, to focus on selling roast chickens for a while so as to build up a customer base quickly, save some money, and see how things stood. They bought a pair of rotisserie machines with six spits, each with a capacity for thirty chickens, and for a few years they devoted themselves exclusively to selling chickens with a special deal. With each bird sold, they gave away a free portion of special fried rice and a soft drink or beer. The monotonous activity of cooking the rice, skewering the chickens onto the spits, selling them, and cleaning up kept them busy all day long. Shortly after Chi-Huei arrived, they installed a ventilation system and a high-quality gas range and could now cook in the back of the restaurant without fear of the neighbors complaining. Chi-Huei’s arrival appeared to have kick-started the first few changes. Next to the sign advertising the chicken and rice deal, they put up a little menu that included the essential dishes for any Chinese restaurant—spring rolls, special fried rice, special fried noodles, beef and peppers, sweet and sour pork, and chicken in oyster sauce—and this gave new impetus to the business.

  His grandfather had struck gold with his idea of the offer of free rice with every chicken, and this deal earned his rotisserie a good reputation. They opened at one p.m., which was when the first customers arrived, mostly foreign tourists who turned up hungry for chicken and ended up eating a bowl of noodles or pork too, once the menu had been put up. The restaurant was situated between downtown and the old town, very close to the cathedral, and was surrounded by electronics shops and small businesses selling trendy clothes and trinkets, which meant there was a constant flow of people. Although they already had enough customers, his grandfather and his mother (and to a lesser degree his father) had an obsession with growing the business, and so after buying the ventilation system and the range there came the motorbike to deliver food to people’s homes. His step-grandmother was in charge of the home deliveries. With the noisy bike, it took her ten minutes to get anywhere less than a mile or so from the restaurant. His grandfather thought that women ought to cook and wait tables, not go driving around on motorbikes delivering food, but they had no choice—his father was starting to allow himself to be overcome by mental paralysis, his grandfather wanted to be present at all times to keep an eye on the business, and his mother didn’t know how to ride a motorbike and was essential to keeping the restaurant running smoothly at peak times. His step-grandmother, meanwhile, was not essential, knew how to drive, and, moreover, was in her element climbing onto the bike and driving calmly off. It was his step-grandmother, too, who would go marching from door to door every Thursday morning from nine till twelve, armed with a backpack full of fliers and handing out ads for the rotisserie that was to become a restaurant. They had wavered a great deal before putting “CHINESE RESTAURANT / ROAST CHICKENS” on the little red fliers that flew religiously out of the photocopier every Wednesday, not out of a sense of scruples but because it represented a small transformation that propelled them forward too quickly. Although their aim was to be a restaurant, any movement toward this goal was looked on by his grandfather and by his mother and father with obsessive suspicion, as if it concealed a trap that would catch them all when they least expected it.

  His father was usually to be found at the bar, where the customers wanting chicken would crowd together at lunchtime and in the evenings. Most of them took their chickens home, although a few ate them at the tables by the windows. When she wasn’t out doing home deliveries, his step-grandmother made the food, and his mother would be going back and forth between the kitchen and the tables. Since the menu was limited, the food was already prepared, and when they opened all they had to do was reheat it. His grandfather ranged about all over the place doing whatever he felt like, keeping an eye on them all; when it took his fancy he would remove a table, or ring up a chicken deal.

  They opened at one and closed at five. Then they opened again at eight and closed at one in the morning. In between, they went shopping, cleaned, peeled carrots and onions, put chickens into the machine, chopped peppers, mushrooms and pork, and boiled rice and noodles. When lunchtime approached, the kitchen had been up and running for some time already, and the whole place was filled with the smell of fried food and steam from the rice and noodles. As his mother and step-grandmother cooked, the sweat ran down their faces, their arms, and their legs. They talked often about China, about his grandfather, about his father, about his brother, and about him, and the noise of the food being stirred and the oil spitting meant they didn’t have to lower their voices to say things they didn’t want his grandfather to hear. When they were cooking and dealing with the matters of the day, his mother and step-grandmother got on well. However, whenever they talked about the future, which was synonymous with his grandfather’s death, they would both put their guards up. His mother more than his step-grandmother. His father, meanwhile, was almost always quiet—sweeping the floor, laying the tables, getting the machines ready … His grandfather spent the whole day moving around so he could keep watch over everyone. One minute he would sit down at a table, pricking up his ears, the next he would serve himself some food so as to have an excuse to go into the kitchen, looking around and sniffing, and the next he would go into the bathroom and look closely at himself in the mirror while listening to everyone’s noises, as sound was amplified in the bathroom for some reason no one understood. In the bathroom (always with the door open, because there was something of the exhibitionist in him) the high-pitched, indistinguishable sounds seemed to confirm what his grandfather had suspected for a long time, and he would nod his head as if to say “You see?”

  His grandfather did not get on too well with Chi-Huei’s step-grandmother or with his mother, and the boy’s father was an endless disappointment, which meant he couldn’t share this or any other impression with anyone. What’s more, he considered Chi-Huei’s mother to be no more than the wife of an idiot, although this thought, which at times was expressed out loud, sounded a little like self-pity. If it weren’t for his mother’s energy, the business wouldn’t run so well, and his grandfather knew this.

  Occasionally his mother felt brave enough to confront his grandfather when it came to matters concerning his brother and him. And so, for instance, she had managed to persuade Chi-Huei’s grandfather to get an internet connection for the restaurant. To win an argument against him, his mother had to lead the old man to believe that he was still in a position of authority. On the question of the internet, she had repeated twenty times, as sweet as can be, that Chi-Huei and his brother needed it to do their homework and to learn how to fend for themselves like other boys their age, and that if they couldn’t do this, he would be throwing all the money he’d invested in them down the drain. His grandfather agreed through gritted teeth, probably out of fear, and then spent several days brooding dejectedly. Every time he let his arm be twisted, he would spend days sunk in deep reflection, or maybe it wasn’t reflection but a sort of chaos to which he resigned himself and within which he attempted to establish some sort of mental order. One thing his mother hadn’t managed to do was to get him to hire someone so they didn’t have to work so frenziedly on the weekends, when the place would get really full. Whenever she suggested it, his grandfather would shout like mad about just where were they going to get the money for the remodeling so they could be a real restaurant, that they’d been in Spain for years now and still hadn’t managed to build up a proper business—even though the rotisserie couldn’t be doing better and they had enough money besides. Nevertheless, the way his grandfather saw it, as long as this fundamental goal of establishing a good restaurant had not been achieved, they had to save as much money as possible and not assume that they could afford certain luxuries just yet.

  At night, when the place was empty, his step-grandmother and mother were in charge of the cleaning. His grandfather, his brother, and he would go and sleep, and his father would sometimes stay to clean and other times would go up to bed with them. His father was at liberty to choose whether to clean or to spend more time sleeping. He and his brother were not. He and his brother were obligated to sleep, in the same way that they were obligated to go to school in the mornings, to eat quickly, to study from five to eight every evening except Tuesdays and Thursdays, when they had English and Chinese lessons (his grandfather didn’t want them to forget their Chinese), and, once they reached the age of thirteen, to work lunchtimes and evenings on the weekend. They lived according to the rhythm of the business, which never closed and was always endlessly, overwhelmingly busy. In the hours they spent bent over their books and his mother, father, and step-grandmother prepared the restaurant for the evening, his grandfather would prowl around the table where they were studying—watching them, approving every sum they solved, each sentence they read, which he could not read, since he couldn’t read Spanish. It was unbearable having his grandfather behind them, nodding his approval, mainly due to the content of his approval, which had nothing to do with the subjects they were studying, about which he felt not the least bit curious. What prompted his grandfather’s approval was the spectacle of the two of them doing their duty, an extremely important one in his eyes as it represented nothing less than a brilliant future—not in Spain but in China, where they would return triumphant, which was synonymous with having earned lots of money. His grandfather (and, up to a point, his mother) could not entertain the idea that all their efforts might not lead to them triumphing back home, rather than here; and this triumph was to be first and foremost an economic one. For some time Chi-Huei thought that by the time that happened, his grandfather would have died and his parents would both be quite elderly and retired.