For whom

 　　I don't know how to cook, and I blame my inability to cook on my background—I'm a mainland girl; in Taiwan, "mainlander" actually means "refugee." Mainlander refugee families, in their displacement, lost everything attached to the land, including farmland, houses, ancestral halls, temples, as well as the fellow villagers and social networks crucial for survival.

　　Because they lost all of this, refugee parents placed all their hopes on the education of their children. They seemed to have discovered that only education was a rope lowered to the bottom of a well, which those below could climb out. So, as

　　the daughter of a refugee, I wasn't required to do housework from a young age. After dinner, I would put down my chopsticks, quickly retreat to my desk, sit upright, and assume a reading posture, while my mother would wash the dishes and my father would turn the gramophone down. Memorizing the *Guan Zhi* (a collection of classical Chinese prose) was important; my mother took care of all the household chores. But

　　after becoming a mother myself, I immediately became a very capable person.

　　While I was beating eggs, mixing flour, butter, sugar, and baking powder to make cakes, Andrei and Philip sat on those low chairs around a lump of fresh, lovely wet dough on the low table, shaping it into pigs, cows, sheep, horses, and all sorts of animals.

　　I became very "efficient" at cooking. Cookbooks lined up in a long row on the ivy-covered windowsill. The page for carrot cake was almost worn through; the pages for macaroni and cheese and lasagna were worn down. I could serve four children—two sons and their inseparable best friend—a colorful meal with all the vitamins A, B, C, D, E, and starches in ten minutes. Then I'd put the kids in the car, one off to soccer, another to swimming lessons…then rush back to the soccer field to pick up the eldest, back to the pool to pick up the second, home, and then make dinner.

　　Mother, it turns out, is a top-tier full-time, all-around CEO, only no one pays her a salary.

　　Then it suddenly occurred to me, ah, the mother who shoulders all the responsibilities of cooking and cleaning, before she became a mother, was also a young lady hiding in her study.

　　As the children grew up, I found myself reverting to being someone who couldn't cook, while my grown children became gourmets. Philippe enrolled in cooking classes at sixteen, learning Italian cuisine from a pot-bellied chef in a white top hat. At seventeen, he started an internship in the kitchen of a three-Michelin-starred French restaurant, learning everything from peeling potatoes to making every dipping sauce from a chef from Marseille. Andre bought cookbooks from various countries—Turkish, African, Chinese—all experimental projects. He used a watch to keep track of his cooking. As

　　for me, I ate whatever was available. I didn't need anything. I couldn't tell you the price of an egg; my refrigerator was mostly empty. Once, I made Andre instant noodles with some leafy greens.

　　When the soup was served, Andre took a couple of bites and suddenly asked, "Where did the greens come from?"

　　I didn't answer, but he pressed on, "It's from the salad you bought last week, isn't it?"

　　I nodded. Yes.

　　He put down his chopsticks, a look of exasperation on his face, and said, "That's not fresh anymore, Mom, why are you still using it? It's just a habit of your generation, right?"

　　He stopped eating.

　　A few days later, Andrei suddenly said, "Shall we go grocery shopping together?"

　　The mother and son went to the supermarket in the city with the most international food. Andrei carefully selected items back and forth for three whole hours. When they got home, it was already dark. He told me, his mother, to stand beside him and watch, "Don't go anywhere."

　　He unfolded the top-quality Australian beef steak and placed it aside. Then he took various spice jars off the shelf one by one and lined them up. He turned the button, the lower rack of the oven started to heat up, and he put the plate in to maintain the temperature. He washed the potatoes and started boiling water, preparing to make fresh mashed potatoes. It was clear that he had a grand plan in mind, running several parallel processes in a certain time sequence, like an orchestra conductor, observing everything, each step tightly linked to the next.

　　The phone rang. I was about to leave the kitchen to take it when he stopped me, saying, "Don't take it, don't take it. Stay in the kitchen and watch me cook."

　　A wine glass and a mineral water glass stood side by side. Pumpkin soup was served first, followed by a salad with pine nuts. The main course was steak, wrapped in foil, which I ordered medium-rare. Finally, dessert.

　　It was autumn, a gentle sea breeze was blowing, and a moon, like a thick egg yolk, rose above the sea.

　　I said, "Okay, I've learned how. I can make it for you from now on."

　　My son looked at me with wide eyes and said seriously, "I don't want you to make it for me. Don't you understand? I want you to learn how to make it for yourself."