Before the trip
When I found that my visa had been expired for more than one year, the time was almost too late for the renewal application. It was not surprising that my application was rejected also due to an anti-bioterror reason. It took us a lot of efforts to get a renewed visa; I got my visa just 12 hours before my departure. When Ben drove me to the airport, the highway had a terrible traffic jam. Everything drove me crazy. For the time being, besides the Am-Iraq war, a kind of infectious respiratory disease, called SARS, broke out in the South China and Hong-Kong. In the airport, most of the passengers were wearing masks. It appeared that I was in a hospital instead of the airport.
On the plane bounding for Los Angels, I was reading a modern version of “The Dream of the Red Chamber”. When I got to the LA airport, I just realized that the transfer was not immediate and I had to find a hotel nearby to stay overnight. I was truly muddleheaded and did not carefully read my itinerary before the trip. After I settled down, I went out buying food but could not find anything eatable. It was not unusual that I could not sleep well, so I read books till the morning. Nothing sounded good.
Snowbird
I flew to Salt Lake City and then took a shuttle to Snowbird. The driver was too talkative. Shortly after he drove out of the airport, I saw snowing. When the van went up into the snow covered mountains, I was a silver world.
The Keystone meeting was very expensive, and had a very loose schedule. However, this small meeting made me to have more chances to talk with other scientists. When people all went skiing in afternoons, I did excise in the fitness room. This excise center was located at the highest floor of the hotel, so I could watch the silver mountains while running on the treadmill. This was much worthy. I sometimes had my lunch in the Aerie Restaurant. While eating, I could watch snowing outside. One day, I went to the nearby Snowbird Center and had a simple lunch in the Forklift restaurant. I bought a piece of Zen-style painting from a gallery. This black circle has been hung in my office till now. One afternoon I went with a group of people by bus to a town called Park City for sightseeing. A few streets were full of stores for souvenir, art works, and clothing. A place was built for tourists.
Back to Yale
I flew to Newark in the midnight. It took me some time to settle down in a nearby hotel. On the next day, I took a Connect Limo to New Haven. The I-95 had an incredible traffic congestion. This highway appeared to be under construction all the time. I was so thirsty and hungry and was completely exhausted. I couldn’t believe that the public transportation system was still inconvenient and unfriendly in the States.
I had not been back to Yale for seven years since I left. I could not wait to see Joan. She was wearing glasses and sitting in front of the computer. She gave me a warm hug; at that moment, tears almost burst out of my eyes. After I gave a seminar, Joan treated me and her whole lab a big dinner in the Malaysian restaurant Bentaya. This was indeed for celebration of her receipt of the Excellence in Science Award from the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB).
We had Chardonnay. I tossed to Joan for her touching and unforgettable hospitality. I almost lost words to express my appreciation. I had a long chat with Joan. Under the dim light, I was looking at her, a great and elegant woman scientist and a role model of mine. Did she know that I respect her so much and follow her step by step? She was wearing a pair of double helix rings (with no discriminative major and minor grooves, she explained) and a pin of U2, a gift from Benoit. I brought her a crystal paper-weight from the Palace Museum, which was a copy of Han dynasty. The gathering eventually ended; no one could stop time.
On the next day, Joan asked me to see her before she departed for San Diego to receive the FAESEB award. I gave her a promise of my revisit in the near future. I then went with friends to Willouby, a coffee shop that we used to come in afternoons. The neighborhood of the Yale Medical School had made a lot of changes; I wished I could have time to revisit the streets, but my trip was really too short. I soon left for Newark. On the plane to Taipei, I finished the book “The Dream of the Red Buildings”; the ending told me that flowers are falling and eventually become dust. I also watched a sad movie “White Oleander” which deals with the relationship between an artist but also a criminal mother and her daughter. For the rest of time, I was thinking deeply about my life and something else.
After the trip
I arrived in the morning. It took me a whole day to get recovered a bit. I used to believe that planes fly too fast so that my soul would not come back to me till later. I hoped my body and spirit could reunite. At the sleepless night, I watched a movie, “Wit”, which could be translated to “The Ward of the Spirit” in Chinese. A female professor suffered from ovarian cancer and was about to die. She narrated the story herself regarding how she faced her death. It was full of sadness. I should not have watched this particularly at this fragile moment. While the dawn came, I went to the office to start my real life.
April, 2003
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