Pregnancy: A Chinese Cultural Embarrassment

Going out for Chinese food has long been a passion. I love the food and I love to get to know my Chinese waitresses. Most speak broken English, few ever open up to Americans. I can't figure out why? But every once in awhile a new Chinese waitress comes along who welcomes social interchange.

My most recent "new best Chinese friend" has been assigned the American name "Shirley". I'm conflicted about this, after all, I don't think I'd like to be working in China and find myself being assigned a Chinese name to be called by. Shirley seems find with her American name so I don't rock the boat by giving her my opinion on how disrespectful it is to her that we Americans are not expected to address her by the name her parents gave her.

Shirley it turns out is "a mail order bride"! Well to be more exact, I think she is probably an internet bride. She came here from rural China a little over a year and a half ago to marry an American man. He works at a Battery Plus store and Shirley works across the parking lot from the battery store at the Chinese restaurant.

I hadn't seen Shirley for the past six or eight weeks. I was beginning to think I would never see her again. But yesterday I stopped in for a meal at the Chinese restaurant at an offbeat time. And there was Shirley, rushing around taking care of her tables and customers.

At first I didn't recognize her. She'd put on weight. I thought that was normal seeing we'd just come through the holiday season. Who doesn't put on weight from Thanksgiving through Christmas and on to New Year's.

But the more I studied Shirley I grew confident she was pregnant. But then again, what if she wasn't! I didn't want to embarrass her or myself by congratulating her on the impending birth when maybe there was no baby.

I spotted another one of the waitresses that I chat with and discreetly asked her if Shirley was pregnant. "Yesssssssssssssssssss," she whispered bowing her head close to mine, "almost six month." I smiled my thanks and returned to my table.

Happily Shirley was running the cash register when I was ready to pay my check. "Shirley," I exclaimed, "congratulations on the baby!"

"Oh tanks," said Shirley. Bowing her head she said, "I am so embarrassed I did not know how to tell you."

"Why would you be embarrassed," I asked?

"In China we do not talk about such things - it is embarrassing."

"In this country," I said, "it is just the opposite. A pregnant woman fills up with so much joy she soon tells everyone. And we are happy for the new mother-to-be!"

"This is so?" asked Shirley searching my face to see if I was teasing her.

"It's true Shirley," I said clapping my hands together quietly to demonstrate my joy for her baby that will be arriving in three months.

"Dis country is so different from my country."

As I nodded my head up and down I could see relief spread across Shirley's face. I squeezed her hand, said good-bye and then rushed out. Twenty minutes later I was in the department store searching for the perfect baby gift for my not so embarrassed "anymore" Chinese friend.