Madame Kuo
Madame Kuo was born and raised in Shanghai. She went to a prestigious women's college there and studied English. She met Mr. Kuo, a student of Nanking University then, in a dance party. They fell in love , got married, and fled the communist China to Taiwan together. In Taiwan, Madame Kuo was keen on real estate and made a small fortune off it. In the 70's, she invested her money in this restaurant and immigrated her family over. The restaurant had undergone some change. Before it was a steak house. I had asked Madame Kuo why not a Chinese Restaurant. She replied "I don't cook. I only run the business. It matters to me more that this place is the right size for me to handle." And indeed she found her niche in this cafe style restaurant. Over the years, the deco of the restaurant had changed somewhat but the menu stayed pretty much the same. It's convenient for faithful like me to know beforehand what I am going to get on a particular day. Madame Kuo usually was the one that oversaw things while Mr. Kuo sat at the cashier. They hired help staffing the kitchen and busing the table while Madame Kuo's son and daughter waited the table. It took Madame Kuo two years before the place turn profitable though. After that things turned upward really quick. In a few years Madame Kuo already bought one of those big houses with a view of the valley in a gated community on the hill.
Madame Kuo was a smart looking woman, still is. Pretty, but more smartness than beauty. Her lips are too thin. But her eyes are bright. She wear her dyed jet black hair tidily tugged into a bulb on the back of her head. Greek nose, fair skin, short but shapely. Sharp gaze, gregarious smile, she'd remember your name if you had mentioned it to her once. She exuded so much energy that at 50 something when I first met her more than ten years ago, she could have passed for a 40 year old.
Her son and daughter-in-law stayed with her. She was the happiest when they gave her a grandson and she had talked about transferring her business to her son someday since. That did not take place until years later. She did gradually get her son involved in the purchasing aspect of the business and her daughter-in-law moved up to the cashier sometimes to relieve Mr. Kuo when he became too tired to work. Madame Kuo alone was in charge of the bank account and the signature on the checks. She had finally let go of the finances of the restaurant after Mr. Kuo passed away just a couple of years ago. After she relinquished her control, she would only show up on Saturdays. Weekdays, her son and daughter-in-law were the ones in charge of the restaurant. She aged a lot in the year following, the loss of a spouse as much as the idleness caused it. At last, she looked her age like a sixty year old. She started to talk about retiring entirely and moving into one of those senior centers. "But what about your family?" I asked. "They don't need me around to tell them what to do," she replied. She had always run the show. It was too much to bear to just sit around and be the respectable elderly in the family. "I want to be in charge. That's a hard habit to break. With me around, I would interfere with how my son runs the business, how my daughter-in-law runs the household, how they bring up my grandson. It's better to get out of the way. Besides, out of sight, out of mind. When I move out, I won't miss this cafe that much."
She did move out. She moved to a senior center several hundred miles away. The last I heard from her son about her, she had started a Mahjong Club in the senior center where she stayed. Her son showed me a picture of her she sent him. In the picture, she was playing mahjong with her fellow senior center residents. Her eyes shines bright as she was engaged in the game. She looked happy. She looked herself again.