culture shock
For ecwoodburn, a drabble that fell out of my head like she asked for
Audra's new job is this: forensics, coroner and general medical slash biogeek for the time police in Seattle. She got it through eighty-five percent pure knowledge and fifteen percent nepotism: her mother is still part of the same organization, although on a more international level, and she made a phone call or two. Audra's not ashamed of that in the least. Connections are worthless if left unused, like a muscle that atrophies in zero-gravity. At first she thinks this use of connections and backtalk to do business is more the case in Hong Kong and that's why Americans have so many issues with the practice: in time she realizes that it's the same in both countries, but for some reason Americans hide it in shame instead of allowing it enough sunlight and air to grow naturally.
Audra thinks, not for the last time, that she will probably never understand Americans.
She remembers her coworkers, but with younger faces: Anthony with tousled hair and overalls, serious, studious even in the simple act of stacking blocks, Fabian staggering around in his mother's high heels and an outrageous pink spangled camisole that hung limply on his wire-thin frame.
Anthony is now khakis and coffee and looks eerily like her memories of Jack; she has to retag that face in her brain, now. She's nearly slipped and called him fu chan Jack, has to stop herself from bowing. Fabian grins and calls her jeih je like old times - big sister - but he's checking out her ass and the heels are on boots made of butter-soft leather that fit like they'd grown onto his calves.
*Author's note - fu chan Jack means something like "maternal uncle Jack" in Cantonese according to the niternet but if I've totally messed that up, TELL ME. I want to change it.
Audra's new job is this: forensics, coroner and general medical slash biogeek for the time police in Seattle. She got it through eighty-five percent pure knowledge and fifteen percent nepotism: her mother is still part of the same organization, although on a more international level, and she made a phone call or two. Audra's not ashamed of that in the least. Connections are worthless if left unused, like a muscle that atrophies in zero-gravity. At first she thinks this use of connections and backtalk to do business is more the case in Hong Kong and that's why Americans have so many issues with the practice: in time she realizes that it's the same in both countries, but for some reason Americans hide it in shame instead of allowing it enough sunlight and air to grow naturally.
Audra thinks, not for the last time, that she will probably never understand Americans.
She remembers her coworkers, but with younger faces: Anthony with tousled hair and overalls, serious, studious even in the simple act of stacking blocks, Fabian staggering around in his mother's high heels and an outrageous pink spangled camisole that hung limply on his wire-thin frame.
Anthony is now khakis and coffee and looks eerily like her memories of Jack; she has to retag that face in her brain, now. She's nearly slipped and called him fu chan Jack, has to stop herself from bowing. Fabian grins and calls her jeih je like old times - big sister - but he's checking out her ass and the heels are on boots made of butter-soft leather that fit like they'd grown onto his calves.
*Author's note - fu chan Jack means something like "maternal uncle Jack" in Cantonese according to the niternet but if I've totally messed that up, TELL ME. I want to change it.