Chapter 20

We discovered that our children were growing up more Chinese than American, and we realized that there was only one solution to that problem: we had to move to the USA! AGTC agreed to buy our mansion for the amount of money that I had put into the purchase plus 10%. We thought at first of moving to San Francisco, but then we wondered if that was American enough. After discussing the matter in more detail, we decided to move to Boston, New York City, or Philadelphia.

We decided on New York City, as close as we could get to Central Park. An agent recommenced by the AGCT home office found us an apartment with enough rooms on the top floor of a building that was only two blocks from Central Park. Of course, the apartment was ungodly expensive, $167 per month, but we could afford it, so we moved in.

We were on the fifth floor of the building and the roof was flat so that the kids could play up there. The roof coping was high enough that there was no danger of one of them falling off, and the top of the coping was shaped so that there was no temptation to sit upon it or to try to walk on it. We were not going to let the kids go up there without supervision, so we felt safe with it.

There was an elevator with a permanently assigned operator. Hell, with the price we were paying for the apartment, there damned well should be one. He knew without us saying anything not to take the kids down to the street level without an adult along with them. We found a 34-year-old nanny who spoke excellent English, though she had a British accent, who moved in to live in a spare bedroom.

Charles, who was 8 years old, was entered in the 3^rd Grade because of his age, even though he was capable of doing 5^th Grade work. I wondered how long it would be before he was bored to death. Sarah went to kindergarten and Ted stayed home.

The nanny, Ann Hopewell, traveled to school each morning with Charles and met him to bring him home from school every afternoon. This was necessary because Charles had not yet learned how to negotiate the streets by himself. He also tended to speak Mandarin when he got lost and nervous, so there was nobody who could understand his questions and give him directions. Ann solved that problem by traveling back and forth with Charles the whole time he was in the 3^rd Grade.

Yes, as expected, Charles was thoroughly bored with the 3^rd Grade by the end of the second month. He was an A+ student across the board except in deportment. Charles was lucky to receive a C- in that skill. His problem was that he had a habit of correcting the teacher on several subjects, and she was getting tired of it.

Everybody finally gave in and shifted Charles to the 5^th Grade. His attitude improved immediately because the class was studying things that he had not previously learned from his tutor in China. Now, Charles’ problem was the bullies who were delighted to have a much younger boy to pick on.

What they did not know was that Charles had studied kung fu while he was in China, and he broke one bully’s arm, it was a compound fracture, when he went too far in bullying Charles. This happened to be the largest bully in the class, and it was enough to frighten the other bullies enough that they left Charles alone from then on.

Charles wound up making some fast friends in the 5^th Grade when he would not let the bullies pick on anyone whom he considered a friend, and, to Charles, you were automatically a friend until you proved otherwise. He even stopped the bullying among the girls, though he never had to use physical force. The female bullies were afraid that he might forget himself and attack one of them. The 5^th Grade became a much more pleasant place for everybody, including the teacher.

The teacher was the one who told us about how Charles dominated the playground and kept order with just a stern glance. She appreciated that, and she wanted us to know what a treasure Charles was. Of course that was news to Liz and me because Charles never mentioned it. He just thought that was the way things should be, and he was going to see to it since no one else was doing the job.

We were both very proud of him and what he was doing to protect the weaker members of the class. One day, I mentioned that to Charles, and he was dumbfounded. He never thought of himself as a hero, he figured that he was an ordinary citizen doing what any citizen should do. Liz said that Charles was “a chip off the old block.” I found that very pleasing, but also somewhat surprising. I never thought of myself that way.

Charles finished the 5^th Grade at the top of his class, and we were now willing to let him travel the streets of New York City alone. He did carry a stick with him which he had learned to use in the kung fu class, so he was the equal of any adult who did not use a gun. The knife was still the favorite weapon of the thugs on the street, and no knife was going to get close to Charles if he had any warning at all.

In fact, the times when I walked the streets with Charles, I had the distinct feeling that he was protecting me! This tuned out to be a very pleasant summer, so Ann and the kids spent a lot of time in Central Park. Charles had his baton, as he called it, along with him every time they went out, and he expected to use it if he had to defend any of his party against unwanted actions.

On one occasion, four high school boys made some unwanted advances on Sarah. Ann warned them off, but they would not listen to “that old bitch.” This was more than Charles could take, so he stepped in. He ordered the boys to go somewhere else, and, naturally, they laughed at him. One of them grabbed Sarah’s arm, and she screamed in terror. After all, she was only 7 years old.

Ann reported that Charles reacted so fast that she had trouble following what happened. Charles drew his baton and swatted the boy holding Sarah in that arm with the baton hard enough to break his elbow. He poked another boy in the solar plexus and drove out his breath. The third boy tried to kick Charles, and that resulted in a broken ankle from a baton strike.

The fourth boy very stupidly drew a knife and made a swipe at Charles. Charles blocked the knife with his baton and hit the boy on the right ear with the palm of his left hand. This was enough to knock the boy to the ground, and the knife went flying. Charles directed Ann to pick up the knife while he watched over the four boys.

Three of the four boys needed medical attention, so Charles sent the fourth boy, the one he had poked in the solar plexus, to find a policeman and bring him to the site of the altercation. It took a good 30 minutes for the boy to get back with the policeman, who was all primed to arrest Charles for assault and battery. However, he saw the difference in size between the four high school boys and the elementary school boy and burst into laughter.