Married Life in Seattle, Washington, USA

The University of Washington is a beautiful campus. So is the City of Seattle. Because of the sometimes dreaded rain that lasts about 7 months of the year, everything is wet and green there. Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks even made a movie there once. It is called Sleepless in Seattle although most viewers would remember the Empire State Building in New York where the lovebirds finally met better than the Space Needle of Seattle.

Mary joined Paul in Seattle a week after graduating from HKU. The life of this newly-wed couple who were foreign students was not one of luxury.Although Paul drew a monthly research stipend of about $3,000, he and Mary had to budget it carefully to pay for a small one-bedroom apartment, food, clothing and all the other necessaries of life. They couldn’t afford a car; so they bought two used bicycles with mud flaps.

They were both betting that Paul would receive his Ph.D. in less than three years so that their involuntary vow of
poverty could be lifted. While that was going on for him, she took classes in English and biology as she always wanted to have a degree in the latter even when she was studying Chinese literature at HKU. The system in Hong Kong was such that if you were in one academic discipline, you could hardly take classes in others. It would be next to impossible for a liberal arts major to take classes in science subjects.

But she would always schedule her classes around him. Specifically she would avoid classes that happened close to noon time, as that was the time they had lunch together either in the school cafeteria, on a school lawn or by Lake Washington when the weather was nice. Without exception, every day she made and packed two lunches in the morning. She did that because she wanted him to eat healthy and because they really couldn’t afford to buy lunch too often.

Overall, their life was typical of many young couples who were poor graduate students. School was the center of their calendar. During school breaks and summer, they would joy-ride with friends around the city and state. They even traveled to near-by Vancouver, Canada two or three times and ate good, cheap Chinese food there. Paul was truly an advanced computer person. He was well respected by his peers and professors in his department. Mary did well in her pursuit of a biology major too. She even had fleeting thoughts about going to medical school later because her grades were exemplary. Although she would like to go out and see more of the United States, Paul was not the adventurous type, so they never went very far from campus.

Paul did receive his Ph.D. in less than three years. He was recruited right away by Mightysoft as a senior engineer. Three months after his new job at the high-tech giant, they bought a 3,000 square-foot house in Seattle,
Washington.

Now they were middle class Americans. A few months after they moved in their new house, Mary finished her degree in biology and they held a big celebration in their new home. The parents from both sides of the family from Hong Kong were invited. Mary’s older siblings Jack and Tanya also came. So did Paul’s younger brother Tom. Everybody was proud of and happy for this young couple’s achievements.

During the party, Mary’s dad pulled his daughter aside and asked:

“Mary, you don’t look too excited. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Dad.”

“Paul treating you okay?”

“He’s fine, Dad.”

*** To Be Continued ***

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