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My nainai was born to a landowning family in Jiangsu. Her surname was Shi, which means "stone", a stubborn word that suited her personality. In 1944, when she was not yet 16, she renounced her class and joined the army in service of the Communist party's cause. She had dry, sturdy hands that raised three generations of children. My cousins, relying on her long after they'd left home, would often leave their children, her great-grandchildren, in her care. She was fiery and straightforward, unpretentious to the core. On the other side of the ocean, my father often laughed at how you couldn't trust nainai to buy any clothes. One summer, in middle school, I grabbed a cigarette from her when she was playing mahjong and told her not to smoke. She laughed at me and pulled another cigarette from the packet.
奶奶出生在江苏省的一个地主家里。她姓石，是“石头”的意思，这个词很硬，很适合她固执的性格。1944年，未满16岁的奶奶放弃了自己的阶级参了军，为共产党的事业服务。她有一双干练的手，养育了三代子孙。我的表兄弟姐妹们离开家后很长时间都在依靠她照顾，他们的孩子，也就是她的曾孙，也常常由她来照顾。她热情直率而又朴实无华。在大洋的另一边，我的父亲经常嘲笑我，他说奶奶真的从来不买衣服，你怎么能不信呢？记得我在上中学的一个夏天，奶奶在打麻将，我从她手里夺过一根烟，让不要抽烟。她对我笑了笑，然后又从烟盒里抽出一支烟。
On the last day of our interviews, after I turned off the microphone, she put a hand on my wrist and started talking again. She said that in her life, she had just been an ordinary person. Not extraordinary at anything. And with a personality like a boy's. But she'd always tried to help others. Whether she had money or not, if there was something she could do, she did it. So even though she was just a low-level cadre in the civil system, people liked her. They all came to give her greetings at New Year. She was known for being diligent at work. She wasn't selfish. That was how she'd lived her life.
在我们采访的最后一天，我关掉麦克风后，她把一只手放在我的手腕上，然后又开始说话了。她说，在我的一生中，我都只是一个普通人，没有什么特别的地方。奶奶有着男孩子的性格，不过她总会尽力帮助别人。不管自己有没有钱，只要她能帮她都会去帮。所以，虽然奶奶只是民事系统中的低层干部，但是大家都很喜欢她，都会过来给她拜年。奶奶工作勤奋是出了名的，她从不自私自利。奶奶的一生就是这么过来的。
After she died, I shared the recordings of my interviews in the family WeChat group. My uncle, who had been in Indiana and was also unable to physically attend the funeral, thanked me. "I cried hearing her voice again," he said.
奶奶死后，我在微信家庭群里分享了我的采访录音。我的叔叔当时在印第安纳州，也没能亲自参加奶奶的葬礼，他对我表示感谢。“又听到了她的声音，我哭了，”他说。
Later, he pointed out how basic my questions had been. "That interview – you don't understand Chinese history at all, though!"
后来，他指出我问的问题太基础了。“那个采访——只能说明你对中国的历史一点儿都不懂！”
He probably didn't realise how this hurt me, but oh, it hurt. It was another reminder of how I didn't really "belong" with the people on the other side of the WeChat group. I had tried my best to keep up with the Chinese world, but time spent in one world was time spent away from my other one.
他可能没有意识到这句话有多让我伤心，真的很让人伤心。它再次提醒我我并不真正“属于”微信群另一边的人。我已经在尽力跟上中国的步伐了，但是活在另一个世界里的我又怎能了解这个世界的全部呢。
