Mahjong and Me

The pressure is building, and she cannot decide if she is feeling it of is she seeing it. She knows nothing about the game of majhong, but sitting next to her MIL (mother-in-law), watching those fat shiny tiles knocking about the table, taking in all the banter and trying to suss out what was actually going on, was fascinating enough.

Mrs Lee has stopped talking in the last five minutes; all her tiles are face down and her eyes move with every tile that is being handled. Yingying, sitting opposite Mrs Lee, continues to slurp her bowl of instant noodles intermittently, making loud smacking noises which strangely reminds her of the movie "Gremlins". Mr Wong sits opposite MIL, and smokes a grubby looking Double Happiness as he discusses the stock market with Yingying. MIL butts in every now and then, trying to get Mrs Lee back into the conversation in the vain hope of making her let something, anything slip. She also interjects Mr Wong and Yingying's chitchat with anecdotes and grossly exaggerated "facts and figures" regarding the performance of various H-shares.

They've been playing for about two hours and as far as I can work out, Mr Wong is the biggest loser so far. He has been paying up at the end of every win and he is yet to have his first win (I might have missed it when I was sent to the kitchen to make the instant noodles for Yingying). Mrs Lee is right behind him, having only had one win so far, which probably explains her intense concentration on the game at the moment.

MIL is the real sneaky one, pitching people against one another. She might appear to be making friendly chit chat, but I know her, and I know she is not the one to waste her time on anything that does not promise a tangible gain of some sort. A right bitch, she is. She agreed to her son marrying me, because I was already pregnant with her first grandchild.

She was appalled by the fact that I do not know how to play mahjong.