(Written by a former physics teacher in Shanghai who now lives in Portland, Oregon)

While I was cooking dinner, the door bell rang, and when I opened the door, my friend Dr. Zhou was standing there mumbling an apology.  I didn’t understand and asked what he had done.  He looked like a child that had been scolded for improper behavior and I finally understood that his wife had told him that he shouldn’t have left his apartment when I visited them.   He said that he had left, as he wanted to go to the library to catch up on the day’s news.  He said that he was very sorry. 

I couldn’t help laughing and told him that his leaving hadn’t mattered to me at all.  I explained to him that when he had left, his wife and I had had a good time chatting.

He was pleased to hear that as it put his mind at rest and with a smile he returned to his apartment.

            The event he was referring to had occurred a couple of hours previously.  He had asked me to go to his apartment for an explanation of problems he was having in listening to English and his wife had been there.    His teacher – Barbara – had taped several exercises for him, and even though he’d played it many times, he couldn’t understand parts of it so I'd explained them.  His wife had had some questions, too, and I worked with her.

While that was happening, he had nothing to do so he said that he was going to go to the computer room to read the news on the internet.  His wife had immediately said that he couldn’t leave so he asked again, and when she still said that he shouldn’t leave, he left anyway.  I had been amused.  There was something childlike about the way he asked and then did what he wanted even though permission hadn’t been granted.  

     The day after he came to apologize, his wife knocked on my door, as she wanted  to talk about the matter.  I told her that nothing more need be said, as he’d already told me he was sorry that he had left, but she wanted to tell me her version of what had happened. 

     She said that when he'd gone to the computer room to read the news, she had decided that she'd ignore him when he returned.

     As soon as he entered the apartment, he saw that she was unhappy, and asked what the problem was.  She told him once more that he shouldn’t have left their apartment while I was there.  When she said it that third time, he had finally agreed that he had been wrong and that’s why he had come to my apartment to apologize.

She went on to say that she was angry with him for making such a stupid mistake, as he was almost seventy years old.

In an effort to make her feel better, I said that his leaving that day had been perfectly acceptable to me.  I added that I'd always regarded the two of them as being a very happy husband and wife team even though in this case, she had acted more like his mother. 

That made both of us laugh for we knew it was true.