Since they both agreed they were starving, since they only received powdered eggs and a dry, rubbery pastry during the flight, they decided to find a place to eat. "Chinatown," Stephen said. "Let's take the subway for a spin."
It seemed strange to be able to catch a train by descending stairs into darkness, and when they reached the platform and the tracks, the noise of the approaching trains with squealing wheels assaulted her eardrums with their volume. A long, light blue train slowed on the platform. Stephen read the placards on the side and said "There it is! Let's get it!" Linda could see rows of people standing inside.
"Can't we wait for one that's a little less full?"
"Aw, just grab the hook on the overhead rail, darling," he told her as he took her hand and led her onto the train. "Be like a real New Yorker. Besides, we won't be on it that long."
A sea of humanity surrounded them on the inside, from burly, longshoreman types to Asian girls carrying backpacks who appeared to be students, to businessmen who had folded newspapers into a narrow little section and studied them as the train rushed along. A man dressed in rags shuffled about approaching people and asking them for spare change.
When they stepped off the subway at the stop for Chinatown, they climbed stairs and emerged into a world that Linda swore must be in Shanghai. Chinese merchants sold fish and meat from open-air markets and Chinese youths rode bicycles through the streets. Other tourists like them snapped pictures of the buildings with slanting Oriental roofs and gilded accents. A couple of blocks down, they found a restaurant with a window reading "American Style cuisine." Stephen guided her through the door and she saw a little walking bridge and an artificial stream running beneath it, where large, colorful koi swam.
A polite hostess in a pea-collared gold jacket greeted them, and helped them to a circular booth in a dim, cozy restaurant. Well-groomed, efficient waiters in gold mandarin jackets breezed past, from the dining room to the tables. "American style cuisine?" Linda said. "This looks like some of the nicer Chinese restaurants back home."
"Well, I've heard that Chinese people don't actually eat Chinese food," he said. As they settled into the booth and looked over their menus, Stephen proposed a toast with their water glasses.
When the waiter arrived to take their order, Linda was surprised to hear him speaking plain, unaccented English. "Is it true," she asked "that Chinese people don't really eat Chinese food?"