Crazy Rich Asians (7 page)

Most people driving past the squat grayish-brown building on a busy intersection of
Causeway Bay would likely assume it was some sort of government health office, but
the Chinese Athletic Association was actually one of Hong Kong’s most exclusive private
clubs. Despite its rather perfunctory name, it was the first Chinese-founded sports
facility in the former British Crown colony. It boasted the legendary gambling tycoon
Stanley Lo as its honorary president, and its restrictive membership had an eight-year
waiting list open only to the most established families.

The CAA’s public rooms were still firmly entrenched in late-seventies chrome-and-leather
decor, since members voted to spend all the money on updating the sports facilities.
Only the acclaimed restaurant had been revamped in the last few years into a plush
dining room with pale-rose brocade walls and windows overlooking the main tennis courts.
The round tables were strategically aligned so that everyone was seated with a view
of the restaurant’s main door, allowing its esteemed members to make a grand entrance
in their après-sport outfits and making mealtimes a prime spectator sport.

Every Sunday afternoon, the Cheng family would come together without fail for lunch
at the CAA. No matter how busy or hectic the week had been, everyone knew that Sunday
dim sum at the
Clubhouse, as they called it, was mandatory attendance by all family members who were
in town. Dr. Malcolm Cheng was Asia’s most esteemed heart surgeon. So prized were
his skilled hands that he was famous for always wearing lambskin gloves—made specially
for him by Dunhill—to protect his precious hands whenever he ventured out in public,
and he took additional measures to safeguard them from the wear and tear of driving,
opting instead to be chauffeured in his Rolls-Royce Silver Spirit.

This was something his well-brought-up wife, the former Alexandra “Alix” Young of
Singapore, felt to be overly ostentatious, so she preferred to call for a taxi wherever
possible and allow her husband the exclusive use of his car and driver. “After all,”
she was keen to say, “he’s saving people’s lives every day and I’m just a housewife.”
This self-deprecation was standard behavior for Alexandra, even though she was the
true architect of their fortune.

As a bored doctor’s wife, Alexandra began channeling every cent of her husband’s considerable
earnings into properties just as the Hong Kong housing boom was taking off. She found
that she had a preternatural talent for timing the market, so beginning in the oil-recession
days of the seventies, through the Communist-panic sell-off of the mid-eighties and
the Asian financial crisis of 1997, Alexandra was always snapping up properties when
they hit rock bottom and selling at the peak. By the middle of the first decade of
the new century, with Hong Kong property going for more money per square foot than
anywhere else in the world, the Chengs found themselves sitting on one of the largest
privately held real estate portfolios on the island.

Sunday lunch gave Malcolm and his wife a chance to inspect their children and grandchildren
on a weekly basis, and it was a duty they undertook with utter seriousness. For in
spite of all the advantages the Cheng children had growing up, Malcolm and Alexandra
were constantly worrying about them. (Actually, Alexandra was the one doing most of
the worrying.)

Their youngest son, Alistair, “the hopeless one,” was the pampered ne’er-do-well who
had just barely scraped through Sydney University and was now doing something or other
in the Hong Kong film industry. He had recently become involved with Kitty Pong, a
soap-opera star who claimed she was from “a good Taiwanese family,”
even though everyone else in the Cheng family doubted it, since her spoken Mandarin
took on a distinctive northern China accent rather than the more cutesy inflections
of Taiwanese Mandarin.

Their daughter, Cecilia, “the horsey one,” had developed a passion for dressage at
an early age and was constantly dealing with her temperamental horse or her temperamental
husband, Tony, an Australian commodities trader whom Malcolm and Alexandra secretly
nicknamed “the Convict.” A “full-time mother,” Cecilia actually spent more time on
the international equestrian circuit than raising their son, Jake. (Due to all the
hours he spent with their Filipino maids, Jake was becoming fluent in Tagalog; he
could also do a brilliant impression of Sinatra’s “My Way.”)

And then there was Eddie, their firstborn. To all appearances, Edison Cheng was “the
perfect one.” He had breezed through Cambridge Judge Business School with distinction,
done a stint at Cazenove in London, and was now a rising star in Hong Kong’s private
banking world. He had married Fiona Tung, who hailed from a politically connected
family, and they had three very studious, well-behaved children. But privately, Alexandra
worried the most about Eddie. In the last few years, he was spending far too much
time hanging around with these dubious Mainland Chinese billionaires, flying all over
Asia every week to attend parties, and she worried how this might be affecting his
health and his family life.

Today’s lunch was especially important since Alexandra wanted to plan the logistics
of the family trip next month to Singapore for the Khoo wedding. It was the first
time the entire family—parents, children, grandchildren, servants, and nannies included—was
traveling together, and Alexandra wanted to make sure everything went off perfectly.
At one o’clock, the family began filtering in from all corners: Malcolm from a mixed-doubles
tennis match; Alexandra from church with Cecilia, Tony, and Jake; Fiona and her children
from their weekend tutors; and Alistair from rolling out of bed fifteen minutes ago.

Eddie was the last to arrive, and as usual he was on his phone, coming to the table
and ignoring everyone, chattering loudly in Cantonese on his Bluetooth earpiece. When
he finally finished his call, he flashed his family a self-satisfied grin. “It’s all
sorted! I just spoke with Leo, and he wants us to use his family jet,” Eddie declared,
referring to his best friend Leo Ming.

“For all of us to fly to Singapore?” Alexandra asked, a bit confused.

“Yes, of course!”

Fiona raised an immediate objection. “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. First,
I really don’t think the entire family should be traveling together on the same plane.
What would happen if there was an accident? Second, we shouldn’t be asking such a
favor of Leo.”

“I knew you were going to say that, Fi,” Eddie began. “That’s why I came up with this
plan: Daddy and Mummy should go a day earlier with Alistair; Cecilia, Tony, and Jake
can fly with us the next day; and later in the day, the nannies can bring our children.”

“That’s outrageous. How can you even think of taking advantage of Leo’s plane like
that?” Fiona exclaimed.

“Fi, he’s my best friend and he couldn’t care less how much we use the plane,” Eddie
retorted.

“What kind of jet is it? A Gulfstream? A Falcon?” Tony asked.

Cecilia dug her nails into her husband’s arm, annoyed at his eagerness, and cut in.
“Why do
your
kids get to fly separately while my son has to travel with us?”

“What about Kitty? She’s coming too,” Alistair asked quietly.

Everyone at the table glared at Alistair in horror. “
Nay chee seen, ah!
”
^*
Eddie snapped.

Alistair was indignant. “I already RSVP’d for her. And Colin told me that he couldn’t
wait
to meet her. She’s a big star, and I—”

“In the
New Territories
maybe a couple of idiots watching trashy soap operas might know who she is, but trust
me, nobody in Singapore has ever heard of her,” Eddie cut in.

“That’s not true—she’s one of Asia’s fastest-rising stars. And that’s beside the point—I
want all our relatives in Singapore to meet her,” Alistair said.

Alexandra considered the implications of his declaration quietly, but decided to pick
her battles one at a time. “Fiona is right. We can’t possibly borrow the Ming family
plane two days in a row! In fact, I think it would look very inappropriate for us
to fly in a private plane at all. I mean, who do we think we are?”

“Daddy’s one of the most famous heart surgeons in the world! You are Singaporean royalty!
What’s wrong with flying on a private
plane?” Eddie shouted in frustration, his hands gesticulating so wildly that he almost
hit the waiter behind him, who was about to place a huge stack of bamboo steamers
on the table.

“Uncle Eddie, look out! There’s food right behind you!” his nephew Jake shouted.

Eddie glanced around for a second and continued on his tirade. “Why are you always
like this, Mummy? Why do you always behave so provincial? You are filthy rich! Why
can’t you be a little less cheap for once and have more a sense of your own self-worth?”
His three children looked up momentarily from their math practice test books. They
were used to his rages at home but had rarely seen him so upset in front of
Gong Gong
and Ah Ma. Fiona pulled at his sleeve, whispering, “Lower your voice! Please don’t
talk about money in front of the children.”

His mother shook her head calmly. “Eddie, this has nothing to do with self-worth.
I just feel this sort of extravagance is completely unnecessary. And I am not Singaporean
royalty. Singapore has no royalty. What a ridiculous thing to say.”

“This is so typical of you, Eddie. You just want all of Singapore to know that you
flew in on Ming Kah-Ching’s plane,” Cecilia interjected, reaching for one of the plump
roast-pork buns. “If it was
your
own plane, that would be one thing, but to have the audacity to
borrow
a plane for three trips in two days is just unheard of. I personally would rather
pay for my own tickets.”

“Kitty flies private all the time,” Alistair said, though no one at the table paid
him any attention.

“Well, we
should
get our own jet. I’ve been saying it for years. Dad, you spend practically half the
month in the Beijing clinic, and since I plan to expand my presence into China in
a big way in the coming year—” Eddie began.

“Eddie, I have to agree with your mother and sister on this one. I just would not
want to be indebted to the Ming family in this way,” Malcolm finally said. As much
as he enjoyed flying private, he could not stomach the thought of borrowing the Ming
jet.

“Why do I keep trying to do this ungrateful family so many favors?” Eddie huffed in
disgust. “Okay, you all do what you want. Squeeze into economy on China Airlines for
all I care.
My
family and I are taking Leo’s plane. And it’s a Bombardier Global Express. It’s
huge, state-of-the-art. There’s even a Matisse in the cabin. It’s going to be
amazing
.”

Fiona gave him a disapproving look, but he glared at her so forcefully that she retreated
from any further objection. Eddie shoveled down a few rolls of shrimp
cheong fun
, got up, and announced imperiously, “I’m off. I have important clients to attend
to!” And with that, Eddie stormed out, leaving a rather relieved family in his wake.

Tony, mouth full of food, whispered to Cecilia, “Let’s see their entire family plunge
into the South China Sea on Leo Ming’s fancy-ass plane.”

As much as she tried to, Cecilia couldn’t stifle her laugh.

Eleanor

After a few days of strategically placed phone calls, Eleanor finally nailed down
the source of the disturbing rumor involving her son. Daisy confessed hearing it from
her daughter-in-law’s best friend Rebecca Tang, who in turn revealed that she’d heard
it from her brother Moses Tang, who had been at Cambridge with Leonard Shang. And
Moses had this to report to Eleanor:

“I was in London for a conference. At the last minute, Leonard invites me down to
dinner at his country estate in Surrey. Have you been there, Mrs. Young? Aiyoh, what
a palace! I didn’t realize it was designed by Gabriel-Hippolyte Destailleur, the architect
who built Waddesdon Manor for the English Rothschilds. Anyway, we were dining with
all these
ang mor
^*
VIPS and MPs
^†
visiting from Singapore and as usual Cassandra Shang is holding court. And then out
of nowhere Cassandra says loudly across the table to your sister-in-law Victoria Young,
‘You’ll never guess what I heard … Nicky has been dating a Taiwanese girl in New York,
and now he’s bringing her to Singapore for the Khoo wedding!’ And Victoria says, ‘Are
you sure?
Taiwanese?
Good grief, did he fall for some gold digger?’ And then
Cassandra says something like, ‘Well, it might not be as bad as you think. I have
it on good authority that she’s one of the Chu girls. You know, of the Taipei Plastics
Chus. Not exactly old money, but at least they are one of the most solid families
in Taiwan.”