Diamond Grill (1996)

Submitted by:
srudy
February, 2010

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Perfect bound with red, purple and black cover. Combined black and white photographs courtesy of Fred Wah on the front cover, excerpts from and commentary on Diamond Grill, brief biography and photograph of Fred Wah by Don Denton on back cover. [I am in negotiations with the publisher to make a portion of this text available in digital form soon.]

Second edition (2006) available from NeWest Press.

Citation

title:

Diamond Grill

title without prefix:

Diamond Grill

full citation:

Wah, Fred. Diamond Grill. Edmonton: NeWest P, 1996.

publication date:

1996

first published:

1996

archival date:

2010

number of pages:

176

catalogue description:

A27 DIAMOND GRILL 1996

Diamond | Grill | Fred Wah
Pp. 1-176
9 x 6 in.; 23 x 15 cm.; Perfect bound with red, purple and black cover. Combined black and white photographs courtesy of Fred Wah on the front cover, excerpts from and commentary on Diamond Grill, brief biography and photograph of Fred Wah by Don Denton on back cover.

[i] half-title; [ii] blank; [iii] title-page [iv] copyright information [v] dedication: for Fred, Connie, and Ethel | for family; [vi] blank; [vii] epigraph: You were part Chinese I tell them. | They look at me. I’m pulling their leg. | So I’m Chinese too and that’s why my name is Wah. | They don’t really believe me. That’s o.k. | When you’re not “pure” you just make it up. | —from Waiting for Saskatchewan; [viii] blank; [ix] Acknowledgements [x] blank [xi-xv] contents [xvi] blank 1-176 text.

Published in Edmonton by NeWest Press, 1996.

Titles: In the Diamond, at the End of a – Mixed Grill is an Entrée at the Diamond – The Muffled Scraping of the Snow Plow Down – Yet Languageless. Mouth Always a Gauze, Words Locked – Dirty Heathens, Granny Erickson Thinks of the Chinese – Chinese Sausage? When I’m in Chinatown I See – To Top it Off, His Birth Certificate Has – Dad Doesn’t Cook Much With Ginger But Whenever – One of the First Times I Become Him – They Wouldn’t Speak to Me Until After You – 5:30 A.M by the Time He Walks Into – Whenever I Open Up For Him (So He – I Guess He’s Peeved Enough at All The – By the Time He Gets Over Feeling Spooked – His Mother’s Family Are Stern and Religious Scots/Irish – Those Doors Take Quite a Beating. Brass – These Straits and Islands of the Blood Can – Pong Shows Up Anytime in the Morning – Famous Chinese Restaurant is the Name of A – Once in The New World, The Immigrant Can – Cabri Quote – As Soon As the Café Opens at Quarter – The Silent Anger Simmers, Over Some Failed Expectation – I tell if He Get’s Her A – At the Front of the Diamond Grill are – She Complained, My Mother Says of Granny Erickson – The Race Track? Swedish, Chinese, Scottish, Irish, Canadian – Hands on the Move, and With One of – Old Man Hansen Comes In at Ten To – I’m Fairly Blond in Grade Four and Still – Stainless Steel All Along the Soda Fountain, Silver – But I’m Half Swedish. My Mother was Born – My Sister Says Tomato Beef is Enough To – Takeout at the Diamond is Usually Just Sandwiches – But Poor Mom. She Knows the Girls Don’t – She Cries From Anger. That’s What She Tells – On my Swedish Side I Feel More Gloom – I’m a Chintzy Tipper in Restaurants Because I’m – The Way We Serve Milk at the Diamond – Don’t Cut Your Food Up All At Once – Better Watch Out For The Craw, Better Watch – He Wouldn’t Go Back Again With No Chance – Florence Was the Cashier at the Regal. Good – Lucky Jim Always Had A Big Gold-Toothed Smile – How to Beat The Game (But First We’ll – Faking it from all that Language, in the – My Father Plays Mah Jong and Fan Tan – When I Sit On One of the Stools – In Nelson My Father Joins the Lions Club – Quite Suddenly Lo Bok Reappears in my Life – Sitkum Dollah Grampa Wah Laughs as He Flips – The Christmas Before He Dies he Comes to – Last Christmas When I Grabbed you by the – The Lottery, Pak Kop Piu, is a Hub – Why Grampa Eats Such Much, Or Drinks It – Rice is White Rice, Polished, and, if Cooked – Donna Mori’s Shift Starts at Seven – After the War, Japanese-Canadians Continue to Live – The Best Times in the Diamond Are Around – My Dad Half Jokes Once in Awhile That – A Few Years I Came Upon Some – Salisbury Steak, A Patty of Ground Beef Mixed – I’m Just a Baby, Maybe Six Months (.5%) – Course Again, Now We’re Talking A Different Generation – What Anima Gets Through the Family Ghosts Immediate – The Wah Family Reunions Are Usually During the – Whenever We Ask Auntie Ethel About China or – They’re Old and Sitting on the Couch and – When Ethel Broke Her Hip, In Moose Jaw – After our Family Moves Out to British Columbia – Well, Ray, The Other Question I’m Kind of – The early morning rush is over by 7:30 – My father never screams. When he gets mad – Until Mary McNutter called me a Chink I – Whenever I go to him straight, there’s never – The door to the kitchen cooler is just – He never gets blue. He’ll get red when – Looks like it’s going to snow all day – The coffee urn’s a big stainless double with – Spring, Stanley Cup Playoffs, You Away and Your – I complain to my mom one night that – The pastry cook in the Diamond is one – I bust my ass to give those kids – It could be as irrelevant as pouting each – On the edge of Centre. Just off Main – Deep fried whole rock cod is a special – The cook’s anger, scowly. Back behind some uncle – The stove at the Diamond is a big – Salesmen start coming into the kitchen around eight – And you, old, mumbling to yourself Swedish Grampa – The doorway to the basement is to the – The café itself is a long narrow room – What’s already in the ground, roots of another – I can always tell, when our family walks – Around quarter to ten the morning coffee rush – Another chip on my shoulder is the appropriation – The dishwasher is a thin, old man whose only – Even their dark eyes. A kind of afterbirth – The safe is in the office and the – In our family we call it Gim Jim – Chinese head tax paid out land grants to – A few years ago I get his gun – Strange to watch your children’s bloods. Like ones – Lake link. A small beach etched out from – My wife’s grandparents homesteaded this place. Her grandfather – I hardly ever go into King’s Family Restaurant – The politics of the Family – The Chinese banquet at our family reunion is – Up front between the door and the soda – It’s a small Colt pistol. I keep it – Soft ice cream hits Nelson about 1953 but – Between eleven and noon a lull in business – My Dad’s favourite song on the jukebox is – A new menu every day. Soup du Jour – I’m not aware it’s called tofu until after – The vinyl floor in the café has to – You get to know the tippers. If they – The rush hour at lunch today is more – You never taught me how, but I remember – Besides the four miniature Wurlitzers stationed on the – Who is he, this guy with smiles and – The gates to the kitchen are the same – Just another tight lipped high muck-a-muck reception listening – Who am I thought I might say – Juk is a soup we always have after – The name’s all I’ve had to work through – Cellars are complicit with gravity. An entire town’s – The New Star is actually our first café – His FW signet ring on my left little – His half-dream in the still dark breathing silence is – Years in the never-ending aftershock reverberates on at – He usually parks behind the café. Coming down.