© Maynard Chen, All rights reserved 2009.
A sharing by Maynard Chen
February 3rd 2003, On the road to Wendover, Utah
After Sacramento I began the ascent into the Sierras. This was where one was most likely to encounter snow. I began to listen to Red Azaleas by Anchee Min. It was a poignant semi-autobiographical story of her growing up in China during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. As I drove past Emigrant Gap and Donner Summit(7239 ft) I thought of the early settlers who had passed along the route. The nearby pass is where the Donner party were stuck in the winter of 1846. Of the 81 emigrants, only 45 survived to reach California and some resorted to cannibalism. There couldn’t be anything more disparate and disconnected between the two chains of thought alternating in my mind: Anchee Min’s story of interpersonal struggles as a budding actress in China and the trials and tribulations of the early immigrants pitted against the weather while moving west to California.
Fortunately for me the weather held up, only a light dusting of snow. I turned on the windshield wipers to clear the snow, but something weird was happening. The more I sprayed fluid the dirtier it got! Upon closer examination I realized that the “dirt” was nothing more than the windshield cleaning fluid freezing and turning into slush. I had forgotten that my sunny California windshield wiper fluid did not contain anti-freeze. A new bottle of wiper fluid fixed the problem.
After driving over the Sierras, I crossed my first state border into Nevada – the casino state. The border was quite obvious because of the plethora of gigantic neons inviting you to try your luck and make (or more likely lose) your fortune. It was quite clear they were there to suck money out of Californians. Despite the glittering neons I did not stop except for gas, food and toilet breaks.
As I approached Wendover on the border with Utah, it was getting dark and I had resolved earlier to stop whenever it got dark so as to avoid getting into a situation where I might be stranded on the freeway at night. If I had engine problems, it would be bitterly cold, and if I was caught in a snowstorm I would not dare to leave the engine running anyway. In the Massachusetts blizzard of ’78, some people who were stranded on the freeway and left their engines on to keep the car warm, died of carbon monoxide poisoning because snow drifts blocked their exhaust vents.
On a lesser scale, at the border with Utah there were neon signs again attempting to suck money from the residents of Utah.
I checked into a Motel 6 in Wendover. This is a great chain. The rooms are clean and comfortable, and the prices very reasonable. One advantage of the presence of a gaming industry for non-gamblers like me is the low price of accommodations and meals. I suspect they can afford to subsidise them so as to lure the crowds to the gaming tables.
(To be continued)
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About the Writer
Maynard Chen was a software consultant working in Silicon Valley from 1997 to 2003. He has now relocated to Singapore.
