She stays in my mind because I found her fascinating. I stand by that. It’s not the whole truth, of course.

I’ve already established the fact I don’t know the rules of what I’m allowed to say, about whom, to what level of honesty. While I’m not worried about being canceled, I know what I’m about to say might (nay, will) offend some.

The flight attendant on our flight was a Chinese woman. She told us she’s Chinese; that she came to “…this great country to pursue my dreams.” My guess is she was between 55-65. Her English was coated with a thick accent. That accent. The one movies and comedians use to mock the Chinese.

That’s how she spoke. Truly. I have need to embellish or lie. Why? Because I don’t know the rules around writing about someone who’s putting herself right thick in the middle of a cultural stereotype.

I wrote down some of the sentences she said during our flight. As she spoke to a young boy around five or six, she said, “Do you want a wing? Don’t eat it, okay?” The wing in question is one of those captain’s pins. Nothing having to do with chicken. Then, she went on, “You come home with me. I’ll make you Chinese fried rice.”

As she came down the aisle to gather up trash, she sang, “We Chinese like garbage.” At first people laughed, but soon the laughter became uncomfortable. Are we allowed to laugh at this?

We arrived at our gate, and she called out, “No cheating. We’re here, but we’re not there. The captain will make a cute sound like, ‘ching-ching’ and then you can stand up. Until then, sit down. Stay seated, everybody.” Because people ignored her, she then said, “Sit down, everybody. Sit down.” This time everyone listened.

With the door of the plane open and passengers deplaning, she called out, “Take care of yourself and be kind to each other.”

There’s so much about her I found refreshing, but the accent kept nagging at me. Am I allowed to share this? If people read it with a thick, Chinese accent, is this racist? If I don’t mention her accent, am I whitewashing? Who decides these rules?

I found her delightful. The fact she was trying was clear—make people laugh, make a boy feel comfortable, obey rules—still, something about her also caught me off guard.

This happened back in January of this year. I’ve been carrying around the page of legal paper where I wrote down her words. I’ve been thinking about her all year. There’s something about her. Yet, I still can’ quite articulate it.

I’ll let you know what it is when I figure it out.