Yu Han Wang

Spring day approaches without notice and barren trees are slowly budding with blossom. The ice cream truck’s music calls attention to the warming season, and the sunlight reflected by the building onto my face tells me that it’s time to do a closet switch.

“MOM, MA, MOMMY,” I yelled from my room, “do you remember where we put the summer clothing last year?” My room is a mess right now, hoodies are everywhere, and it’s hard to find a place for my feet to land. “Didn’t we store it in a plastic bucket?” Mom replied while sight at the mess I had made. Warzone, she must be thinking that. “Might be in your closet. Back.” “Back?” I wobbled through the room, minding my step. I crawled into my closet even though it did not let me in at all, “Back?” I mumbled. The closet itself is another warzone as Mama always tells me to clean up my wreck. The broken right door made it even harder to find the bucket, I tried to extend my arms to the back.

Touched something.

Not the tactile of a bucket but I cannot relate it to any of my clothing either. Touch it again, long, rectangle, got handle, leather.

I grabbed the object, light, and pulled it out.

It’s a red suitcase.

It’s my red suitcase.

I lay the suitcase on top of my clothing on the floor, just too excited to see what was inside since I had not seen it for years. I do not even know it’s in my closet…but well that is the problem with the broken door, not my memory.

Reach the zipper, unzip it, flip it up, “Mom, guess what I f…” My voice fades away, and so does the light of the room. I’m dazed, like drunk, even though I never had alcohol before. As I try to refocus my sight, something is weird. The hue is different, not my room’s familiar warm tone. It’s cold, not just in color tone, but in body temperature.

WHAT is happening, where am I? I looked around.

“Follow up, Yu Han,” she grabbed my left hand, and looked at me, “are you looking for something?” I investigated that woman’s face, it took me only a few seconds to recognize her as my grandma, much younger and taller. Wait. Taller? I look down, not the regular height that I was supposed to be up the ground. Much closer. I’m shorter, my body scales down like shrunk clothes.

“Is this teleport?” I mumbled, “No no no no, it seems like time travel more. I guess my 18-year-old spirit’s now within kindergarten me?” As I tried to figure out the situation, my grandma asked, “Are you looking for a bathroom?” It has been a long time since I saw my maternal grandma face to face, it must have been 10 years ago, at least. “No, I’m just…I miss you…” I catch up with the group and hold her hands again trying to hold my tears back. This time, it’s real, at least it feels realer than a dream, the temperature of her palm, the fine lines on her hands.

“Where are we heading toward?” I asked, trying to figure out what year it was from my memory.

Grandma did not reply, instead, she laughed, “Why are you talking to me in Mandarin now? When did you become so fluent in it?” She pats my head, like the way I pat my sister when she says something funny.

“I…” Before I can find a good excuse, the same dizziness approaches, light fades away, and so does my voice.

“Find it?” The same warm hue appears in my sight.

HOME, I’m back home now. Or did I ever leave the house?

It seems like the warmth of her palm still exists, but I start to doubt the truth of the meeting. I’m in the same position I was in before my last travel. Maybe rewind a little bit as I’m now still in the closet. As expected, my hand touched something leather again. This time, I’m sure it’s my suitcase.

I grabbed the suitcase, still light, and pulled it out.

Was it that I missed her too much, so the brain started to delulu…I leave the suitcase on the floor and reach my arm back to the closet again, just by doing that I start to sweat. I do not know if the sweat is out of nervousness or that winter is leaving with the rising temperature. Finally, I touched the bucket, it was all the way to the right where the broken door blocked me from moving it. “Well,” my brother said, “it’s because you’re too weak, just admit it.” when I called him to move that bucket out for me. I COULDN’T beat that sentence, so I yelled, “Mind you step while moving, DON’T STEP ON MY CLOTHES.” I rushed before him and moved everything that blocks his way, as I touched the suitcase and try to move it, he yells “Bro, I know this suitcase, damn, it must be as old as you.”

He likes to comment on EVERYTHING in my room, and the bright red suitcase is the best target. However, before I could hit him with my fist, the same dizziness came, and lights and sounds faded away as last time. 

Are you kidding me?

“Follow up, Yu Han,” she grabbed my left hand, and looked at me, “are you looking for something?” I looked at her again, “Granny?” said in FuZhou dialect this time.

“Bathroom?”

“No.”

“Alright, then let’s catch up with the group, we’re falling behind.”

I looked around, it was the same setup as last time, we were in the airport, on our way somewhere. Even the first sentence Grandma says is the same. This is crazy. My brain is processing like a hamster running a wheel till it’s on fire, so I better figure it out before my brain is on fire.

Who caused this traverse to happen? What exactly is it for? Where are we heading toward? When is this going to end? Why is it me? Thinking exactly the way English class has taught me to, the little hamster inside my head must be trying hard to write responses on those five W’s. My English teacher should be thankful that even when I’m delulu, I still think rationally.

“Where are we going?” Carefully, I asked, then closed my eyes waiting for the dizziness to come since it was the last sentence I had spoken before I got to traverse back home last time. “Disneyland,” Grandma replied, “no change at all, so don’t worry.” To be honest, I was not expecting a reply, but at least one of the W is solved. As I walked down the hallway, I recognized more faces, my parents, uncles, aunties, and parental grandparents. I’m walking with a huge group of people, not only my relatives but their friends as well. All of them look much younger, so this is real time-travel, I think more firmly. How come I cannot find any memory of this airport walk?

Not knowing when will the time be up for me to be here, I want to spend every second with my grandma. I guess I’m just going to stay with her in the back of the group.

For the little me, it’s an enormous airport, with massive passengers rushing through. Even though it’s my spirit inside the body, the announcement still sounds like a giant, it yells the closing of gates and there are people still not aboard yet. One person rushed through beside me, then two, and three. Probably the ones that the announcement calls for. Suddenly, someone bumped into me, a foreigner, and I fell to the ground grandma was pulled by me since our hands were held tight.

“Omg, I’m so sorry, are you guys…okay?”

Grandma grabbed me up, and I replied “We’re fin…”

Before I could finish my words, the same dizziness approaches again, I close my eyes this time waiting calmly for the traverse.

“Just admit it.” I open my eyes; my brother is holding the plastic bucket, and everything is the same as before the last traverse back.

If there has only been one traverse, I could convince myself that it was a fantasy, but traveling through time TWICE is not a joke. My butt still hurts from the bump so how can I fool myself that it’s just an illusion?

“Move all this garbage please, my foot has nowhere to land in your room, dude.” My little brother’s complaint interrupted my thinking, I walked in front of him and moved all my clothes aside. “Move the suitcase too, I don’t think the space is large enough to put this down.” He spoke. I turned back and looked at the suitcase.

The suitcase is the key to traverse.

This thought flew through my mind, so quickly that I almost lost it.

“I was unzipping it when the first traverse happened, and I was moving it when the second traverse happened,” I mumbled myself, “so touching is the key to the door of time travel?” It seems like there is a pattern for it. “Stop talking to yourself.” My brother slightly kicks the suitcase and says, “Sisterrrrrrr, please, please, please, move the suitcase please, the bucket is heavy.” “Shushhhhhh.” I walk toward the suitcase, planning to verify if my idea is correct.

I squat down and touch the suitcase. One. Two. Three. Three seconds passed and nothing happened. No dizziness, no change of surrounding’s color tone, no fading of lights or sounds, nothing happened. I lay on the ground full of frustration, it should be the right key for the traverse, am I missing anything, or it’s simply wrong? My hand’s still on the suitcase, caressing it as if it’s a pet. I kept still there so my brother started to get angry, “MOVE IT.”

Reluctantly, I stood up and tried to move the suitcase somewhere, but the same dizziness approached as I walked. Light fades away with the sounds. This how drunk feels like? Like in a dream walking on the clouds that are made up of marshmallows?

“Follow up, Yu Han,” she grabbed my left hand, and looked at me, “are you looking for something?” This is the third time hearing this same exact opening, the little hamster inside my brain has started to feel like everyone is an NPC now. “No. I’m just too excited for the trip.” I replied looking at her directly, she looked real, does not look like AI (Artificial Intelligence) or anything that appears in 2024 only, so little hamster might be wrong on this try. It was smart enough to get its second W though. I was the cause of the traverse.

During the few seconds of dizziness, I figured out the missing element that caused the traverse to fail even when I touched the suitcase – there was no sound. Precisely talking, the sounds must be a talking voice directed at me; this traverse is successful because my brother yelled at me when my hands were still on the suitcase.

The wheels on my brain started to have a flash of fire, and I hoped my little hamster knew how to keep itself safe.

We walked for a long time, at least this was the third time walking down the path for me, so I reached into my pocket for some cookies that I brought before leaving home this morning. Wait a minute, why do I know this? Even though it’s my spirit inside the body, the body still has its’ own script to follow. While I’m still shocked by my action, the strawberry cookies are in my mouth already. It tasted good, I’m always a strawberry lover.

The announcement yells the closing of gates again and some individuals started to rush their way. I keep myself closer to Granny this time, I even hold the suitcase tighter to me because my butt still hurts. People rushing through give me a feeling that they are all NPCs whose only code is to bump me to the ground. Everything is so BIG to the LITTLE me. I hold Granny’s hand tighter, and the dizziness approaches again, so I release my hand waiting to go home.

Failed, this is the first time dizziness has appeared, but no traverse happened. WTF, am I going to be left here with these elephant passengers? Fear sweeps through my body, people are still rushing beside me, and the only thing I can do is hold my grandma’s hand tighter again. The dizziness reappears.

I quickly released my tension on Granny’s hand, and the dizziness disappeared again. Someone quickly bumped into me, but I took a step back and avoided it. It’s a different person from last time and I feel the dizziness again. I collapsed to the ground purposely, and as expected the dizziness faded away.

My brain wheels are now on fire. Whenever I break away from the storyline or setting of this world, those NPCs will try to bring me back otherwise I will be transported back to the present day.

To verify it, I did not hold my granny’s hand when she tried to pull me up, instead, I asked her if we could go back home in English. Dizziness appears, light fades away so do sounds, but I could see all these passengers running towards me and before they hit me, my brother’s voice appears, “…the bucket is heavy.”

“Just put it down anywhere, thanks.”

“Why are you all sweaty?” he asked as he laid the bucket on top of my clothes, the same position I laid it before the first traverse.

“Huh?” a drop of sweat drips down from my forehead, “Oh, well, you know…” I have not quite caught my breath yet and I’m still scared, “that’s why I’m doing a closet switch, spring is coming, and sweat is normal.” I pushed him out of my room and closed the door.

Quickly I write it out on paper:

1. There is a storyline existing at that time (needs to be followed)
2. My suitcase is the key (I need to touch it while someone is talking to me)
3. Whenever I fail to follow the storyline, I will get transported back to 2024.
4. I still need to figure out what the purpose of the traverse is and why it’s me.

I took a deep breath, put my hand on the red suitcase, and called my brother, as he replied “What.” The dizziness starts to pervade in like smoke. “Follow up, Yu Han,” she grabbed my left hand again, and looked at me, “are you looking for something?” I did not say anything, instead, I tried to relax and let the body direct the script that it tried to show me. I could feel that my energy was getting weaker and weaker, I could not make any changes to the body anymore. I became the true NPC. However, there are some accidents where I disrupted the storyline. I will get transported back to 2024 but then I will use the same way to get back and finish the storyline.

On the seventh time back to 2024, on paper, I write:

1. A Family Trip to Hong Kong Disneyland.
2. I’m no more than 5 years old.
3. I was walking with my granny the whole time and the red suitcase was held on right.
4. After the announcement, people will start to rush their way, and I must be bumped.
5. I will be eating my cookies right before the bump happens.
6. I might get lost at the airport.

I underlined the 6^th point on my note because it reminds me of the call that I had with my grandma, she tells the story repeatedly of how I almost got kidnapped at an airport and I was able to fill in every detail with this traverse.

I called my brothers again and the same drunk dazed feeling approached. “Follow up, Yu Han,” she grabbed my left hand again, and looked at me, “are you looking for something?” Her hand is still warmth, but I had no time to linger on that anymore, I let the body guide the story, and my mind is completely nowhere until it hits this new part of the story.

On my right hand, it’s my favorite red suitcase, and on the left, it’s a strawberry cookie. Then a bump will happen. One person rushed through beside me, then two, and three. Finally, one person bumped into me, but I did not fall onto the ground this time, and I let it be like that. The body walks on its own down the path, guiding me somewhere. After I finish my cookies Grandma holds my hand again, and I’m waiting for the new plot to come but everything seems harmonious. I wonder if this is the end of this journey.  It’s up to a point that I’m so relaxed and enjoying my time with granny again. I look at her, wanting to remember every detail but I CANNOT. IT’S A COMPLETE STRANGER.

Our hands hold. She holds my hand tightly. We walked fast, fast down to the airport, fast enough that no one realized I was gone. Immediately, I cried out asking to use the bathroom saying that I was about to pee my pants. I cannot tell whether this action is my body’s instinct, or it’s my behavior. The dizziness did not come so this action must have followed the plot. The woman and her partners did not allow me to go obviously, but the crying attracted other passengers and some of my relatives. They chat about why that kid is crying, and at the same time, my grandma starts to realize that I’m missing.

She and my mom tracked down the path and saw me crying with three strangers, still holding tight to my red suitcase. I wonder if they recognized me or the red suitcase they saw. Yes, that simply, I was kidnapped. Nothing as dramatic as a television show or movie might demonstrate happened, it was just a “mis-hold” of hands. They run straight to me, and I’m still crying about going to the bathroom. I was completely overwhelmed and numb when they reached me, it seemed like peeing my pants was not an excuse anymore. I have told this kidnap over and over to my friends as a funny moment of my life, but as I’m experiencing it now, all I think of is fear. Complete fear and sweat like a hyperhidrosis individual.  

Dizziness approaches, sounds and lights fade away, and the last scene I can see before traverse is that woman slipping away with her group and turning to the corner that they intended to bring me to. They disappeared into the crowd and so did me. As I opened my eyes back in 2024, it was not the same setup anymore. The rewind is the biggest one, it’s a five-hour rewind. Or is it all a dream? I have just woken up and Mommy is asking if I’m going to do the closet switch that I have said for days now.

“Yes, and it’s in the back of my closet, right?” I climb down the bunk bed and rush to my closet. “It should be, otherwise I don’t know.” Mom replied, “Breakfast is ready, get yourself ready as well. Please.” Ignoring her, I reached my arm to the back of the closet and touched something. Long, rectangle, got handle, but not leather. I pull it out with all my force. Not my red suitcase, but the plastic bucket with my summer clothes. Confused, I climbed into the right side of the closet. My red suitcase is missing.

“Mom, do you know where my suitcase is?”

“Which one?” She walked into my room, “What do you need it for?”

“Something’s inside.”

“It should be in my room, under my bed.”

I rushed to her room, and on my way, I asked her if she remembered the scene where I got kidnapped. “Didn’t you say you don’t remember it?” Mom replied with confusion. “Yeah, that is why I want to know more. It’s a trip to Disneyland?” Her reply shocked me again. It was not a trip to Disneyland, and I never got bumped to the ground at all. From her memory, it was me being naughty and falling behind the line who later got kidnapped by those kidnappers. I asked my paternal grandma and she claimed that it was a trip to a wax museum, and the kidnapping did not happen at all. From her memory, it was that I got lost and randomly held a lady’s hand and she was trying to find my parents for me.

All of them had a piece of this story, but these pieces are not from the same puzzle set. They do not match each other, and I do not have any memory of this scene to see who is correct.

Finally, I got the red suitcase under my mom’s bed, it was unzipped already, and there was something inside. Flipping it open, there is a plastic bag full of my childhood pictures, pictures of me in Disneyland, pictures with mom and my little brother, pictures of the wax museum, and pictures of me and my grandma. What I just experienced is not completely consistent with what Grandma has told me in calls either. It feels like a mix of all, which might be why every traverse has some contrasting character and plot.

I took the photos out and showed them to Mommy, and my little sister said, “I wish I could exchange souls with you back then to experience these fun places.

Is that why I never had this memory? It was or it’s the 18-year-old Yu Han who experienced the kidnap this whole time.

Memory accuracy is important for individuals to express their experience and is a significant part of legal implications. Both articles: “Negative Emotion Enhances Memory Accuracy: Behavioral and Neuroimaging Evidence” by Elizabeth A. Kensinger, and “Eyewitness Memory Contamination through Misleading Questions by Reporters” by Robin Blom and Kuo-Ting Huang, introduced the issue of post-event memory inaccuracy and delve into the reasoning behind from two different perspectives. Kensinger focused on how internal emotion affects memory while Blom and Huang focused on external effects. Even though these two sources examine memory findings in two separate approaches, their research is structured similarly with trustworthy content that includes cause-and-effect invention.

These authors engaged with the audiences effectively with an identical passage structure as they started their passage by addressing the phenomenon. They begin with their past belief about memory, then introduce the missing components of their belief which later get emphasized through formal experiments. Blom and Huang reinforce the fact that wrongful conviction cases are often on news media but not much improvement has been done to avoid future eyewitness misidentification. This concern is closely related to every individual, and readers are more likely to consider an analysis of more relevant experiments. Similarly, in Kensinger’s paper, she mentions how people tend to remember events that contain emotions more vividly than those that involve less emotion. This opening catches the reader’s interest as it introduces a concept that the public is familiar with and believes in. People are more likely to continue reading due to curiosity in finding out whether the results conform to their pre-existing understanding. Indeed, these authors close their research in an identical conclusion structure by explaining their experiments’ results in a more comprehensible way to the audience. Both passages had a straightforward start and conclusion that appealed to the readers. Even if the experiments contain technical vocabularies that are hard to understand, readers could still acknowledge the research either way.

Both articles are pure studies with experiments posted on Sage Journal, where all articles are rigorously peer-reviewed. With that, the sources also have a DOI Digital Object Identifier which adds more credibility. Almost everything throughout the passage can be proven by other references listed, and there were more than 20 references for Kensinger’s paper while Blom and Huang’s paper has over 35 references. With these reliable components, the authority and authenticity of the authors and the experiments are high; this contributes to the establishment of the ethos of the authors and papers. On top of that, one research result often leads to other research needed, so even with their detailed experiments, the conclusions still open new discussions in the field of memory recall. This action demonstrated the attentiveness of these authors and won a higher reliance from the readers. Kensinger expressed that scenes with negative emotions are more likely to be identified or least likely to be distorted, “However, whether emotion enhances the detail with which information is remembered or whether emotion simply biases a person to believe that they retained a vivid memory continues to be debated. (Kensinger)” Still, she challenges the field to delve even deeper into how much emotion enhances the details. Moreover, Blom and Huang’s research believes “it may be even worth investigating whether certain interview questions and techniques have different effects when asked by police or journalists, as interviewees may experience different power structures that could lead to different answers and willingness to answer in more or less detail to similar questions. (Blom and Huang)” As a result, when an article is written logically and with inspirational questions, audiences are more likely to believe in it because the authors are presented with credibility. In this case, all Kensinger, Blom, and Huang, are presented with ethos.

For an experiment to be conducted there must be a hypothesis in the first case such as an if-and-then situation. If the leading question asked was different, then does it affect the outcome of individuals recalling memory? If we remember sad memories better, then does it mean that painful memories are more accurate? Indeed, the hypothesis is creating a cause-and-effect situation. It is asking if the independent variable affects the dependent variable eventually, and if it does, how. More than that, for Blom and Huang’s passage the reason behind conducting their experiments was the lack of scholarly work on eyewitness misidentification in journalism and mass communication. This is what causes our authors to react and perform their experiments that further affect public understanding. For Kensinger’s research, the cause-and-effect is implicitly included in the conclusion part when she states that “because a primary function of emotion is to guide action and to plan for similar future occurrences (Lazarus cited Kensinger).” This explains the logic behind humans remembering negative emotional scenes better; we need that information to predict and prevent relevant occurrences. Even though cause and effect are presented in different content in these two research, both explain how one action might lead to another. Pre-existing issues often cause individuals to conduct research, and the results are usually relevant to another social norm. This explains why cause-and-effect invention commonly exists in research papers, it is because the experiments results that were conducted often lead to other studies.

Every time I have a call with my grandma, she tells this story over and over again that I was able to fill in every detail after times and times of calls. Sometimes she asked me questions like: “Did you recognize that woman as me?” or anxious about what would happen if I did disappear over the corner. I am over eighteen now, but she reminds me repeatedly not to go with strangers as if she worries the kidnap will ever happen again. However, instead of relying on little kids, believe that they are going to use the skills they learned at home and school to keep themselves safe and escape from some adult kidnappers, just keep high attention on your kids as kidnapping can happen anywhere at any time. To be honest, I barely remember the scene; it was after my grandma told me the story that I began to have, re-establish, this memory with pictures in my mind.

We are on a family trip to Hong Kong Disneyland, holding my grandma’s hand in the squishy airport, walking with a huge group of people, not only my relatives but their friends as well. As always, I am holding my red suitcase when my mom asks me to greet people, with faces, I recognized or never seen before. I am only four or five years old, kindergarten age, so I greet them all using uncles and aunts. I mean… don’t hope a little kid understands the complex “relative title” that exists in the Chinese culture, not even mentioning how to properly address them. On the other side, they do not care about me either, they are all excited and focused about the trip that is coming.

I guess I am just going to stay with my grandma in the back of the group.

It is an enormous airport, with massive passengers rushing through. The announcement talks like a giant, it whispers the closing of gates and there are people still not aboard yet. Everything seems so BIG to the LITTLE me, I am a small pebble with stones and mountains surrounding me, existing but inconspicuous. We have walked for a long time, at least I was a bit bored, so I reached into my pocket for some cookies that I brought before leaving home this morning. On my right hand, it is my favorite red suitcase, and on the left, it is a strawberry cookie. One person rushed through beside me, then two, and three. Probably the ones that the announcement calls for. I’m laughing with cookies in my mouth and ask my grandma if they are going to make it there before the airplane takes off.

She did not answer me.

As I started to realize that the hand, I was holding was not my grandma’s, I looked at that woman’s face for a long time, trying to see if I could match it with anyone I had greeted before. I CANNOT. IT IS A COMPLETE STRANGER. Our hands hold. She holds my hand tightly. We walked fast, fast down the airport, fast enough that no one realized I was gone. Immediately, I cried out asking to use the bathroom saying that I was about to pee my pants. They did not allow me obviously, but the crying attracted other passengers and some of my relatives. They chat about why that kid is crying, and at the same time, my grandma starts to realize that I am missing. She and my mom tracked down the path and saw me crying with three strangers, still holding tight to my red suitcase. I wonder if it’s the fact that they recognized me or the red suitcase that they saw. Yes, that simply, I was kidnapped. Nothing as dramatic as a television show or movie might demonstrate happened, it was just a “mid-hold” of hands. They run straight to me, and I am still crying about going to the bathroom. I was completely overwhelmed and numbed when they reached me, seems like peeing my pants was really going to happen.

My mom and my grandma just let the lady slip away with her group, they turned to the corner that they intended to bring me to and disappeared into the crowd.

I have told this story over and over to my friends as a funny moment of my life, but I know how serious it would be if I was kidnapped that day. It will be more than fingers chopped off as Grandma used this saying to scare me. I know she worries, and she regrets, she thinks it was all her fault that she let go of my hand that day. She regrets that she should have run to me the first sight when she saw me with that stranger instead of double confirming with my mom. I am over eighteen now, but she reminds me repeatedly not to go with strangers as if she worries the kidnap will happen again.

Back in kindergarten, the school had implemented “how to avoid kidnap” in the curriculum, we even had a kidnap drill planned by instructors and parents during school hours. I never ever failed to keep myself safe in these drills, which seems funny to me now because the only time I failed was in a real scene: that airport day I did go with that woman. Even though preparing your kids how to act for the potential risks of being kidnapped is important, true kidnaps come in different forms that you could never be fully prepared for. I am still alive with my two arms and legs, but still, it was out of luck that the kidnap failed. They could have made me faint or dragged me away when I was crying, telling passengers that I was just being naughty. If my grandma did not realize that I was missing, or the kidnappers walked fast enough and brought me past that corner. I would probably be gone now, forever, with that red suitcase.