The Walking Table
sumi ink on mulberry paper / poem by Eugenia Yu

The Walking Table is a film about a story about family:

(20 years ago, in 1993, when I was 8 years old) my father the
engineer cut off one of the branches of the mangrove tree to
make a walking table. The table was small, but it fit us five,
my father, my mother, my brother, my sister, and I. No matter
where we went, the table followed. We never knew when we
would need it, so making one with the ability to get up and
move wherever we went, proved very useful at the time. But
you see, a walking table can have its problems as well. Take for
example when one person wants to have dinner with a friend
that they haven’t seen in a long time, and one person doesn’t
feel hungry at all but would rather do something else, it can
cause a lot of trouble. The table, engineered to follow us five,
would scamper about the room in all directions, hitting walls
and knocking over things until finally we each arrived and
settled comfortably into our respective places. Then, the table
was perfectly still. To correct this oversight, my father removed
its legs, with all the apprehension of a father letting go.

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