Stay True: A Memoir

Cigarette smoking runs as a leitmotif through Hua’s memoir. When Hua first arrived at Berkeley, he identified as straight edge and thus rejected smoking, drinking, and drugs. Shortly after meeting Ken, however, the two began frequenting the smoking balcony on the third floor of their dorm. Neither Hua nor Ken smoked at the time, but smoke breaks served as a pretense to talk. Shortly after their first outing to a thrift store, Ken saw Hua pretending to study and asked him to go out to the balcony, where they discussed a frat party Ken attended and Hua’s thoughts on Heidegger. “I need a smoke” became their code whenever they wanted to talk, take a break from their homework, or escape a room full of strangers. Hua describes the lengths to which he and Ken went to prevent others from intruding on their conversations: “Leaning on the railing, chatting conspiratorially, pretending that we were smoking so that nobody would bother us” (48). Hua and Ken began smoking in earnest shortly thereafter, and, by sophomore year, Hua delighted in the ritual of it: “Pull the strip and peel back the cellophane. Smack it against your wrist.