It’s hard to recall exactly when I first met Angela, but it’s been over 20 years. I do remember the place: my friend’s brother’s house in a small college town, where I was attending my junior year at CSU Chico. Angela had originally been at U.C. Berkeley but had taken a year off to travel in England. When she returned, for reasons I can’t quite remember, she transferred to Chico—possibly because her childhood friend Vin was nearby. They grew up together in Richmond, CA, and went to high school there. In any case, Angela ended up becoming my roommate for three semesters until Vin’s brother sold the house.

Even back then, there were hints of her interest in Chinese mysticism. Her family was Toishanese, a southeastern Chinese group with shamanic traditions. Her uncle, in fact, was a part-time shaman who often officiated funerals and matchmaking rituals. Angela’s personality was a blend of free-spirited whimsicality and practical groundedness. We would talk for hours about the futility of materialism, yet she was a business major. On one trip to China, she stayed in a poor village and came back with glowing stories of the experience. In London, she had lived it up—clubbing, exploring cafés, and soaking in city life. She could just as easily pack up and chase adventure abroad as she could return home to California, where family and friends were her anchor. Still, it was her time in China that would later define her as the mystic and psychic I know today.

After graduation, we went our separate ways, promising to keep in touch but, as often happens, drifting apart. I ran into her occasionally at weddings or gatherings. She stayed closer to Vin for a few years, but eventually even they lost touch. Then, about a year ago, fate intervened. I was in Berkeley and needed to withdraw a large sum of cash at Wells Fargo. While standing in line, I suddenly heard, “Johnathan! Johnathan Wong!” To my surprise, there was Angela, sitting at a banker’s desk—instantly recognizable even after 13 years.

This is also the perfect moment to explain the name Mystic Wabbit. No, it’s not a play on Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd. When people first met Angela, many noticed her adorable speech impediment—she pronounced her R’s as W’s, a condition known as rhotacism. For months after her return from London, her rhotacism was flavored with a faint British accent, though the accent faded over time. The W-for-Rs, however, remained the most endearing quirk I remember. And why “Rabbit”? She was born in 1975—the Year of the Rabbit. Or, as she’d say, the Wabbit.

Our reunion gave me the chance to catch up on her journey. Angela had spent several years as an accountant at a battered women’s shelter. She liked the work but admitted it wasn’t her true calling. Restless, she traveled the world—Dubai, Serbia, Nigeria, and more. In 2015, ready for another change, she heard from her mother that a relative’s rural school in China needed an English teacher. With no ties—she wasn’t married and had no kids—she leapt at the chance.

Back in China, she reconnected with her shaman uncle and became fascinated with his traditions. Between teaching English, she apprenticed under him, learning the secrets of Toishanese mysticism. Younger villagers dismissed it as outdated, but Angela embraced it wholeheartedly. She absorbed every lesson with passion. After a year, she returned to California and resumed her accounting role at the shelter, but she also launched a fortune-telling practice on the side, continuing to explore her mystical path.

Ironically, the idea for this site didn’t come directly from Angela. One day, my friend Anne asked me to show her visiting friend Rachelle around San Francisco. Rachelle wanted to see a fortune teller, which instantly reminded me of Angela. Had time allowed, I would have introduced them. Though it didn’t work out, the thought stayed with me—and that’s how Mystic Wabbit was born. 🙂