After finding out so much more information on Asian immigration, I almost feel more confused.  I never really understood why Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in the first place, so when I was taught because it was an easy target, and all that other jazz I just accepted it at face value.  After reading Takaki, and realizing that Hawaii was so accepting of the Japanese when America really didn’t want them coming it seems like Hawaii really got shitted on pretty hard.  I guess maybe I’m feeling kind of pissed off because of a situation I’m currently in.  But it seems like whenever you’re nice to somebody, and you do the the right thing it comes back to haunt you.  I too, don’t remember learning about the Japanese-American side of the story in High School, but I’m not sure if that’s because we didn’t learn it, or if I just wasn’t paying attention.  It seems so hypocritical to me that America went over to save the day in Germany, and free the Jewish people from the Nazi death camps, while we put American citizens in internment camps for just as little as the Nazi’s chose to discriminate against the Jews.  I am in no way comparing what America did to the Japanese to what the Nazi’s did to the Jews, but in some ways it’s very hard to not draw parallels.  I think this is why American schools don’t teach as much about Japanese internment because it’s a shameful time in American history.

    The ending of this book really made me angry.  I was reading, and actually yelled out “Don’t be a LIAR” when I got to the line where Sone writes: “Now I know I’m just as responsible as the men in Washington was its actions.  I just don’t believe that she genuinely thinks it was her fault that she was put in a camp…what did she do?  I can’t understand this.  I’m glad the book ends on a positive note, I suppose.  But, truthfully, I would have respected Sone Lot more if she said she didn’t figure out who she was, and she wasn’t able to tame the two heads, because I think that’s how it really is.  I would imagine that she is in the minority when it comes to Asian-Americans if she truly feels at peace with both of her cultures.  I’m not sure that a person is ever really 100% at peace.  Sone writes that she was “returning to Wendell College with confidence and hope”….to me that sounds like a terribly corny and cliche ending.

     I found these chapters to be very interesting.  Sone shows how embarrassed she is over her Japanese heritage in many ways in these chapters.  In the beginning of chapter 3 we see how Sone goes shopping with her mother and Mrs. Kato.  Mrs. Kato is doing all these rituals that are part of the culture in Japan, but in America she is just looked at as strange.  She is so into these traditions that Monica and her mother actually leave her at the train station.  That part was kind of funny to me.  Right after that story Sone continues to talk about so-called embarrassing moments that happened to her.  Her mother was trying to learn English and called something lousy, when she really meant loud.  Sone thought that she was going to be teased, but the teacher didn’t even remember the incident.

      While Sone talks about the embarrassing moments that her family put her through, she also gives us a glimpse at how different her family was from traditional Japanese families.  As readers, we already got that sense from the earlier chapters when she talks about the differences between her mother and the way that Mrs. Matsui disciplines her children.  Once again, we see that Sone’s parents don’t follow the Japanese traditions when it comes to New Years.  They actually ate apple pie and drank coffee, which is pretty much as American as you can get.

      In the next chapters the family goes to Japan, where the youngest brother dies?  Sone barely talked about it though, and I found that part confusing.  Although, I do know that it is a generational thing to not talk about death.  My mother had a brother who died at the age of the three, and we were never allowed to ask my grandmother about it.  So I wondered if that had something to do with it.  My mom never talks about it, and neither do her older siblings who clearly remember him.  So while I found it a little odd, because this is a memoir, I understood it as well.  In this chapter we see Monica fighting for “her country” with some boys that have been teasing her and her brother.  I found it so weird that even as a very little girl she felt that her “American-ness” was being challenged by everyone.

     I liked the chapter where she described her “love interest” who she wasn’t allowed to let her family know about.  This to me, showed how much she respected her parents, an ultimately their culture.  She knew it would upset them that she was thinking about a boy and not concentrating on her school work.  Sone also talks about how she’s freakishly tall because she had grown to be 5′6.  I think that’s hilarious, because clearly, 5′6 isn’t THAT very gigantic.  But in her culture, she was looked at as a weirdo.  But in a way, I thought she would be pleased with this height, because it kind of gives her a more American edge, so I was surprised that she hated it do much.

     In the final  chapter was assigned for us to read, Sone gets sent to a sanitarium.  This part was extremely confusing.  It just went from her not wanting to go to business school to suddenly being seen a threat for tuberculosis?  I’m still not sure if I have this 100% correct, but in any case it was strange how there was no transition.  She gives a little bit of information about the sanitarium, but what struck me the most was how she didn’t want to go home because she thought no one would love her.  She didn’t think she could function in her old community.  That was very sad.

When I began this assignment for class I had a very hard time getting into it (I had to take a break and go get a toaster strudel).  But once I buckled down and actually read the two chapters that were assigned I did enjoy the reading.  I found a lot of sections to be almost disturbing.  For example, the first paragraph of the first chapter.  Sone writes: “The first five years of my life I lived in amoebic bliss, not knowing whether I was plant or animal, at the old Carrollton Hotel on the waterfront of Seattle.  One day when I was a happy six-year-old, I made the shocking discovery that I had Japanese blood.  I was a Japanese.”  It was the last few words that really stuck in my mind.  Referring to herself as A Japanese.  It definitely felt like there was a negative connotation associated with that thought.  Also, that she goes from living in “amoebic bliss” to making a “shocking discovery.”  I felt like she didn’t want to be Japanese at all, and that thought there was something wrong with being Japanese.

Need I say more?

This is the picture that is on the back cover of ABC.

So I was going to post “The Asian Backstreet Boys” on here, because….well, I love them.  So I searched them on Youtube, and then I came across this video about why Asian guys can’t get white girls….It’s kinda funny, I guess.

I actually enjoyed reading Takaki’s work.  I thought he was upfront, and clear with his words, and his reasons for writing this history was apparent.  The thing that stuck with me the most was the way the Japanese went about allowing their citizens to leave Japan.  They wanted to have a good representation of people, and so only the most healthy and most highly educated were allowed to leave.  On paper, this is a very smart idea.  You send over the brightest, and most hard-working, so that when they return they will have had a better shot at making money.  So this plan should have worked out perfectly for the Japanese people, but it backfired.  Americans saw another wave of immigrants from an Asian country coming, just like the Chinese had come.  The Japanese immigrants never really stood a chance to be accepted in America because of this fact.  When the Chinese immigrants came over, the government put all those laws into affect that would purposely hold back anyone other than Americans.  So being that Americans had already developed this hatred for the Chinese, it was almost evident that they would develop a hatred for the Japanese people as well.  The government put laws out there so that Americans were “living” with the Chinese immigrants who came there, because, really, they had no rights, had no jobs, had no women, and basically had no life.  But when the Japanese came over they were a whole new culture, so the Americans had the attitude like “enough is enough with this immigration crap” and really lashed out at the Japanese.  It’s like…they had accepted the Chinese because, eh, they weren’t allowed to do anything, they were just there.  But, the Japanese people were really smart, and whenever a group of smart people comes around it makes everyone who is just average really nervous.  I just thought that it really wasn’t shocking at all that the Japanese were treated so badly.

“At The Western Palace” reminded me of modern day.  We all have that friend that never lets anything go.  If someone bumps into them and doesn’t say “excuse me” they yell it after them down the hallway.  I know I am sometimes that friend.  It reminds of when a friend of mine found out there her boyfriend was cheating on her, and she didn’t want to cause a big scene, and I made her go confront the boyfriend.  Luckily, it didn’t turn out like Brave Orchid and Moon Orchid’s experience.  What I mean is my friend didn’t end up in the looney bin.  Which is lucky for me.  But overall, this chapter was the most sad.  Moon Orchid was abandoned by her husband because he wanted to forget China.  He had a new wife, and spoke English, and wanted nothing to do with the “old” way of life.  It’s sad when people in your life move on and you’re still stuck in the past holding on.  It’s like every cliche break up.  Boyfriend finds new, hotter, younger wife- leaves “old” wife and he lives happily ever after while the “old” wife lives the rest of her life in pain.  Wow…

In “A Song For A Barbarian Reed Pipe” we see Maxine becoming def up with her parents lack of reality.  She can’t determine what is real and fake anymore.  No one can live in these conditions, and after re-reading this chapter and remembering how anger I was that I couldn’t figure out what was real and fake I can’t help but wonder if Kingston did that on purpose.  Maybe she didn’t tell us what was real and fake because she herself didn’t know.  Not knowing what was real or fake influenced her life, and shaped who she was.  Perhaps, she wanted the reader to get a little taste of her life.  She wanted the reader to know what it was like to be her.  She never knew reality from fantasy so how could she as an author tell the audience was what real or not?  It’s like a huge twist, she wants us to be as confused as she was for her whole childhood….so crafty.  I hope those were her intentions.

The first thing that struck me about this post was that the mother had a medical degree of some sort.  I guess I have preconceived notions about China, and other Asian countries that women weren’t allowed to pursue such things.  I liked the part about the mother not understanding the "Chinese-American" snap shots, and asking why everyone is laughing.  Certainly things are very generational, but I never thought of photographs as being that way.  The next section that I found particularly interesting was how no one offered to help her unpack because they didn’t want to disrupt the pleasure of it.  That she was reveling in the time alone, and the fact taht she had her own room.  I know this takes place a long time ago, but to imagine this same scenario in modern times is almost impossible.   I almost hate realize how much I take for granted, if I couldn’t have my own room I would be genuinely upset, and probably make a big deal out if.  These women were honored and so grateful to have their own rooms. and to be able to live the dream of going to college/medical school.  I really liked the part where the mother talked about how she felt like she had to be the smartest in the class because she was so much older, it’s funny how age makes people so self conscious, younger or older.  The story became much more interesting after the mother graduated from the school and told stories to her daughter about her time as a doctor.  All the things about the slaves, and how she never felt equal to the female slave her mother purchased was very sad.  I feel like this story, but really the the book as a whole is sad, but almost doesn’t make you feel sad at the same time.  It’s very confusing as to which emotion to feel.  At first I was really confused about the whole ghost thing.  Then I realized that’s what the call all American people.  I liked how at the end of the story the mother almost seems to let go, she allows the daughter to leave and it’s almost like she’s allowing her to be American, she realizes that she can’t control her children anymore because they’re old, and she’s even older. 

The first sentence of No Name Women grabs your attention immediately- “You must not tell anyone,” my mother said, “what I am about to tell you.  In China your fatehr had a siser who killer herself.  She jumped into the family well.  We say that your father has all brothers becaue it is as if she had never been born.”  This sentence brings you into the story right away, you want to know why the mother is telling a seemingly young girl about this horrible story.  We soon find out that it’s a warning from the mother, that the aunt got pregnant by someone other than her husband and the mother didn’t want her to disgrace the family like her aunt had done.  The daughter then goes through life thinking about what her aunt was like.   She feels that her aunt haunts her, she thinks about her constantly, her legacy and what she has done to thier family, afraid to say the aunts  name because it will do some mystery harm to her father.  It’s amazing how family stories and ancient history can affect present life.

Hey Guys,

 My name is Elizabeth, but I prefer to be called Liz.  My Blog title “Slizz” is what all the little kids call me at the day care where I work, and it has become an accepted nick name for everyone to call me.  I’m currently a sophmore, working toward a degree in Early Childhood/Special Ed with a concentration in English.  I’m very loud and outspoken, and sometimes I love a good arguement (so watch out), just kidding.  I live in Albany for now, but I’m originally from Long Island (no, no, not Lawn Guyland, I swear no one from Long Island actually says it like that) and I love it there.  As for Albany….it’s definitely growing on me, but it will never compare to LI.  It’s hard to believe that Albany and Long Island are in the same state, it feels like we should be different countries.  Anyways, I love sports especially college basketball.  I am completely obsessed with Duke Basketball and I will take it personally if you talk trash about them.  I’m hoping to learn about more than just Asian-American Lit this semester, maybe this class will help break down some stereotypes we all have not only about Asian-American’s, and the Asian culture, but other negative stereotypes as well.