As seen on TV!

My Year of Meats is probably one of my favorites yet. I believe it’s because it’s more related to the current times than some of our previous readings.

Robot Stories

Horray movies! Horray robots! Horray robot movies! Horray Asian American robot movies? After reading the Feng article I was trying to figure out how the idea of robots would fit into Asian-American films. This image came to mind:

It turns out I was only partially right (maybe like 15%) because robots was the theme but it was used in conjuction with another theme of Asian-Americans. The Feng article presented the idea of what is Asian-American film? The problem with it is that they get classified under either Asian or American. There doesn’t seem like there is much recognition for the genre in general.

The movie Robot Stories is actually four different movies. They aren’t linked together in anyway and they all deal with a different issue, and yet in some way they are all linked together by a common theme.

The first one is called Robot Baby in which a couple must cake care of a robot baby before they can adopt a real one. The problem is the soon to be mother has had a rough childhood with of her own with her mother and father getting into a fight and being told never to get married nor have kids while crying in a closet. What ends up happening is that the mother has difficulties with the baby. Ironically the movie ends in the same fashion with the mother crying in the closet with the robot baby except the robot baby comforts her and it seems like it’s going to have a happy ending.Kinda neat but still confusing of the jump from being told not to get married and have kids to doing the exact opposite anyway. I also found how the father of the mother (robot baby’s grandfather) was used to reprogram the baby to take care of itself. As he was doing this he told her that she couldn’t do this with a robot baby. Even more interesting to me is how despite that she had the reprogram done to the baby, it still behaved awful, showing that it takes more than cleaning and feeding to raise a baby and she was forgetting the most important thing. Love i guess.

Robot fixer is the second part and it’s one of my favorites. Short summary, a mother visits her son in a hospital with her daughter. The son has been hit by a car and attemps to complete his toy collection in hopes it would wake him up. The use of robots here isn’t an actual robot, but toy robots. There are plenty of nice metaphors here, but my favorite one is the one toward the end. At the hospital she was told that her son was gone and there was no saving him. Already the mother had completed all the toys, except for one which seemed to be the son’s favorite, a blue microbot. On it’s leg it was missing a wing and she could not obtain one. She then went to extreme measures to steal a pink microbot with the exact wing on it. After stealing it she finds out that the pink one is also missing a wing. A sign that it was time to let go of her son and that she and her son were much alike. The pink robot was missing the wing on the same leg as the blue one. To me that signifies that they were the same in the end. Completing the blue microbot seemed like the revival of her son and when she couldn’t it was like a symbol of letting him go.

Robot Love was pretty funny to me. A robot worker built to be a obidient slave for a company learns to love as he is rejected by fellow co-workers. As i was watching this I was reminded of fond days of highschool. There was the popular kids, the new kids, the unpopular kids, the unattentive authoritive figure and as usual (please note this isn’t the case with all highschools, just a scenerio) the hard working nerdy kid was being taken advantaged of by his/her piers. I just find it hilarious how despite maybe ten or twelve years things don’t change much it seems.

Clay is my favorite of the four. This last one doesn’t have the word ‘robot’ in it’s title. Of the four i’d say this one is the most unique one. It’s about in the future before your body dies your thoughts are scanned into a computer and your conscious digitalized. In a way you live forever it seems. We are given this old man is an artist with clay. His wife died previously and her mind was digitalized and he can communicate with her digital self. This man is on the verge of death himself and he debates on the idea of having his mind scanned. Society sees this as abnormal. You live forever, you can see everything, know everything, heck you can still be with your loved ones, why ruin such a good thing? Well it’s an ethical issue which is such a beautiful theme in my opinion. Though he is digitalized he isnt really there. He can’t really feel things out which to him is such a lie. He even questions a lot of things that have become digitalized and in the end finds a way to die without being digitalized. The issue of being digitalized is the heart of this theme. For me, i’m not sure i’d like to be preserved. It might be fun for a while, but the fact that I’d just be data, just there unable to feel out anything doesn’t seem to be real for me. Doesn’t seem to be as fun if it’s real. As a side track note see the following video. Theres a slight joke on virtual intercourse which happens in “Clay.”

WATCH VIDEO: Yahtzee goes to GDC

Hmm ok i’ve probably written more than people would want to read. To all those that have read this far, I’d give you a medal. Well finally at the end let’s look at all the videos as a whole. Technology and how we interact with them seem to be at the heart of it. There is the robot baby, the robot toys (lesser tech but still tech anyway!), the robot workers, and the digitalization making you into a robot somewhat. The message seems to be about how the interactions between man and machine are changing and who knows when the line will be blurred. Where do Asian-Americans fit in? I’d guess on the way they are seen in society. Not to offend anyone, but often times the asian-american guy is seen as this industrious worker. They complete their work with great efficiancy in a timely manner like you know…ROBOTS. In general though i thought the entire film was quite hilarious in some twisted way and it was a nice play on themes. Thank you for reading this rather meaninglessly long post.

It’s What’s for Dinner

I felt the need to express the topic of this post with this giant image.

My Year of Meats gives several themes for us to play around with. Probaby one of the biggest themes is meat itself. So what is meat to us? What is the message that Ruth Ozeki is trying to convey to us with this book? Well meat is basically tissue that we are obtaining from other animals or ourselves if you’re into cannabilism. Meat seems to be the image of America. The ranching industry is associated with the western cowboys riding their horses in long cattledrives. It’s rough, it’s tough, it’s masculine.

Pages 206-207 give a different view of meat. Earlier in the novel Jane discovers about dangerous chemicals in the meat such as DES and the inhumane tactics to obtain the meat. It’s described in a sickening way. Jane at this point is found out to be pregnant and yet after seeing all these bad things she wants to eat it. The word craving is used here which comes off as this strong desire for it and it’s not just a simple want, she NEEDS it. Later it is describing the death sound of a baby lamb. A nice constrast to the baby inside Jane because now she is worrying about her baby’s health as well. Despite all the harmful things the meat will do to her baby Jane just can’t keep the meat out of her teeth.

Later on in page 334 Jane is talking about ignorance and meat. How despite all the things that are wrong with it known to her she still does her job making it look good. It was a way of life to people. The comparison is made to the clear cutting in the rain forest. People know that it’s going on, but no one seems to be doing anything about it. The blind ignorance of the people is at work here.

So what is meat in this novel?

 
Something like this

It’s not the manly thing as first imagined is the first part of it. There is a notion that it is unappitizing, disgusting, and obtained through cruel slaughter. Like America it’s industrialized and for all the profits nasty chemicals are added. The problem is, we know about these horrible things. We know about the chemicals, we know what they will do to us, and yet we can’t seem to stop. It’s a horrible horrible addiction that we cannot break somewhat similar to a smoker’s addiction to cigarettes i’d say.

Dehumanizing Meat

IT’S MADE FROM PEOPLE!!!

So what does soylent green have to do with My Year of Meats? Nothing really, but there is a small section on page 87 that caught my interest. It is a small article about Japanese housewives buying meat. Apparently they do not like the interaction between with the butcher which adds to less consumption of beef. There was even a part saying if they could, Japanese housewives would rather buy meat from a vending machine. 

Can you even imagine that? Besides the fact they’d order a Rib-eye steak using dollar bills and quarters along with their soda but also the cut out of formalties. In the passage these housewives are compared to hermits and frown upon the social interaction. The concept really baffles me mainly for the fact some of the themes of the book is about an ever shrinking world. In this theory social interation is going to increase, but here these housewives are trying to avoid it. They would rather dehumanize meat (Un-soylent green it! Har! Har! Har!) and talk to machines instead. Any thoughts? Anyone at all?

“Freeze!”

Next part refers to a miscommunication error between a Japanese exchange student and a butcher. The kid said “Freeze” in a attempt to order meat and the butcher thought he was being robbed and in response, shot the kid. The jury let him go.

There are several problems with this scenerio. 1.) Why does a butcher carry a loaded gun? 2.) In what part of ordering meat do you have to yell “Freeze?” In america firearms seem rather to come by. Heck walking into our local Wal Mart can get me a decent weapon used for “hunting.” Conflicting this is the bill of rights with right to bear arms. We have the right to defend ourselves right? But is it fair that we sometimes go overboard to protect ourselves?

Now both parts seem totally unrelated, but the theme of communication seems to echo through both. In one, they don’t want to communicate and in the other, the communications isn’t the greatest. This is just my personal opinion but I feel it is impossible to escape human contact. We have to communicate. We have to interact in order to survive. The problem sometimes is that we all come from different backgrounds which creates chaos when we try to. So it is important to try to understand each other’s differences to solve those issues.

#18 As Seen on TV!

Secret Asian Man

Today’s post is about Native Speaker by Chang-Rae Lee. I kinda have mixed feelings about this book. As I read it, I find the subject changing on me constantly. In a lot of ways it reminds me of Woman Warrior because I find myself reading one thing then switching to something completely different. The difference is that Native Speaker isn’t a memoir so I’ll give it props, though I’ll admit that this constant switching is giving me a headache.

Anyway the main character is a Korean-American and his job reminds me of a spy. He iniltrates famous people and finds dirt on them in order to bring them down. In a sense, he’s the secret asian man as my friend’s used to joke on about on this song. Well in this case the 00 Henry is taking on John Kwang, a Korean American who is running for the position of mayor of NYC. Agent Henry had been scouting his target for some time and now he finall meets him.

The scene where they first meet is in Kwang’s HQ. Upon entry Henry senses everyone around him seems somewhat overwhelmed by this impressive figure that enters the room. Mr Kwang and another man Edwardo have a little boxing match it seems just for laughs, although Kwang apparently massacre’s Edwardo. After reading that small section I get the image of a light-hearted king with a sense of humor, yet he isn’t a pushover. Agent Henry then starts to go off on a weird tangent of comparing their hair and looks. Apparently Henry’s dad was quite the looker and took care of his hair very well.

For the most part, Kwang is just this nice guy. He appreciates all the work his volunteers do like getting on his knees to kiss the hand of a volunteer who had gone into overtime for him. Heck he even treats his people to dinner and drinks. Yet again agent Henry decides to compare this to his dad, who would say he is just following confuciousism ideology. He is far from perfect though. Page 145 shows that he can lose it as he snaps at his wife at one momment, but even then it appears he calms down shortly after. In the city there are racial tensions between the Koreans and the African Americans living there. This becomes the main issue of his speech he gives after meeting with some black ministers. From the previous talks he had with his people and the speech you can get the basis of his ideals on the topic of living together in a world where every race is mixed together. Shortly after there was a supposed gunshot as he was leaving leading to a escorted escape.

There are two things to pull off from all this. The first one is the idea about Kwang. He is a nice guy that with this ideal of working together different races. In class he is compared Barack Obama being a minority running for a high up position. In a way Henry starts to respect this guy and I feel he is going to have a problem with his job to bring him down.

The second thing is that there are so many comparsons to his own father. To me it seems like he puts a lot of negative descriptions to his father like being cruel for saying his hair will never be like his (Not everyone can have hair like Johnny Bravo afterall). Yet, in this comparison to Kwang there seems to be this respect for his father. Mathmatically i’m thinking: If Kwang is great and Kwang is like father, then father must be great. Maybe it’s not that simple but I think there’s more to his dad than just hate.

Jingle Bells 95

Previously on Asian American Lit:
The class broke into 4 groups to tackle 4 different readings their professor had assigned to them. This is a review of the findings of the group in charge of Christmas 95.

To start off we kinda got left with the longest reading of the 4 and I call foul on Brad’s team for sticking us with it! Well not really, I just like to blame people. Anyway the passage we read about was Christmas 95. When reading this title for the first time the image of snow, X-mas trees, Saint Nick, and sledding came to my mind. Then it slapped me in the face and I began to  wonder what the heck this would have to do with Asian American Literature.

The Story is about a family consisting of a French dad and Vietamese wife and their daughter. The setting is most likey Christmas 95 (just a hunch) and the family is together celebrating well… christmas. The daughter is the narrator of the story and she is already grown up and is there with her husband. She first talks about her father and his family, then moving on to her mother and her family. Then following that comes a little bit about their childhood. French and Vietamese? Could it be!? Inter-racial marridges!? Yes this probably wasn’t uncommon between the two ethnic groups because for some time, the French had control of Vietnam.

Anyway one of the interesting themes that run in this story comes on page 10. There is a line that goes “…each of us holding firmly on to our masks. Each carrying more than one.” So what is the narrator saying? Let’s say the masks represent a part of us. For example, the dad would carry a French mask, the mother carries a Vietamese mask. Firmly grasped could be seen as how stuck in their ways they are. In the story, even though they are married they hang out seperately in their own little groups. The daughter carries more than one being she’s both and it’s up to her to juggle these masks around to try to satisfy both groups. In a way this can be seen as a internal struggle with a theme of identity of who she is. I think Kim brought up a good point, that it’s no wonder why it’s hard for the author (or any other asian american) to figure out who they are when trying to juggle these masks.

“God dictates”

Immigration Blues by Bienvenido Santos takes us on the Filipino side of things. It was a nice easy read and I felt rather comfortable in reading it. As a summary it takes place on the west coast of America where a old pinoy named Alipio has been living after losing his wife and getting into a car accident. Then two women visit him. One of them is the wife of one of his friends and the other her sister. They end up talking a lot about how they came here and how they got married in order to stay in the United States. After a long talk the sisters confess that they came here because they needed to get the younger sister married before she get’s deported which brings the story back to the first points of their conversation. Alipio never comes out and says it but I believe that he agreed to their terms.

The entire seen is quite humerous to me because it reminds me of my home actually. Not the old man living all alone peacefully part, but the concepts of eating. It’s a very big deal to be a good host to Alipio and he offers practically everything to his guests for lunch. My own parents do the same thing and it oftens frightens my friends when they cannot escape eating upon entering my house. Other concepts are the mentioning of sending things back home. Balikbayan boxes are boxes we fill will all sorts of things to send back to our relatives back in the Philippines. It’s the same concept but I just wanted to share that little tid bit with you all this time because it is funny when you go to an airport with 4-5 giant cardboard boxes.

I titled this post “God dictates” because that is Alipio’s most used quote. Now what does it mean? Basically it means an act of providence, it is going to happen, or one might call it fate. If there is one thing I’ve learned about Filipinos, it is that they are very religious. For the most part it is prodominatly catholic so their is a big emphasis on the big honcho God. There are even extremes when people crucify themselves.

To bring this full circle Alipio stays true to this concept. Despite that God has taken away his wife and broke his leg he still has faith in him. I think it’s because of this that such a strong character is built so even he can overcome the monumental task of moving on after a loved one’s death, but God Dictates.

This post sorta feels odd to me. I guess it’s because I put a bit of my own personal info on it. Slightly odd to me but whatever, I won’t do this often and this is probably one of the few times i’ll do it. So to break it down

1.) Food and hospitality are important
2.) Balikbayan boxes are used to carry goods to relatives back home
3.) Religion is highly valued

Hey if I can get my body back soon that would be cool thanks!

Posting a little late and quite sorry for this, but things have been busy for me as of late.

Over break we were to read Milton Murayama’s All I Asking for Is My Body. The story is about a Japenese American guy growing up in Hawaii around the era of World War II. Like with the last book we read there is a slight disliking of the Japenese part of themselves, but it takes it in another direction. Unlike Nisei Daughter the main character is bound to this debt left by his grandfather through his parents. Due to a Japenese custom he is forced to serve his parents to work out of this debt. In order to pay off the debt the family starts working in the sugar cane plantations in Hawaii. The problem about this is they’re not making enough money and the kids dreams are starting to grow more and more distant.

What struck me as interesting in this entire story was the concept of “Filial Duty.” Now I’ve heard of kids taking care of parents as they grow older, but this new concept of paying off debts and serving under them is entirely new to me. In a way I found this to relate a lot to the Japenese-American lifestyle. It would be easy to just seperate one’s self from the family to escape the debt but due to traditional values placed, that did not seem as an option.

“It was the Japenese way, face was that much more important, like the starving samurai who walks around with a toothpick in his mouth, pretending he’d just eaten. You covered up more, and it was rough when you were the one being covered up or you were holding up somebody else’s face.”

I think this is such a nice way of describing it. The first part talking about how face was imporant. Even more so, how it was more important. I think this goes with the Japenese way of looking good to the rest of the world. In the Takaki book he mentions how the Japenese government screened who went out of the country so they could make Japan look good to the rest of the world. in this way no matter how bad things may go they cannot show it or it may make the home country look bad. To narrow that down even more let’s put the family as the thing a individual wants to look good. This is the reason for keeping up traditions I feel.

Little Hirohito

Before we begin I decided to put up the Robot Chicken reference Brad brought up in class. Sorta unrelated to the topic but it’s really funny. Here is the link!

Alright despite the title saying Hirohito, this has little if none to do with him. I just felt it made for a funny title crossing the above video with Japenese (Hirohito being the current emperor at the time) things. Ok enough random side side tracking, back to the book.

One of the main turn around points was the bombing of pearl harbor. By now we should all know what happened. US embargo and other fun stuff makes Japan angry so they attack the naval fleet in Pearl Harbor Hawaii. It’s not so much the event that happens as much as what follows. The people of the US become well shaken by the attack and to me it’s no surprise there is this paranoia created toward the Japenese. What I found more interesting is how some of the Japenese reacted. It was an interesting scene that they were burning everything Japenese in their homes and raising American flags on their porches.  In class we talked about how they did it to look more American, they were trying to distinguish themselves as not Japenese. I found this interesting because it reminds me of basic human instinct of survival. The Japenese and Japenese Americans knew after this event they would be looked at in a harsh way so they did the most natural thing they could do, try not to look it. Sadly if you recall in my post about the Takaki piece it didn’t matter in the end. Regardless where they were born, as long as they had the face, they were all the same.

Everyone in America i’m sure have heard about the Nazi concentration camps and how they slaughtered the jews. After a small poll in the class it turns out that not too many knew about the Japenese interment camps. Though the intention was different (Hitler killing jews and FDR just putting them to work), people were still shipped out without any trial. Now according to Edd when he was in Germany they didn’t go over the events of WWII as extensively as we probably do. Most likely they wanted to try to forget the embarassing events I feel. The same probably could be said about the interment camps in the US as well. Oh just for my own curiosity, how many people know about the experiments the Japenese war crimes during this time. As a short summary the Japenese had a huge portion of China during WWII. They often used the Chinese for certain experiments such as placing them around a bomb and seeing what kinda dammage they would do. Other times they tested chemical warfare and observed the effects. They killed countless people and at the end of the war, unlike the Germans who got tried, the Japenese involved were let off practically free. Why you might ask? It’s because the Japenese gave the results to the United States. It’s basically as infuriating to the Chinese as it was the Japenese.

The end of the book was a nice reverse of the first chapter in accepting the two heads thing, but it was also predictable in my opinion. Points of interest is when she is talking about how the blame is partially on themselves. Well Sone doesn’t come out and say it but she states that part of the responsibility is on them to make a change. Fairly sure we got the idea that in the US we get a vote and a chance to make a difference, but is it fair to say the internment experience was on them too? How can anyone justify that the Japenese put themselves in that position. I’m not sure about placing the blame on them, but i think it was to say it’s not everyone in Washington’s fault. I guess i could even extend it to say that maybe they could’ve prevented this by more rallying against the injustice and demanding a trial. Not sure really, guess only Sone knows that one for sure.