Out of the Rubbles

In the face of great adversity or calamity, people usually band together regardless of differences in race, ethnicity, gender, income, religious affiliation, income levels, or political alliances. In the light of the horrific recent natural disasters in Asia, this ability to set aside our differences is demonstrated again and again. Even internally in places which have been repressed.

But I am truly moved and inspired by this recent New York Times article about a Chinese couple whose marriage was falling apart but was able to survived being trapped under the rubbles of the earthquake for 28 hours. Prior to the disaster, the couple rarely saw each other since the husband traveled much for work while the wife took care of their daughter. But during the pivotal hours trapped under their building, they encouraged each other to cling to life and live for their family. Although the wife's arm inevitably had to be amputated since it was crushed under the husband's body for many hours, the couple was extremely lucky to survive at all and acquired a new beginning for their relationship.

I guess it's human nature to not see what we have and look at what we lack. Sometimes it does take some catastrophe to realign our values and put into perspective what truly matters. For this couple the earthquake in China was truly life changing.

Boy-friend

"How's your friend doing?" my mom asks in Cantonese.

Although my mom has not change her conversational voice, the lilt in her voice is unmistakable. She might as well physically italicize the word friend as it came streaming out of her mouth. That is the funny thing about parents, so many times they don't say what they want to say but you pretty much get the gist of where they are coming from.

In my case, it was my white boyfriend who was finally introduced to my parents after over a year of dating. It's not that I wanted to hide him from public but when you are living on your own as your own person, away from your strict parents, and in a relatively unstable "I don't know what I am doing with my life" phase, it's pretty hard to introduce someone to your parents when you don't know how the relationship will be going.

Regardless, he was introduced and they know of his existence. The fact that they cannot pronounce his name with their limited English vocabulary presents some problems ("Is his name this in Cantonese?" No, that means crazy. "Does it sound like this?" No, that means rotting and sounds nothing like his name. Agh I give up!) but the fact that he is not a "nice Chinese boy" compounds it. Even after meeting him, he is never referred to as my boyfriend by my friend.

"Have you been seeing your friend lately?"
"Is your friend picking you up from the airport after your business trip?"
"How was meeting your friend's parents?"

One of my co-workers who happens to be gay, Chinese, and has a white boyfriend advises me that every single time my parents say friend, to ask them point-blank specifically which friend until they give up and say his butchered name. Alas I am not brave enough to implement his advice. After all I am the one who still needs to talk to my parents.

At the beginning

As a an avid reader and opinionated Chinese-American women straddling the Eastern/Western cultural divide, trying to decipher my place in corporate America, and dealing with family, friends, co-workers, and classmates, I avoid keeping diaries or journals like a plague. Probably due to the traumatic childhood incidence involving my younger brother finding my fanciful thoughts in a girly diary and the subsequent outrage/carnage.

However, after graduating from college and working for a few years I feel like time has passed by exceedingly fast and excruciatingly slow at times. Yet so many events pass in a blink of an eye. Here are my perhaps irreverent efforts to remember them.