Clothes

In Article 3 of Part One, we explore other cultures and how women are represented in them. One particular topic stood out to me. Cynthia Fuchs Epstein writes, "Although men, with some exceptions, wear Western dress in much of the world, women's clothing is used to symbolize their cultures' confrontations with modernity, in addition to clothing's symbolic roles". I've seen this before. Don't images just rush to minds-- bits and pieces of things you've seen on Discovery Channel. Do you instantly think of women in saris beside men in jeans and t-shirts, or again in Africa men in t-shirts and women bright wraps with tall head wraps, and the same for any other culture. In performance, we dress women in time-period clothes, but men are looked down upon in time period clothes that aren't armor. As if it makes them seem more feminine... is costume a feminine tradition? There's so much emphasis on the way women look! A woman has to represent her heritage on top of her flesh, while a man can hold his within. Why? Why is this rule in place? Is it that whole "seen and not heard" rule. Is that rule universal?

Me Love You Long Time

Out of all of our reading thus far, When I Was Growing Up by Nellie Wong was the most compelling for me. I've never heard an Asian American woman complain about the stereotypes against her, and so somehow that made them true in a way. I believed that she would SUBMIT to such abuse, and so I became a perpetuater of her oppression. Me, of all people! It's difficult to admit when your wrong, but I have never even deeply thought about the way Asian American women are portrayed before reading this poem. I've always been concerned with myself, with women in general. As I was reading her reveal herself, I could only imagine all the pop-ups I've seen that say, "Do you like Asian chicks" "Barely 18 and Japanese" "Japanese girls and candy" or the horror stories of mail order brides. I hate that they're treated this way, like dolls and not people. I wish we could respect and admire Asian beauty as a delicate culture rather than poke and probe at it with barbaric perversion. I wish we could respect Asian women as women, and not treat them like children because Western body types are bigger and rounder than the stereotypical Asian body type. Why do we not stereotype Asian men the same way? Why don't we have male order husbands? I've never met an Asian woman who wasn't respectful, proud, and intelligent, and these are the attributes of Eastern culture. Nothing about the Eastern tradition is submissive or childlike.

September 16th

It was 1988, the year Reagan left office and the Bush family began their presidential reign, gas was 91 cents a gallon, and the little girl from Poltergeist died. I didn't know any of that stuff. I was in Bumpus Mills, Tennessee, a town that hasn't changed much since 1988. Those kids around me are my cousins. I'm the third oldest in my generation, so I probably knew all of the cousins there that day by name, but as they multiplied I quit trying. They filled our tiny apartment with reenactments of The Terminator or whaling like Tarzan. Trapped in such a small space with my cousins, aunts, and uncles, the sound would swell. Sweaty heads and elbows swarmed me. Only my grandmother and I were still. Sometimes my dad would look at me and then his mom, once he said, “Mama, Sami reminds me of you, ya know her mannerism. Ya'll are always so calm and quiet”. I can remember thinking, “I'm not an old lady!” Now I realize my grandmother wasn't an old lady then, and he was right. We were dreamy, lost in thoughts and fantasy. Had I been given the chance, I bet I could have spent an entire day staring, thinking about what was going on around me or dreaming of places I'd never seen. My best friend in fifth grade said to boy who asked if I had a staring problem, “She always stares”. Kids in Bumpus Mills don't have themed parties or tables of presents. I had a Rainbow Brite cake, Smurf plates, and Garfield hats. My aunts and uncles brought pieces of the party. The girl behind me is Kristen, she's a year younger than me. She's a nurse now at the Stewart County Hospital, and married to her high school sweetheart. The boy in the hat is Beau, he does electrical work in Stewart County, and he has kids, but I don't know how many. They were having fun. They were playing, telling jokes, swinging off the arms of men and begging women for something new every chance they got. I was there, but the only reason I'm in the picture is because it was my birthday. The world was happening around me, and I was discovering different ways to talk to people. I was finding my own way. I've always wanted to be like them. I've spent days wishing I could tell jokes and climb trees and be content in Stewart County forever, but when I see myself trying so hard I realize the life I inherited doesn't suit me at all. Was that what my grandmother was talking about when she called my humor dry? In the hallways of WKU, I feel exactly the way I felt on the same day twenty one years ago, like life is happening all around me, and I'm watching, thinking, dreaming. I meandered through my life to end up in same place I started, chewing on my lip with my head down.

Reality hit me tonight. Well... it fell on top of me in the darkness as I lay awake in bed playing all of the day's events over in my mind. I walked (again) into my professor's office. I listened to the highlights of our conversation, but this time I could see myself. I watched Me sit, with my hand near my mouth and my hair out of place. I told him I worked full-time, and he said something like, "Oh, not from a family with money, huh?" This time I walked into the hall, but unlike the first time I noticed my surroundings. I could see the passers-by, and in that second, I was washed under three years of that university. I could see the other students. I saw their clothes, their cars, their smooth round faces and tan skin. How could I have been so blind before? It's so obvious I don't belong. Why am I here? Every semester I take out another loan that I'll never be able to pay back, and why? I'll never afford graduate school, and if I do... If I do, I'll be the one they call ma'am. I will be the forbidden one. I may already be the forbidden one, blinded by the ease of maturation. I may not notice that everyone else notices my starter wrinkles. Why am I doing this? To write? I could write for free! The professor (the one I spoke to earlier today) always says, “You know what a Bachelor’s in English and a quarter will get ya?” He never answers his riddle, and I would rather not hear the rest. I love college. I do. I love the academic surroundings, so much so that I want to be a professor-- not selflessly. I don't want to be a professor to better my fellow man, but the surroundings motivate me to work and to learn. If I could be a professor, I could write forever, and improve until I die without the bullshit of other jobs draining my desire. It sort of goes back to what my Grandma used to say, “You are who you hang with”. Obviously, that’s not completely true, but the rule does have some merit. Your surroundings inarguably influence who you are. When I am in classroom, I’m still Sami, but I’m a different version. I’m the Sami I want to be, as opposed to the Sami at the cash register asking if you’d like to donate a dollar. So, I guess that's why I'm here. I'm here to earn the freedom to be myself. I'm buying my freedom to be happy. In a few years, when the reality of paying back
loans for the rest of my life comes crashing down, I’m sure there will be times, perhaps when I’m sealing envelopes of checks, that I question if the actual value of my time at Western, but I’ve made my choice. I've gone too far to stop now.