Recently, China has become a part of my day-to-day life again. I started tutoring in Chinese (which happens to involve cooking Chinese food once a week), I'm reading a book about China, watched a very long show in Chinese, and I'm considering applying for work teaching Chinese students. Suddenly, I'm thinking in Chinese again.
It feels good in a way I'm not quite able to articulate. It's not exactly happy or exciting (though it's not not those things), nor is it purely nostalgic, because it's not a repetition of the past. New words, new books, new ideas, new insight, new faces. It's not exactly something that's always been there, because it's specific to this point in time. Maybe it's like a piece of clay that I carry with me. It's always there in a formless state, but it's not alive nor does it carry specific meaning unless I put my hand to it and shape it.
I like the way Chinese sounds. Familiar, but also with infinite unexplored corners. I like picking it out in a crowd, like a code that most people can't decipher. When we were out trick-or-treating last week, I heard a man on his cell phone, saying to his older relative on the other end, "how are your eyes?" These moments are like being brushed with the beam of a lighthouse, directed at me. I like being able to speak a second tongue without effort, even if I rarely use it. Like an old locket that's always around my neck, but hasn't been opened in a long time. It's like opening the door of your home after a long trip away, and recognizing its smell that you can't decipher when you've been living in the midst of it. The rooms are the same, but you have changed. You walk through the house and you open the windows. A fresh breeze shifts the scents, not unpleasantly.
(W.T. Benda)
I am wary of ever saying I've healed from something. Healing seems to be a key that unlocks new doors that held previously restricted areas in need of healing. I am wary of saying that reconnecting with part of me that wants to be steeped in a Chinese life is a turning point, rather than a blip.
Sometimes I think TCKs (Third Culture Kids) are afraid to be healed. What are we, without the special concoction of pain and lack-of-belonging and misunderstood-ness and identity crises that we all recognize and embrace as our Third Culture? It's a beloved culture and it's something that gives us a place with one another, so what will be left to feel if we whittle away the sharp edges of that community bond? The sharp edges that poke us into remembrance, even if the memories are painful? What is left to understand if not for being misunderstood? What is to be shared if not for a sense that no one can fully share with us?
The good parts of being a TCK are often specific to the cultures that make us up. The bad parts are universally understood by TCKs. So I'm stuck thinking that:
To heal is to let go.
To let go is to forget.
To forget is to lose my identity.
Therefore I must not heal entirely.
I know there are flaws in that progression, but it's my perception. I've gone through that process to a degree and simply built a new identity. I am rooted in America now. I don't always think of myself as American in the same way that non-TCK Americans are American, but America is my home now, none the less. That's why sudden immersion into Chinese customs and thoughts and entertainment and language has me...unable to define how I feel about it. It might be healing. But it might also be ripping off a scab. Re-breaking a bone that didn't set correctly. I don't want to break, but I do want to heal.
I've wanted my identity to be in the homeless, stateless, wandering community where I understand the terms, bitter as they are. But it's purgatory. It does not sustain full life. If I am a tree, I wanted my roots to suck life from both sides of the ocean, but I simply am not big enough to do both well. And to let one half of the roots thrive means letting the other half wither. And it's a dreadful thing to choose. For a tree to grow, it must allow its roots to run deep.
I don't know if I can do it, or if it's a one time decision at all, but maybe China is a place that can be a part of me going forward, not just always looking back. Maybe I can let go and grab on anew at the same time. I will inevitably forget things, but maybe also remember a few things, and make new memories that are informed by a foundation that is blurry now. Maybe I can identify myself in a realm that encompasses more than loss of things I've loved.
Despite my hopes for instant and wild fame as a result of blogging, it's always been something of a personal journal. A journal is a place where you don't have to have all the answers, you won't be graded on how well you argued your point, and it's okay to not have a point at all. I don't have bullet points today, and if I don't feel hopeful at the end of writing it, then I just won't end on a hopeful note.
I do love it when people give glowing reviews of whatever I have to say or I get praise for being "so honest". But it's not an achievement for me. There's always another layer I haven't reached or shared yet, not because it's too dark or too personal, but just because I'm a work in progress. In my mind - most days - I Have Arrived. The way I am is the culmination of everything I've said and felt and been and done up until now and I can't be any more than that. But I forget that tomorrow will add to that and I never really Arrive at the final version of myself. I've had everything worked out since I was 5, and it's a continuous irritation that I'm just not developing according to my master plan.
Rather than having arrived at Butterflyness, I think I'm more like something freaky emerging from a chrysalis. And my hips are stuck. I went in fuzzy and I'm coming out... still fuzzy. I'm beginning to realize that my butt just might not look at all like what I'd imagined. Figuratively speaking.
I'm sad. And I know it. And I don't know how to go through it instead of around it. Even if I knew how, I don't want to. Most of the time I'm not sad, but sometimes things happen that I can't prevent and that makes me recognize that little by little, I've made choices to insulate myself from feeling sadness. When that insulation gets chipped or threatened, I get a little twitchy. A lot twitchy. So twitchy that I've started to recognize that even though I don't know what it is that I'm suppressing or why it's there, it's something that I'm afraid of letting it out because I certainly recognize its magnitude.
In my waning ability to control this thing, I've noticed that I'm manifesting some neurosis, and that startled me. The most notable thing is that it's become increasingly difficult for me to drive. I've never been in a real accident, but my inability to control other drivers while I'm driving or the idea that anything unexpected could happen at any moment makes me extremely jumpy when driving, and I get sweaty and feel tingly. When I reach my destination I feel an inflated sense of relief. I've even begun to avoid some travel because I'm too stressed by the journey to get there. I think I will actually just get a little too sad right now if I explore how my must-control-my-environment coping mechanisms affects how I relate to my children. Sometimes I don't let them talk in the car.
Unresolved sadness upon unresolved sadness has built up into something that feels insurmountable. My family often asks me why I "bottle up my feelings" and I always deny that I do, because I certainly don't do it consciously. I have a lot of feelings and I express plenty of them. I recognize that "bottling" is not a good thing to do, and therefore I would never willfully ignore something that needed to be dealt with. But I guess that's the whole point - somehow I fake myself out of thinking the hardest things are worth dealing with, and that is by nature burying it.
If you're wondering why I'm sad or how I got to be cripplingly sad, I couldn't really tell you. I loved my childhood, but it was a never ending cycle of ended relationships and I was not in control of when I got to say goodbye. Or if I wanted to say goodbye. It's no ones fault, but it was sad then and it's sad now. There wasn't any use in fighting it and no one who deserved my wrath, so I never fought it and I didn't take it out on anyone. But fighting is part of grief, and since I never grieved, I guess I just skipped all the emotional work that's necessary when you experience something sad. Now, when I experience something sad, I don't know how to accept the sadness and it leaks out of me in other ways, like my control issues. And there's so much pent up sadness that is pushing against the back of my eyeballs whenever something even a little bit sad happens that it would be a disaster to let it all out over something that isn't worth a tsunami of feelings over. Sometimes, I've wished someone (no one in particular, calm yourself) would die so that I had an appropriate occasion to really lose my shit all at once.
I never really understand that whole "Instagram looks so perfect, but don't believe that perfect life" refrain. I'm not covering up a dark secret with images of my beautiful life. My life is actually beautiful a lot of the time and I'm not trying to pretend that I don't have problems. But then when I get to a place where I can even consider that I might be detached from part of my own being... well, how does one casually bring that up on Instagram or otherwise. Flower photo, vintage outfit photo, cooking tip, my kids looking cute, more flowers, oh by the way my mind and body are conspiring against my commands as a result of Unresolved Grief. Do you like my dress? I do.
In acknowledging that I have some emotional trauma buried that I need to process, I've had several people recommend that I develop a compassionate inner voice. I'm trying not to blow that off as the bougiest thing I've ever heard because the whole point is to acknowledge that maybe I am repressing something and I'm aware that I'm not currently equipped to handle the exorcism. Therefore, logic would dictate that I might need some new tools to help me. I have a few, but I'm not ready to use them yet.
Am I mean to myself? I mean, not that I know of... but on the other hand, would a she-devil that's always been a she-devil know that there was any option out there but attack with fangs? As ironic as this is, I don't really want to bad-mouth my inner voice because she is... me. My inner voice chamber is where I don't have to filter the way I encounter the world in order to be polite. Yeah, inner voice can be sassy and ruthless, but so is reality.
I want to tell Inner Voice not to tell me to be nicer, because when I'm in pain, I don't want to be nice. And I don't want to feel guilty about having that space where I get to lash out without verbalizing my most wretched desires and dreads. I like a place to contemplate crimes without having to commit any. I also don't want Inner Voice to give me any bullshit about how the blackness of my heart will eventually come out of my mouth because that's what the Bible says will happen. Inner Voice right now to hypothetical Inner Voice telling me stuff I don't want to hear: "I know, dumbass, I can read." She's rude and mean. So am I. But she's also as honest as she knows how to be and recognizes when things suck and it sucks to feel them. And I don't want to nicen that up. I rely on cynical, angry voice to help me process things that I don't like. I guess I just don't know how to tone it down when I get past the angry phase.
I also don't want the internet to think that I don't have "real friends" with whom I can discuss these more troubling things with. I do have wonderful in-person friends. But sometimes I don't talk too good out loud and I have to wait for someone else to respond and Inner Voice has to be tamed for the sake of human relationships.
When I think about the idea that internal stress that I don't acknowledge affects me physically and in some really strange ways, I just want to watch myself as a bystander. I mean, how WEIRD is that driving thing?! If it was someone else telling me that, I'd think they were making it up or making a rather far-fetched connection, though it must be said I'm notoriously bad at connecting causes and affects related to my body. I just don't have the time to figure out if cheese makes my stomach uncomfortable. Even if it did, I'd still eat it. Things that don't fit in to my personal logic structure just get relegated to "must not be real".
I only experience one reality, personally, but I'm much more open to the idea that there is no such thing as one static "reality" than I used to be. I have my own reality, but the more I think about it, the less it worries me if someone else who is "crazy" believes they're communing with aliens and stuff. I mean, who am I to say they aren't? It's real to them. And I really can't prove that it's not real. Imagine how frustrating it would be if you really were an alien and no one believed you. Anyway, that's tangential, but being that this is my journal and all, I can acknowledge any number of realities that I want to. Who knows what other weird stuff I might do in the future as a result of... I don't know...anything?! The more I recognize my own illogical, inexplicable self, the fewer assumptions I make about other people's "crazy" behavior. I'm not sure why I even value "having it together".
Relying on an environment I can completely control is I think partly why I've stopped writing very much. It's too draining for me to process other people's responses or to second guess my own thoughts and feelings about things. I don't want to explain myself any better than I already have. I don't know if it makes sense, and if it doesn't make sense to someone I don't want to work harder to explain myself. I am releasing myself from explaining why I have the urge to share everything on the internet too (thanks, Sweet, Sadistic, Inner Voice). It's because I'm a really gifted, brilliant, funny, mostly always genius and right writer, okay. And the world deserves to have my sparkle rub off on all its peasants.
It seems to me that most men have a sense of self assurance. The other day, I heard a man praised as "someone who never second guesses himself". I was starting to envy that belief that one is always right, until I remembered that it takes a lot more courage and work to consider that you might be wrong. Someone who never second guesses themselves can never listen to criticism. But I listen to all criticism because I believe other people's words (usually) have value. I think that's mostly a good trait, but it becomes deafening sometimes.
I've been reading Pearl S. Buck's autobiography (My Several Worlds) for a long time now, and this passage really stuck out to me:
"[I was sent several pages of blistering rebuke over The Good Earth because] I had been so frank about human life... The worlds in which I have lived and grown have made me what must be called a controversial figure, as I have been told often enough, and this is because inescapably, by experience and nature, I see the other side of every human being. If he be good, then there is that other side, and if he be evil, there is again another side, and if the ability to comprehend the reasonableness of both seems confounding to those who are content with one dimension, to others as to me, it is an endless source of interest and amusement and opportunity for love and life. We have no enemies, we for whom the globe is home, for we hate no one, and where there is no hate, it is not possible to escape love."
This perhaps proves that my Inner Voice needs a makeover, but the only person I can't argue both sides for is myself, to myself. My own dualities can be so destabilizing that I end up feeling confused and even angry with my inability to figure myself out. I can't help but encompass everything all at the same time. I don't view myself as controversial, I'm just a giant umbrella that is inexplicably compelled to present you with every option you haven't thought of every time you open your mouth. I'm not mentally unstable (well, not very), I'm just too small a vessel to carry all the things that I've absorbed and if you don't understand that innately, it makes me overheat in an effort to HELP YOU SEE BEHIND THE CURTAIN. I'm a sad, confused droid that wants to help people but only knows how to communicate in droid-speak. So kind of like a not-very-helpful thing that wants to be helpful.
I don't like this. I am a strong, grown-ass woman who is usually proud of herself and is good at things and I'm not happy that part of my own team is sabotaging me with it's crazy psycho drama that is part of me but also not listening to me and YOU WICKED DEMON SADNESS MONSTER JUST STAY IN YOUR BOX. I've been doing quite well telling my feelings when and where to feel, and I have no intention of letting them run the show. This is not a democracy, it's a dictatorship. My subjects are getting cocky with their insubordination and their feeling coup d'états.
Are there rehab facilities for sad people? Where you can go and kill stuff, followed by a quiet soak in a scalding bath in a pitch black room? With dessert afterward? Maybe a Japanese mafia spa.
Inner Voice says I am not brave enough to get my weird fuzzy butt out of this chrysalis.
As I was scrolling through Instagram stories today, a designer I follow had a reminder to "please be respectful of Mexican culture instead of mocking it in light of Cinco de Mayo coming up." I immediately panicked, wondering if I unwittingly show disrespect, since I couldn't imagine how one might celebrate Cinco de Mayo in a mocking way. I wrote the designer and asked what she considered disrespectful and she mentioned drunkenly imitating Mexican accents while wearing sombreros, and thankfully I've never done that or even considered it.
That experience of worrying whether I'm inadvertently appropriating someone else's culture is common to me. I think about the topic of cultural appropriation often because I know it's real but I also know that the rules of what is or is not appropriate shift and are nuanced depending on many factors. I wanted to offer my take, particularly as a Third Culture Kid (TCK) or a "global citizen".
I am ethnically/racially white from every angle of my family. My skin is very, very white. I spent the first 16 years of my life in various areas of China (which has a much larger degree of cultural diversity than is generally portrayed) and occasionally Thailand. Now I live back in the US where more than half of my city is Hispanic/Latino. That leaves me with cultural influences, appreciations, and background that do not match my ethnic background. This is common to all people with transient childhoods (or extended periods of adulthood) and to immigrants. More and more, the experiences that shape our personal and familial cultures are a blend of more than one ethnicity or tradition. Yet in cases such as mine, you'd never know if you didn't ask. If I wear Pakistani clothing while living in California and speaking English with no accent, for example, your first guess about why I might be doing that might not be that I grew up among Pakistanis. It might look suspect, but I still engage in cultural practices or decorate or dress up in clothing from other cultures because many of those cultures have become part of my identity.
Playing dress-up at home in Xinjiang, China, c.1995. Definitely not culturally accurate of any one thing, which seems like a great metaphor for the rest of my life, haha.
I don't think there's a rule book that works all the time for what is or is not cultural appropriation, but here are some of my suggestions.
Appropriation vs. Appreciation
verb
əˈprōprēˌāt/
1.
take (something) for one's own use, typically without the owner's permission.
"his images have been appropriated by advertisers"
synonyms:
seize, commandeer, expropriate, annex, arrogate, sequestrate, sequester, take over, hijack
verb əˈprēSHēˌāt/
1.
recognize the full worth of.
"she feels that he does not appreciate her"
synonyms:
value, treasure, admire, respect, hold in high regard, think highly of, think much of
Even though I understood the concepts of both appreciating and appropriating, I found these definitions to be insightful. Appropriating has this aspect of power-plays (addressed later on) and even violence. The image of a hijacking is an especially vivid association as we can imagine how jarring it would be to be going in one direction and have someone suddenly wrestle that choice away from us and take us in a new, unwanted direction. Similarly, appreciating means something more profound than the way in which I often use it - it carries this deep sense of worth, synonymous with treasure. I was especially struck by the definition of "recognizing the full worth". That's a true litmus test for whether we are appropriating or appreciating something.
I treasure many things. It's called being a maximalist, aka a trash rat. I literally find other people's trash and nail it to my walls, and it brings me great satisfaction! I've found that because of my messy cultural background, I like a lot of different things that have meaning or hold memories for me. Even if I don't have a specific memory tied to an object, I might see an object that reminds me of something or somewhere or even someone I love, and then I want to add that object into my living space. I am also interested in a lot of things that I don't yet "recognize the full value of" but exploring things that intrigue me is a way that I learn. A lot of items that I'm drawn to have an ethnic feel because I like color and pattern and faintly macabre stuff (carvings and masks) and that happens to overlap with many tribal, Eastern, or South American cultures. I find that I also search for things to attach meaning to as a way to compensate for not having strong cultural and spiritual markers within my ethnic heritage. That tendancy can easily become appropriation, but it has everything to do with your motivation, attitude, and experience.
I'm not sure I do appreciate the full worth of every thing I bring into my home or put on my body, but I do believe things have worth and that I add worth with my care for them. When reusing and recycling (thrifting), it's almost impossible to know the history of an item and what it meant to the previous owner. In that sense, we might never appreciate something in the way that it was first appreciated or designed to be appreciated, but at the same time, we have the opportunity to actually add value through a new appreciation of that item. I never want to seize something - an idea, an object, a look - that belongs to someone else, but instead to treasure things that I'm drawn to, even if the reasons I treasure them are different than what they were originally made for.
Create vs. Imitate
One way in which to avoid appropriating is to focus on fusion or mixing and matching. As someone with ambiguous or mixed up or layered cultural makeup, I'm typically drawing from and creating things - food, outfits, spaces, thoughts - that aren't purely of any one culture. Honestly, is anything culturally "pure" in our world? I don't think very many people would argue that being inspired isn't a great thing or that cultures don't borrow from each other in order to improve or adapt all the time!
However, to avoid making an imperfect homage to a culture or custom that I don't fully belong to, I create something distinct. For example, I found a long, red piece of cotton at the thrift store that has silver trim on each end and mirrors sewn on to it in several places. This is likely part of an Indian or Pakistani outfit. Instead of trying to wear it like a Pakistani women would (I did not find matching pieces when I bought it, anyway), I might use it as a bed canopy or a headwrap or a shawl with an evening dress (probably not an evening dress that is distinctly Central or South Asian). Being too "on the nose" with cultural imitation or appreciation can easily look like mockery to others, even if you have the best intentions. Trying to create an exact copy usually only highlights that the effort is a poor imitation. In my opinion, you can't get it "wrong" if you make something that is new, because you're the only person who's done that before, so there is no blue-print to misinterpret.
Adding something with cultural significance into a mix of other things isn't meant to veil that item's cultural significance by taking it out of context, but instead to weave it into my own identity without being costumey or running the risk of looking like I'm mocking someone else's heritage. I'm creating something new with pieces of many different things rather than imitating something that I can never fully identify with. This happens quite naturally with food because food is so tied to location by its very necessity. To truly recreate a Turkish dish, for example, I would need access to lamb in some form other than ground meat and a variety of spices in raw form. Neither of those things are easy to come by in my area of California, so I substitute and tweak. Sometimes it's sad that I can't perfectly recreate something, but at the same time, I end up making something new that has a piece of California in it, and that new fusion is distinctly mine. I don't pretend that it's perfectly Turkish and it certainly isn't native to California, but rather than degrading either of those labels, I hope that it elevates a new, third category.
Photo: My friend Karissa M. grew up in Cameroon and now carries her daughter in traditional baby sling (photo used with permission).
Thoughtfulness vs. Consumerism
I've already stressed the necessity of being thoughtful about how we incorporate culturally significant objects or practices into our lives, but I wanted to talk about consumerism for a minute too.
There's nothing wrong with buying things that originated in other countries or cultures. We often want souvenirs of our travels, and sometimes we buy items to support the artisans that make them. In many places, selling craftwork to tourists or international markets is a main source of income for people. But I do get uncomfortable when craftwork is treated as a souvenir, in the sense that now we think that object belongs us to (because we paid for it) with no strings attached and we can be flippant about it or toss it aside when we clean out the house in a year or two. If you buy something when you travel, be willing to pay good money for something that's truly a work of art, and then treasure it for what it's worth. Don't buy junk (or treat your souvenir as junk) just for the sake of having visual representation of where you've been.
It's also makes me a bit uncomfortable when we see ourselves as benevolently lifting up "poor artisans." I'm not saying that there is no place for supporting ethnic craftsmanship, but please do so with dignity instead of out of guilt or a belief that someone else's livelihood depends on your kindness. I heard a story recently in which people who had had Western missionaries move to their area were asked about their feelings toward missionaries. The missionaries who were respected were those who treated others as equals, not as students or people who were in need of something that the missionary had. One missionary mentioned in the story had a family emergency come up in his home country. Unable to pay for a ticket home, he asked for help from the people he lived among, and that really made an impression on them, because that's how real friends treat one another - not that one party is always the giver and the other always the recipient, but that we help each other in times of need. Being humble enough to be the recipient of service is a way to show honor to others. In the same vein, don't devalue ethnic craftsman and women by underpaying or overpaying, because neither acknowledges that regardless of our circumstances, we are of equal worth in terms of our humanity.
I am still struggling with how to show dignity to people who make clothing for "fast fashion" companies like HandM, Forever 21, Topshop, Old Navy and probably Asos and Zara, to name a few. Even though clothing from these companies is generally culturally neutral, it comes at a relatively low cost to the consumer, which means that it's likely that whoever made it was not paid very well. Unfortunately, even those of us who don't work in sweat shops can't usually afford clothing that is for-sure ethically made. Buying clothes second-hand definitely alleviates some of that guilt for me because I'm not perpetuating the demand for items that can't possibly be worth as little as they sell for, but it's something I'm trying to be aware of in general as a consumer.
Historical Context and Power Dynamics
I mentioned earlier how I am drawn to things with a strong cultural feeling because I feel that I lack that in my own ancestry. I want to clarify that that general attitude can be what perpetuates appropriation. It's not that I have literally no heritage, but more that I don't identify with my ethnic heritage of French-German-British-Scottish-etc. I'm not sure if my parents do either, but even if they did, my parent's cultural identity is not my cultural identity by nature of my global upbringing, even though we share an ethnicity. On top of that, my religious background is from a church denomination that does not have ancient history or any dramatic rituals or markers such as traditional clothing, artwork, decor, rites of passage, or festivals.
I think that lack of cultural richness is common for Americans, especially because any cultural markers that we do have are so much the norm in our country that we don't even recognize them as cultural markers. Many of us then go looking for something to casually spice up our whiteness, but approach that process as if other cultures are cheap jewelry for us to take on and off as we please. It's a struggle, because I really do understand that it's strange to feel that you have no cultural meaning of your own. For those of us with more recent European ancestry ties or who are aware of a strong European cultural background, it can be a little bit tricky to lean into that, because a lot of European history and culture in the past several hundred years is very tied in with oppressing non-European cultures.
Even though we would never borrow culture from others out of spite or to degrade other people, we have to be aware that in general (speaking for white/European peoples) our ancestors and some of our contemporaries control much of the money and influence in the world. Similarly, as an American, my passport countries' military is involved in many places throughout the globe, and not always in the best way. That is a deeply emotional issue to many people, and even if my own beliefs differ from the actions of the US military or government, I still carry that association in the eyes of many others. Positions of economic or military dominance leave us with a responsibility to be aware of power dynamics and the fact that less prominent or affluent regions might be in a position of vulnerability in order to survive economically. That reality is not a free pass to export or incorporate culture at will. Imperialism is alive and well, but we don't always recognize it because we assume that what we have to offer is better than what someone else has. It's okay to believe that we have a good thing going, but it's not our job to decide whether someone else believes that too. I think it's good when cultures mix, but that mixing and sharing should be led by the person who owns that culture, not the tourist, the expat, the short term missionary, the foreign teacher, the occupying military, or even the researcher.
Not everything needs to be branded or exported, whether physically or idealistically. Being able to travel and explore other places is a privileged, not a right, and when we use other cultures as a backdrop to our lives or as a way to get more "likes", we're being exploitative. Ethnicity is not a commodity.
Similarly, we must be wary of exoticism and voyeurism. Geishas aren't there for us to photography and Bedouins don't exist to belly dance for tourists. I don't know if modern (or ancient, for that matter) nomadic tribes belly dance at all, frankly. If you do see something that seems exotic when traveling, I think it's okay to be excited or in awe, but people aren't zoo animals. Just because it's fascinating to us doesn't mean that person or custom we're admiring is from another point in time or isn't as advanced as our home cultures or doesn't have modern worries like we do. I know all of that probably sounds obvious, but I believe it's really important to understand the habits that land us in unhealthy situations. We are all insensitive at times, but we ususally don't recognize that we've crossed a line. Even the purest of intentions can be founded in ignorance and result in damage. To avoid that, we have to open to learning and not assume that we haven't caused harm just because we didn't know or didn't mean to.
As I said before, what is and isn't appropriate is on a bit of a sliding scale, too. Even 10 years ago, there were things that almost everyone would consider fine that are now looked upon in horror. I'm sure all of my peers will remember how the word "gay" was used to mean "lame" about 15 years ago. I was never aware of that being tied to any gender-identity in the context in which I heard it and used it, and it certainly wasn't used as a slur in my circles. But today, I cringe when I hear it because it is a word that people use to describe their sexuality and if you use that word as in adjective and only ever in negative situations, it suggests that you think very little of gay people.
If we feed into a system where there is some profit in the exposition of others (performing their own cultural rituals for the sake of entertaining a crowd), those people will continue to be exploited, either by their own economic needs or by modern slave masters, even if we don't realize it. The scenario of a human zoo exhibit is very real to me. I've been treated that way and I've seen others treated that way. We have to be very careful to make sure that our interest and appreciation is tempered by an understanding of the motivation and intentions of those we are observing. Taboos and Sacred Symbols
There are some things that are always no-nos, at least at this point in time. Slurs, hate speech, or mocking (in word or in deed) are never appropriate, not even as a joke. There are other things that have become so politically charged that I would just avoid them unless you have a legitimate ethnic claim. Usually these items or subjects are explicitly stated as sacred or taboo by those who the culture belongs to.
For example, feather headdresses are part of religious ceremonies for many Native Americans and they consider it offensive for their religious objects to be used as decoration for those who don't share their beliefs. For those who aren't Native American, there is nothing inherently wrong about wearing a feather headdress, but there's really no situation in which that's necessary and since it's been stated as disrespectful by a group of people who that imagery is clearly associated with, it's disrespectful to use their symbols outside of their sacred context. I've heard some discussion that dream catchers might be something that was co-opted into popular culture when it shouldn't have been (not so much the use of an actual dream catcher, but using the motif on shirts, etc.), but I don't know if they carry similar cultural weight as headdresses.
One taboo that was kind of difficult for me to let go of was tattoos of Arabic calligraphy. As the Koran was revealed in Arabic, it is considered sacred to many Muslims. Tattoos are traditionally forbidden in Islam, so tattoos in Arabic are considered taboo. However, when I just went a-googlin', the internet seems to have changed its mind on this topic. I asked about in a forum years ago and the response was tentative to negative, but general opinion now seems to be that it's not offensive. You might have noticed the same progression of opinion surrounding tattoos in Christian circles over the last decade (as a Christian, I never considered tattoos to be un-Biblical in nature, though there are some that would still offend me in content). I guess the moral of that story is do a little research if you're unsure. As a rule, you should never get a tattoo in a language you can't read or write. It will only be ridiculous and possibly even offensive to people who know that language. Similarly, tattoos of Buddha are very much frowned upon in Thailand, for example. Thai Buddists consider it very offensive that their religion be used as a vacation souvenir (it says so on giant signs in most airports in Thailand, haha).
Four sisters who I know who grew up in Thailand got sister-tattoos of lotuses to symbolize their shared multiculturalism. My favorite part is that each sister has a slightly different interpretation of the lotus. (photo from Kara H., used with permission)
Bindis (red forehead mark or ornament in India) and some African-origin hairstyles like cornrows are so recognizable as being native to one group and/or explicitly stated as not appropriate as ornamentation for "the masses" that I avoid those things, even in appreciation. I did get my hair braided in cornrows as a touristy thing in Thailand growing up, and there was certainly no malice in that on anyone's part, but I wouldn't do that today as an adult. I think that if you spend a great deal of time in Africa or India or again, have some legitimate connection to those cultural heritages you could make a case for wearing those styles, but otherwise I think it's risky.
I wanted to touch on blackface, too. There have been two occasions on which white friends of mine have dressed in blackface, not knowing it was very offensive to most people. Just last week, there was an incident at a frat house in our area concerning blackface that shut down the entire greek system at that school. Most people have been told at one time or another that blackface is strictly off limits, but I'm not sure that very few people know why. Especially in the area in which I live, there are very few black people and our education system doesn't do the best job at teaching these things. It's not the act of coloring your skin that is offensive in itself (cultures all over the world do this, either tanning to get darker skin or applying creams to get fairer skin, etc.). It's the historical roots of blackface that make it so unsavory. Blackface originated with white performers in the late 1800s who would caricature black people as a form of entertainment for white people. These caricatures were almost exclusively slap-stick style and portrayed black people as idiotic and incapable of serious thought or art. Many white people at the time believed that to be true of black people. So, blackface was a marker that only ever went hand in hand with mocking black people as being objects to laugh at.
Nothing that is someone's heritage should be turned into entertainment or costume. That's why ethnicity-based costumes (Native Americans, geishas, Mexicans, belly dancers, gypsies etc.) are frowned upon. If you want to dress up as a specific historical character that fits into one of those categories, go the extra mile and add some distinguishing attributes to your costume and be ready to be a fount of knowledge on who you're representing. Last year I saw a discussion thread on birthday party themes (and I would add wedding themes too) that are simply "Mexican" or "Japanese", for example. Unless you are somehow connected with those countries, their culture shouldn't be thought of as a party theme. Imagine going to a birthday party in China that was "American" themed and included Bay Watch cut out posters, soggy french fries, guns as props, and everyone wearing curly blond wigs and making jokes about the most stereotypical aspects of American culture. It would be embarrassing! Even though all of those things exist in the US, it's not a flattering or accurate depiction of American life. (Tbh, that sounds like a funny party, but that's not my point...).
I'm sure there are more symbols and subjects that are obviously inappropriate to some people that I am not aware of yet! I hope that I don't come to find out what those things are "the hard way." I try and keep my ears and eyes open and instead of rolling my eyes when "yet another thing" is claimed as sacred by one group or another, simply do what is in my power not to inflict damage if I can easily avoid doing so. I am not offended when non-Christians wear crosses or otherwise use Christian symbols - it's a symbol, not an embodiment of my belief or some higher power - but I definitely roll my eyes when I know someone is using it with no idea of its meaning (similarly, celebrating religious holidays without any of the religious significance or belief). It doesn't hurt or offend me personally, it just makes that person look ignorant. Learning and Teaching
For someone like me who has legitimate cultural roots unrelated to my ethnicity, and for many other people too, there's absolutely a place for borrowing, appreciating, and incorporating multiple cultures into one lifestyle. I even think it's okay to dress up as a specific historical or fictional character that is not of your own race. The key is to be educated about what you're doing, though. I want to be in a position in which if someone was to accuse me of appropriating, I could confidently explain my place in the culture that I'm not obviously from. In the case of costumes, you should be prepared to give a mini history lesson on the person you're representing, not just throw your hands up and say "I'm a Mexican!" or something. I also want to be open to hearing from someone who might criticize me in the event that they actually know more than I do and feel that I am using something out of context. If I did something thoughtlessly, I should adjust my actions. If not, I should take that opportunity to explain that plenty of people are from mixed upbringings, whether or not their physical features reflect that.
I'm also doing my best to let others speak on topics of cultures that aren't fully mine (if I'm with a Muslim friend, that friend should be able to share his or her beliefs instead of me "whitesplaining" it, even though I do have experience). No one is an expert on everything. Take every opportunity to let a culture (and its adherent) to speak for itself on what is and isn't up for grabs to the rest of the world. Different people within one culture feel differently about things too. There is huge variety in what is or is not socially acceptable among Muslims. It varies by family in my experience, just like it does in Christianity.
Always be ready to apologize if you blunder, even if whatever you did wasn't offensive to someone else in a previous situation. Also, avoid talking about things you don't understand. Confusing Chinese and Japanese culture is one of the most ignorant things to me, as they are very different. Similarly, I'm irritated by labels of "Asian", given that Asia is about 1/3 of the size of the entire globe. Why not take the time to find out where in Asia something originated? In my own life, I'm trying to be better about learning countries and their characteristics in Africa instead of talking about it like it's one homogeneous place.
Asiyami Gold is an art director who I follow on Instagram. I'm not sure what her ethnic roots are, but I really like the way she uses more traditional fabrics from her homeland in modern ways. (She's mentioned her cultural heritage before, but it's not posted anywhere and I can't remember!)
What's your take on appreciation and appropriation? I'd love to hear any good (or bad - you know I love the juicy stuff) stories you have on the topic. I'm especially interested to hear from fellow TCKs on how you explain your style to people who might assume that you're being insensitive. Does having a mixed cultural background make you feel more free to incorporate cultural aspects from places you don't have a connection with, because your identity is "everything" or "nothing"? I want to hear it all!
Ten years ago, I moved to America.
I was born here, but not raised here. The most recent ten years of life here, plus the 3 first years of my life here now add up to half my lifetime. Very soon, the scale will tip and I will have spent more of my life in America than anywhere else. This makes me cry.
There are many things that I am grateful for in America and that I appreciate about being an American, but it is hard for me to find it in myself to say that I love America. Perhaps in the same way that I wrote about my struggle to feel emotional fondness for children at times, I do not have emotional fondness for America most of the time, though I love it in a sort of fierce, visceral way and because I can not escape it, even if I were to move away.
In many ways, I am an immigrant, having moved to America from somewhere else that was once home. I think I can say that I share the immigrant's experience of being grateful for the promises that America holds and that in many ways, life for me here is "better" than it could be elsewhere, but I also harbor the immigrant's wound of feeling that I don't fully belong and I see with immigrants eyes that much of what America promises is a half-truth at best.
I am resisting the urge to apologize for this cynicism, because while I recognize and appreciate the good things, I am ever more aware that my sometimes-perception of America being "the best place" isn't the America that most people live in. I suppose that if you get to know anywhere well enough, you'll discover that it's not quite the same as you expected.
When I didn't live in America, America was always the Shining Place, where everything was better than wherever else I was in the world. The water was clean enough to drink from the pipes, the streets were paved and without trash, there weren't amputee children lying in the middle of the sidewalks,
and everyone had money to spare. This is both true and untrue. It is true that in most regards America's norms are of a higher standard than in other places. It's good enough on the surface that we can claim that it's good enough. I experience a lot of "grey" America, where everything is middle-of-the-road enough that we can get by without ever doing good or doing evil. You can also get by here without resisting evil.
I haven't traveled very much within the United States, but the little bit that I have seen astonishes me with its variety. Some people here don't have clean water, or enough water at all. There are unpaved streets and plenty of trash. There are more and more people begging for a living, and for most people, the thought of "money to spare" makes them laugh and cry at once. It is true that if we compare to rural China, for example, most Americans don't have much to complain about.
But I don't live in rural China anymore, I live here. I'm not a woman in Saudi Arabia "where things are really bad for women", I live here, where things aren't good enough for women. I don't live in a country where I will very likely be killed for my faith or my politics, I live here now, in a country where religious freedom is confused about itself and the religious don't take their faith very seriously but it's also commonplace to act on the most heinous of beliefs. I don't live in Yemen, where children are literally dying of hunger, but I live here, where fresh food costs more than poison.
I said before how life in America feels like grey-area to me much of the time. I think that is often a result of the America that I can see, but the more I am curious and the more I peek around corners, the more I have a sense that for many people, life in America is actually dark. I read somewhere recently that, "the world isn't getting darker, we're just pulling back the veil."
I live in a country where at 26, and within the time that I've lived here, I have outlived at least seven of over 5400 people shot by police officers (as of May 1, 2013 when such a list was created. The list below is from I Am Not Your Negro).
Tamir Rice 2002-2014 (age 12)
Darius Simmons 1998-2012 (age 14)
Trayvon Martin 1995-12 (age 17)
Aiyana Stanley-Jones 2002-2010 (age 8)
Christopher McCray 1996-2014 (age 18)
Cameron Tillman 2000-2014 (age 14)
Amir Brooks 1997-2014 (age 17)
Not only have I outlived them, but I was born before all of them too.
I don't bring this up to demonize the police. I understand that it is a difficult job, and sometimes officers shoot in self defense. I bring it up because it helps me to see that there is more than one America, and I'm trying to understand my place in all of them.
I didn't expect it to be so hard to do good here. Sometimes it feels impossible to recruit people to see my America, and sometimes people are too busy to love or be loved.
In many ways, I believe that President Trump has cut me loose, as a white woman, from what I thought I knew or what felt familiar here in America, and forced me to forge new bonds and recognize old rifts. I'm extremely grateful to his presidency for that. It has made my heart feel raw and exposed to elements I did not know existed, but I am grateful.
Ten years in, I still don't feel a sense of "where I'm from", but I do have this sense that I have a unique opportunity to understand and define what it means to be an American. I get to choose my identity to a greater degree than someone who was born and raised here, and that does make me feel invested in what it means to be American. I am from here, so I must be a part of here, and learn how to manipulate the potential for good here. I think that coming from outside gives me both a fierce love for what is good, and a less calloused view of what is rotten. I know where my loyalties are not, when it comes to Americanism.
Being American encompasses a lot more than I'll ever know or see, and the more I understand that, the more I realize that as much as I get to define Americanism for myself, I can't do that for everyone in this country. There isn't one right answer to what it means to love this country or be a part of it, or even to dislike being a part of it. But I do get to offer a counter-narrative when America is held up as something that I revile, because I am also American which means my view of Americanism counts for something.
Lately, my struggle has been to separate my identity as an American from my experience as a white woman. As I keep saying, being American looks different depending on who and where you are in this country, but I'm beginning to see that for me, it isn't right to stay in my America when other versions of America suffer for it. What I mean by this is that by not breaking away from the narrative of America, land of the free and brave, where everything is cleaner and better than elsewhere, I am complicit in perpetuating the version of America that is oppressive and warped. The warped version, where racism, sexism, imperialism, and religious oppression are deeply rooted generally isn't my America, which means that I can pretty safely ignore it (consciously and unconsciously). But if someone else lives in that America and I deny the truth of that, am I not perpetuating it? And if I can not deny it, how can I rest without challenging it?
If you live in America and you don't often find yourself angry and heartbroken, I do not think you are paying attention. I'm not saying that as a political slogan. Honestly ask yourself, if you think that life in America is "pretty good", not only for yourself but for other Americans that you might never have met, then what have you removed or not let in to your circle of influence? People are dying unnatural deaths here and suffering here, in America, and that shouldn't sit easily with any of us. Nor should we say we are upset by it, but then not change the very foundations of our lives and beliefs and understanding in order to prevent it from continuing.
I frequently become overwhelmed when I think of all the ways in which I am unsatisfied with America. But in the wise words of Mrs. Frizzle from the Magic School Bus, "if you have a problem that is too big to solve, solve a smaller problem first."
I have a fear that my life will be boring, lack meaning, or otherwise be average. I admit that sometimes I am motivated by my own search for glory, but I also think of who I admire in this world, and on a more relevant scale to this particular subject, which Americans do I admire?
I admire people who overcome great odds, I admire artists (who's job is often to unsettle the settled), and I admire the people who are willing to be called "crazy" or "fringe" and even not be taken seriously because they decided that being middle-of-the-road wasn't going to cut it. It's hard for me to rationalize "a quiet life" of domesticity (however necessary or worthy or even rightly enjoyable) and reading and vacationing as "good enough". For those of us that have the option of that life, we must recognize that leading that life requires ignorance of or disinterest in the fact that most people can't live that life. I don't mean that pursuing those things is wrong, I only mean that I think we're falling short of our potential as citizens if we stop there.
When I've challenged people who seem to have stopped short of realizing their social potential, sometimes I hear, "I care, I just don't talk about it". Please talk about it! Talking about it helps us to engage with what's going on around us and opens us up to being challenged either to tweak our behavior or to defend it. Talking about it lets those who are struggling know that we are not complacent about their suffering.
As I struggle with looking my America in the face and coming to terms with belonging here, for better or worse, I find that my passion for changing the things I can't live with here leading me to invest in the communities around me. That makes it feel like home. I belong here, and therefore I am allowed to be upset when it falls short. I don't believe it is wrong or should even be frowned upon to be unsatisfied or even angry with our surroundings, our government, and our nation sometimes. I makes me personally invested in seeing it get better.
In writing out these thoughts, I have been taken aback by the depth of sadness and darkness they conjure in me. To have come to America, imagining it to be the place where everything is made right (Heaven? Haha), and then find out that not only is everything not right, but we refuse to admit that it's
not right... well, it's disenchanting to say the least. It feels like betrayal, and it confuses the concept of home, if home is a place where you're supposed to feel safe and happy.
I am still recognizing and warming up to my right as an American to be unhappy with America and to challenge common narratives of the good we do, when it's not good for everyone at all. I have realized something terrifying and exhilarating at once: America is not the best country in the world.
There is no "best" country.
I am just from this country, and it's not "the best".
I believe that thinking of America as the best can actually keep us from even being "good". Logically, if one is from/in the "best" place, than everywhere is less-than-best. Even my children understand that there can only be ONE "best", despite my attempts to convince them of 1st winners and 2nd winners. Even though we rarely admit that we think America and Americans are not only "the best" but consequently "better than", that is the generally unspoken byproduct of believing and acting as if we're the best.
I don't have a super tidy way to wrap up these thoughts. This wasn't even really about the specific ways in which America is not what I thought her to be. I do, however, have a few small takeaways and hopes about what home means and what it means to be American, or even at home in America.
1. Naguib Mahfouz wrote, "Home is not where you are born, home is where all your attempts to escape cease." I've found that in a community - even a very imperfect one - if not a country. I am grateful for that sense of home and that it's somehow both bigger and smaller than the nation itself.
2. Home is where you are known, and that's worth holding on to. More and more, the space in which we are known can also be in a state of transience.
3. America is unique, to my knowledge, in that citizenship (or extended time spent) makes you American, not your ethnicity. Anyone can be American in time, whereas if I moved to Sweden or China, even if gained citizenship there, I would never be Swedish or Chinese. I cherish the fact that being American isn't based on ethnicity, and I will fight to make sure that that stays a defining characteristic of being American.
4. As ridiculous as this might sound, I've found solace and joy and in the cream cheese wonton. It's certainly not Chinese, but most people probably associate it with Chinese food if they don't give much thought to it (which they probably haven't). These hybrid bundles of delight have come to encompass my experience as an American-Chinese-American - maybe a bit confused about its identity, "but good. Yeah, still good."
Image credits: 1. Unknown, possibly an artist called Kim Kim 2. By Ron Wimberly 3. Match cover, found here
Time passes quickly when I'm at home, but seems to take on otherworldly qualities when I travel.
I just got home from my first trip abroad in 10 years, and my first trip abroad as an adult. It's strange to realize that, considering how often I think about traveling and consider myself "well-traveled."
In many ways, I've become fully American. When I fly over Los Angeles, it feels like coming home. I quickly sink back into routines and old frames of mind, but there are fragments of me that got to step out of my time and my world for a little bit while traveling. Coming home feels like viewing the world from underwater - being conscious that I'm reentering a bubble, and everything feeling muted and warped for a few days while I re-calibrate and absorb new experiences into the old ones.
How odd to have to remind myself of the things that I care so much about here at home, and try and avoid the cycles of frustration and burnout that I'm generally stuck in. How odd that my world is largely a construct of my own perspective, and when taken out of my regular environment, I am floating and detached from all those things that have felt like solid identity.
How remarkable to be a US passport holder - no questions asked, yet no interest expressed by others. In airports I was aware of how easily I moved, and how exceptional that I can just pick up and travel for fun, wherever I want. At the same time, I felt the burden of that little blue book, my American passport, and all the assumptions and figurative baggage that goes with it. Are people disgusted by me? Do they think I'm clueless and careless? Do they think about it at all?
How typical, really, for me to have been surprised to realize that the United States is not as important as I thought. No one was talking about American politics, no one was waiting with baited breath or heavy sighs to see what was going to happen. Are all the things I care about and pore over only weighty in my own micro-climate? How can I be so easily distracted from what I find most important when I'm at home? How refreshing to take a break, but how laughable that I get to choose whether it even affects me.
I think of travel as something that "everyone but me" gets to do regularly. Again, what a narrow lens I generally view the world from. I was struck by how unusual it is that most of the people closest to me prioritize international travel above most other experiences, and how unusual to travel for leisure without our children. Guilt and pleasure mingled in that decision, and it made me think hard about where to go from here in terms of raising our children with a global perspective. I often consider Asia to be in their blood because it is in mine, but the truth is that experiences are not hereditary and they have zero connection to it. All of those things that come with growing up abroad are things that are being projected on them by me, rather than them taking part in it. How do I change that without moving abroad with them? Should I change that?
I knew that Asia today would not be the same Asia I left. What I didn't realize is that traveling for leisure in a 3rd world country is grueling, and lonely. So much of the hardship of traveling in Asia was absorbed by my parents and shielded from me last time I was traveling there. This time, many people were not friendly, and we couldn't even speak the same language as other tourists. Before now, I have only ever traveled in groups or to visit people I know, so this was a new dimension of alienation. Frankly, it seemed like a ludicrous scenario, at times. I have never been interested in traveling around Europe or in hopping from hotel to hotel, taking guided tours. That is not experiencing the real world (the latter, that is). And yet, even backpacking tourism seems like such an American thing to do. To willingly subject myself to discomfort, inconvenience, and alienation in the name of "experience". I don't regret it, but it is a rather strange concept.
I want to blend in and belong in Asia seamlessly, but I don't. Chinese and Thai people don't think of me as belonging there, nor is it easy for me to be there. I am an American now.
I don't think I've ever been as conflicted as I am about President Obama as I have been this past week, researching this post and reading everyone else's "summing up" articles. It's difficult to even remember what all has happened in the past 8 years, and of course there are mixed feelings, as well as a mixed record. All the same, I've done what I can to understand and then tried to work through some thoughts.
I've loved Obama from the very beginning, without always knowing why. I do not claim to understand or even be aware of all or even most of the politics that surround the Obama presidency and I am not writing to defend this or that thing that he did or said. I know he is merely a man, and I know that he made mistakes. I know that many people feel that he helped to ruin something they loved. I'm not writing to persuade you or to mock your feelings, I am writing because this is a significant goodbye for me, and I want to honor it.
"He was a man, take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again". - Hamlet
I am a woman intoxicated by words, and Obama was a master with them. As the prophet Muhammad was believed to have said, "verily eloquence includes sorcery." I know that we should choose our leaders based on a multitude of factors, least of which should be campaign promises or excellent speeches, but I do not know (nor do I believe it fully possible) how to know what can truly be known about another human being except their character, and for that reason, I often go by "my feeling" about politicians. My feelings are not infallible or unchangeable, but I never stopped admiring Obama and simply liking what I know of him as a person.
I believe he did what he thought was right as a leader and as a man, and I felt safe within that.
I'll miss his calm, steady voice on the radio. He is a man who showed compassion and emotion, yet rarely (if ever?) lost his cool when ridiculed or demeaned with the most base and false accusations. He never spoke thoughtlessly, hurtfully, or hatefully. He so often looks happy in spite of the gravity of his position, but he also cried in response to national tragedies and hugged those who were in pain.
He was cool. He was fun-loving. He was gentle. He felt accessible to me. He was free of personal scandals. His wife was the epitome of grace, yet real and warm; his daughters were respectful, yet fierce.
To me, Barack Obama has been worthy of respect and has played a substantial role in a formative decade in my life - my first decade in this country, my first decade of being old enough to vote, my first decade of awareness of politics.
One of the first things I heard about him after he became president in 2009 was that he was employing TCKs (Third Culture Kids) in places of prominence around him. This caught my attention, not only because I am a TCK, but because few people in the US even know what a TCK is, despite the fact that plenty of Americans are TCKs, even if they don't know it. To be a TCK is to be first-generation multicultural - it does not necessarily mean mixed-race, it just means you have multiple cultural backgrounds as a result of growing up on more than one continent. (Here's another article on Obama's TCKness.)
I recently watched the movie Barry on Netflix, about a year or so in Obama's life as a college student at Columbia. It wasn't remarkable as a movie, but it definitely drove home his struggle with defining himself as a young man who wasn't from any one place. Hawaii, Jakarta, Kenya, California, New York - he had long explanations any time someone asked where he was from, and I'm not sure that even he knew. That is the classic dilemma of a TCK. At the end of the movie, he had started to say, "I live here, now", which is in some ways the ultimate response of someone who has come to terms with their identity as a child of multiple cultures and places, belonging with no one race and to no single city. The best part of the movie was when he was launching into the whole explanation of his background to a mixed-race couple, who simply said, "well, that makes you American." That's part of what I admire about the Obamas, and part of what crushes me about Trump. I feel like Obama knows who I am and what makes our country truly great (strength and richness through diversity), and I don't think that Trump does. I realize that this sounds like "I like Obama because I am like him, and I don't like Trump because I am not like him", and I'm not ashamed of there being some truth in that.
Some people said Obama only got elected because he was black. I don't think that's true, but I also don't see why that should be a smear. I am proud of diversity in the public eye, and I'm proud that we had a black president. Although it shouldn't feel momentous, it did. The first post on this blog was about Obama having won the nomination in 2008, and it felt like I was standing in the middle of a glorious piece of American history.
Obama's blackness doesn't make me ashamed to be white, it simply makes me proud to be an American, proud to be a TCK who chooses a path of resistance instead of blending in when blending in would be the easier choice. His presidency felt like riding a wave of powerful goodness as young people of color and diversity were emboldened to continue demanding justice and respect. I don't think that wave has crashed for good with the election of Trump, but I think things will get much uglier before they get better (if they ever get better, which I pray they do), and I'm walking into this new era with some trepidation, even as I try and be brave and willing to stand up, myself.
In Ta-Nehisi Coates' series of essays, "My President Was Black" (from which I hijacked the title for this post), Obama is presented as a black man who grew up in very unusual racial circumstances that allowed him to have faith in white people. That factor of his outlook enabled him, sometimes to his detriment, to believe in the goodness of all Americans, even though not all Americans are good.
I find it hard to fault him for that. Just as we tend to overlook the flaws of those we are romantically inclined toward, I find that some of Obama's flaws endear him to me even more. When I look at him, I feel warmth and acceptance, and what a privilege to feel that way about my President (without feeling like that comes at the cost of other people feeling that toward him). I believe he genuinely cares for the well-being of all Americans, even the ones who hate him.
When I think of the things that I know of that Obama did, the first things that come to mind are international, because that's often where my heart lies and we relate to all authority figures on the basis of what they do/who they are that concerns us, in my opinion.
He made provisions for children fleeing violence in Mexico. (The illegal immigration of children may have ended less happily...)
He repaired relations with both Cuba and Iran, and stood up to Israel when necessary (though perhaps not enough, in my opinion - I can't find the example from last year that I was most pleased with).
He didn't close Guantanamo, but he relocated all but 45 of 242.
He enacted the Child Soldiers Prevention Act (am I crazy, or was there some momentous thing about this being the first grassroots bill to be signed into law by a president?! I have some memory of that, but can't verify it), though it's implementation has been flawed.
He engaged with Southeast Asia, which is often treated as not important (or simply left out) in global conversations.
Things I was not cool with:
Bailout of national banks (though this began right before he took office) and auto industry. I'm sure not bailing out all those big players would have been very painful, but I also think corruption should have a price.
Winning the Nobel Peace Prize (not his choice) after less than one year on the job for a "vision" of what his presidency could accomplish.
Awarding your BFF (Joe Biden) the highest civilian honor simply because....? I think this cheapens the award.
There are more good, shady, and silly things leaping to mind as I compile this list, as well as things I'm just not sure about. As I mentioned at the top, I felt very conflicted over my views of Obama's legacy in light of some of the things he did that I really didn't like. The deportation numbers felt like a betrayal of some of the ideals that I equate with Obama and admire him for. The results of Obama's policies are a mixed bag. This article is the best I've found in terms of comparison and numbers. Strangely, the international category is the least successful looking, though it's hard to say how much of that is Obama's fault. At any rate, in many ways, Obama is leaving things in better condition than in which he inherited them, and for that I'm grateful.
As I said before, sometimes admiration aids us in looking past a person's faults. Despite Obama's faults, I still believe he did the best he could with what he had, and he did it believing he was doing the right things. That does not excuse everything, but if we were to agree that both of those things are true of his actions, I don't think we could ask more of him, or anyone else.
I don't say this with inconsolable sadness, but I think American has been and continues to be in decline in terms of world power. We live in volatile times indeed, and even if Obama couldn't completely turn this ship around, he made a valiant attempt.
I'm not sad that Hillary didn't win, I'm not even sad that a Democrat didn't win. I'm just sad to see a president I admire go. And sad to see one I don't trust take control. On second thought, I do not wish Obama could continue being the president - change is good, though change is hard. It is just hard to see someone I respect stepping down to give way to someone I do not respect and who I fear will undo the things that brought me comfort and hope in the past 8 years (and even beyond). I know the same could be said with the candidates reversed for some of my friends, and although I don't understand that, I try and respect it.
One thing that I actually appreciate about Trump is that more than any other president, he has helped me to see that anyone can be president! That may be a backhanded compliment, but it's probably healthy that I don't idolize the position so much that I think the "little guy" doesn't matter. I feel like the little guy matters more than ever under a president Trump.
I am determined to have a voice in my community and in this country. As Nelson Mandela said, "may your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears".
To me, Barack Obama has embodied much of what I want to see in my country, and I will miss him greatly.
Mr. Obama, thank you for being my president.
Thank you for going grey for me; you have not gone unappreciated.
The question of identity is central to the process of every human growing up, but as a Third Culture Kid (TCK) I've found that there are extra complications in finding a personal identity in the midst of having multiple cultural identities. To ask the question "who am I?" and find no answer within ourselves or in our surroundings creates panic. Tanya Crossman's new book, Misunderstood: The Impact of Growing up Overseas in the 21st Century, is a candle to hold aloft in the midst of that panic. A tool to help TCKs begin defining their identities.
(my copy, along with jewelry from China, jewelry form the US, and jewelry bought in the US that reminds me of China)
I knew I had been quoted in the book several times, so as I read I was playing this game trying to guess my own quotes before seeing who actually said them. So often, I would go, "oh yeah, that was me" only to realize it wasn't - someone else felt word-for-word what I felt. In essence, that is the power of Misunderstood. Here you will find that the things that define you (or your child, if you're raising a TCK), whether you're aware of them or not, are common in the TCK community. To me, this is both comforting and saddening.
I had to read this book slowly because sometimes it brought up memories or realizations that required some emotional debriefing before I could resume. This book is me, growing up. What a complicated thing to review.
I first met Tanya in Beijing in 2005. I was 14, she was 24. My family was in the midst of one of the biggest transitional phases of my life and during our 6 months in Beijing, I slept on the floor of an office - there simply wasn't room for more beds in our small apartment. I wore a lot of heavy eye make up and wrote a lot of dark poetry and felt incredibly lost. Truth be told, I didn't spend a ton of time with Tanya in Beijing, partly because I just wasn't there for long, but the thing that impressed me about her was that she stuck with me when everything around me was changing.
In the following decade, we only talked a handful of times, but she's always managed to be there at these pivotal moments, gently helping me to understand that major parts of my life are not flukes, but part of this rich tapestry of a global childhood which continues to define me in adulthood. We recently got to meet up again for the first time since 2008, right here in LA!
(Me, Tanya, and fellow TCK Pauline)
I moved to China with my missionary parents soon after turning 3. Between 1994 and 2008, I moved continents or major cities 9 times (not to mention endless houses within those cities). My family returned to the US for good in 2008, just as I finished high school. My dad found work in Santa Maria, California, where I have now lived for the past 8 years. I did not plan to stay, but I met my husband, settled down (to an extent), and had two children. That's the short version of my life so far, but between all those milestones, I've grown into an adult with a life-story that's been shaped by a myriad of experiences and pulled in countless directions.
Something that I found especially valuable about Tanya's writing and research is its ability to put names to my experiences. This happened during the behind-the-scenes process of writing this book, and then continued to astonish me as I read through the finished version. Some of these realizations have been dramatic - I realized that my husband was a "fence post", a relationship that I developed immediately after repatriating that helped me navigate life in America. Initially, I felt very rattled that something so personal as a relationship that turned into marriage played right into a textbook TCK scenario. The entire book has made me question what is me, and what is simply a result of my unusual upbringing?
Within the first few pages of Misunderstood, I'd uncovered yet another major realization. Tanya includes a graphic of all the kinds of people that fall under the TCK label, including refugees, immigrants, and adoptees. I've been working toward a career advocating for the rights and well-being of refugees and immigrants, never realizing that I am likely drawn to them as my brothers and sisters by experience. I may not be fleeing war or impoverishment, but I understand the experience and what it does to ones heart, and ultimately ones entire life. I think it is a common human characteristic to seek out others who are "like us", and for me, that is the transient community.
Sometimes, I resent that I'm often defined by something that I can't control.
I have had several meet-ups with TCKs since repatriating, though not nearly as many as some other TCKs. Part of my repatriation strategy was to avoid sheltering myself in a TCK-only community. I've never attended a TCK gathering or conference or gone to therapy to discuss what sort of impact my TCK-ness has had on me. In a way, this strategy worked, but in the few times that I have met up with TCK friends, I've been astonished at how easy everything suddenly seems. Even though I no longer try and explain myself to the general public, knowing that I have nothing to explain at all in the presence of another TCK takes an invisible burden off my shoulders.
Part of the struggle of being a repatriated TCK is that in many ways, I fit in completely: I look and sound similar to the people around me, and after 8 years, I can keep up with pop culture. Most people that I know around town do not know that I was not raised in the US. On the one hand, it's a mark of success for a a TCK to blend in so seamlessly in a place, but at my core, I've simply had to quiet the parts of me that don't fit in here at all. I'm 25 and I'm still getting hit in the face by how Chinese I am - how I will never raise my voice at someone in an argument because that would only embarrass my honor.
In the book, Tanya writes, "TCKs spend a lot of time explaining. No matter where they are, someone does not understand key aspects of their life and experience." I spend a lot of time trying to deny this, because I think it causes pain for my non-TCK friends when I allude to the fact that they just "don't get it". In some ways, I like being a chameleon, but I wonder if things would be more straightforward if I looked Chinese. I have this innate desire to associate with the Chinese (or Southeast Asian) people I come in contact with in the US, but I'm not really one of them either and it must be incredibly strange to them that I stare and try and be close to them.
If I were fully Chinese, then I wouldn't have to explain how frustrated I am with America (or living in America) sometimes and how sometimes I think of myself as separate from "regular Americans". I'm American when it suits me, but I am not-fully-American/a TCK when America hurts me or confuses me. Both are true.
The feeling of belonging is a powerful experience. So powerful, in fact, that some researchers suggest that a TCK's (in the article, referred to as "in-betweeners") lack-of-belonging in a new place can make them more susceptible to the call of ISIS or other radical choices. I don't point that out to be a sensationalist, only to emphasize how important the experience of belonging (or lack of belonging) is.
One of the most powerful take-aways from Misunderstood was validation that a TCK's life is one of grief. Acceptance and the ability to work through grief is a major theme in the book. I never experienced a single event that was what I'd consider tragic - no one close to me died, no terrible illness or calamity befell me or my loved ones. Saying goodbye and being uprooted frequently was "normal" to us, and neither something that we could control or something that ever occurred to me to complain about.
I usually don't talk about being a TCK. I have wonderful memories, but I can't help but focus on the fact that I can't access that part of my life any more, even in my memories sometimes, as they begin to fade. I have a happy new life, but remembering the first half is almost always sad. In reading Misunderstood, I felt like I finally had permission to admit that the cumulative affect of loss, even if it was not actual death, broke my heart repeatedly and that I still carry those wounds, even if they have mostly healed.
Misunderstood made me realize that I might not be as at peace here in the US as I thought I was, but I see that as a positive thing. I do think that I've settled here in the US - it feels more like home than China - but sometimes I think that in order to "fully be here" I have to forget my previous life so that the hurt of losing it isn't raw. Although it sounds childish and perhaps even sad, I thought I'd more or less put being a TCK behind me. Instead, Tanya has helped me to see that being a TCK is this rich and vibrant opportunity stretching out in front of me. I believe that knowledge is power, and the more I can dive in to what has shaped my entire self, the better I will be able to overcome the parts that hold me back.
I can not overemphasize how much Misunderstood touches on every aspect of my life. My faith, my friendships, my marriage, my siblings, my parents, my patriotism, my parenting, my career. Sometimes I want to stop being a TCK, but I can't. I can't separate myself from this, so the only thing is to move forward in it and let myself be open to growth and the pain that accompanies it. Having a guidebook through this ongoing experience is something that I didn't know I needed until now.
(photo: my copy is filled with notes, realizations, and reminders to myself)
Misunderstood has also been incredibly helpful to me as a parent, as I gaug whether I want to move overseas with my own children. Right now, the answer is no. It's hard for me to say that, because I do desperately want them to experience the positive aspects of life overseas, but I'm still reeling from all the ways in which my life has been changed by being a TCK, and so much of it being defined by grief. I know that grief is a universal experience, but I hesitate to knowingly bestow it on my children. I hope to provide them with a stable home base and still be able to travel with them in more of a vacation setting.
In a practical sense, this book is not a strategy book for how to navigate life as a TCK. Instead, it is a guidebook to what defines TCKs. If I didn't feel like it would undo so much of my settling-in work, I would push this book into the hands of every non-TCK that I love.
In the dedication of Misunderstood, Tanya writes that it is "to my kids", and it made me tear up. She's never let go of us, even when so many others have. For that, she has my eternal heartfelt gratitude, and I think you will find that her book will be a comforting friend in times and situations of uncertainty, whether they are your own or your child's.
This blog got its name from a quote of Kurt Cobain's, "I like girls with weird eyes." As far as I can tell, it's a mash up of raw thoughts and stolen pictures. It's an eclectic, eccentric, psychedelic, feather-trimmed, sparkle dusted, category-defying, questioning, challenging lifestyle blog. "I write to make peace with the things I can't control."
"He forges the subtile and delicate air into wise and melodious words, and gives them wings as angels of persuasion and command." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Come writers and critics Who prophesize with your pen And keep your eyes wide The chance won’t come again And don’t speak too soon For the wheel’s still in spin And there’s no tellin’ who that it’s namin’ For the loser now will be later to win For the times they are a-changin’
