As I sat in rush-hour traffic last week listening to NPR's All Things Considered with Michele Norris, I had the pleasure of listening to an interview with Author Bich Minh Nguyen (pronounced bit min new-win). Nguyen discussed her new book Stealing Buddha's Dinner, a memoir about growing up in America as an outsider trying to assimilate in a culture of fast foods, Rice-A-Roni and Toll House Cookies as it clashed against the Vietnamese foods and customs in the Nguyen household.
It was a thought-provoking interview that left me pondering my own ideas on how brands and products shape our culture, and it also stirred up my own memories of trying to fit in when you don't belong (or at least feeling like you don't belong).
Nguyen's use of food as symbolic parallels to her longing to assimilate in the world around her, which was predominately conservative and white in the town of Grand Rapids, Michigan, is a creative twist and look at how foods and products do shape our culture. Until this interview, I had never really given much thought about how foods influence and shape American culture, but they do. They are actually a big part of American culture.
Food is something that can bring people together, but it can also make a child stand out among peers when the foods he or she eats at home are different than those of his or her peers.
For the most part, growing up in my home was typical American fare, but it was balanced against Japanese foods such as sashimi, sukiyaki, and futomaki and inari sushi. My friends, who were mostly white, found this "exotic" food to be odd and preferred McDonald's or a Burrito Supreme from Taco Bell, or the bag of Dorito's and a Pepsi that we all had for lunch everyday down at the 7-11 store during our middle school years.
Japanese food was a differentiator back then, but now sushi is part of the American landscape. I suppose that's assimilation all in of itself. But I still have friends that think eating raw fish is somewhat disgusting. I suppose it's one of those things that you just have to grow up with, sort of like eating chicken feet or pig intestines. If you grew up with it, it's just food, but if you didn't, then it's foreign and nasty.
I can relate to Nguyen's experience on some levels, but given that I am half white, I suppose that I was a bit more assimilated when it came to foods in my home growing up. However, I do understand feeling different, and not quite fitting in. I, too, grew up in a predominately white neighborhood, but being half white and half Japanese, I supposed it allowed me to cross the line into each culture (White America and Japanese) despite never fitting in completely in either.
Growing up in the 1960s and 70s, I was the only hapa kid at my school, besides my brother that is. The kids at my school were almost all white and I clearly felt different. Sometimes it was racial slurs or actions, such as pulling their eyes to be slanted or talking with an Asian accent trying to be funny; and other times it was innocent comments or questions about Japanese culture, but either way, it made me feel different and sometimes like an outsider.
What I find interesting is how people will always notice differences before likeness. It didn't matter what group of kids I was with. I was always different. The white kids viewed me more as Japanese than white; and when I was with my Japanese friends hanging out in Japantown, I again, was different. You can't hide your race, it's printed on your face, so it was a little hard to blend in. However, times have changed over the years and assimilation and acceptance continues to improve. A few years ago I attended the Obon Festival, and I was delighted to see that there were so many hapa kids running around.
There is a bit of a duality when your home life differs from what you see in your friend's homes, on TV and in movies, be it cultural or dysfunction. As children, we are desperate to not stand out and will do anything to feed our desires to fit in.
It's funny now, because as we get older we make a shift in thinking and we love that we are unique whether it be our ethnic background or even our names. I hated my Japanese name growing up, because it was unusual and made me different. I didn’t want to be different. I wanted a name like Tammy or Lisa. I wanted a “normal” name. I didn’t have the luxury of getting to pick an “American name” like the Vietnamese immigrant children did when they arrived in America. I remember how cool I thought that was.
Now, I look back and think how silly that was. I bet many have dumped their “American names” and have returned to using only their birth names at home and in their professional lives. I love my name now. I love its uniqueness and that it represents my roots, my ancestors, and my connectedness to where I come from. Some times I think that's part of America's problem. Too many people have lost where they've come from. They don't know their roots, their ancestors, or the culture and customs in which their ancestors lived.
Instead, many Americans are held captive to the American Way of materialism, brand names, fast cars, fast food and junk food. And let's not forget our insatiable appetite for instant gratification. Buy now, pay later, which really means fall further in debt and remain enslaved to the materialistic American Way. It's sad. Because the American lifestyle is killing us in more ways than one.
Assimilation is good to a point, but not if it means giving up who you are and where you come from. Yes, if you move to a new country, you need to learn the language, customs and ways, and you need to adapt in order to survive, but in the process it’s important to hold onto your own customs and culture and also share it with others. It’s what I love about America. There are so many people from all over the world and learning about others’ cultures is what makes life so rich and beautiful.
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