2. Immigrant identity
Holidays, the American flag, and after-dinner conversations...
What I’m up to
We are celebrating half-Christmas (half-Christmas Eve today) since we don’t get to celebrate actual Christmas with Paul’s family. Grammy and the girls decorated the back porch with Christmas lights and ornaments. We also celebrated Easter last week. It’s a bit strange to participate in holiday traditions on random summer days, but it’s a reminder that the significance of these holidays holds true regardless of when they are celebrated.
What I’m reading
Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore. This is another time-hopping book, about a woman who has to live her life… out of order. It’s not my favorite novel in this genre (that would be The Time Traveler’s Wife), but it was entertaining enough.
The Switch by Beth O’Leary is charming. It’s about a woman and her grandmother who decide to switch lives for two months. I love cozy stories set in rural England. I read this in virtually one sitting and enjoyed it immensely.
America is Not the Heart by Elaine Castillo. This leads me to…
What I’m thinking about
I have been turning American is Not the Heart over and over in my head. It’s a novel about a communist rebel fighter who ends up immigrating to the Bay Area, where she ultimately finds herself a community of extended family and other Filipino immigrants. The book is expansive in its scope. Hero, the protagonist, essentially lives multiple lives – first as a member of an established privileged family, then as an insurgent, then as a TNT (tago ng tago) immigrant. It’s a complex portrayal of what it means to be Filipina and, likewise, what it means to be American. Filipino history comprises colonialism, genocide, political upheaval, and abject poverty, as well as internalized racism, wealth, and generational privilege. Being Filipino is experiencing directly or indirectly all of the above. And to be American is similarly wide in scope: being American includes the oft-cited Transcendentalist ideas of individualism and self-reliance, but it also includes inextricably interwoven immigrant communities, who celebrate every birthday with pancit, whose family members take turns working extra jobs to put each others’ children through school.
The author includes some direct quotes from American military and missionary colonialists, all of which share the thread of depicting Filipinos as dirty, less-than-human, in need of whitening or, in many cases, extermination. I don’t have the language to describe the feeling of knowing I, as a Filipina-American, lay claim to both sides of this history.
Several of the neighboring houses still have Trump flags strung up. I have a visceral reaction to those flags; they make me feel unsafe. Paul’s mom and the girls put up a US flag in front of our house and that discomfited me as well, but I left it up. I see Trump flags flying alongside US flags. To me, the US flag can have connotations of xenophobia, racism. Meanwhile, I am ashamed that a part of me also sees flying the flag outside our house as a defense — see, I am American too! Don’t attack me!
But I am determined to define being American as inclusive of all the experiences I carry with me. America is the all-white town in rural Pennsylvania and the all-Filipino suburban neighborhoods in the Bay Area. When I swore in as a citizen, I swore in under a black president. My immigration officer had an Eastern European accent. My fellow new Americans, swearing in alongside me, were Asian, Latino, Middle Eastern. My husband and his family are white. This is my America.
What I’m learning
We’re with my in-laws the majority of each day and one thing that boggles my mind is how much they talk. They sit around after meals or between chores talking, no devices in hand, no TV going, no music on in the background. And I remembered that this is exactly what I used to do with my friends in high school and in college. We used to just talk for hours — that was our idea of a good time.
I have wondered for years if I have fully switched over to introversion after growing up a hard-core extrovert. I’ve heard MBTI profiles are not supposed to change, but I’m unconvinced. I point to motherhood, and now my very outward-facing job, as reasons why I have become introverted, but now I wonder if it’s also a byproduct of technology and subsequent culture change. I find it easier and more appealing to look at exactly what I want to look at on my phone rather than take part in a meandering conversation that may or may not be of interest, that either way requires the effort of forming thoughtful contributions. So: what I’m learning is conversation, and possibly extroversion, is a skill than can be lost… which means it’s a skill that can be regained.
What I’m making
Jewelry! My sister-in-law C. brought jewelry-making supplies for the girls (she always gets them the best gifts). I made a simple beaded necklace and immediately fell down the rabbit hole of Googling jewelry-making supplies. (I resisted purchasing anything, seeing as I have enough hobbies to fill my time.) There is something very satisfying about making something you can wear. In my plans for our upcoming two week quarantine in Taiwan: sewing myself a shirt.
What I’ve saved
Limited internet means limited browsing, so no links this week. To be honest, most of my surfing has been limited to online orders to stock up before returning to Taiwan (tampons, Egyptian Magic).
Until next time,
Kate