American Born Chinese

The inevitable problem with these blogs is that I'm inclined to write about anything that crosses my mind. In the past few days, I've contemplated writing a long rant about my strong desire to go postal on the head office of the MBTA for their inadequate service and quite frankly, a lack of motivation to change any of their services to save money for their patrons. I've also contemplated ranting about the Celtics (who I just watched lose to the Cav's on some awful calls and a LeBron 3/4 court bank shot in the closing seconds of the 3rd quarter), whose metaphor for this season is wholly embodied by one Gerald Green: so much potential and yet, they still suck.

But of course, I am a positive person, and those two topics would have had negativity oozing out of my ears. With that said, I've decided to give my two cents about a recently completed book (and I use that term loosely), which I finished on my bus ride home yesterday. Juvenile as it may be, American Born Chinese is a reflection into the author's personal experiences growing up (in comical form, of course). I would be lying if I were to say that I was unable to relate to any of the main themes in the book..oh, I mean comic strip: themes of adolescent insecurities stemming from a wholly misunderstood bi-culturalism that exists for American Born Chinese.





Skimming the well drawn comics seemingly transported me back to the days of Lincoln Eliot's playground where my adolescent naivety sheltered me from any negative vibe I might have been getting from my classmates. Quite frankly, I thought I lucked out in terms of the cultural teasing; or maybe I have managed to block out all memories of those negative feelings when I was a kid growing up in a new environment in Newton.

It's amazing how his experiences transcend among all Asian Americans, particularly mine (except I don't have parents that are college educated...nope, not even high school). As I moved through the book, i began recalling some of the events that I might have forgotten: the desire to fit in (translation: being white), the jitters from first cross-cultural dates in middle school (he got that section down pat!), and even perhaps the solitude consuming me because I was ostracized for being different among the overwhelming majority (oh wait, that was college!). But of course, me being me, I was able to quickly forget (probably my best defense mechanism), and it's certainly nice to know that these experiences are not unique to myself (in fact, I'm damn sure. It's just fun to see it in a comic strip.). I found myself chuckling inside as I was reading through some of the scenes. The book is in fact, quite impressive - both for the upbeat message that it holds (be yourself, Asian children), as well as the mindfulness for it's older audience (the inclusion of the Chin-kee story does just that in portraying the media-cultivated image of the stereotypical Asian man).

If you want to know what I'm talking about, feel free to purchase the book! It is a fantastic teaching tool for young children to reveal the perhaps unknown coming of age experiences of most Asian boys who have had to deal with being a drastically different small minority. Find it at http://www.amazon.com/American-Chinese-Gene-Luen-Yang/dp/1596431520.