Reach Me (Revision).

Original Blog Post

So far in the book When you Reach Me by Rebecca Stead, adolescent Miranda helps her mother win a game show named The $20,000 Pyramid. Her best friend, Sal, unexpectedly gets wounded from a kid on the street, damaging their relationship.

First thought - HELP your friend. Don't just stand there thinking, "our friendship is over. Hey, let me go over that lonely corner". Obviously, you guys can't be best friends if you just stand there looking at him. Moreover, how can that ruin your relationship? You don't even KNOW that kid. Just give yer friend Sal over there some first aid. Done. Third, you should've said something. Honestly.

I'm pretty much glad that kid across the street punched him inside out. Well, I meant if that happened to Miranda. Maybe if this happened to me in reality, I'd be in shock. But it wouldn't necessarily damage my friend's relationship. Yeah, I won't actually go in front of this kid and be like, "little kid, don't do such violent things," or "dude, you're hurting my friend. Punch wars?" but there's no connection between the kid and me in the first place. Besides, a friend that judges you in any way - particularly, in your neighborhood, then that can't be a true friend. I feel as aggravated as ever thinking about this.

However, thinking about this reminds me of society itself. It isn't normal to fight someone who bullied your friend. If this were to happen to me, I don't even know what to do other than to threaten the kid himself. It feels as if nowadays, we treat our friends as nothing. Take popular males and female abundances, for instance - they have many friends. But they don't cherish their friends. When I fought with my friend, I thought, "Fine. I'll just make friends with someone else." But after thinking about it a little more, I apologized to her. She was more than a friend. She was my best friend.


If we don't cherish our moments with our friends, they will disappear.

Yell-Oh! Part 2. Thinking as a whole.

Still reading Yell-Oh Girls! by Vickie Nam, I decided to communicate with other Asian American females via web and in reality to discuss the issues based on the book. Yell-Oh Girls! is a collaboration of different writings written by young Asian American girls describing their hardships and experiences, including family matters, racism, discrimination, and so forth.

Realizing back in the past, racism jokes and puns revolving around Asians - no - all races, don't really exist because people are racist. It's because we, as people, are ignorant. After watching a YouTube video response to a college student describing "insane Chinese people screaming in the library", I realized the reason of these problems. In the video response, the YouTube user describes the truth behind common Asian stereotypes.

The original video was a UCLA girl who rants about Asians in a library. She describes these people screaming about troubles in Japan and their members there, etcetera. What the problem was was her. This girl is not racist. She also states that she has Asian friends. She's just...ignorant. Back in childhood, I always called African-American's black. This is a common, offensive comment towards an African-American. But, honestly, it was too long to state these two words. These types of ignorances aren't just coming from African-Americans or Asians, but all races and genders.

The reason why typical Asians cannot leave their families is because we don't want to. My sister takes two-hour trips to college and she never leaves, much like the typical American who lives in expensive dormitories. We have superbly close connections with our families. Why would you want to leave in the first place?

So who's to blame?

First, being the media. Very few Asian Americans are portrayed in the media. In the foreword of the book, Vickie Nam writes about a magazine featuring Niki Taylor with Asian-styled clothing. She questioned the editor, "if you were going to portray Asian clothes, why didn't you at least use Asian models in the fashion spread?" and the magazine editors did not respond at all. This is a very oblivious scenery. One-hundred percent of Asian stereotypes are portrayed in various T.V. shows, mostly cartoons.

Second is the people that spread these stereotypes, followed by the people who believe these and use them. Remembering the ignorance of people, sometimes people should educate them. Maybe they don't know where Asia is. Heck, others probably don't know true Asian culture.

So, the definite culprit?

I don't know. But most likely the media.

Yellow. Yell-oh. Yell "Oh!"

The book I am currently reading is Yell-Oh Girls! by Vickie Nam. In this book contains past experiences of Asian American girls that faced racism, discrimination, family matters, and many other complex issues they've encountered in Asia and America.

Being an Asian American myself, I can understand the pain these people suffered - not because I'm Asian American, but because I faced many of these problems as an Asian American. This is some really complex wording, so just pretend you understood.

Connecting this to real life and my past experience, all I can remember is some inequality in elementary and junior high. In my past elementary school, there were different races, and different colors. During class, I would hear things along the lines of, "hey, you Chinese, right?" and I would reply, "Yeah/Duh". To be honest, elementary didn't matter...except for the times when they said I looked very Chinese, which is obvious.

During sixth grade, racism literally exploded. Combusted. I had an African-American friend who'd say mean, provoking things like, "you know, your toes...they look so...Asian. They don't look right. You're really yellow, too." Looking back at the past, she was a bit innocent, though. But most of our time, we would talk about how black/yellow/racist we are. This isn't really the most shocking part.

I was nominated as 'task manager' (in our school, each class had a folder which contains all the classmates' names and our teachers would comment whether an individual was off-task or excellent, and whether the entire class did good or bad in general) during sixth grade, as well. It was a really big thing to do that year - everyone wanted to see whether their teachers commented well or not. My science teacher warned me not to display it like that and put it in my backpack, but I couldn't help it; my teachers wanted it immediately and I had to leave on time with it. One day, a classmate screamed and tried to steal the folder from me. Of course, I tried my best to pull it away. He screamed, "You stupid Chinese motherfu**ker!" and I was seriously provoked by such rude manner (maybe I kicked him really hard one or two times...). My science teacher then found me with the folder in my hands and I was fired from task manager. I was crying desperately, not because I was fired. I actually felt more relaxed being fired. What I hated the most was the racial comment this so-called 'classmate' said towards my face. I took the comment independently, however, which I regret. Sixth grade was the worst grade I have ever experienced.

I received many stereotypical comments overtime during junior high, too. In seventh grade, I always received a 94+ average on all my classes but math. I was in Accelerated Math, but it only made it worse. I had high to low 80s during that year, along with my other Asian friend. Other Asians received 90+, but they knew how I felt. The others would state, "aren't you Asian? Aren't you supposed to be good at math?" and I would be a little offended. My mother and sister were so tense on me. At one point, I was on the computer watching a show, and my mom gave me food. Beforehand, my sister forced me to sweep the floor, and I just stopped when she was in front of me. She said, "what? Go CLEAN it!" and, of course, I did. When my mom gave me my food, she went back into the living room with my sister. My sister literally talked in a tone that I could hear, and said, "You know, this girl...she swept, right? Then she stopped and left the garbage on the floor". Mother, went, "she's stupid. So lazy. And she's getting so lazy; back then you'd study right after you do homework and you don't play games on the computer". She said it in a disrespectful, rude manner. When she was on her laptop, I was eating and crying while she was behind me. I kept weeping until I ran to the bathroom. I couldn't believe she'd speak of me like that. I kept cursing to both of them in my mind. Too bad I'm not sis, freaking as*hole, I would repeat in my mind. I even planned of running away when I felt like I couldn't stand it anymore, but I would just be in more trouble. Even remembering this would make me cry, as I'm writing this. I'm different compared to my sister, after all.

I'm not sure about other people, but the most truthful stereotype is that Asian mothers are scary and they over-stress you.

Yellow. Yelloh. Yell

-- Templeton

The current book I'm reading is called The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff. So far, the main character Willie Upton has to live in her ancestral home in Templeton, New York along with her hippie mother known as Vi. Afterwards, biologists find a new prehistoric monster that was discovered as a new species in Lake Glimmerglass.

To be honest, I find this book possibly my most challenging one to understand. There are tons of unnecessary subplots, story is hard to follow, and too many unanswered necessities. I had to reread quite a lot to understand a chapter. The only thing that I can explain right now is Willie and Vi's relationship.

As a daughter of an over-securing mother, I can understand where Willie is going; Vi as well. The 'typical mother' will obviously make you study to be smarter - say, going to Stanford; rather than an archaeology career where the 'typical mother' thinks you won't bother making a living out of yourself. If I were Willie, I'd probably make a fool out of myself and say that I'm still going to Stanford, and then be ashamed of myself and start regretting later. But really, I think that Vi is going overboard.

This book somewhat reminds me of Life as We Knew It, a book that connects the main character with her mother frequently. Both describe happiness, sadness, and anger between both supporting and main characters.

If I were Vi in this situation, I would try to give Willie some more precaution, and take things more gently. People often make big mistakes, and there are times when anger doesn't solve it.

Being a mother doesn't seem easy.

Chanda's Secrets

// Note: some spoilers.

Chanda's Secrets by Allan Stratton refers to a 16-year-old girl named Chanda and her mother who are left with family troubles after her father died in the diamond mines. Her stepfather abused her, the other died of a stroke, and the third is an alcoholic. Her life hasn't been peaceful, ever.

The entire story that I've read so far is darkening. Chanda was about to be raped, her newborn sister died at 3 months, and she herself has AIDS. This brings us to the theme of death.

AIDS, known as Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, is the after-phase of HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) and occurs when your immune system contains less than two-hundred T-cells. This virus is commonly received from unsafe sex, or infected blood transfers. In this book, those with AIDS would be discriminated for having it. You would be shunned, and those connected with you can be shunned, or even kicked out of their house. To me, I think, would be completely rude.

I remember the day it was AIDS day - thousands of people lined up in their seats in a hospital, looking down, as if they were ashamed, or embarrassed, or simply sick. I always wonder how they feel deep down. I feel the same with Chanda's mother as well.

To be honest, I would think that those with AIDS love sexual intercourse (or something in-between) - but I can't help it, my mother constantly tells me not to be one of them. Reading this in the book reminds me of many stereotypical thoughts - that African-Americans love to have sexual intercourse, or that they usually get married at the age of 16, known to be raped, so and so and so and so. However, looking back at all the experiences of past books I've read, I'm assuming that Chanda's mother (whom received the AIDS and passed it on, genetic hereditary diseases) has a reason for it. But, I cannot comprehend why or how at the moment.

What do you think about this?