It does not matter what your name is, it does matter who you are!

After reading "Jasmine", I really fall in love with this broken story. This woman's life seems to be so long, not because how many years it has passed, but because it includes so many stories, people, and emotions. It's a woman's legend, which encourages me a lot, since it's not a simple happy story, but a tough story. As Jasmine's first name-Joyti, which means light, it's more shinning when you see light through darkness. I think that's also why I love this story so much. After all the experiences, I see Jasmine is still standing there and moving on.

I want to analyze the three important man Jasmine has lived with in the story, because I think each man changes her life a lot, also her name and identity. Jasmine's first husband is Prakash. They got married two weeks after they first met. She had already fallen in love with his voice, overheard during a conversation with her brothers. Prakash is not like the traditional Indian man that he is more open-minded and modern. He gives her a new name Jasmine, which also starts a new life for Jasmine. He asked Jasmine to call his first name, rather than the pronoun used in the traditional address between women and men, which creates a equality between husband and wife. He also planed to move to America, to look for his American dream with Jasmine. I really like this man and I think Jasmine does love him as well. Unfortunately, he was killed before the departure, which changed Jasmine's fate the first time. I feel this man is quite important for Jasmine that he pointed out a different life direction to her--to go to America.

The second, and maybe the most essential man in Jasmine's life is Taylor, who named her Jase. I feel that Taylor's love gave her an experience to feel the freedom. Under the free atmosphere of America, Taylor declared his love to Jasmine. In this relationship, I feel the most important thing is that Jasmine and Taylor are two independent person. As the article says, "Jase was a woman who bought herself spangled heels and silk chartreuse pants. Jasmine lived for the future, for Vijh and Wife,. Jase went to the movies and lived for today..." From this time period, Jasmine's self-identity become more and more obvious, because she can earn money for herself that she is not a girl who need to depend on parent or men. From Taylor, she did not only earn love, but her new life.

I guess Bud is a necessary character in the story, even though I don't like this man. After fate gave Jasmine a second-time destroy, Jasmine had to come back and began her life with Bud. This man is quite traditional, even not like Prakash. I don't think Jasmine actually loves him. What she felt about him is that she need to take this responsibility to be with him. In the end of the story, Jasmine struggled to leave Bud because she thought it's not the right thing. Taylor urged her to pull down the shade in her head and block out any thoughts that prevent her from utilizing her own free well. This time, Jasmine made her choice to leave with Taylor. She at last broke the last obstacle in her life, and began to make choice for her own.

I hold that these three men helped Jasmine to finish her transformation and rebirth. It also make me believe that people can really rebirth again and again. If you want, then you will find the chance to start over. I don't know what will happen to Jasmine in the future, but I'm sure she can get over it, because she is a new Jasmine, who will follow her own will.

PS: There is one interesting point is that Jasmine is a flower's name as well. And when I research on the characters of Jasmine, I find that Jasmine will flourish three times in a year, which is just like Jasmine in the book who can rebirth again and again.

stands for purity, respect and loyalty 

And I also want to introduce a great movie to you, which I think is also a encouraging story like Jasmine. The movie is directed by a Taiwanese Zhang Aijia, which name is "Siao Yu". It tells a story that a girl named Siao Yu who goes to America with her husband without an illegal status. She needs to "fake" marry to an American guy so that she can become the illegal citizen in America. And through this process, she changes her identity and at last starts a new life in America.

Something about Bharati Mukherjee

Biography


Bharati Mukherjee was born on July 27, 1940 to wealthy parents, Sudhir Lal and Bina Mukherjee in Calcutta, India (Alam 1). She learned how to read and write by the age of three (Vignisson). In 1947, she moved to Britain with her family at the age of eight and lived in Europe for about three and a half years. By the age of ten, Mukherjee knew that she wanted to become a writer, and had written numerous short stories.
After getting her B.A from the University of Calcutta in 1959 and her M.A. in English and Ancient Indian Culture from the University of Baroda in 1961, she came to the United States of America (Alam 4). Having been awarded a scholarship from the University of Iowa, earned her M.F.A. in Creative Writing in 1963 and her Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature in 1969 (Alam 5). While studying at the University of Iowa, she met and married a Canadian student from Harvard, Clark Blaise, on September 19, 1963. The two writers met and, after a brief courtship, married within two weeks (Alam 7).; Together, the two writers have produced two books along with their other independent works. Mukherjee's career a professor and her marriage to Blaise Clark has given her opportunities to teach all over the United States and Canada. Currently she is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley.

Major Themes


Mukherjee's works focus on the "phenomenon of migration, the status of new immigrants, and the feeling of alienation often experienced by expatriates" as well as on Indian women and their struggle (Alam 7). Her own struggle with identity first as an exile from India, then an Indian expatriate in Canada, and finally as a immigrant in the United States has lead to her current contentment of being an immigrant in a country of immigrants

Works

The Tiger's Daughter, Houghton, 1972.
Wife, Houghton, 1975.
Kautilya's Concept of Diplomacy: A New Interpretation, Minerva, 1976.
(With Blaise) Days and Nights in Calcutta (nonfiction), Doubleday: Garden City, New York, 1977.
An Invisible Woman, McClelland & Stewart, 1981.
Darkness, Penguin, 1985.
(With Blaise) The Sorrow and the Terror: The Haunting Legacy of the Air India Tragedy, Viking, 1987.
The Middleman and Other Stories, Grove, 1988.
Jasmine, Grove, 1989.
Political Culture and Leadership in India (nonfiction), South Asia, 1991.
Regionalism in Indian Perspective (nonfiction), South Asia, 1992.
The Holder of the World, Knopf: New York City, 1993.
Leave It to Me, A.A. Knopf: New York City, 1997.

I'm crazy, because I feel the pain

After reading the article "Beccah", I feel this is a story full of mysteries. Maybe it is because it's about the phychic mother who can know things others cannot. And maybe it's becuase I don't know anything about the background of this mother and daughter. Where did they come from? What they had got through? How did Beccah's father dead? What happened to Akiko? I really cannot tell what excatly happened to them, but from the reality today in the article, I can imagine what had happend. It must be a sad and tough story.

I think Akiko is a combination of the three--she is psychic, crazy and traumatized. I don't know what's the order actually, nevertheless my conjecture is that she became traumatized first, then crazy, then psychic. The reason for saying that is that nobody is naturally born crazy, except the genius like artists or scentists. Obviously, Akiko is not that kind of genius that she is a normal woman. So there must be some causes for her craziness, and the very reasonable one is that she got traumatized, which is related to Beccah's father's death. In the beginning of the article, it says, "On the fifth anniversary of my father's death, my mother confessed to his death." A woman confessed that she killed her husband to her daughter. We can see she had already turned to be crazy at that time. There must be some bad things happened between his mother and father. Maybe she never loved this man and gave birth to Beccah reluctantly. Maybe this man ruined her life and own plan. There maybe thousands of possibilities. The only one result is Akiko got traumatized and crazy. I don't think Akiko is really phychic, at least I don't believe in that. In Akiko's perspective, she may believe that she really owns some special power, in this way her husband is killed by her curses day by day. As in the ending paragraph, Akiko told Beccah, "I'm teaching you something very important about life. Listen, Sickness, bad luck, death, these things are not accidents. This kind stuff, people wish on you. Believe me, I know and if you cannot block these wishes, all the death thoughts people and you collect, become arrows in your back." In a world in the reality where you feel that you cannot change anything, people start to build a dream world where they can change things. Akiko is such an example that she builds the phychic world for herself. And the guests' belief in Akiko's power, on one hand is becuase Auntie Reno's persuasive word, on the other hand is becuase they maybe victims like Akiko as well.

I don't know Akiko has any connection to the Korean War or not, but she reminds me of the women during Nanjing massacre, who were raped and tortured by the Japanese soldiers. A lot of them were tortured to death, while some of them got through and gave birth to children. What you will feel if your children's father is someone you hate? I think the experience is miserable and complicated.

Here are some pictures of the women during the Nanjing Massacre.

Flying Boy cannot fly

This week and last week's topic are both about the war, which is heavy and make me think a lot. When I think about the Pearl Harbor Attack, the first thing comes to my mind is the movie "Pearl Harbor", which is very touching. War is different from anything. It can drive people crazy. Individual's pain and happiness seems to be unimportant and insignificant anymore. People's crying is covered by the sound of the gunfires. Democracy and liberty  automatically change its meaning. People fight with each other without knowing the meaning. I really enjoy reading this week's articles and poems. I have learnt a lot from the readings  about the history of Japanese Americans during the internment living in the camp that time.

For the article "Only what we could carry", I want to talk about two specific things. The first one is why in a country like America, who advocate democracy, liberty and freedom, will do these cruel things to their fellows? In the article "All-out Victory", there are sentences "The anger of the American people have been aroused to the maximum and nothing short of victory will satisfy us now. ... Japan began this war and it is now up to United States to end the war by crushing the Japanese empire and her ruthless, barbaric leader." We can see how angry America and Americans were at that time. There are many innocent women and children, who are not soldiers died during the Pearl Harbor Attack. Their family, the country lost them in a sudden, without any notification. For human beings, when somebody beat you, it's the instinctive feedback for you to beat back. That's what happened that time, so America decided to start the war with Japan Empire. And they bring the hate to the Japanese Americans too. They begin to suspect them, because they have the yellow skin, the Japanese face and the blood of Japanese. They begin to forget that they are also American citizens. When one's heart is occupied by thought of revenge, he cannot think normally. They totally forget liberty, democracy and equality. And they are frightened, who just want to protect themselves in any possible ways. I must say this behavior for the US government is understandable, but at the same time, it's very unfair and inhuman. The second thing I want to talk about is the Japanese American soldiers' true feeling, who serve in the army after the attack to show their loyalty. I cannot exactly tell what's their feeling, because I didn't experience what they got through. And I guess their feeling is really complicated. In the article "Give us a Chance", it says, "In our willingness to sacrifice our lives, we ask fellow Americans to give us the opportunity to serve our cause at the front ranks, not in the back lines, relatively unimportant places, but where the danger is most conspicuous." I feel there are several possibilities of emotion they may have. They may want to join the army and fight for America, because this is also their land, which they want to protect with their lives. There maybe another possibility is that they want to escape from the camp, because from the poems I can see what kind of life it is. It's the hell without freedom. So maybe they tell the government they want to fight so that they can get away from there, at the same time, it will also help their family in the camp. For the good behavior of them, maybe their family members can leave there earlier too. I think in their inner heart, they must struggle a lot. I don't think they can fight like the other American soldiers. They have roots in Japan, and maybe some of them still have relatives and friends at Japan.

For the poems, the one I like the most is "The legend of Flying boys" I can see how his life is at the camp. "There was a boy/ who had nothing to do/ No toys, no nothing./ Plus, it was hot/ in the empty room" We can see that the boy has no choice that he cannot live like other children. His childhood is ruined. He has no freedom at all. "You had to be there/ Including the activity/ that followed." Flying boy refers to a boy who actually cannot fly, but dream to fly to the free world. Who can he blame? The America government? or the Japanese government? or the war? I feel that nobody can "fly" during the wartime. You have no choice to choose your destiny, but the destiny choose you. Hopefully, I wish the world will have no war anymore, even sounds impossible, but I really hope so.

Here is a video about the Interment on youtube I want to share with you guys.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkaQqzumMGE

Do you remember that baddest boy?

At the beginning of the story, Bacho writes that " When I was growing up in Seattle, Rico Divina was the baddest Filipino I ever knew, and I knew them all. Vietnam killed him. Not there, but it killed him nevertheless."(p20) How should we understand the word "baddest" here? Is it a positive or a negative word here? I think "baddest" here refers to the fact that Rico always fight with the neighborhood boys and has a lot of affairs with the white girls. Nevertheless, for Buddy, the narrator, I feel it's a positive word which shows his admire to Rico, even though he is "bad" and died at Vietnam. Rico is brave, who owns the courage that Buddy does not have.

Rico and Buddy are good friends, but they are so different. With Buddy's description, we can know what kind of people Rico is. Rico is a typical rebellious teenage boy, or we can say he is more than typical, who is the baddest. He is good at dancing. He can fight against a boy, without thinking about the result. He can get the white blonde long-legged girls. He doesn't care about his future, because he thinks he has no future. On the other hand, Buddy is also Filipino, but he does not act like Rico. In the article, there are not a lot of description about Rico. We know that he wants to go to college, marry a girl and give birth to a child. That's all his life. We can imagine what kind of teenager he is and we can imagine what kind of adult he will become. In the other words, I will say that Buddy is someone who are looking for a peaceful life, like most people. But Rico is not that kind of person. He doesn't care about his future and what kind of person he will be. What he care about is what he is doing now and who he is now. He is someone always on his way to find himself. Find himself everywhere and nowhere. So he chose to go to Vietnam. He choose to fight. Actually, he doesn't really care about that war. As the author writes "For us, Vietnam had no moral ambiguities; the government called, and we went. Simple as that"(P23) Rico goes to the war, not for the country, but for himself. He wants to fight. He wants to leave and go somewhere else, because he thinks that's the only way for him to feel he is alive. I guess most of the people who actively participate the Vietnam war are like Rico. They don't really know what the war means and what it will lead to. They don't know the purpose. They are not politicians, but people just like Vietnam people, who are innocent, nevertheless whose innocence causes the others' suffering. I always hear that there is no winner in a war, both sides are sufferers. People are always the ones who are crying.

Buddy wants to stop Rico. I don't think the reason is because he thinks the war is bad. I feel he just feels that's dangerous, which may make him lose his best friend. But in the real life, no one can stop the step of another, no matter how imitate they are. Rico and Buddy are different, which decides they will choose  the different way. Rico also reminds me of that kind of baddest boy and girl when I was in high school. They don't like to study. They always want to make some affairs. They do the stuff other students don't dare to do. They dissipate their youth just like they will die tomorrow. They are too brave, so their rays of light disappear fast. I don't know what I feel about them, pity? or jealousy? Whatever the answer is, I know I will not forget them. Do you still remember that baddest boy?

You need to find the answer on your own!

After reading "Homebase", I feel that this is a novel deserves to be read again and again. All the dreams, thoughts and sadness combine together, which makes the story so beautiful and fragile. As a sensitive person, I can quite understand Rainsford's inner heart, even though I'm quite lucky than he is. He is struggling, because he doesn't know who he is and where he comes from. He keeps looking for the answers that being violent is his way to protect and dissemble himself.  His parents die so early, which has a big attack on him, then he cannot get the answer from them. So he keep moving on, he goes to Angel Island for answers. 

In Chapter Five, after Rainsford goes to Angle Island, He says that "I am declined to believe in ghosts because islands in California are places of waiting and the waiting is what destroys people."(p81) Yes, that's right. His grandfather spent a lot of time waiting on the Island, So do many Chinese men there. And he, Rainsfird, is waiting too. He is waiting for answers with confusions filling his heart. Waiting is painful, because you cannot see the way ahead of you. Then, Rainsford met with the Indian man who points a way for him. The Indian man tells Rainsford that "You should be out looking for your place, your home. This is part of mine. ... This is your country. Go out and make yourself at home." (p84) The Indian man can see Rainsford's confusion and pain, Maybe because once upon a time, he also gets through with it. He is also not a native person here, even less native than Rainsford. But he is strong, because he identifies with himself. He knows that when Rainsford says he lives there, actually he lives nowhere. He is a man stands nowhere. He was born at America and  lives all his life there, but he doesn't identify himself as an American. His parents are Chinese, but they died early, so he has no way to understand Chinese. In this case, he doesn't identify himself as Chinese too. In the article, it says that "The sounds I heard as a child in dreams made me deaf but never woke me. Hearing voice wakes me." (p88) It shows that Rainsford is afraid of the world and his identity. To be safe, he would like to cover up his eyes and ears.

I feel that if one want to identify with himself, he must learn to face the reality and his heart bravely. If Rainsford wants to find the answer for his life, he must directly face his family, his history and the environment. This is the first step. Nothing in the world is isolated. One's identity is made up with several parts. Rainsford is not a pure America or Chinese, actually no one does. His identity is unique, different from anybody else. You need to find the answer on your own. Secondly, I feel the novel's name homebase is very interesting. It makes me think a lot about hometown. I have heard a Chinese author says that "Hometown is somewhere you can never go back." I really agree with that. People change as they go to different places. Hometown gradually turns to be a place in one's memory. You can never go back, because you have changed. So what I feel is that maybe it's not that crucial for Rainsford to go back to "where he comes from". What he needs to do is understand where he comes from, so it can help him to go where he really wants to go.

Family-"same word, different meaning"

After reading the article "Who is Irish?" written by Gish Jen, I feel strongly that how the word "family" can be different in different culture. People create language which suppose to have the same meaning for all the people from different countries, nevertheless, the culture re-offers the language different inner meanings which cannot be understood by other countries. Like in the article " Who is Irish?", the Irish family and Chinese family live in America together, and they all speak english, but they hold a different notion of "Family". What family stands for? What responsibilities should a family member take? How should they get along with each other? In the article, obviously, the Grandmother, Natalie or John gives out different answers. Here, I want to share with you how Chinese notion about family are different from Irish family or American family.

1 Husband&Wife:
Husband and wife make up the main and core part of a family. In the article "Who is Irish?", you can feel that grandmother has something not that pleasant on her daughter's husband John. The reason is because that John doesn't have a job at the beginning of the story. The big house Natalie owns is basically payed by her salary. In the Chinese family notion, man should be the one who support the family. Wife also work, but their main responsibility is take care of the children and husband, but not make money. That's why grandmother cannot be satisfied with John. She also feels weird that John goes to gym but not urges to find a job to "be a man". In the Chinese family notion, a man who cannot support the family will be considered as useless and kind of "lose face".

2 Mother&Daughter:
After coming to America, I recognize that how the relationship between parents and children can be so different. In "Who is Irish?", at the end of the story, grandmother moves out of her daughter's house to live in Bess's family. I can make sure that if this happens in China, Natalie will be criticized by the society. In China, the children who let their parents to live on their own, especially one of them has already passed away, are supposed to be not obedient and cold hearted. At the same time, in America, after children come to their 18s, they are considered as adult, who are supposed to live on their own. But in China, I feel that you are always a kid in your parents' eyes that they always have the strength of control on your life. For Natalie's family, both John and Natalie think that they should have their own life and raise Sophie in their way that the grandmother should not intervene in. This is typically an American's notion. In China. daughters should always obey their parents, not matter who is right and who is wrong. That's the rule.

3 Grandmother and Granddaughter:
In China, there are a lot of children who grow up with the grandmother and grandfather, which is kind of tradition. Your parents help you to take care of the children, which is a very common phenomenon in China. In another way, we can say that China's most Baby-sitter are the children's grandparents. So in the article, the grandmother thinks that it is she who should take care of Sophie and tells her what to do and what not to do. And as the relationship of mother and daughter, grandchildren should always listen to their grandmother. And there is an old saying in China that "Beating is a sign of affection, cursing is a sign of love". This is why in the article the grandmother uses a stick to lesson Sophie, because she thinks it's a good way to teach Sophie what she should not do. She does that because Sophie is her intimate granddaughter. On the other way around, people from other countries except Asian cannot understand this way of learning.

From these three kinds of relationships, you may understand more about how China's family notion are different from Irish and America. In this way, you can also understand the grandmother more. Even though she pretends to be OK, but I'm sure in her heart she feels very sad.

I would like to introduce a movie for you guys to watch, which is directed by the famous Chinese director An Lee---Pushing hands. It also tells a story about a gerontic father who moves to America to live with his son and his American daughter-in-law. You can also see the strong culture conflicts in that movie.

Here is some videos on youtube for you to check!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D0xj-qtD3A&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wlz6-nKbJNg&feature=related