Savoring the Sweet

I remember the first time I saw an Asian meal. It was sushi. It wasn’t in real life though; it was on screen—with Molly Ringwald and some of the other “Brat Pack” gang trapped in detention in the movie The Breakfast Club. I was transfixed by the rich black marble of the bento box, with its red, flesh-colored, interior. How the hues of light illuminated her soft pinkish hands, as they maneuvered left and right, caressing—not gripping for the soy sauce, then the cabbage, then the wasabi paste, without looking up, allowing her mind to travel elsewhere for a moment. without regard to her surroundings.   And the ivory chopsticks; how they clicked when she smoothly rubbed them together.

Every move she made to prepare the meal was delicate, exact, and precise. I’mma try that… I said to myself, not knowing when I would or where they even sold the stuff. I knew it would be out of my reach sometime, because of Molly’s character coming from a wealthy, cultured background in the flick. But this was New York, and anything could happen to you here. Even if you were poor, Black and unwanted by the elites of the city.

I had never seen such respect for the actual prep of a meal; in our house we would have to bow our heads over the plate of hamhogs or chicken neckbone and white rice, with green-gray lima beans or thick stalks of green beans in a show of grace—thanking God for the meal, He bequeathed us yet again. This was the nightly routine in our household.  I don’t believe we ever once were delicate with our hands, as we dug and tugged at the “soul food” meal, the juices from the portion of pig meat and lima beans spilling over the rice, gifting it with extra flavor. Did we enjoy the meal? Yes, because we were hungry—no, because we were hungry and poor.

Somehow, the food we ate always reminded me and my sisters that we were from the Brooklyn ghetto; it signified our future there too, as we all of us families ate the same meals—never to be transported “away” with the taste of foreign flavors in our mouths. So, when I finally got the chance to taste the dish of salmon, over sticky white rice, wrapped in seaweed and dipped in soy sauce, with sweet cabbage and wasabi on top I was thrilled! It didn’t matter that the people, other kids in my class made fun of my selection on the class field trip. “Gurl, yo’ think yo’ whyte?”  I kept chewing, silent, remaining in the magical space that I was transported to. My silence was the greatest complement I could give to the sushi chef—and the biggest fuck you to everybody who wanted me to stay in an uncultured world.

I suppose that is why I expose my kid to the delicious delectables of differing kingdoms, lands far and wide awake with different stories to tell through the succulence of food digestion. If you look closely, feel the textures within each meal you are having, you are breaking down the walls to poverty, to prejudice, to the corner of the earth you are painted and potted into. Ringwald’s character showed me something that day that many people I’ve met are still afraid of. Culture clashes are what makes life great, it doesn’t just allow questions to emerge; it allows answers to erupt and be savored.

I can say this with pride, as my taste for adventure led me to different dining tables. Korean fried chicken, hovering over the heat of the meat, picking it up then biting wholeheartedly into its crispy flesh…Yummmmm! How cross-cultural influence came out of the worst of possible situations. The waitress looked at my face as I gave her the thumbs up. Her smile was wide, and her sigh was full of gratitude. My hunger for adventure had given me another glimpse into a world that was so unlike the one I grew up in. Till this day I salivate at the mere thought of getting to chomp into it again.

I cannot say that these tiny insights have made me a “good person.” But it has made me observant of the differences and commonalities that are laid before me when I witness episodes of culture cross and culture clash. Case in point, I was travelling through the G-line subway station on my way to Greenpoint, Brooklyn. I had stepped out of the subway and began walking towards the subway station stairs leading to the exit the stairs. And there they were, faces petrified like two life-frightened mice stealthily strolling through a feline-filled courtyard. However, it wasn’t my presence the Asian couple were fearful of; it was the Black “cats” behind them shout obscenities and slurs that triggered the couple with the threat of violence for every small step they took ahead in the subway tunnel platform. “I wish they just get the fuck outta our count’y!” This is what Black man retorted; if the Asian couple could be feel anymore antagonized this, was it—the bottom had been reached and I knew that the Black couple had been another one of many infected with Trump’s anti-Asian agenda. What could I do? As I watched their innocent faces contort under the weight of those words. Struggling silently for dignity, for respect. For any compassion you would administer a goddamn dog!

“I kno’ rite!” I jump in cutting in between the two sets of couples like a gleeful instigator. The Black couple stops in front of me “Word!” the Black chick hollers, “Fuck dem chinks!” Something inside me grimaced but for the Asian couple’s sake I continued onward laughing loudly in the Black couples faces, while secretly motioning my hand for the Asian couple to move along quickly. From the corner of my eye, I saw the Asian man get my drift, grabbing his female companion by the arm and hauling ass as quickly as they could. I give the Black couple my attentiveness for a minute or two more, hoping they don’t notice the Asian couples victorious, harm-avoided retreat.

I continue on with my day, shaking my head as the Black couple walled onward and away; leaving me hoping that the world will one day rid itself of all its callousness, its insensitivity, the anti-unifiers that make one soul, shrivel and sour draining all of its colors and  flavors out of the world, making dishes for us all that are all salty with our tears leaving no room for anything savory, making our union on this earth with no heartiness, making our sorrows even less sweet.