Sharp Turn Ahead (Circa 1985) #UnAmerican
Our first car in America was a used Oldsmobile station wagon. It was white with wood trim on the outside. We’d never seen a car like that back in Korea where we didn’t even own a car. It was big and powerful. All things that we associated with America, our new country, our new home. Going up and down the rolling hills of upstate New York we would pretend that the station wagon was our personal roller coaster. We would all ooooooh and wooooh in unison, including our parents. I don’t think we raised our hands. We were too young and too small to ride a real rollercoaster. We probably didn’t know that people did that. Every time we approached the top of a hill, we would get nervous, unable to see the drop, but we knew we were safe, sometimes the drop was short, we’d be disappointed and had to wait for the next great hill.
My dad loved taking us on road trips. Apple picking, pumpkin picking, garage sales, yard sales, water falls, lakes, state parks, caverns, we explored much of upstate New York when we first arrived. It wasn’t until I was older that I learned that not all families took part in such activities. The importance of exploring and experiencing was instilled early in our young immigrant lives. We’d pack food and often eat at rest stops. Sometimes we’d bring a bunsen burner, a pot, and make instant ramen. Usually Ichiban, Neoguri, and later Shin Ramyun. And there were always bags of fruit to eat in the car.
And I think it was on one of these trips when we found ourselves behind a pick up truck with kids sitting in the back. Think there were two kids, maybe three. I distinctively remember the girl who was around our age. I was around seven or eight and my sister five or six. The kids on the back of the pickup were playing and laughing with one another. It was a warm and sunny day. The kids looked like they were in a John Cougar Mellencamp video.
They noticed us and stopped what they were doing. The little white girl smiled and waved at us to get closer. My dad, an overly safe driver all his life, lightly sped up to get closer to the pickup. The little girl got the attention of who may have been a friend or a family member sitting across from her on the pickup and got him to look our way. We got excited. Happy. They wanted to play with us and we’d just seen them laughing with one another and they wanted us to be a part of the fun.
We smiled and waved at them. Curiously. The little girl waved us in closer. My dad gently eased the car closer to the pickup. We smiled and waved at them again. Now we were driving behind them, driving through beautiful lush green hills that looked like photographs that art students try to paint in classrooms. They smiled and waved back. Then the little white girl’s smile turned mischievous, slightly sinister. She took her index fingers to the outer corner of her eyes and pulled them apart as far as they would go. We couldn’t hear but we could see that she was laughing. The boy across from her was laughing too. Their mouths open wide, their faces up towards the sky. The joyful smiling face that enticed us to come closer was now mocking us. Not just at me but my sister, my father, and my mother.
She pulled her eyes, now looking like slits on a piece on a paper mask, up and down and touched her knees. Our English was still developing and our understanding of American culture still raw but we knew. “Chinese..Japanese…dirty knees…look at these.” Can’t remember where we first heard it or saw it. Probably during recess at our elementary school in our small educated liberal town. I do remember the laughs that it would spark. I didn’t understand what it meant. I probably laughed along in the beginning, not knowing that they were laughing at me. But I wanted to be in on the joke. After all, I wasn’t Chinese or Japanese. Right?
We were still behind the pickup. The kids had moved on from us. They didn’t look our way after that. However, we didn’t have a choice. They were right in our view. I think my dad said, “Hey, that’s not nice.” What could we do really? Honk and ask them to pull over and explain to whoever was driving that the kids in the back made racist gestures towards us? What if the person driving was the one who taught them the joke?
I remember feeling stupid. I remember feeling helpless. I remember hoping that we’d make a turn so that we wouldn’t have to look at them anymore. And that they wouldn’t be able to see how that they’d affected us. Them the people who moved on from us and was now having more fun with themselves while we still felt the sting of the betrayal we felt in our young hearts. We barely noticed the lush hills and greenery anymore. The sun didn’t seem so bright or warm. The two lane two way rural road that felt expansive and adventurous before now felt constraining. I just wanted to get home, I didn’t want to see the pickup anymore. I don’t remember how long we were behind them, it probably felt longer than it actually was. I think they turned. Or maybe we did. Trying to remember that doesn’t seem important.
