Railroad Standard Time
“She chanted a spell up over me that conjured the meaning of what she was saying in the shape of old memories come to call.” (Page 1)
Parents are one of the only ways in which children learn of their own culture. This quote brings up many moments of when my parents would talk about living in the Philippines when they were younger. Like a spell however, these images are just that, a vision but not something that can be experienced.
“Christians who never heard of each other, hardworking people who sweat out the exact same Chinatown book, the same cunning “Confucius says”, joke, just like me.” (Page 3)
My interpretation of the quote is that it is a critique about the homogeny of people in the same group. There is a lack of innovation which deteriorates the uniqueness of the subject that is being discussed.
“I read a list of what I remembered eating at my grandmother’s table and knew I’d always be known by what I ate, that we come from a hungry tradition.” (Page 3)
A hungry tradition implies a legacy of poverty. The struggle of immigrants moving to America from their country of origin and starting from nothing is a commonly heard tale. A tragedy considering that many immigrate to America for better opportunities and to improve their previous circumstances in life. Starting from nothing is just salt in the wound.
“The old men in the Chinatown books are all fixtures for Chinese ceremonies. All the same.” (Page 5)
One of the themes that is discussed frequently is the tension between the second generation and their parents. Here, Frank Chin describes the portrayal of the older Chinese generation as objects rather than people. This portrayal dehumanizes the older generation and a calling out to the stubbornness of tradition.
The Eat and Run Midnight People
“In the movie about me, I’m in a war far from home, a straggler, out to kill at last, and happy enough for it to be corny, to make light of shoving my thighs through rancid water further into enemy-infested darkness.” (Page 10)
There is an element of blending in here. The narrator, a Chinaman, views himself as an American soldier. It is an example of identifying more as American in the vein of a patriot dying in war for the country. It is also escapism in which he watches the film to be far from the island of Maui.
“We were the dregs, the bandits, the killers, the get out of town eat and run folks, hungry all the time after looking for food.” (Page 11)
Allusions to poverty aside, the story is tinged with an undercurrent of desperation. The struggle to survive while being viewed as savages is an experience that shapes them. There is a theme established in which the higher class are patient and able to wait due to their wealth. The poor however, are forced to live in the constant present, scavenging and consuming everything.
“Her body, the moon, the beach, breath, splash, sea heaving through the sand, her body all one, grinding in my hunger pangs.” (Page 14)
The woman the narrator fornicates with is described though sand related imagery. The imagery in this context can refer to the rough, course, and gritty way in which sand irritates someone. Sand is also connected to beaches, a part of Hawaii that is featured. Rough can also be unrefined, bringing up how the narrator describes himself and his people.
“We were itchy with the reverberations of all those songs going off at once as we walked across roadbed and track to the train that was ours.” (Page 16)
In a way, the songs are of the dominant culture’s power. They resonate unfavorably with the listeners, making them uncomfortable, hence the itchiness. Strangely enough, it is only the few that know all the songs that are uncomfortable.
The Chinatown Kid
“No one would put a hand on his shoulder and ask him about his feelings, while their eyes insidiously tried to read him as if he were a thermometer.” (Page 24)
Commentary about the snap judgements often made regarding people of a marginalized group. There are biases already established which reinforces the division of races. The perception of groups is a difficult one to shake.
“…her mongrel eyes neither Oriental or Mexican, her flat baby’s nose, hardly perceptible cheeks with a prophecy of highness, all dark, four-year-old young, aging quality whiskey of sleeping unpredictable girl. He loved her. She was loved by ghosts.” (Page 25)
Another problem being addressed here is families of mixed ethnicities. Similar to the film Come See the Paradise, there is a conflict of traditional values and made even more difficult by the fact that Pete is a single father. The ghosts are perhaps a mention to how Asian cultures place emphasis on their ancestors. In a way, the narrator feels alienated by his own culture while his daughter is blissfully unaware.
“Dressing the girl had been an act of revenge; he was a master baker ornamenting a poisoned wedding cake, something white and preciously beautiful that would mindlessly be eaten alive.” (Page 32)
The color white has connotations of purity. Here the narrator is dressing up his daughter for visiting his relatives as a pretense of ultimately giving her away. The narrator is pressured by his grief leading him to be unfit to raise his daughter. While ultimately better for the sake of his daughter, he can’t help but see this event as a betrayal to his wife as he releases his daughter to be assimilated by his family.
“She was already dying, accumulating weariness like a pus that would send her crashing to the floor of her room in a puddle of her last urine.” (Page 35)
The narrator has a sense of disdain for his family, viewing them as being strictly traditional. This quote describes how he views his sister, worn down by the responsibilities placed on her by the family. Being what seems to be the black sheep of the family, Pete is pained by the realization that her daughter will end up in a similar situation.
The Only Real Day
“Nobody gets over these days, so don’t bang your head about not getting people over.” (Page 42)
The Chinese Exclusion Act was implemented in order to limit the amount of Chinese that could immigrate. The fears of Chinese laborers working for cheap and taking jobs away from Americans combined with xenophobic attitudes led to the passing of this act. This quote echoes the sentiment of that period to the present day.
“What do you want to be Jew for? You’re Chinese! That’s bad enough!” (Page 44)
Another case of casual racism directed at another minority. With limited resources, competition is created amongst various other ethnicities which only divides them. This quote also shows how image and perception is important with ethnicities having a preconceived notion of their status in society.
“The flying ship that doesn’t fly anymore. The boy had the name of an extinct species.” (Page 56)
Flight has connotations with freedom and a dirigible describes a flying ship such as a blimp. Portrayed as a Chinese that struggles to speak Chinese, Dirigible is someone that confuses Yuen. Yuen struggles with his friends talking constantly about white women and the portrayal of Chinese women. Dirigible and Yuen both are outsiders with Dirigible still trying to understand Chinese and Yuen wanting to distance himself from his own friends.
“Every white muscle in his body felt raw and tender, from the base of his spine, and the muscles from his neck down to his shoulder, and the hard muscles behind his armpit.” (Page 61)
The mention of the armpit is bizarre as his friend Huie mentions wanting to stick his head in a woman’s armpit. His muscles are described as white with the adjectives raw and tender similar to a recent workout. Yuen is attempting to exercise his American –ness especially when facing the possibility of deportation.
Yes, Young Daddy
“Your the only boy I think mommy will let come up, since she don’t like strangers to see how a mess we live in, and she says I can’t go out until I’m 18!” (Page 79)
My own interpretation of this line is that there is the image of a pure, young, virginal maiden that is upheld for young women. Tradition heavily factors into this as to tarnish the image shames the rest of the family. There is no mention of a father figure however which could lead to the mother trying to assert some form of authority within the family structure.
“He began by crossing out “Dirge for you.” Time to break the habit of answering to that nickname.” (Page 81)
A dirge is a song of lament, often regarding the dead. Considering Yuen’s death in the previous story, the type of grief Dirigible felt was not for Yuen but rather since Dirigible claimed Yuen as his possession. He moves away from Dirge as a nickname as it represents the person that killed Yuen.
“But he did not regret leaving, for like the boy downstairs who was like all the boys in this house, everything was the same.” (Page 84)
Nostalgia wars with independence for Dirigible as he revisits his cousin’s house. As a second generation, he felt stifled by the older generation and their traditions. Surrounded and growing up educated in America, he feels alienated. This is hinted frequently by his responses to Lena being about critiquing her lack of English fluency.
“He opened up his ammunition box. Her perfumed letters had gassed everything. That smell would be there forever.” (Page 90)
After being chased out by Lena’s mother, he feels disgust at his reactions towards his cousin. Thus, the letters are tainted by that memory and he can no longer bear to see something that reminds him of his cousin. Gassed, ammunition, these terms evoke war and by extension trauma.
“Give the Enemy Sweet Sissies and Women to Infatuate Him, and Jades and silks to Blind Him with Greed”
(Page 92, referring to the title of the chapter)
This chapter title references The Art of War by Sun Tzu. The Art of War being a guide to warfare is still quoted today and is a prominent Chinese text. An approximation of the original quote is “Give the enemy young boys and women to infatuate him, and silks and jades to excite his ambitions.”
“He felt himself being invaded, ransacked, and looted by nothing tangible, nothing of perceptible value, by merely being conscious.” (Page 94)
Dirigible finds himself being pulled by the actions of the crowd in the phenomenon known as mob mentality. Being a distinctly self-conscious and independent individual, he loathes crowds as they appear false. His sense of privacy is being violated merely by being in the proximity of other people. Ironically enough, this shows Dirigible’s concern towards his public image and his jaded outlook following the events with his cousin Lena.
“He was her doctor and her reverend minister, the medicine man who couldn’t cure her and raced to finish his church in time to hold her funeral.” (Page 97)
Dirigible has some resentment towards Buddhism, as his mother’s doctor was a Buddhist and yet could not offer a way to save her. Considering his relationship with the church, Dirigible is lashing out at religion causing him to be an outcast from his relatives.
“She had cheated him out of the opportunity of forgetting her while she lived, and had left him a large fossil. A crowd of selves – the punk, the obnoxious adolescent fool, the lapsed Buddhist – mingled in the room, were him, watched him, all hating each other and competing for dominion over what the church, his mother, Mrs. Hasman, and various other creditors and probation officers, called his soul.” (Page 107)
Dirigible hides a lot of turmoil in himself, trying to project the image of someone who is happy and funny. He challenges others for being false yet all these other individuals pull him apart internally. A crisis of identity plagues him and he hates Sharon making an impression on him as that influences him.
A Chinese Lady Dies
“The clean-shaven face, washed and dried, cleanly, drily opaque for the time being, pinkish, brownish, yellowish, and vaguely luminescent in the light, was grand.” (Page 109)
This face as described by the quote is a bit confusing. Is the face a stand-in for every male American? The face is portrayed in the light, making allusions to reverence and perhaps showing the ideal appearance leading into homogeny.
“Standing there unseen, alone with pigeons and riderless wooden horses, watching everything, tensely doing nothing, nothing happening was pointless.” (Page 111)
A contrast between nature and civilization is being portrayed in close proximity to each other. Another contrary part is Dirigible walking through what is an abandoned part of Chinatown, which is usually active and full of life. It is this duality that makes him contemplate his loneliness.
“A machine, alone, being mechanically lonely, custom-made, one of a kind, missing nuts and bolts staring out of the window between the toilet and the tub…” (Page 112)
An introspection at Dirigible’s crisis of identity. After feeling the pull of all the influences in his life, he decides the best way to handle the strain is be unemotional. As machines have been described as soulless, his own soul has been shredded by the fake personalities he uses to interact in public.
“I’m real good at being the kind of son who just loves to come over for Mommy’s real home cooking. I am not myself as the son who first wipes one parent’s ass for a few years, then his other parent’s ass.” (Page 115)
Having to take care of his parents in their old age is something that Dirigible resents doing. It forces him to remain attached to others even though he is averse to it. He is also chained down by the obligation he has to care for his parents, further pushing Dirigible down the path of being machine-like.
The Sons of Chan
“Going through puberty I let the radio’s electricity into me to feed and fatten up, flash crazy from pole to pole in my flesh to bring the Lone Ranger in out of the sky for me to hear, and Terry and the Pirates, and O. Henry’s Robin Hood of the Old West, the Cisco kid.” (Page 131)
While most of the things mentioned in the quote are things I’m not familiar with, they appear to be facets of American culture. The narrator is Americanizing their self with the mention of puberty being a period of transition into maturity. Even more telling is the stereotype of the fat American with the mention of fattening up through exposure to the radio.
“This Hawaii was Hillbilly Heaven, where every colored boy and girl danced to the whiteman’s crazy tune, sang his songs, talked his language, did his work, believed in his God, which not even the whiteman believed in that much.” (Page 132)
There is the Plantation Era of Hawaii when many different ethnicities were hired to work the sugar cane fields. Another aspect also involves the efforts of the missionaries to almost kill the Hawaiian culture by forcing the natives to only speak English, burning sacred texts, and even outlawing hula dancing as a seductive ritual. Calling Hawaii a Hillbilly Heaven only makes sense when there was no other option for resistance by that point.
“…I fought electricity like a man, to the death, and would sometimes be found crying like that, crying and rolling on the ground, refusing to let go and turn it off.” (Page 132-133)
The radio is a literal lifeline for the narrator, finding it as the only source of affirmation towards his connection with Charlie Chan. There is a dangerous obsession driving the narrator to the point where he administers electroshock therapy to simulate his radio fix. The radio is almost a drug in a sense, being connected to it harms him and yet he can’t stop being connected to it.
“Such an angry, pitiful wail it still is on the after-midnight TV picking up ghosts.” (Page 134)
I am a bit confused here as the narrator calls himself an actor. The orphan role he describes is either something that happened to him early in his life or something that he acted starting before. Either way, it produces a legacy of trauma and war. The leftover trauma of war are the ghosts listening in to the wail.