WEST MEETS EAST by Sunny Frazier

May 27, 2022

May is Asian-American and Pacific Islander Appreciation month. Jimmy Carter selected this month in 2009. Filipinos came ashore in 1587. The Chinese followed in 1778. One hundred years later the Koreans showed up. Samoans arrived during the Roaring 20’s. The Vietnamese came in 1912, years before we went to war in their country. After the Vietnam War, Fresno became the home of one of the largest population of Hmongs in the country. The Hmong New Year celebrated at the fair grounds is attended by over 100,000 people. But after the invasion of Covid, some Americans blamed Asians and sought revenge.

Hmong women going to market.

I love historical fiction. Up to now I’ve been focused on the Medieval history of Europe. I can recite the entire line-up of the Plantagenets, talk about the Tudor era but I wouldn’t go as far as James I. Italian and French timelines are a bit harder, especially the names.

I steered away from Asian novels. I didn’t think I could relate. My curiosity wasn’t piqued. Plus, the names are confusing. I never read Pearl S. Buck’s The Good Earth. I did read Shogun, Tai-Pan and Noble House by James Clavell. Of course I read Memoirs of a Geisha. I enjoyed several books by Amy Tan.

It wasn’t until a friend gave me Shanghai Girls by Lisa See that I was drawn into modern Asian literature. It’s about two Chinese women who modestly posed for pin-up calendars. When Japan invaded China in the 1930’s, they tried to escape and carry their mother, who had the bound “lotus feet.”

The Japanese invasion also damaged Korea. I loved See’s writing so much that I tried out her book, The Island of Sea Women. This is about women who dived, not for pearls, but for sea delicacies to sell. They used no equipment and free-dived into icy water wearing only thin cotton covers.

I dived into more Asian cultures: Chinese, Japanese, Indochine (Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia), Korea, even Mongolia. I find the writing lyrical. The stories are often tragic, but beautifully told.

And, I learned. Did you know the first novel was written by a woman who wrote romance stories for the Emperor’s women? Men were documenting (or rewriting) history, battles, politics statistics. Women wanted to read about love. Muraski Shiki served it up with The Tale of Genji in 1000 BC.

Was this just a new genre for me, or was the reading public embracing it as well? Suddenly there were books being produced, with each country telling their piece of history. I’ve always thought that first generation, the ones who lived the tragedies, are inclined to write memoirs. They want to tell the world their stories. It’s the 2^nd generation which has the education and time to novelize stories told by their elders. The children that followed write about the Asian-American experience. Fresh off the Boat, Crazy Rich Asian and Crying at H Mart reached public attention The book Pachinko is now a series on Apple+.