Hell Hath No Fury Like an Asian Scorned

A typical conversation with an Asian mother…

Mom: “That’s okay. I’ll just let my body slowly and painfully wither away as it feeds off itself due to a lack of food. Maybe there’s some dirt outside I could eat so I don’t go hungry. Is that okay or will that be too noisy for you? The important thing is I don’t inconvenience you.”

You: “Fine. I’ll go to the store and pick up some Ritz crackers.”

The point of this performance is to demonstrate how Asians favor the melodramatic. We don’t cry, we wail. We don’t get mad, we wail. We don’t Jenga, we wail. If you ever get the chance, watch a non-reality TV show from Asia. I was viewing one with my parents once. It was basically an hour of people gasping in disbelief, anguish, suffering and of course, wailing. When I asked the people who made me what kind of drama this was, they informed me this was a comedy.  

Why all the theatrics? I would argue that when it comes to emotional situations Asians don’t know how to react, so we overreact. Dr. Woo Jong-Min, a psychiatrist at Paik Hospital (in Seoul, Korea), agrees. According to him, “[Koreans] are particularly vulnerable to vexation in daily life. They don’t know how to quell and vent anger. They have learned to compete at their schools and workplaces, but never learned how to relax and vent their frustrations.”

You need to understand that Asian culture is not one of self-help books and Dr. Phil. We don’t voluntarily take a year off to “recharge our batteries”. We’re taught to take responsibility for everything. I think one of the appeals of Caucasian culture to Bananas like me is this willingness to get in touch with your emotions and blame other people’s political party for all our problems. I’m not saying Asian culture is this robotic, unfeeling thing or that it’s wrong. After all, we’re big on meditation. It’s just different.

Well, it’s time for me to go and watch Jerry Springer to feel better about myself.  

A Short Track Mind

The Winter Olympics are over and once again curling will join the Detroit Lions as the butt of all sports jokes. Besides the athletes in the Olympic Village going through 100,000 condoms in a week, one of the things I’ll remember most about the Vancouver Games is short track speed skating. If you haven’t seen it before, short track is basically roller derby on ice. And it’s a sport dominated by Asians and Asian halfsies alike. But why does this cardiovascular activity favor people who look like me? To find out I consulted a few bottles of beer and came up with these answers:

Form. The preferred walking posture for many Asians is to have their hands behind their back while leaning forward: the same exact pose short track skaters use when racing. In contrast many Caucasians prefer to have their arms to their side when walking or dancing.     

Small Spaces. With so many Asians in the world and not enough Universities to house them, nations like Japan and Korea tend to be very congested. As a result they have developed this innate sense of how to navigate crowds in tight spaces while knocking down Canadians, perfect for short track skating. 

Number Two. Perhaps one of the best training grounds in the world for short track is the Asian restroom. You see, this is a sport where you really need to stay low to the ground. And in many Asian countries toilets tend to sit really, really low – some even at ground level. As silly as this may sound to some people, is there really any dignified way to do what medical doctors call pooping?

Leftists. Asians have a natural inclination to lean left, which, by the way, is the same direction short track skaters race. This tendency stems from the way Asians read. While western cultures read from left to right, Asian cultures go from right to left. Having their books spines on the opposite side of ours, however, doesn’t mean the opposite happens in Asian versions of western literature. For example, at the end of the Chinese version of The DaVinci Code you still find out that Dan Brown is an overrated author.