Kimchi Mamas

Washing rice

When I was little, I used to help my mom prepare for dinner by washing the rice.  My instructions were to wash it until the water ran clear.  This was the perfect job for little, slightly-OCD me.  I would wash and rinse repeatedly trying for the clearest water possible.

Once I asked her why we needed to wash the rice so much.  She told me that rice used to be coated with talc and washing helped to rinse the powder off. There wasn't any talc on the rice we were eating. Those days were long past, but still, I washed.  Washing helped the grains to be shiny and pearly, said mom. It made pretty rice.

Once I left my mother's house, I never washed my rice.  I'd huck some rice into the pot, eyeball the water level as I filled it from the kitchen sink, and then set it the rice cooker to do its thing. I didn't care about "pretty rice." I just wanted dinner to be done in 20 minutes. My rice always came out fine. What is rice but something to temper whatever meat or fish or spicy side dish that is being eaten? Who cares what it looks like?  I never paid much attention to separateness or shininess of the grains.

Washing rice is a topic that has been discussed myriad times on blogs and boards across the internet. Most Asians were raised to wash their rice, often not knowing why. Most haoles have never heard of such a thing.

I was thinking about this today as I was preparing rice for our lunch. Bunny, my three-year-old, requested kim (toasted sea weed) and rice so she could make kim bap (sushi). She asked if she could help prepare lunch, as she often does. I carefully measured the rice into the pot and was about to put in on, but I stopped and said, "Here. Wash this rice until until the water is clear."

"How come?" she replied.

"So it will be shiny and pretty," I said.

That answer seemed to satisfy her, and she stood on her chair quietly washing rice at the sink while I prepared the other parts of our meal. Then it suddenly dawned on me, the real reason why Korean mothers have been telling their children to wash and wash and wash that rice.

For ten minutes I heard nothing but the sound of swishing water and softly crunching rice. But more than the fact that I did appreciate the few moments of quiet during a normally frenzied time, I loved seeing Bunny so focused on doing her best to complete her task.

Smart mamas.

—Stefania Pomponi Butler

I dream in Korean, with French subtitles

My parents are a first generation Koreans. They immigrated to France soon after they got married in 1975. I was born and grew up in France. My husband came to study in Paris when he was 18. We met, dated, got married and had two children in less than 9 years.

Because I look completely Korean, people often expect me to act, talk and think like one. I struggled with feelings of inferiority and inadequacy when I went to Korea or met some of my husband's friends and colleagues. I do speak Korean well enough, but don't always understand what I am told or manage to express my opinions and reflect my personal thoughts. And this is so frustrating sometimes. This is probably why I am so worried about Sean and Will still not speaking Korean.

My in-laws had a hard time trying to mold me into something I am not. "Talk like this, don't use that word, this is not what Koreans do and you're married to a Korean now so you must adjust" they kept telling me. I tried to please them sometimes, but I never gave in.

On the outside we look like a Korean family. I cook Korean meals every day, have mastered the art of Kimchi Chigae and we love watching Korean TV shows. But inside, we are also French. And I hope that the world my children will evolve in and the people they will meet will be more understanding and embrace this. Because it is something even my husband hasn't assimilated yet. Lately we've been trying to buy a house. Apparently in Korea, the wife is the one who is in charge of house hunting and somehow, my husband expected me to take care of everything.

Boy was he disillusioned.

- Irene

Asian American Literature

Tae's favorite book right now is My First Chinese New Year. We've been reading it, well, ever since the lunar new year. I have to admit, I'm curious why this one is her favorite - it's not the most exciting book - no flaps, nothing to feel. At Grammy and Grandpop's house, Tae was also pretty curious about Big Bird in China. There's one page with a picture of people doing tai chi in a park, and I caught Tae just studying this picture. But, we've also read Halmony's Day and she didn't seem that interested.

Part of me wonders (hopes?) if Tae is interested in these books because they have imagery of people who look like her and her family. Granted, we've also noticed that about 90% of the people that Tae interacts with on a regular basis are also Asian. Beyond our families (who are Chinese American and Korean American), my closest colleagues at work are all Asian American, and my husband works at a Japanese restaurant. We've created this mini Asian American community for Tae in a city that does not have a large Asian American population at all.

I know little kids are really a lot more aware than we think. So, does Tae really like Kim, the angry little Asian girl because she looks like her? Does she have a concept of race already? Does she notice all the Mexican kids in our neighborhood and wonder why they don't all play together? I've made it a point to introduce Tae to books like skin again by bell hooks. I wonder how much of this she's really absorbing.

What do you do to introduce issues of multiculturalism and diversity to your children?

- eliaday

Five Year Plan

A few weeks ago I was discussing with my mom the recent incident in which a local Korean man doused his SUV in gasoline, locked himself and his children inside, and set the car afire (and then, when it apparently got to painful for him, let himself out of the car and watched his kids burn to death inside).

I guess the story was all over the Korean media, and my mom told me that a lot of Koreans were, because of the incident, taking a hard look at the so-called "five year plan". According to this plan, if you don't succeed after coming to the United States in five years, then you're effectively a failure. Other Koreans reportedly thought that it was an "American" crime, in that evil American culture somehow perverted this man into someone capable of commiting such a crime.

The father was a convicted wife beater, his business had failed and he had had to move out of the well-to-do Hancock Park area, his wife had filed for divorce the week before, and he was supposedly mired in gambling debt and living in his car. All this somehow brought him to the point of planning a horrendous murder/suicide plan. It goes without saying that this man had some serious issues that are obviously not universal to Korean Americans.

The general idea behind the five year plan, however, is pervasive in Korean American immigrant culture. The black and white of success or failure looms over our culture and seeps into our values, our ambitions, our self-image. For all the inacuracies of the "model minority" stereotype, shame and guilt and pride are all too often the driving force behind our successes. And our failures. Because when we fail, where do we turn? Failure is, in all seriousness, not an option. Families are shunned from their communities, children are disowned, lives are counted worthless.

I have seen this again and again. I blogged about it awhile ago. I admire the Korean values of aiming high and setting standards, and, most of all, I believe in having dreams that stretch the realm of our percieved capabilities. I think it is awesome that Korean Americans have succeeded in so many realms of American society, and I appreciate the sacrifices that previous generations made that allowed me to have the kind of opportunities that I've had. But is it not possible to aim for success and yet still have the flexibility and strength of character to accept failure? I personally think that our self-worth should never be based upon such a transient thing as material success.

- Nina

Uncle Jimmy

So there's this stereotype of a Korean man that—if you're Korean or intimately familiar with Koreans—you've heard before. It goes something like this.

Korean men:

• Never talk. They speak in grunts and certainly never speak in full sentences, at least not when women and children are around.
• Like to gamble. Especially at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas.
• Play golf. Anytime, anywhere.
• Are haughty. Because everyone knows Koreans are superior to all other races.

In my world, the embodiment of this stereotype was my Uncle Jimmy.

Uncle Jimmy never said more than three words to me in my whole life.  Once, when I was about 6 years old, I picked his newspaper up off his driveway and carried up to him as he waited on his front porch. "Here's your paper, Uncle Jimmy," I remember saying brightly. "Grhhhhhnnnnhh," he responded.

In the 70's, Uncle Jimmy drove a DeTomaso Pantera. I think he had the only one in all of Hawaii (where I grew up). I am sure he won it in a poker game. He also "brought home" a Trans-Am for my cousin Garrett. His first car. I think Garrett was 11 at the time.  It sat in their garage for about a year and then, one day, it was gone. It had an eagle on the hood, I remember that.

Uncle Jimmy hung out with guys named Slim and Takeo. He had four TVs and watched four different football games at the same time. While eating beef jerky from Chinatown. He used to command his daughter (my cousin) to cheer for certain teams because her college money was riding on the game.

He also used to tell her that for her first car, he was going to get her a baby blue, 1956 Thunderbird. Because that was a "ladies' car."  Yeah. I know. Cool, right?

Uncle Jimmy went to Vegas. A lot. He wore plaid Sansabelt pants and orange-tinted sunglasses. He drank Chivas. When he went out, he left the house at midnight. He didn't come home until two days later.

He and my aunt were like the Robert DeNiro and Sharon Stone characters in Casino. They had a wood-panelled bedroom  with wall-to-wall carpeting, and my aunt kept an 8 x 10 framed photo of Elvis (in Blue Hawaii, natch) on her bedside table.

Fuck yeah, Uncle Jimmy was haughty. Why? Because—nevermind being Korean—he ruled and he knew it.

Uncle Jimmy was a gambler. His lifestyle was rough. It cost him his marriage and his family. But Uncle Jimmy was getting his shit together. His kids were grown and graduated from college. He was selling Fords. He had an apartment.

Uncle Jimmy loved golf. Golf was probably the one constant in his life.  And, one sunny, Hawaiian day, it was there, on the golf course, that he had a heart attack and died.

He was 59 years old. And for most of his life, he kicked ass.

—Stefania Pomponi Butler

Oriental

I'm wondering exactly when it became déclassé to call Asian-Americans "Orientals." I may be totally out of touch, but it seems that this linguistic shift happened some time in the early nineteen-eighties-but perhaps that's only when I became aware of it. I may be dating myself, but when I was growing up in the honkey-and-Mexican-American-populated berg of Santa Barbara, CA, "Oriental" was what white people called anyone who was of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean descent.  Didn't matter if you were fresh off the boat or your family had been here for a hundred years.  You were singled out, set apart from the mainstream. Mind you, I was the only such person in my entire elementary school. When I went to junior high, perhaps there were four of us, one of whom was also hapa.  In high school, there may have been seven of us.  We were a rare breed, we "Orientals," yet we did not stick together.  Instead, we assimilated into groups of white friends.  We had no ethnic identity.

Halmonie still (proudly) refers herself an Oriental, even though I've told her countless times that, especially in the Bay Area, the word is embarrassingly politically incorrect.  It reflects an imperialist, Eurocentric worldview rather than an inclusive, globalist perspective that respects all people of the world, regardless of their orientation to Western Europe. She claims that "Oriental" differentiates her from other "Asians," such as Thais, Indians, Vietnamese, Malaysians, etc- in other words, from people who are not Chinese/Japanese/Korean, the "classic" Orientals.  I have stopped trying to convert her, as she sees nothing wrong with the old term.  That's fine, as long as she doesn't say the "O" word around any of my commie/leftist friends!

When I was in high school, some of my friends would jokingly refer to me as their "Oriental" friend, which I did not mind at the time. Instead, I laughed it off and retorted by calling them "WOPS," Micks," and other disparaging terms that I don't dare print in this blog.  It felt naughty, but hell, I was all about being iconoclastic and contrary, so using these disparaging terms seemed like nothing but innocent, irreverent fun.  One early boyfriend even went as far as to call me a Gook.  "My cute little Gook," he'd coo adoringly. I thought it was sweet.

Now, if asked, I call myself an Asian-American, not an Oriental, not a Gook; however, because I'm half, I feel vaguely fraudulent when I use that characterization on official forms or when filling out the census. I check the "Asian-American" box, but feel somewhat guilty for dissing my honkey side.  I am, after all, 50/50. Why does my Korean half, rather than my Caucasian half, deserve to be "counted" in the census?  Easy.  Because it's the side of me that is the underdog.  It's my historically oppressed side. My Korean side is out of the mainstream, ethnic, powerful, and different. White is the default, which I don't want to be.

Twizzle

Edited to add: Here's some additional commentary on the subject.

Soup and Rice

Repost from Keepin It Real

Lately, It has been obvious that my daughter is beginning to take after my husband. Her eating preferences, her sleeping habits and her general personality are all indications that his genes have dominated her tiny little being. I always joke that my husband is still somewhat of a fob. He came to America when he was 7 but still speaks fluent Korean. He has extensive knowledge of Korean history and tradition and even his eating habits still reflect his attachment with Korean cooking and flavor.

We’ve been together over 10 years (married for almost 5) and he has mellowed out quite a bit. He is still not hip with American pop culture the way I am* and he enjoys some good down home cooking. He grew up in Texas for a few years so he knows some good belt loosening grub. However, after a long business trip away from home, he always insists on a bowl of hot, spicy yukkaejang and rice as his first meal back. Luckily, I can cook both Korean and American food (although not that particular dish) so I’ve learned over the years to tweak my cooking to meet both of our tastes.

I don’t know if it is E’s age of 20 months or her recent bought with the flu/cold but her eating habits have become somewhat erratic. Her breakfast of yogurt and a banana remains the same, but she refuses to eat any type of sandwich or meat product. She will chew something to suck the juice or flavor out of it, spit the remainder out and then kindly hand it back to us in a grizzly, chewed up wad. The only thing we are guaranteed she will eat is gook or chigae mixed with rice or some sort of noodle in broth. She even loves things spicy, like kimchi and picked cucumbers. I can already see her habits becoming very similar to my husbands, where Korean food is required at least every other day.

SIGH. I miss the days when my MIL had dinner (Korean food, of course) ready and waiting for us when we came home from work.

—Linda

*I am the queen of Trivial Pursuit: Pop Culture Edition

Wednesday is Korean Lunch Day

Originally published on CityMama.

Every week for as long as she can remember, I've taken Bunny out for a weekly lunch date. There was a brief hiatus after Wallie was born when I didn't have my shit together enough to figure out how to take both girls out of the house at the same time, but when Wallie turned six-months-old, our dates resumed.

When we lived in Portland, we went out for pho or to our local bakery. Now that we're back in San Francisco and within walking distance of three very good Korean restaurants, I've been taking the girls out for barbecue. This is our Humpday routine. 

On Wednesdays we get to laze around the house all morning, and then both girls will follow me into the bathroom while I take a shower. Bunny brushes her teeth while she tells me all the things she's going to eat for lunch, and Wallie hangs over the side of the tub playing with the soapy bubbles from my shower gel. Either that or she's unrolling the toilet paper while Bunny shrieks, "No! No!  You're not supposed to do that, Wallie!"

Finally we make it out of the house and as we walk, we talk about which restaurant we want to go to. Each specializes in something different (tofu soup or barbecued meat or sauteed items), so it depends on what we feel like that day.

Even though I am half Korean, I rarely cook Korean food at home. For me, it's easier to either buy it from a market (which a lot of Koreans do), or wait until we see my mom and have her cook for us. Korean food is pretty involved. Each dish has so many ingredients, and there are so many side dishes (ban chan) that go with each meal. Talk about labor intensive. I don't know how Korean mothers do it.  Let's hope they are hitting up the ban chan section of their local markets (the way we might hit up the deli) to cut themselves some slack.

Anyway, I'm pleased to share my culinary heritage with my daughters, since they are a quarter Korean, after all. When I was pregnant with Bunny I had powerful cravings for Korean food. When I felt nauseous, a bowl of mul naeng myun (cold noodles in icy broth) instantly made me feel better. It's like my DNA was trying to tell me that this kid would be Korean no matter what.

With Wallie, my cravings for Korean weren't as strong, but I still ate a ton of it, especially chili pepper- and garlic-laden kim chee. Both girls eat Korean food with so much relish that their Korean genes are probably doing a victory dance. They wipe out the entire table. They eat like this one meal is going to sustain them for the week until "Korean lunch date day" rolls around again. And maybe, in a sense, it does. In any case, they never eat as much at home.

We usually have barbecued beef (bul go gi) because it is soft enough for little toddler teeth. The best thing about Korean food is what a good deal it is. The beef comes with everything you see in the photos (side dishes, seaweed soup for both girls, and rice) for less than $7. And, aside from the fiery kimchees, most of the side dishes are not spicy and, therefore, kid-friendly. Both Bunny and Wallie love kim either toasted, which Bunny uses to make little "kim bap," or in soup, which Wallie slurps up.

To finish our lunch, we are given complimentary bowls of shiike.  Bunny drinks hers as well as mine, and Wallie tries to lick every drop from her bowl. At this point, it's time to take Bunny to preschool and we spend the rest of lunch talking about what she will take for show-and-tell, or who she will see on the playground.

I then drop her off at school with a full belly, smelling of charcoal and barley tea and garlic, and I'm sure her teachers must wonder where she goes on Wednesday mornings.

I hope she tells them, "On a date with Mamma."

—Stefania Butler

not-a-momma

It's a little ironic that my first post here comes at a time when I am feeling completely un-mom-a-rific. I am pretending not to be a mom, even though I feel like I should have a big sign over my head that says "FIRST TIME AWAY FROM MY BABY - HANDLE WITH CAUTION."

Walking through the airport, I felt this affinity to every mom I saw carrying a baby - I wanted to offer to hold them, and help them through their flights. And, at the same time, I felt amazingly FREE. I feel a little guilty because, to be honest, it's nice to be traveling sans baby - without the massive diaper bags and fear of spit-up. Without the fear that everyone else on the plane is hoping that they're not stuck sitting next to *that* baby on the plane.

I'm traveling on business doing job interviews. And even though I'm interviewing for jobs, I'm also interviewing the communities the jobs are in to see if I think this would be a good place for my family. Sadly, we'll be leaving the colorful sprawling world that is southern California. And in comparison, most of the places I'm looking at look really White. We're talking L.L. Bean White. We'll be in for an interesting ride, especially considering that S, my husband, is a sushi chef. I get the feeling that there are some parts of the east coast don't even know the difference between "Chinese" cuisine and "Japanese" cuisine, based on the number of restaurants I've seen called things like "Tapei Tokyo" and "Peking Sushi." Kimchi would probably just completely blow off everyone's little cardigan sweaters.

- eliaday

Community

I'm quite honored to be a part of a group of very talented, amazing women who have come together to create this blog. Our one commonality might be that we are all mothers but sometimes one thing is all it takes to create a community. I look forward to reading the experiences of others as well as journaling my own experiences of raising a child of Asian descent in today's society.

Until next time,

Linda