Bruce Lee fight scene, Enter the Dragon"Mum-ah?"
"Mum-ahhh!"
I hear "Mum-ah" no less than one hundred times in an eight-hour period. Swear.
"Yes, Iris?"
"Is dat man Chinese?"
"Dat man" is the delivery man I just paid from the Chinese restaurant. "Well, uh, yes... Why?"
Scowling, dark eyes flat: "I! Don't! Like! CHINESE Pee-Pulls. No."
My daughter, one of two (both are three-and-a-half, half-Korean) "Don't! Like!" Chinese people. Her sister is a bit more tolerant, but not too fond, either.
Why?
"They look funny."
"They not nice." Uh-oh.
This little phase of pot-coloring-kettle-black (we are Asian!) bigotry is completely organic. I, pretty much, am Korean and my husband is a Heinz-57 of Europe with a distinct and deceptively-ethnic Spanish surname. Our best friends are collectively gay, Jewish, black, Cuban, Asian (including CHINESE), blonde, or a great mixture. We ain't prejudice, hee-ah. Our children: long-limbed and sturdy with upturned profiles from their Germanic heritage, yet angular-featured and sorta-dark (courtesy of me), are a complete melting pot.
I was of course, mouth-wide-open stunned and barbed on a personal level: my kids not liking Chinese folks logically, meant that my kids didn't like me, as I am Chinese-like, I am Korean. This feared realization left me in a less-far-away-than-I-thought place of paramount vulnerability. I remember my incredulous and pained laughter when my daughters pointed to my Kindergarten Halloween picture:
"Mum-ah, dat girl CHINESE!"
That's Mama.
"Noooooo!!!" Tears, T-E-A-R-S, follow...
There was also my calm and measured "Okay, um-hmmm" when my other daughter, Olive, insisted that she only looks like her Daddy and nothing like me - ouch! Forget race: uh, ugly?
Ever-dysfunction-ally, I ask:
"Do you like Mama? Mamma is Korean - and - YOU are half-Korean."
I was bracing for a howl and in truth, was self-satisfied plotting, Dr. Evil-like: "These little brats WILL like who they are...Y-E-S, they will..."
Instead:
Iris, breaking into a chubby-round, gap-toothed pumpkin smile,
"Oh, Vuvey-Dovey!!! (my nickname)
I vuv you!!!
I vuv-your-face-I-vuv-your-Kowean-I haff-Kowean!!!"
This moment, sublime: her sweaty, squat starfish hands claw all over my face.
Throughout all of the puke, poop, slobber, and tantrums, these are the moments that make a parent speechless and entirely grateful.
