Right now at the Best Wok over off Meadowbrook you can get “Vegetable egg rolls (no meat)” for only $1. They’re awexxome. The unexpected dash of the triumph of the American melting pot and the wonders of diversity is free.
I was taken aback the other night when a group of young Hispanic workers came in to the Best Wok whilst I was waiting on my vegetable egg foo young. They were clearly regulars, and shouted out the friendly “hola, amigo!” to the youngish guy working the counter at the Best Wok, who responded in kind. Then they sorta roughed out a conversation in a mix of Chinese, Spanish, and English.
I was struck immediately by stories by great-grandfather told me about growing up in Chicago in the dawn of the 20th century. “Nobody really spoke English,” he’d say of the children that he worked with in the factories of that great city—this was when child labor laws were still a glimmer in the eye of progressives. “We’d learn bits of each other’s language to the point where we could all talk with each other.”
My great-paw paw was German (although he’d been born in America to German parents, they returned to Germany, and formally returned in roughly 1901). Before his death he could still recall swatches of Dutch and a few other languages he’d learned as a child.
At some point after working in factories up in Chicago, he got his right arm ripped off below the elbow, moved to Alabama, took a wife, built three houses by (his single) hand (with the help of a variety of home-made hooks and artificial limbs he crafted for specific purposes) (one of the houses was down the street from where Wah grew up), had a bunch of kids, sent one of them off to a world war, and pretty much was what I think of as the All-American guy.
Whatever that means. I won’t pretend to understand the complexities of immigration—the arguments over resources, numbers, and assimilation. I do understand two guys working hard in a strange place, and doing what they can to communicate with others, learning what they can along the way, becoming Americans the very moment they try.
I think your Paw Paw sounds cool, but I need to know if he rigged up a wife-taking attachment for his arm.
I’m really glad people stopped taking wives.
Well. I guess they mostly stopped. There is Tom Cruise, after all. I mean, he’s a fact, unfortunately.
Man. Your great-granddad sounds like a swell guy and a badass. And this sort of linguistic mixing fascinates me.
A poignant reminder of a time when “give me your huddled masses / yearning to be free” actually meant something to most Americans. And the fact that we are, after all, basically an immigrant nation (in this I include in the strictest historicist sense native Americans who migrated acros the siberian landice bridge millennia ago) causes me a great deal of both shame and frankly outrage in the way certain groups respond to “illegals” now: “deport all the mfs just as long as I don’t have to pay them too much to cut my lawn, clean my pool, or otherwise make my airconditioned blowdried, nicely starched beemer lifestyle run smoothly.” If harsh immigration stuff actually went through som,e of hese right wing blowhards might actually realize how our total economy operates.
Myself. My paternal family the Lights feature a rear admiral of the great white fleet (Robely Dunglanson Evans and one of my namesakes) and are of primarily Scotch and Welsh/Irish extraction including the first professor of anatomy at UVA, Robley Dunglinson. We’ll call it my celtic fringe.
On maternal side (Koskos shortened from Kosciusko) Prussian stock by way of fin de siecle Vienna who settled in upstate PA and then somehow eventually made it to SW VA (Roanoke) where both my parents grew up.
our great paw-paw was an amazing man. he lived a life that so few people ever get to see and hear about. there were many time we sat at his house while he told us stories about history that he lived through. first cars, first electric everything, first televisions, first computers.
gorjus and I learned a lot about life because of him. I often wish that my daughter could have met him. he was such a strong part of our development that hardly a day goes by that I don’t miss him.
thanks for this, big brother, your fond memories always bring something special to my day. i love you.
The man in my office who replaced, no. . .that would be impossible. . . does some of the same things that Contessa used to do, is so excited that a the days of the big marches have returned. “Viva La Raza.” We are getting our picket signs ready. (Fury—you and your youth group keep your hands off!)
Down with private land owning, down with borders.
Love, Granddaughter of a Swede
this brings up something that always comes around w/ immigration debates, etc. some people just HATE the idea of people speaking spanish around them. now, iknow it is VASTLY different to live in El Sigundo vs. Salt Lake City when it comes to this, but whenever I hear a Mississippian complain i wonder ‘just how does this inconvenience you?’ sure its a burden for THAT person to bear, but how does it affect YOU? you know? i agree that they need english to acclimate them to our society, but i also think that isn’t an ‘OK’ for us to only learn ONE language. there are roughly 3 countries in this entire hemisphere that don’t speak spanish. why in the world should we americans keep ourselves ignorant?
i have started to think the ‘send all them illegals back!’ folks are becoming rarer and rarer. i’m not saying they don’t exist, but the reality of illegals is being noticed and the fact that you cannot and will not move 12 million people ‘out of the country’ is setting in. you can’t do it, so yo better come up with another idea.
its also worth noting that the congressmen (like mine, Chip Pickering, co-sponsor of the current house bill/abomination) often have relatively few illegal aliens in their districts in the first place. sorta like haveing a MS Delta congressman dictating what’s best for the great lakes. hmmpf.
In honor of NPM and my grandpa Kosko (shortened from Kosciusko), his favorite poem, “In Flanders Field” by John McCrae
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
To understand fully the horrors of Ypres 1915, the poem hints at, go here.
Three things:
First, Kathleen rightfully blasts me for the use of a archaic and likely grotesque use of language—”took a wife.” I think I was so caught up in the “All-American” narrative of my great-grandfather that I resorted to using language which I find personally objectionable—that is, that one might “own” or possess another person, especially in the context of a male “taking” a female in a marriage.
I hate those concepts, and I didn’t mean to resort to them, even in a wistful manner. A woman is not a piece of fruit to be “taken.” I’m going to leave it up, mainly because Kathleen made a good (and funny) point about it, and because it’s a good reminder that I can always try harder to respect the rights of others (truth be told, I was concerned people might get on to me for the cariactures of the Latino worker and the Chinese businessman: while they’re grounded in a true story, I did result to physical stereotypes to get the point across through my art—although the appearances were also grounded in fact).
Secondly, I have to disagree vehemently with you, jp!, about the Third Congressional District of Mississippi not having a lot of Latinos. I’d argue that we are actually (not-so-secretly) flooded with laborers working in the poultry plants and many construction sites in this big chunk of east and central Mississippi.
Just because they don’t yet have an organized political voice (and they don’t), doesn’t mean they aren’t here. In fact, the recent case with the Madison police officer getting ten years in jail for extorting immigrant workers only highlights the need for more attention to be given this subject by us and our representatives.
Third, I love hearing about family stuff. While Sally may be a DAR, many of the rest of us aren’t! It’s wonderful knowing where we all came from—and being reminded that we may be closer to the current debate then we originally thought.
My grandpa also had his arm ripped off at the elbow, but his was a farm accident. He married my grandmother because she insisted he open the door for her regardless of him missing half an arm.
There were towns in the midwest where German was the main language (in schools, newspapers, etc.) until World Wat I. Unfortuately, it was considered unpatriotic to speak German at that time. Hermann, Missouri, is one example. I am pretty sure the Amana Colonies in Iowa were the same way. There were also towns in Iowa with names like “Berlin” that were changed to more anglo names during WWI.
My background: German and a teeny bit of English. I grew up in the midwest where everyone has last names like Biemermeister and Schubermeir.
One of the greatest things I ever heard a teacher say: “I’m a racist, a sexist, and a homophobic—but I’m trying everyday to overcome those things.” This from a lesbian feminist civil rights activist. If you grew up in this culture, you can’t possibly have missed a little of the latent ism’s and phobias which so undergird our national character rubbing off on you. The point is to admit and try to be better. I wouldn’t beat myself up, Gorjus.
i’ll second your assessment of the 3rd district’s latino population gorjus… we both have a friend that worked for an immigration charity up that way and i think she would agree also…
is the older guy with glasses back at best wok now?? it pained me how my two favorite dishes from there, pork lo mein and hot and sour soup, went south after he left…
next time your down in the stick i’ll have to take you to china star…it’s a worthy best wok substitute, though the strip mall it’s in isn’t near as ‘authentic’...