When I lived in North Carolina, I was an outcast. I had friends growing up or at least everyone wanted to be my friend, but there were ‘microaggressions’ abound. I.e. in middle school, I had a group of white girl friends. Nicknames? Blondie, Redhead, Natalie-because-Natalies, and me, ‘Blackhead.’
In high school, I went from “Cute? Smart? Asian girl? With fucked up teeth?” to “Fat, ugly, must’ve gotten knocked up this summer.”
In college, I made one friend a year. Rod, she-who-shall-not-be-named-for-she-is-a-manipulative-cunt, Jules, and Lindsay. All people of color, all pretty gay in one way or the other.
And then I moved to California, where suddenly I wasn’t the rare Asian, but, wait, an Asian Woman who Likes Rap and Wears Pants and Goes Places by Herself and Drives Well and Talks About Politics with a Beer in Hand?
Oh, shit!
Yes, it’s me. #AsianGirlJoy is just as hard to find. Seriously, try looking around and seeing how many purely happy Asian girls there are. We’re oppressed by a lot of things within our cultures, believe it or not. A billion hoops we have to jump through to be ‘presentable’ that men… well, men can get away with anything, can’t they?
I named this blog Another Asian Jennifer because I’m not ‘another Asian Jennifer.’ My mom named me after Jennifer Aniston because she didn’t know what to name me when I popped out in 1993 and that was the most popular name at the time, but it’s Jennifer Aniston so hey. She named me Nhu after Madame Nhu because Madame Nhu was that bitch.
The amount of jokes I put up with for my name alone… Isn’t it discouraging for anyone to try anything when the perceptions of those around you make you feel small?
Only for me to realize, when I moved to a bigger place,
that small people
try to make
big people
feel like them.
My mom got one thing right in her neglectful upbringing. Doctors don’t know it all. Medicine, pharmacy, etc. are industries filled with rich people trying to keep the money in. For us plebes down here? Broke and hungry? Go to McDonalds and get you a 2,000-calorie dinner. And all those sugars in there, sure they’ll taste good, but you’ll be hungry and you’ll be back. And then when all the fast food catches up to you? Hello diabetes, high blood pressure, and so on. Cha-ching.
I made a joke to Double D last night, deep in Political Conversation, saying I choose to be a writer because if I were a reporter, I’d probably get beheaded. I laughed loudly and he laughed awkwardly because he knew I was dead serious at the end of the day.
A STOR¥ BY ? 