[ExI] dr suess

[spike at rainier66.com]

From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat
Sent: Friday, March 5, 2021 6:21 AM
To: ExI chat list <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
Cc: William Flynn Wallace <foozler83 at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [ExI] dr suess

 

>…Let's see - sushi - isn't that the raw fish that you have to put hot mustard on for it to have any taste?  

 

Taste harder.  Sushi has a flavor, but you need to reach out for it a bit.  It is subtle.  If you blast it with wasabi, there is no point in paying all that money.

 

>…  Which way is the discrimination, from Japanese to Chinese and Vietnamese or vice versa?

 

Hard to say BillW.  There are so many subtleties in how cultures interact, and we all filter everything thru our own cultural viewpoints.  It is clear enough to me that China and Vietnam are still fighting the second world war.

 

There is an important subtlety most westerners don’t get (but I do because I had a lot of personal contact with Japantown because of a friend and colleague from work who grew up there and was there when his family was sent to an internment camp.)  Before the US involvement in the war, the citizens of Japantown were not afraid of the Americans, they were afraid of the Chinese gangs.  The Japanese young people knew to stay right in their own neighborhood down there, where the concentration of Japanese was high enough they were relatively safe.  Outside that area, they were vulnerable to Chinese gangs which were common in San Jose.

 

When the word came that they would be evacuated to internment camps, there was mixed opinion on what was going to happen.  Some thought they were going to be exterminated, some thought they were being protected from Chinese gangs, everything in between.  When my friend’s family returned to their home in late 1945, nothing had been touched, everything was exactly as they left it.  The San Jose cops let the Chinese gangs know if they (or anyone) went into Japantown, things would go very badly for them.  They stayed out.  

 

The Japanese returned after nearly 4 years and resumed their lives.  My colleague was then in grade 6.  He finished high school right there, went to San Jose State U, took an engineering degree and ended up an engineering manager at Lockheed.  His 11 siblings did well.  One of them took the leadership of the Buddhist temple where I volunteered as for the team who prepared marugame udon for the crowds at the annual Obon festival.  His son took over leadership and runs that place to this day. 

 

But I digress.

 

spike

 

 

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