“the price of admission”
i paid very hard for my immigrant ignorance
—Mirtha Quintanales
earlier this year, during christmas, when everywhere was closed except for the museum that wouldn’t close until 5pm, i stayed there for an entire day, hopping on and off to all the floors of the museum and to the gift shop. I remember coming across an anthology of James baldwin: “the price of admission.” the contents of that particular essay don’t come as a surprise to me. to be admitted is to surrender to assimilation, to assume the perspective of blended experiences (esp if I come from a “third-world” culture), and to dwell at this awkwardly niche consciousness, where no fair descriptions match the unpredictability of such narrative.
i had hoped that i read baldwin wrong. i gaslit myself that maybe “the price of admission” was unnecessarily interpreted by my biased mind to be awfully cruel. i keep warning myself, don’t overthink or over-paint the facts, and please don’t read into everything or romanticize them into my novelistic intonation.
in the past years, i ask myself almost at the beginning of every year that, why i’m here. what am i doing here? why do i have to come to america as one of the culturally diffident chinese? why do i go to shanghai? why not just stay in my hometown where i can enjoy a foolish yet uneventfully safe life? why do i have to be discontent? why not just marry at 22 to the rich douche that you could chance with in the neighborhood? why not choose the easy path, or at least the one that looks easy at first?
another quote of uncle jun:
“some race is so behind that they think they are actually leading.”
i’m solving the problems of an 18th century woman in an advanced society. whereas, in fact, the actual timeline is 2024 now.
before my writing becomes too personal, maybe you should pause here and stop reading. every writing of mine is deeply interwoven with my very personal experiences. whether such trait makes a clumsy interloper in the field is a different discussion.
they say, the individual is social. i forgot who said that.
i also ask myself, where else i should be except for being here. i cannot reverse or lobotomize the consciousness of women of color feminism. i cannot wipe away my affinity to ideas of equality and minorities. i cannot remove the attractions i feel toward updating institutions and eradicating mistreatment. and i wouldn’t want to live without fighting for a less problematic institution.
yuja, in an interview on her tour to china last year, was asked why she was tearful before playing glück’s orpheus. orpheus is told not to turn around, yet he pauses, turns around, and gazes toward the past.
the writer, whose name in the literature world doesn’t need to be mentioned again, once prophesies:
“so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
i have the utmost pleasure to join the reading group on women of color feminism, where we read “this bridge called me back.” this bridge may have brought us into layers after layers of contradictions: for third-world feminists like me, to commit to the social is to estrange from my homeland and to assume the role of a traitor—the traitor against filial piety, against political "ómerta.”
confusingly, estrangement is complicated by the desire to reunion with the bridge and by the wish to preserve the bridge. this bridge is both the source of my wretchedness and the foundation of my identity. this bridge is bittersweet and painful.
even so, we must discuss the bridge and confront the bridge
for a better world.
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or at least something else.