My Body is My Canvas

Three days a week, I take the A train from 175th street to West 4th street, then the F to York Street. This gets me to Dumbo, Brooklyn, and it takes roughly an hour. At the end of the day, I make my way back by the same route. Thus I spend roughly two hours per day completely underground and in the company of strangers.

Being averse to reading in moving vehicles, this is a rough sample of what I listen to on my iPod.

Best depressing album for dreary morning commutes when you feel like a lost little girl in the gray underbelly of a steel monster: White Chalk by PJ Harvey

I like to start with “When Under Ether,” which makes me feel like maybe I’m still asleep and just having a bad dream. When she cries “Oh God I miss you” over and over again in “The Piano,” I always manage to think of somebody.
A con is that you can’t always hear the songs well over the sound of the train.

On that note, more depressing songs for the subway (they fit the mood of the A train, trust):
“Beautiful the Freak” & “Girls Like You Don’t Go for Guys Like Me”- Big Phony
“Worms” - Beth Orton
“Superstar” - Sonic Youth. Yes I heard it in Juno, and yes I loved it.
“What’s a Girl to Do?” - Bat for Lashes
“C’mon Through” - Lasse Lindh
“Lullaby for the Lonely People” - Jihae

When you’re crushing on a cute boy but playing it coy:
“Do I Move You” - Nina Simone
“Le plus beau du quartier” & “Le Toi du Moi” - Carla Bruni
“Wait a Minute (Just a Touch)” - Estelle
“This is Not a Love Song” - Nouvelle Vague

When you’re ogling someone and not playing it coy:
“Hey Luv” - Mobb Deep ft. 112
“Sexy, Naughty, Bitchy” - Tata Young
“I Need a Boss” - Shareefa ft. Ludacris
“Seven X Eight” - Anjali
“Take it Off” - The Donnas
“Break You Off” & “The Seed” - The Roots

So hipster it hurts:
“One Week of Danger” - The Virgins
“We are all on Drugs” - Weezer
“On a Neck, On a Spit” - Grizzly Bear
“House Jam” - Gang Gang Dance

Coming back from work, pissed and ready to key someone in the face:
“Fucked Up” - Yo! Majesty (Won’t be released until October, but fyi this song is pretty fucked up)
The Chronic by Dre is really all you need

Coming back from work, feeling above it all:
“Elevators” - Stars
“Ordinary Girl” - Jade
“LDN” - Lily Allen
“I Get Around” - The Beach Boys

Lastly, four songs to prepare you for the urban jungle:
“Wartime!” - theStart
“Good Luck” - Basement Jaxx
“Get Over It” - OK Go
“Still D.R.E.” - Dr. Dre

So I went to my first day of work on Wednesday, and immediately remembered why I hated waitressing and swore to myself that I would never, ever do it again.

I made my first mistake in high school when I gave up my cushy babysitting job and dedicated my entire weekend to waitressing for about three months. I never knew people could treat waiters, let alone waitresses, that way. After the first day I got home at 11 o’clock, so nauseous that I couldn’t eat dinner, and passed out while contemplating ways to tell my manager that I was quitting.

Over the next three months, I gave up my previous illusions about restaurant sanitation (and it was an expensive restaurant, let me assure you), gained a ton of arm strength (ultimately becoming the girls arm-wresting champion in our prom weekend house), drank a lot with my co-workers, and endured sexual harassment from pretty much everyone. Then, I was gently “laid off” by my manager, who told me that perhaps I just wasn’t suited, personality-wise, for waitressing. Or, as my high school friend lovingly put it, “You’re a bitch and you hate serving people.”

Fast forward two years, and I’m starting training at an upscale Kosher restaurant. Oh yes, I had some trouble at my first waitressing job because I was the only person who didn’t speak Japanese. And oh yes, I am the only non-Jewish server at my new restaurant. I’m probably just asking for it.

To save time and space, here’s a pros & cons list for my new job:

Pro

• I’m making money. Or I will be, once training is over. And I get tips. Or at least 75% of them.
• We have bussers and runners. So really all we do is take the orders. That’s why why only get 75% of the tips.
• Free lunches
• One of the other waiters looks like a Jewish Clive Owen
• I can eventually get a job at a better restaurant. No. No.
• I’m making friends with the busboys and the Hispanic dudes in the kitchen.

Con

• The cook is a 7-foot beast of a guy who I’ve been warned about by three different people. Apparently waitresses cry and quit a lot because of him.
• Somebody called asking for sugar-free, non-fattening, whole-wheat pasta. Whoever this person is, I’m throwing up a little bit in my mouth right now.
• I have to learn what pareve, a mesckula (?), haricots verts, caper remoulade, surimi, and all this other shit is. Then explain it to people. (Haricots verts is just French green beans!)
• The Jewish Clive Owen kind of seems like an asshat
• My manager reminds me of my last manager — always smiling and friendly, but capable of great evil
• As one of the Jewish waiters said on my first day, “I hate Jewish people.” Or at least serving the ones that ask for sugar-free, non-fattening whole-wheat pasta.
• I’m making friends with the busboys and the Hispanic dudes in the kitchen.

An unforeseen benefit of my waitressing job is that I have come to appreciate my internship job at Theme magazine. I may be an office bitch, but at least people treat me with enough respect to acknowledge that I’m a sentient being. In fact, I get to do a Q+A with the musician Big Phony after his show (http://www.myspace.com/bigphony). Also, I got a free Kangol hat. And Vitamin water. And there are parties.

And after work, I sometimes meet friends in the city for drinks. So yesterday I had plans with my friend involving shopping, dinner and drinks, but when I showed up at the rather nice restaurant/bar where she was “finishing up” her work party, I discovered that our plans actually involved being hit on by her 30ish-year-old co-workers, passing out and some vomiting (all her, not me, except for one co-worker).

The next thing I knew, I found myself on a cab ride from the Lower West Side to Tenafly, New Jersey. Although her co-workers were generous enough to fork over $160 (it was either that or double the meter), I still had to find a way to get home considering that I no longer live in Tenafly.

And so, with only one mint mojito in my stomach and a handful of Spanish, I began to negotiate with the cab driver. At first he agreed to “only” charge me the meter. Then, he told me that it would be free if I could guess the punchline to this joke:

What did the flag (it’s such a puny little flag, he said) say to the elephant (it’s a very big elephant)?

Feel free to guess the answer.

The meter was $12, I paid $6 and called it a victory.

It’s 6:10 AM as I’m writing this, and I’ve been trying to sleep since 1 AM. Actually I kind of gave up at 5, crawled out of my window onto my roof, and smoked half a cigar (it was just all I had on hand, and I start thinking funny without sleep). Then I wrote a poem. Then I tried to check my school email (unsuccessfully) on Wi-Fi stolen from my neighbors. And I ended up here. So here is my poem.

Let it happen now, she said her
legs wrapped in faded
yellow beach blanket spotted
with burrs from the dingy flat gray
rooftop and the palms of their hands melding
with sweat.

Let it happen now, and not two—
not five, not ten years from now
when you turn
to me and talk about this remarkable
this indescribable this unfathomable
girl whom
you used to know somehow
somewhere
somewhat.

Let it happen now, rooftop
or stars, or not — and then in two
in five, in ten years from
now on separate rooftops in blankets before
dawn and strangers melting into
the remarkable, indescribable, unfathomable
people we’ve become,
there will be no more need for words
between us.

The other day I went to the Health Center because I felt like the living dead and was terrified that I had mono (it’s okay, I don’t have mono). After filling out half a dozen forms, the nurse brought me into an exam room and the following conversation ensued:

Nurse: So your name is Ni, huh?

Me, automatically: You can call me Amy.

N: What did you say?

M: You can just call me Amy.

N: But Ni is your name isn’t it? It’s a beautiful name.

M: Yes well…

N: Everyone’s getting so Westernized these days…

At this point I just couldn’t let it go, and so I began to explain to her how in Chinese, nobody would call me “Ni.” They would always say “Pan Ni” (last name first) or if they felt like being extra cute, “Ni Ni.” Also, the Chinese language has four different inflections for each word, and my “Pan” is the first sound and my “Ni” is the second one. (Just to give an example of how important inflections are, take the word “Ma”: the first sound means “Mom,” the second “numb,” the third “horse,” and the fourth “to scold/yell at”).

I didn’t really tell her all that, and I also didn’t tell her that people did call me “Ni” all throughout first grade in America and that no one, no one ever pronounced it in a remotely beautiful manner.

She said, “Pan Ni.” (I didn’t tell her about the inflections, nor that Pan doesn’t rhyme with Anne in Chinese)

I said, “Er…right.”

She said, “Well my name is *Shawna*” (I didn’t put her real name here, but she made sure to emphasize it as if it were more legitimate and self-identifying than “Amy.” In fact, I think she said it twice.)

I think that at this point I just fell back into my pounding headache and stopped talking to her, until a little while later when she asked: “Where are you from?”

“New Jersey,” I tell her.

“I mean, where are your folks from?”

Only then did I get her meaning, and though I was tempted to say “New Jersey,” I said: “Oh, I’m Chinese.” Because that’s what she was asking.

I guess that bothered me a little. I mean, granted, “Where are you from?” sounds better than “What’s your nationality?” or “What are you?” but it has that kind of politically-correct “I’m not asking about your race I’m just asking where you’re from” mentality which hides the underlying idea that one “belongs” somewhere just because of his/her race. It’s like the idea that all Euroamerican black people feel a “special” connection with the continent of Africa, and while perhaps some do, others just don’t choose to identify themselves in that way.

Personally I was born in Beijing, and I am from China, and I feel a great sense of connection with Chinese people, and I still hate it when people ask me “Where are you from?” I want to say, “I am from more than one place.” Some Asians are offended when people ask them: “Are you Chinese/Korean/Japanese?” There are varying reasons for that, mainly that a lot of non-Asians simply assume that anyone typically Asian-looking is Chinese. I don’t mind it, really. It becomes a little guessing game, and it’s especially interesting between Asian people themselves. I get a lot of people telling me that I look Korean, which is always a laugh for all my Korean friends from high school.

I think that at least, it’s more honest and straight-forward than “Where are you from?”

And the fact that I want people to call me Amy has nothing to do with trying to become a “Westerner” and trying to erase the traces of my Chineseness.

I think that “Pan Ni” is a beautiful name, and it deserves to be pronounced correctly. My entire family has always called me “Pan Ni” and I would never want them to call me “Amy.”

I think “Amy” is a beautiful name and that it has become a part of me after 13 years, no matter what it says on my passport.

So unless your Chinese accent is superb and you actually know me, please, spare me the lecture. And until then, just call me Amy, thanks.

“American women are like beautiful manor houses with lavish artwork and spacious rooms. But the lights are always out. Americans are not born; they are manufactured. Ford-ersatz, Chrysler-ersatz, Buick-ersatz. All exactly alike. I always know what they’ll say next, because they think alike, speak alike, fuck alike.”

- Monsieur Kalashnikov, André Aciman

Sometimes when I have nothing better to do, I drive down to Barnes and Noble and read magazines. Well, actually I was really trying to do some work in their air-conditioned cafe. But I end up reading magazines, and I don’t mean Cosmopolitan — there is a lot of interesting stuff out there, and it’s not all about hair products and diet tips. Being an art major, I get sucked into all the shiny photographs, but there’s a lot of seemingly-irrelevant information that can be really fascinating. I think that magazines are kind of like an ongoing documentation of specific cultures. Like, maybe eons in the future after everything we know is gone, someone will find an old freeze-dried issue of Maxim and come to some really bizarre and perhaps insightful conclusions about living in the 21st century.

Anyway, the reason that I bring all of this up is because I love The Paris Review. It’s probably the most well-established fiction magazine out there, and for a reason. The quote above is from a short story by Andre Aciman called Monsieur Kalashnikov and it’s the best short that I’ve read in a long time. What’s even better about The Paris Review is that you can access a lot of their content online (voila), although personally I prefer to physically hold what I’m reading. It’s a relatively long short story, and starts slow but the build-up is partly what’s so great and the ending just kills me.

I’m not really going to bother summarizing it for you (I almost never do that, and besides there’s something great about starting to read something without knowing what you’re getting into at all), but I will just say that it touches on a certain kind of pretension and an “academic’s crisis.” It’s a little bit of the bizarre, a little of the familiar, and just a great read. It made me read Aciman’s novel, Call Me By Your Name, which was…different. I really enjoyed it, but for some reason I don’t know if it made the impact on me that the short story did. Call Me By Your Name is about youth, and love (gay love actually), and it really is a beautiful, nostalgia-inducing short novel. I would recommend it. I wonder if it would’ve been better as a short story.

So in the latest Paris Review there is an interview with Kazuo Ishiguro. I think I’m still in shock that I’ve never read his work before, especially since I’ve been working my way around a lot of contemporary Japanese lit. I’ve read everything that Haruki Murakami has published (for better or for worse, even if After Dark was sold at Urban Outfitters), a sprinkling of Ryu Murakami, even though Almost Transparent Blue was, in the words of a friend, “absolutely disgusting after a while,” and even started on Kenzaburo Oe. I really hated Natsuo Kirino though, despite all the attention that she’s gotten lately. I gave up on Out halfway through, and I almost never do that. Where was I? Oh yes, Kazuo Ishiguro. This summer.

I almost always read before bed. My favorite books are like dreams - it’s hard to remember exactly what they’re about, but you keep that feeling with you, and maybe it has changed you in some immeasurable way. And I dream a lot. Recently I dreamed that I was riding a flying motorcycle and that I was about to go over the Forbidden City. I woke up before I did, but aren’t dreams always like that? Anyway, there are magazines worth reading, if some only for their visual language.

And Monsieur Kalashnikov. It’s worth a re-reading, and I almost never do that.

I think that the last time I had a blog, it was called a xanga, and it was filled with lists, transcripts of conversations I had with people who annoyed me, spontaneous poems, and other random emotional outbursts. I’m guessing that it would be…less than appropriate here.
In fact, I think the lack of posting on AmhPub is probably due to the fact that nobody is sure where this thing will go yet. Most of the posts that I have seen are more like newspaper articles than personal blog entries. It’s a very self-conscious sport, blogging, and maybe people (myself included) are still a little hesitant to put themselves out there. Totally understandable, and probably wise, given the fact that the Amherst College student body is hardly larger than that of most high schools. And even at bigger universities, bloggers have attracted a lot of attention, and much of it critical. On that note, have you guys seen Sex and the Ivy? It’s by Lena Chen at Harvard, who started out documenting her sex life and ended up a mini-celebrity/martyr/hook-up culture mascot (http://sexandtheivy.com/). And no, I’m not going to write about my sex life.

In any case, I’ve decided to test the waters. Why not? I’ve been needing a more productive way to procrastinate. I have no plans. I might just end up ranting about whatever is on my mind, which may or may not have to do with artsy Asian stuff, fashion (or lack thereof on this campus), obsessions, events, and music. Oh yes, and writing. A short story or two. That kind of thing.

For now, a list of things that I’m looking forward to this summer:

• Dr. Dre’s “last” album Detox is supposed to be dropping this summer, maybe even in June. I feel like a little girl waiting for her pony, and hoping that pony isn’t all lame and mottled and mean at the same time. Please please please don’t kill the remaining respect I have for hip hop.
• My internship. By that, I mean, the free stuff and access that I might get from my internship. Oh yea and experience and stuff.
• Lying out on my roof at night
• Shopping in New York
• Nylon Summer Music Tour. They’ve got She Wants Revenge, Be Your Own Pet, and Switches but actually I just want to see The Virgins (Rich Girls mp3 here). I read about them in Purple Magazine, and they really do seem quite adorable, if in a tattooed ex-drug-addicts kind of way. They’re playing at The Fillmore at Irving Plaza in late May.
• Flying out to California for a week or two (?)
• Being really broke and having to waitress again and be reminded why I hated it in the first place
• Seeing all the lovely people that I miss from high school, only to have them all leave for internships/study abroad programs again.
• This is turning out to be quite a depressing list, so I think I’ll stop here.

Here’s to the weekend,

Amy