…NOT
We’re actually here to talk about Old Asian People.
WARNING: The following post is not racist. It is not based on prejudice, it’s not anti-Asian or advocating the dislike, hatred, shunnance, or other negative treatment of any people based on their ethnic, racial, or linguistic background. Rather, it is an observational piece rooted in almost four years of empirical observation and nearly one bottle of $5 wine. (Shiraz, from Delicoso, rated #1 three years in a row at the California state fair) It’s not that I in any way dislike Asian people for being Asian — I simply have a lot of personal experience demonstrating that a specific brand of folks lives out their stereotype to the fullest. If you are looking for hateful propaganda, I recommend the website of America’s premier diversity promotion outfit.
Look: I work near Chinatown. I don’t work in Chinatown, but the closest stop for the train is the one called “Chinatown”. I live in Boston, one of America’s oldest cities and so, one of the best examples of our persistent Ghettoization. The Irish live in Southie, the Italians live in the North End (and the State House), and Asians of all persuasians have been bundled into one homogeneous and culturally insulting four-block, happy-meal-toy-gated, “culture”-peddling ghetto known as Chinatown. And it’s crowded. Really crowded. A less sensitive man would suggest that the Japanese probably feel right at home.
Anyway, the fact of the matter is that I really wish that my workplace was located someplace other than right next to Little Bangkok (from the beard and versatile usefulness quotient in my office, you’d think it was closer to Little Bangor). It’s not that I have any problem coming into contact with large quantities of Asian people — after all, in terms of weight and mass it’s just about equal to coming into contact with a small quantity of Texans — but those particular to Chinatown seem to have an absurd amount of trouble with public transportation.
Riding it, staying quiet on it, keeping their many children out of my way on it, and (astoundingly) exiting it.
I don’t know what it is, but you can always tell the Chi-town-bound ones from the culturally integrated ones just from lookin’ at ‘em. Something in their eyes, and no, I’m not talking angles and vectors. You just know. Maybe it’s the orange shopping bags (what’s wrong with the white ones??), the ill-fitting pants, the herd of spawn, or the fact that they look exactly like I would look if I had spent the last X-number of days in fucking Chinatown, but I always know.
Probably what it is is that they talk REALLY FUCKING LOUD. Not loud like the massholes from Eastie who wish the feckin’ Sawks would win a gaymahtoo this yeah. Not loud like the black dudes (almost certainly bound for Downtown Crossing) who talk about how I saw my girl talkin’ to some Potta Rican nigga (sp?) the other day on the speakerphones of their Sidekicks. No, loud like… well, I guess like somebody who knows they have to get off at Chinatown and are pissed off about it. Except that I keep my mouth shut.
Probably what it is is that at least one of their 6 little children inevitably winds up between my legs (where I don’t want it) at some point during the commute. I don’t give a fuck if you have an adorable, colorful backpack (probably featuring Spider-Man), you have no fucking business between my legs.
Probably what it is is that no matter how legitimate the pictures look, I can’t help but trusting that the newspaper they’re reading is just a long string of ads for special massages.
Maybe what it is is that you’re positive that the exact same motherfucker cut you in line at CVS yesterday (no lie, 9 of the 9 last people to cut me in line at CVS have been undeniably Asian and at least 50).
Really, though, what it is is that they have repeatedly demonstrated an complete and total inability to exit the train car and station in a remotely expedient manner. I can say with total and scientific certainty that Asians have spent more time over the course of the last several decades IN MY WAY than any other groupable group of groups of people. Furthermore, I’ve spent more time trying to get out of Chinatown station than getting in to any other station. They block the doors. They stop in the middle of turnstiles (for no fucking reason). They magically make the escalators move more slowly (I swear they fucking do), and no matter how hard I try, I can’t find any other way to differentiate the group of folks in my way from the folks not in my way other than old and Asian.
And I haven’t even gotten started on Asians on the road…
