If you haven’t read part 1, Loco in Cap-Haitien, HERE you go!
I wasn’t in Japan long at all before I came to learn that here, particularly for non-Japanese, you are what the image of you portrays you as, nothing more, nothing less, until you’ve made personal contact. And, even then, you’re placed in the (awkward, at best, humiliating, at worst) position, with every new acquaintance made, of having to dismantle the image that proceeds you wherever you go. (Assuming you find the premise “Image is Everything” problematic – some people don’t, I’ve found, and these people tend to LOVE Japan unreservedly).
Nearly every substantial relationship I’ve managed to eke out with Japanese people — be it a co-worker, a girlfriend, a drinking buddy, what have you — was preceded by this course of action, this image dismantling. The duration of this course of action varies dependant solely on the height, width, and girth of the wall erected around you; a wall cemented by the power of that image, and its influence on the person you’re attempting to make a connection with (which of course is case by case).
Stereotype by stereotype, objectification by objectification, brick by ill-laid brick, chiseled away or jackhammered until at last I’m revealed to be the sum of my individual experience, and not the sum of everything said about people who favor me, often via the media.
Early in my time here in Japan, my response to being forced to undo the damaging impact of the media upon my reputation was to go the extra mile to prove that I did not fit ANY of the stereotyped-plagued presumptions about who I am and what I’m capable of that preceded me here. Not one. My efforts at assimilation were characterized as much by my emulation of the native customs as by my efforts to NOT meet any of the native’s preconception.
My goal was for every Japanese person, upon interacting with me, to respond with the Japanese version of: “GET THE FUCK OUTTA TOWN!! You?? But, but, but you’re Black?”
I aimed to be the ANTI-stereotype, to spit in the face of every expectation.
Not with my actions, though. Oh no. I’d been down that road before for the benefit of similarly afflicted white minds back in the States. I’d do the unexpected just for effect, play golf or go on wine tasting excursions, to hammer home the point that neither “New Jack City” nor “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air” synopsized my life. I upped my vocabulary and swallowed my slang. Took the bop out of my stride and kept that chip that perpetually resides on my shoulder hidden beneath my suit’s shoulder pads (unless it somehow served me…or on those rare occasions when I’d “lose my natural mind” over some intolerable bullshit).
Sometimes I’d lose myself in a labyrinthine code-switching, lane-changing, identity obfuscating, integrity ravishing nightmare, in these perverse efforts to show that I wasn’t a credit to my race, but a credit to me! A self-invention.
The number of times I’ve been hit with white declarations that begin, “I didn’t know that, well, that, ummm, black p—, er, that Afro— er, African-Americans liked to so-and-so,” is fairly friggin’ high (I worked in corporate America for many years before coming to Japan). Each declaration taken as a victory, as a teachable moment I fabricated. And, with gusto, I’d respond with some version of, “Well, I can’t speak to what We do. We are over a billion people. I can only speak to what I do!”
But, eventually (as in a looooong fucking time later), I became self-aware. I realized that each occasion was a reflection of my insecurities as much as it was an illustration of their ignorance, that it fed this deep-seated desire to feel included in their exclusivity, their clique of affirmed humanity; affirmation achieved with every click of the remote control. All the while keeping my innate blackness intact.
I was an emotional clusterfuck navigating a minefield in my mind. Not to suggest it didn’t have “real world” implications. Better believe it did! My endeavors translated into opportunities and advancement…in other words, MONEY! But, the way I was going about it would have eventually lead to an asylum or my early demise, likely self-inflicted.
I don’t regret that phase of my development, though. It was essential. I mean, defining yourself by first establishing (and, in my case, emulating) who you aren’t, can be a vital step to ultimately uncovering and refining who you are.
So, no, I wasn’t about to go that route again with the Japanese. That path is fraught with peril.
Here in Japan, my insecurities again reared their ugly head, but this time around I decided to take a modified path. Early on I caught myself falling into those old patterns, not in action, but in my words. That need to impress, to contradict, to once again prove myself to be the anti-stereotype.
“Can I dunk? No, so sorry, I’m afraid not. But once I was caught underneath a tree at Augusta, about 150 yards out, with about a two foot window that I had to hit, right? I took a two-iron and smoked it! Ended up about six feet from the pin. What a stroke!”
“Yeah, sure, Hip-Hop’s cool, but have you heard Yeol Eum Son play Mozart’s Piano Concerto # 21 in C Major? My knees are still buckled!”
No, I would not go all out to win and influence Japanese as I did for white folks in America. But, almost instinctively, I fabricate these teachable moments, and relish each one. For there’s no doubt in my mind that it’s in the best interest of the meaningful relationship that might blossom from these artificial interactions. That is the impetus to put myself through it again and again. I’m of the mind that we need to be strangers before we can be friends. You need to not know me, or un-know the me you think you know, in order to clear the obstacles in your mind, and only then is there a possibility of getting to know the real me. And vice-versa. Many a potential friendship has fallen to the wayside as a result of this image nonsense.
It can be trying process, but this is such well-trampled territory I feel it’s a redundancy even tackling it as much as I have here. The territory that often goes untrodden however, by my reckoning, is the perverse sense of guilt or shame felt amid this process.
Guilt at knowing that we’re co-conspirators in facilitating this image. Shame in knowing that, though the preponderance of these negative images of us is out of proportion, a fair number of these images are accurate.
And an even deeper shame in knowing that, despite knowing the above, despite being a relatively responsible man, and a man capable of objectivity and even abstract thought at times, I TOO have fallen victim to the power of these images in the media.
Chris Rock used comedy to illustrate a issue…but I think he either missed the point (or went for the laugh instead of for the jugular).
I’m going for the jugular!
Part 3, coming soon…
Loco