Minding My MannersSo this post is a little late, that's true. Let's just chalk it up to
filipino time and try to pass it off as being appropriate, shall we?
Here's what we won't do. We won't retread what everyone else has done and throw around the 'cism card. Also, we won't put on the hazy hypocritical goggles of hatred. We will, it seems, embellish in some horrible alliteration. And we will, this time, avoid taking the easy way out, putting all the blame on white people.
Here's the story, for those who haven't heard/read/seen yet:
linkageWhat strikes me as funny about this whole thing is that, until very recently in my life, I didn't even know we Filipinos had a different set of table manners. Eating with a spoon and a fork is/was "normal". I still can't fathom anyone looking sideways at me for that.
Art by my girlfriendA couple of years ago I went out with some friends to one of those breakfast/ice cream joints. The kind where you get ice cream on waffles and ice cream in coffee and some bacon on the side. I was eating my pancakes with a spoon and fork, using my spoon to tear away chunks of the flapjacks and then using my fork to spear them into my mouth.
My friend, a filipina, pointed out that they provided us with knives. "True," I thought, and picked up the knife in my right hand. I then stabilized my pancake with my spoon (now in left hand), cut with the knife, then dropped the knife and used the fork to pick up my food. My friend was laughing at my obvious confusion at having to negotiate three utensils with two hands.
First off, it had never occurred to me that there were certain eating situations where you did not need a spoon. And second off, who cares?
Anyways, to end a story that is funny only in a you-had-to-be-there way (I won't even try to convey it), my friend taught me how to properly eat with a fork and knife and I've been a steak chopping champ ever since.
That's on the one hand.
On the other hand, I do remember always being self-conscious about my eating habits when I was younger. When I went over to a friend's house for dinner I'd often eat slowly, spying on the etiquette of others and then following suit. My elbows don't touch tablecloth until yours do. I'm still like this. Even with Filipinos, because I can never tell whose rules they're playing by until I watch a couple of innings. My girlfriend's family says grace before meals. My family eats rice with their hands. At my tito's house it's everyone for themselves. Other places, you ask for someone to pass the peas. At my babysitter's there was no talking unless talked to, and so I often shut up when eating. I constantly wipe my mouth with a napkin, but I do so as discreetly as possible because I don't want to look overly neat and uptight.
It's annoying. It's a constant balancing act that I used to chalk up to my anti-social personality, but I see now might have more to do with my cultural over-sensitivity.
So what's the big fucking deal? Anarchists and misguided wannabe revolutionaries often balk at any rule that might stifle their inner-freedom. Keep our voices down? Keep eye contact when greeting? FUCK YOU. I've known quite a few heads like that in my life, but really in the long run being a jackass isn't progressive or even non-conformist. It's just being a jackass.
Rules make sense sometimes. On the topic of table manners, you can look up guides from the 1800s or early 1900s and they're full of worthwhile guidelines. Like don't blow your nose on the table cloth, etc. (I don't have a reference for this and it's a blog so I won't bother to find one either. Just vibe with me.) To think, people actually used to do that until it became a rule. Rules make sense sometimes.
What happens though is that rules get out of hand and then you get people on both sides of the stupid fence. There's people who get all up in arms when you use a spoon and fork in tandem, saying you eat like a pig (even though pigs do nothing of the sort), or when there's 15 forks in front of you and you use the carrot fork for your cucumber and the cucumber fork for your ear wax and all of a sudden you're a
savage. And then you get people on the other side who are like how dare you tell me how to eat and then they burp in your face and blow cigarette smoke directly up your nose and are all "lighten up, gawd."
What's interesting about this story in particular is the idea of cultural identity and the underlying critique of Canada's much vaunted multiculturalism. As I've stated, I never even knew I ate differently and if I were to ever make a list of things about my heritage that I'm proud of, or heck, even a list about my heritage in general, negative or positive, eating with a fork and spoon would prolly never even cross my mind. After this story dropped, however, people were writing editorials about "the traditional filipino way of eating" as if that shit is written into our national anthem and performed at festivals alongside that dance we do with the candles.
The problem I see with this whole thing, as is the problem I see with most things in life, is a binary one. Us vs. Them, etc etc. Him, Her, They, We, Mine, Yours. The whole "we eat differently from them" is just more unecessary boundaries and springs from the same nasty pool that the racist principal and his faculty sprang from. (I said I wouldn't toss the 'cism card around, but whoops. Old habits, you know.) I am in no way ashamed of the way I eat, nor will I ever be, but that doesn't mean I'm
proud of it either. It's all just eating to me.
The thing about Canada and multiculturalism is that Canada has never actually been a multicultural society. Canada's multicultural society is still one by lazy definition only. It's a center tile of "normal" surrounded by a quilt of "Others". Those Others put the multi in our cultural, yes, but the noticeable Other-ness of such groups is glaring and problematic, and, oddly, celebrated. I often wonder if we celebrate the differences of others, or if we celebrate the differencing of Others, which are similar things on the surface, but the subtleties of which often blow up into stories such as the one that prompted this post.
Rather than a nation defined by the many, what we in Canada are is a nation defined by the presence of Others. If this sounds flaky, it's true. Canada has often un-defined itself, to the point where many agree that Canada's identity is a fundamental lack of identity. But this brush-off towards self-reflection successfully turns a blind eye towards our problems. Our "multiculturalism" often poses the same problem as "colour blindness" in that is presupposes that there is fundamentally no problem.
On the surface, this is somewhat true. Canada remains a great place to live and I plan to grow old here and die in the soft yet firm arms of health care and pension plans. In terms of human rights and social policy and so forth we are much BETTER than many places on this earth. But still. Still our country's history (as taught by our institutions) is defined by, begins with and ends with, an unmistakably white Anglo-Saxon narrative. This is the story of Canada, with every other group being a bit player, a kooky neighbour, a girlfriend, a wise old mentor.
Our big, loving, tolerant cultural festivals are really nothing more than a bunch of food stalls where we eat other people's "traditional" dishes and listen to some music and then go home, missing entirely what it means to live in a multicultural society, to live with others and not with Others. We have a long way to go before Canada can truly call itself such. Any strong belief otherwise just hurts us and leaves us open to surprise and (ultimately unproductive) outrage when our school principle tells us all of a sudden that we eat like a pig.
"Breaking bread" isn't just hip-hop trope or a biblical anachronism. Maybe instead of just eating each other's foods we should concentrate more on sitting down and actually eating WITH each other. Instead of just watching or learning each other's dances we should maybe fucking dance together. Our traditions are important, as is being proud of them, but that only takes us so far. And when that's as far as we go with shit...well, then there's nowhere to go but backwards.
An ellipsis to this table-manners story is my mom's reaction, rightfully outraged, but then five minutes later complaining about the indignities she had to suffer at an Indian wedding where she
sat on the floor to eat. My girlfriend's mom seems to have the same issues, refusing to eat at an Indian restaurant or even speak to the waiter.
I remember awhile back after the release of her film,
Water, director Deepa Mehta lamented some of the positive reactions to her film's depiction of the treatment of widows in India. Her problem was that people looked upon such a situation with such horror, with such surprise, as if India was in a such a poor state and thank god nothing like that ever goes on here. Mehta then related her own surprise upon settling down in Canada where she discovered that we ship our old people into buildings where they are alienated and segregated and then die alone (which, if you haven't seen the movie, is exactly what happens to the widows in
Water); whereas in India they live with and care for their elders as valuable parts of home and society. A perfect example of how our binary way of thinking can turn a blind eye towards ourselves and our backyards.
While I applaud and support anyone, filipino or not, who threw up arms in light of this story, we must still always be cognizant of activism that remains merely reactionary at best. It would do us all a wealth of good to pay much more mind to the fingers we use for pointing, and much less to the utensils we use for eating.
peace.
