114

It's been a while, but I no longer have a working camera and to be honest my favorite thing is my progressing style.

So all I have to offer the blog world is some writing, or whatever this kind of shit is called.



Lately, I’ve been drawn to old vintage photos of Asian American women. It started with a day trip to the Japanese American History Museum with the boyfriend. We went to see the exhibit celebrating fifteen years of Giant Robot, which is interesting in its own right.

Once we finished that, we explored the rest of the museum, most of it filled with empty space ready to be rented out or decorated in commemoration of something or another. Eventually, we came to the permanent exhibit on Japanese internment.

As an Asian American studies major, I fell like this time period has been taught and re-taught, as one of the most racist acts of imprisonment, its aftermath proving the pre-eminent action of the United States of America completely wrong. After peering into the barrack, brought from Manzanar I believe, we started walking into room filled with pictures and ephemeral items that held so much value in camp.

Instead of being moved, as I once would have been, I was sucked into the pictures. Photographs of men, dressed in well fitting suits and leisure clothing were nice to point out to boyfriend, but it was the photographs of women that shifted my entire reasoning for being there. I became obsessed with staring and every picture of beautiful Japanese American women, dressed in summer dresses and winter coats lined in fur. Lips dark with red lipstick; eyeliner wing tipped. Their hair was magnificent, large voluminous curls.

I permed my own hair a few days later.

The style of these women enamored me. It’s all I could think about. I went home and flipped through the pictures of my Taiwanese grandmother, making noodles in the backyard, camping with friends, strolling through parks and national landmarks.

What does it mean that these women valued maintaining their appearances during one of the most violent and hateful times to be an Asian American woman. While they were cooped in tiny spaces, forced to re-negotiate their entire lives, these women still had the energy and self love to curl their hair and dress as nicely as possible. While they could not move anywhere, or really make money for extra niceties that they would shop from catalogs. I wonder if it was their way to stay connected to the outside world.