Tainted Meat

There are three ideas with in the novel My Year of Meats that are colliding or should I say, they are intertwine with each other like a spiders web of conspiracy. The three ideas are profit/money, class and hormones and these three ideas lead to a big picture. A large beef company syndicate called BEEF-EX is expanding their meat empire to Japan. In order to entice the Japanese population to purchase BEEF-EX meats, they produce a show called My American Wife to display the wholesomeness of America through meat especially through beef. They show beef as a high class meat used by wholesome middle class American, basically their view of the perfect candidate to represent the beef. But the illustration of this wholesome meat is a happy cover up. What’s really inside the meats are man made hormones like DES, recycled feeds (which I find repulsive) cement, plastics, hell why not put a kitchen sink in there! The author of this book basically writes that these tainted meats are giving Americans cancers, infertility, and making antibiotics useless to use, and all this just to make a profit.
This is what is going to happen if the claims in this book are true and it persists. BEEF-EX expands, they sell their meats world wide. Their meat festering in hormones and other deviances will decline the birth rate. I already see a correlation, all western countries (Europe, America) have had a decline in birth rates and all of these countries eat a large amount of meat. Countries like China, India non-western states that don’t eat a lot of meat has a rise in birth rates. The use of hormones in meats may result in a decline in birth rates and may link to certain cancers, but our culture is surrounded by meat. Fast food restaurants, commercials all of these things depict meat is American as apple pie. I tried not eating meat after reading My Year of Meats and I failed because the sizzling sound of a 12oz steak with mashed potatoes and fries at Marie Calendars made my mouth water and the books words and facts seem to turn away like dust in the wind. Propaganda like My American Wife is imbedded in our psyche that it would be hard for us Americans to give up our meat.

The results of Wal-Mart

In My Year of Meats Ruth L. Ozeki introduces Jane Takagi-Little as the director of My America Wife a television show intended to introduce American meat to the Japanese. Throughout her experiences traveling though much of small town America Jane experiences many cultural phenomena and has the chance to witness the good and the bad that come about from it.
Consumer driven America is one cultural phenomenon that can be seen throughout Jane’s travels. This consumerism is most clearly represented though the Wal-Mart chain that is located in nearly every middle to low income, small town that Jane and her crew visits. Wal-Mart feeds on the small town making everyone there nearly dependent on it disregarding the small non-chain stores that they put out of business and then pay less than satisfactory wages. Jane spoke about the small towns that these Wal-Marts were in and expressed that each person living in these towns spent their days at the store. Not only was the Wal-Mart important to the members of the town, but also to the Japanese crew, there for only a few days of filming. “To a Japanese person, Wal-Mart is awesome, the capitalist equivalent of the wide-open spaces and endless horizons of the American geographical frontier” (35). Wal-Mart offers nearly anything that could be desired in a small town and at the cheapest price in town.
The extreme of Wal-Mart can be seen through the experiences of the Bukowskys. The Bukowsky’s daughter was hit buy a Wal-Mart delivery truck and paralyzed. Wal-Mart then refused to give Mrs. Bukowsky so time off to care for her daughter and then refused to fire her so she could collect some unemployment. This refusal came from a concern of making the store look bad, while disregarding the care for their associate and her family.
This disregard for people in the pursuit of money brought about another social phenomenon, and that is one of care for one another without prejudice. After the Bukowsky’s ordeal the whole town came together to help the family. Since neither parent was working the town’s members would bring food and stop by in shifts to spend time with the daughter on the request of her mother.
Each new cultural phenomenon is in some way dependant on anther phenomenon. None can stand alone and while there is many negative affects associate with many phenomena some bring about positive effects.

Greed and Negligence

Drugs, meat, greed, and negligence all collide in My Year of Meats on the Dunns’ feedlot in Colorado.

In MYOM, Gale Dunn uses illegal DES in his feedlot. Gale wants to earn more money without having to do extra work. Gale feels he can only do this by giving his cows drugs that make them meatier. He neglects to observe the changes that have occurred in his body and his stepsister’s body, and he neglects to take into account the repercussions his illegal and immoral action could have on the population that eats Dunn Farm’s meats.
The potential physical results of this collision are obvious. DES could affect the development and reproductive abilities of quite possibly anyone who eats the tainted meat. For example, Rose Dunn develops improperly because she is always around the DES– she already has breasts, pubic hair, and menstrual cycles at age five. DES meat could potentially take motherhood away from generations of women due to its negative effects on their reproductive systems. This collision of drugs, meat, greed, and negligence could also morph the idea of what it is to be a woman in America. Woman could become separated into two species: childbearing and non-childbearing.
This collision could also result in the destruction of the image of the old American West that defines the U.S. Americans and the rest of the world seem to think of the United States as a place full of plains, cowboys, clean air, and clean living. When we find out that there are drugs in our meat, the plains disappear; the cowboys become businessmen dressed in austere suits hiding money behind their backs, and the clean air and clean living seems as dirty as anywhere else in the world. People would start to lose faith in America because it would become a place and a people they no longer could trust.
Overall, this collision could potentially cause the world to lose trust in America (not that anyone trusts it anyways), and the redefinition of the woman’s place in the American society.

when east meats west..

In My Year of Meats, a common theme that carries throughout the novel would be the collision of the traditional, eastern ways of Japan, and the novelty of the new, western American ideals and the irony that is seen from the outcomes. The main focus of my argument results from the relationship between John and Akiko Ueno. Through John’s insistent and abusive nature towards Akiko to better become a mother and better wife through emulation of American wives and ideals, he ultimately hurts his chances of becoming a father and having the perfect wife, because of his persistent need to become “American”.

The idea of John’s show, “My American Wife!,” was to due to Akiko’s inability to produce eggs and therefore her inability to produce babies. John felt that if he got Akiko to follow recipes and make the meals, consisted of mainly beef and other meats (the American way), it would “put meat on her bones” and make her fertile. This beef consumption was colliding with the Japanese diet of mainly rice, vegetables, and seafood. John felt that the Japanese diet wasn’t working, due to the fact that they were childless, and wanted to follow the American diet in hopes of Akiko becoming fertile like the Texan women he so longed for with large breasts and childbearing hips. Ultimately, as the book unfolds, we find that the American beef that John thought was going to help him have children caused Akiko to vomit and come a lot unhealthier, which hindered her ability to produce eggs. Also, with the presence of DES and other drugs, it would caused the sperm count of men to decrease, and his constant consumption of it also helped leave him childless.

John also had hopes that his show would turn Akiko into the American wife that we desired. The typical Japanese wife was submissive, quite, and supportive; all the things that Akiko was. But Akiko’s weekly viewing of My American Wife!, which John insisted abusively, caused Akiko to lose her traditional, Eastern ideals of how life should be and how a wife should behave, to adopt the ideals of what a western, American wife should be, with the freedom of choice, happiness, and equality. John’s hopes of having an American wife, ironically, became true when Akiko left him and moved to America in hopes of a better life for her and her daughter.

Ultimately, John’s need to become “American” which counteracted with what John wanted. His views that the traditional, Japanese ways were inferior to the novel, idealized, American ways hurt him. When East MEATS west (I know the correct verb tense would be MET, but there would be no pun), the west won, like John wanted, but it left him wifeless and childless.

"Normal" People

In the novel, My Year of Meats, numerous cultural phenomena collide continuously throughout the story. One of these collisions that I found to stand out is the difference in the social acceptance of “different” people.

At one point of the story, Jane Takagi-Little introduces a vegetarian lesbian couple with two daughters and decides to film an episode of the show “My American Wife!” about them. In Japan, homosexuals are generally less accepted from the society. To get an idea, it is not rare for people that come out of their closets to lose their jobs because they are thought to bring down the image of the company. Unlike the US, there are no laws that protect them from discrimination of their age, gender, race, or sexual orientation. Although lesbian couples are not necessarily common in the US either, they are more accepted into the society. Consequently, that episode received a very negative feedback from John Ueno; although, the network producers found it “humane and moving…”

Ironically, the episode with the vegetarian lesbian couple turned out to be one of the few successful episodes of the show. This goes to show that “wholesomeness” of a family has very little to do with people’s sexual orientation and more on their determination for their pursuit of happiness as Lara and Dyann understood very well.

Sex, Lies, and Cultural Beliefs

"Guns, race, meat, and Manifest Destiny all collide in a single explosion of violent, dehumanized activity" that resulted in Yoshihiro Hattori’s murder. Other phenomena that clash in My Year of Meats are that of Jane and Akiko’s individual fertility struggles and cultural beliefs that contributes to the results of each woman’s intimate relationships.

In the early part of the novel, we learn that Akiko’s menstruation cycles had ceased, perhaps because of her eating and purging habits, thus preventing her from having "John’s" children. In the Japanese culture, one would consider it unusual if a couple did not have children soon after marriage. This fuels John’s anger and frustration with Akiko, who beats her because she is, in his eyes, stupid, disrespectful, and dishonest, which in turn, does not help her struggle with conceiving. Akiko, being the stereotypical obedient, submissive Japanese wife, defies these cultural beliefs when she does not notify her husband of the return of her menstruation, with her secret promiscuous behavior, and the betrayal of John as she contacts Jane with the intentions of sabotaging his career.

Like Akiko, Jane Takagi-Little had also had great difficulty in attempting to conceive with her husband. The failure of having a child may have contributed to the failure of her first marriage. But in stark contrast to the Japanese culture and their beliefs, Jane is having causal sexual relations with a man named Sloan while on location in her shoots of My American Wife!. Although this type of activity does not classify as the practical relationship between a man and a woman in the American cultural, it has become more prevalent and more accepted, especially amongst those in the later generations. The two engage in unprotected sex for the first time when they come to the conclusion that it is safe to do so since Jane is sterile. To everyone’s shock, she gets pregnant. Not only is it complete taboo (in the Japanese culture) that a woman is having casual sex with a man she is not married to, it is of even greater outrage that she has a child out of wedlock. The unexpected pregnancy initially appeared to have dampened the pair’s informal relationship that they have become accustom to, but eventually, the existence their baby helped to create a meaningful, caring, respectful relationship. While Akiko and John’s marriage faltered under the struggles of having children in a marriage that lacks love and respect through a web of Japanese cultural beliefs, Jane and Sloan had built a near ideal relationship from a fling with the foundation of an unplanned pregnancy in a woman who was believed to be infertile.

Collisions of Corruption and Intolerance

Mr. “John” Ueno is a conflict of cultural phenomena all in one character. He portrays himself as a “wholesome” person, who is trustworthy and understanding but his façade can be seen throughout his actions in the book, My Year of Meats by Ruth Ozeki. At one instance he is a caring and thoughtful husband to his wife, Akiko, by helping her eat more so she could be healthy, but at another moment he is putting hundred dollar bills in the g-strings of Texan strippers and then attempting rape the coordinator of his television show while drunk in a hotel. He is as superficial as the Pepsi in the Coke bottle that Mrs. Suzie Flowers used in her Coca-Cola Roast, “Not the real thing at all…” (Ozeki 30). He does not care for Akiko and only cares to uphold his superficial “wholesome” reputation to his peers and co-workers like him.

“John’s” lifestyle can be illustrated in the superficial ideas of his television show, My American Wife. His show is about “wholesomeness” yet “John” lives in “squalor” (Ozeki 12). He wants to show Japanese housewives his idea of the “true American wife” that lacks any type of imperfection or a second-class status.

His selection of women is similar to shopping at Wal-Mart. His boss selected his wife, he pays for strippers to “offer up her round rump for his inspection” (Ozeki 43), and he thinks he can take any girl he wants, i.e. when he attempted to rape Jane. He is similar to an American shopping at a Wal-Mart superstore where anyone can select and pay for any product they want – from wholesome milk and eggs to guns. Similar to “John,” America is a conflict in cultural phenomena because they promote zero tolerance yet they make guns easily accessible to the public. America is a conflict of “wholesomeness” and corruption.

Furthermore, racism plays a role in the novel when “John” does not want to film Miss Helen and Mr. Purcell from Mississippi because they are black. Racism is apparent within the Unites States and all over the world. Although racism is condemned in the U.S., it is still present in our lives. For example, Jane describes a scene where a white American will not accept that a woman with black hair and brown eyes is also a fellow American, “…a red faced veteran from World War II drew a bead on me and my crew… ‘Where you from, anyway?’ he asked, squinting his bitter blue eyes at me. ‘New York,’ I answered. He shook his head and glared and wiggled a crooked finger inches from my face. ‘No, I mean where were you born?’ ‘Quam, Minnesota,’ I said. ‘No, no…What are you?’ He whined with frustration. And in a voice that was low, but shivering with demented pride, I told him, ‘I…am…a…fucking…AMERICAN!” (Ozeki 11). Although America is supposed to be built on justice and freedom for all, many Americans are not allowed to be American because of the color of their skin.

I was born in the Bay Area and I have lived in the United States all my life. Although I am a full-grown American, people still come to me and ask me where I am from and do not accept my simple answer of “the Bay Area.” Many people expect something exotic and different to match my different skin tone and physical features. America’s value of freedom and equality clashes with the blatant racism in our country.

Culture Clash

With in the novel, My Year of Meats, there are several prominent phenomena that are “colliding” during the story. The most prominent phenomena that are clashing within the novel are cultural expectations as focused around the main character, Jane Takagi-Little, and the real and perceived notions of what is a true “American Family.” Throughout the novel, Jane not only experiences the differences in American and Japanese culture through her recount of childhood experiences, but also wrestles with a mental clash of cultures as she struggles to identify with her mixed heritage. Concurrently, the Japanese view of American families clashes with the real families that Jane portrays on her episodes of the series “My American Wife!”
During the novel, Jane recounts her experiences growing up as a child of mixed race. The clash of culture is even present in her name, where her mother decides that her American surname of Little will bring great burden upon her life, and therefore decides to have her child keep a Japanese surname of Takagi, literally meaning “tall.” For Jane’s father, Little is “just a name,” but to her mother, her surname is “very first thing! Name is face to all the world.” More important than her external experiences with the Japanese and American cultures, is her internal struggle to identify with a race. As a child Jane fantasizes about marrying a man of mixed heritage, an indicator of her youthful openness to her mixed race. After she reads of the supposed inferiority of her race in a local book in her hometown library of Quam, Minnesota, she begins to doubt the benefits of her mixed heritage. Though her mixed heritage did cause her a great deal of struggle, eventually Jane finds peace with it. This is evident in a conversation she has with a WW2 veteran upon arrival to her first shoot. After asking repeatedly where Jane is from, the man asks what she is. In response to this, and proof of her acceptance of her mixed heritage, Jane ends her internal struggle with her racial identify by yelling that she is “a fucking American.”
Also present throughout the film is the collision of what the Japanese audience expects of a proper American family and what is actually real. Primarily, the producers wanted to present their audience with white, upper middle-class Americans. Though families such as the Flowers presented this ideal family, the shows received lower ratings than other shows that presented a more non-traditional family, such as the show chronicling the Burkowsky’s, a family with a severely handicapped girl. These differences in ratings demonstrate the cultural collision of what is real and what is perceived. More traditional families, though considered to be more “moral” by the Japanese producers, are not the true depiction of American families. The clash of realities ultimately leads to the “real” families winning over the hearts of the Japanese. Though not what they would expect in their traditional values, the uniqueness of these families leads the Japanese audience to relate to them more.
Ultimately, Jane wins her internal struggle with racial identity by accepting her mixed heritage and identifying herself as an American. In turn, the Japanese public accepts the more believable American families represented on “My American Wife!” and thus takes a step at ending the culture clash that is occurring on their television screens.

The Collision of Consumerism and Greed

Consumerism and greed collide in My Year of Meats. Much of the consumerism occurs in the Wal-Wart stores that Jane and her production crew visits all across America. The establishments of Wal-Mart stores are in small, middle-class cities that make these prime places for consumerism. “There wasn’t anyplace else to go in those towns. I mean, if you took a Sociological Survey of the people who lived there, they all spent their days off at Wal-Mart too” (pg. 33). Material goods and consumerism are of high interest in these towns that it can potentially lead to greed.

The marginal propensity to consume decreases when income increases due to the fact that when people are well off, they consume less because they already live comfortable lives with all the necessities already bought. Whereas middle-class people want to attain the same level of satisfaction as the wealthy, therefore they consume until they feel they have everything they need which can take years upon years to realize. To need and want goods oftentimes leads to varying degrees of greed because in American culture, “want is good”. Therefore, there is a yearning to consume more and more. The effect of consumerism and greed can lead to a dent in the pocket book or the uncontrollable feeling that you need to buy things in fear that you might be lacking some things in your life. But what would this great land we call America be without the thriving economy called capitalism? The cultural phenomenon in America is to have things in a comfortable abundance, or what the Japanese viewers of My American Wife! would call “excess”.

So, to make consumerism even more convenient, Wal-Mart stores have created a strategic placement of all the goods in Wal-Mart stores that makes it easy to purchase items on top of items. “To a Japanese person, Wal-Mart is awesome, the capitalist equivalent of the wide-open spaces and endless horizons of the American geographical frontier. All this for the taking! Your breast expands with greed and need and wonder” (pg. 35). Because the items in Wal-Mart are so cheap, it is easy to “stock up” and oftentimes, one may buy unnecessary things. I, too, have been a victim tempted by Wal-Mart’s cheap, low prices. When I enter Wal-Mart, I usually have a list that intend on checking off, however, every time I see the large array of selection, I reconsider whether if I will ever need that item because it might be useful in the near future. Wal-Mart makes it especially easy to buy things that will complement your item, like buying caramel dip with the batch of apples you bought, or buying things in pairs so you will be the deal at the cash register. So in the end, I usually buy all the items on my list plus some unnecessary items that I regret buying. Consumerism and a mild form of greed have collided in my life.

Capitalism, Advertising, and the Destruction of American Culture

Throughout My Year of Meats, by Jane Takagi-Little, numerous cultural phenomena are displayed, analyzed, and interpreted. One of these phenomena is centered on the differences between two cultures, more specifically, the differences between the American and Japanese cultures. This comparison, however, is not presented through a simple literal comparison, but through the experiences of Japanese citizens and their interactions with America, Americans, and American culture. When commenting on Yoshihiro Hattori's murder, Little states "Guns, race, meat, and Manifest Destiny all collided in a single explosion of violent dehumanized activity" (89), emphasizing the common American ideology of superiority as a cultural phenomenon.
Although this idea is blatantly stated in the text of this novel, there are many more underlying ideas revolving around cultural collisions and the fusion of diverse ideas. Drawing a close parallel to the collision revealed by Takagi-Little lies the combination of the cultural phenomena of capitalism, racial demographics, and diversity. This combination, although not directly visible, is expressed throughout this text and conveys a strong underlying message about American culture and its interpretation. The first of these cultural phenomena is centralized around the American capitalistic economy and its unsurppressible schemes for making a profit. Though capitalism benefits many Americans, it continues to negatively affect many more through its destruction of the diverse cultural selection of America itself. An example of this type of cultural exterminations is revealed when Little states "Main street is dead... When I returned home from Japan and visited Quam, I found that all the local businesses from my childhood had been extirpated by Wal Mart." In emphasizing the effects of capitalism Little, referring to Wal Mart, goes on to declare, "If there is one single symbol for the demise of regional American culture, it is this superstore prototype, a huge capitalist boot..." (56) This clearly reveals the negative effect superstores and one-stop shopping stores have on American culture and its diversity.
Another underlying theme of this novel is racial demographics and the representation of Americans as one conformed sample of culture and identity. This idea is revealed through the advertising selectivity of BEEF-EX, an American beef exports company.
When conversing with Sloan, Takagi's musical lover, about My American Wife, BEEF-EX's Japanese advertising production, and its demographic selectivity; Takagi states "BEEF-EX people are very strict. They don't want their meat to have a synergistic association with deformities. Like race. Or poverty. Or clubfeet." (57) These statements clearly display the capitalist idea of "real America" and the way America should be portrayed to potential international consumers. These ideas introduce capitalist America as one giant advertising machine, lacking any trace of compassion, reality, or integrity. These issues also highlight profit as the sole purpose of American Corporations; willing to lie, cheat, and sacrifice any dignity they retained in order to further their "cause" and deepen their bank accounts.
The ideas of capitalism and racist marketing are huge problems individually, but are far more prevalent when combined within a corporate operation. The problem is that these two ideas are ceasing to exist as their own separate entities, and are becoming more and more visible in joint action. This collision is very dangerous to America and its culture because it has numerous negative effects on American citizens and their cultural identities. Through the expansion of corporations such as Wal Mart and their utilization of biased advertising, American cultural diversity is at risk of a rapid decline. Also, the idea of a "typical" American is being strongly misrepresented, creating a divide within America among its citizens and an "American" existence that few Americans are able to truly identify with. It is because of these underlying ideas and the coupling of capitalism with racist advertising that Takagi-Little is able to display the immense danger that American citizens are beginning to experience, with the end consequence being the total extermination of a diverse American culture.

Family Values

In My Year of Meats, Ruth L. Ozeki writes commenting on Yoshihiro Hattori’s shooting, “Guns, race, meat, and Manifest Destiny all collided in a single explosion of violent, dehumanized activity.” Several other “dehumanized” events and themes take place throughout the story such as female fertility, the value of family, sexual relations, and the culture difference between Japanese and American culture.
The theme that caught to me the most is that Japanese value family very strongly. How the women should have children, raise the children, cook for the family, and have a good sexual relationship with their partner. Beginning with the show My American Wife!, the crew tries to convey a perfect family status to the viewers of how Americans live in different places and still have the strong family bond. In the show they used the Flowers family to represent one of the episodes of the show. The family in the show was happy and like a normal happily ever after story. Ironically, after the show Mr. Flowers ended up cheating on his wife and left her. Sadly, everything in the show was fake because after everything was filmed, Mrs. Flowers was a lonely wife. As Jane said, “I felt bad about Suzie Flowers like I’d stolen something from her that could never be replaced.” With that said, Jane feels bad about using her family in the show after the bad situation that happened in the family. Another of family values that they showed was the diversity in the different families they showed. For example, the Martinez family that migrated to the United States who had struggled so much and cost Albert’s hand to achieve every detail of life they have presently. Showing the viewers situations that many families in America face to have a strong relationship as a family is what the Japanese crew tries to convey.

My Year of Cultural Illusions

Illustrating various cultural phenomena in her novel, My Year of Meats, Jane Takagi-Little describes how they collide in the midst of misunderstandings, prejudices and racial barriers. Two of the main cultural phenomena and conflicts that present themselves in the novel are the effects of a genuine mixing of cultures and the duality that occurs on how people in the novel believe that the Japanese view American life.

Being called a hybrid throughout the novel, Takagi-Little comes to understand that this part of her is both a favorable characteristic and one of jealousy. There are various times in the novel when Takagi-Little takes on more of a masculine role when members of her Japanese video production crew shy away. For example, when the crew is at a bar, they are approached by an American man, who just so happens to be Takagi-Little’s long-distance boyfriend posing as a part of production staff. Takagi-Little notes how various members of her crew act when conversing with him. One crew member looked at the floor while talking to him, while others would pretend to be occupied with other things as to not look him in the face. This instance shows the humility and reverence which they offered to Takagi-Little’s American acquaintance. This cultural phenomenon seems out of place and strange. As an American reader, I did not understand why Takagi-Little’s crew was so abashed in his presence, but this instance where a cultural gap was present is not the only one that occurs in the novel.

Another cultural phenomenon that occurs in the novel is the two different ways that the characters in the novel think that the average Japanese person views American life and the typical American household. Throughout the beginning of the novel, Takagi-Liottle explains that the false image of American life that the Japanese receive via the television show My American Wife is too perfect and that they can swallow a more honest depiction of American reality within the home. Takagi-Little proves this when the director has an allergic reaction to food and puts her in charge of the next episode. Exploring a Mexican-American family in Texas and illustrating the reality of their not-so-picture-perfect-yet- realistic-life, the ratings go up.

Touching several cultural phenomena throughout the novel, Takagi-Little explores the concepts of a duality between what the Japanese audience wants to see in an American family and the importance put on the mixing of cultures and hybridity.

Blog #5

The worlds of two women are constantly being paralleled throughout the novel, My Year of Meats. Jane Takagi-Little is a Japanese-American producer for a program designed to bring American Culture to the homes of Japan. Akiko Ueno, a Japanese homemaker and wife, follows the program each week, cooking and acting like the American women that Jane features on “My American Wife!”
As Jane pushes the boundary of what “normal” American wives and families represent, Akiko slowly pushes her boundaries as her role of submissive and obedient wife. These two women continue to grow more and more close, and their similarities continue to surface, each woman finds in the other the aspects that they wish they had themselves. Jane's and Akiko's experiences in both American and Jpanese culture collide with struggles with fertility and the role of sex in their lives.
Jane has had the unfortunate incapability to conceive due to a deformity in her reproductive system. In contrast, Akiko's infertility has been a lifestyle choice because she has struggled with her weight which has affected her ability to menstrate. The more traditional roles of women in Japanese culture has hindered the desire for Akiko to have children with her abusive husband. Jane, growing up in America, has been more radical and has been allowed more opportunities for various lifestyles, but has also been unable to fulfill her desire to have children. The conditions of these women shows how the boundaries of cultures have blurred and the collision of these cultures.
Akiko's struggle with the desire to have sex with her husband and Jane's desire to have a sacred relationship with her lover, Sloan, are another way in which these cultures collide. Traditionally, Japanese women are not supposed to have the desire for sex, but to express love and loyalty for their husbands and also just used to have children and raise large families. Since Jane has the freedom to date and have sex with whoever she wants, it is harder for her to establish that bond and love in a relationship that she wants with Sloan.
As their interactions become more personal and frequent, these women share a bond that they don't even know they have.

Cultural Clash and "I " versus "We"

My Year of Meats addressed several controversial themes, yet the novel was still able to flow smoothly by the colliding of topics. A large theme of the novel dealt with the clash among American and Japanese cultures, in which tradition and notions of authenticity became an issue, as well as the topic of individualtiy as amplified in the phrase of "I "versus "we." However with every sub topic and reoccuring theme in the novel Ozeki was able to emphasize the dominant theme of the novel, by drawing analogies between humans and meat, specifically beef.
Traditional Japanese culture was represented by Akiko Ueno a frail Japanese woman who's purpose was to fulfill the commands of her abusive husband and reproduce a child to signify any selfworth to him. However, Jane Takagi is viewed as non-authentic, being a hybrid of American and Japanese and well over the height of small Japanese women. The irony in the situation of reproduction is found when Mr. Ueno compliments Takagi stating that she is a good example of hybrid vigor, and that she is good and strong from cross breeding. He then states that Japanese women get teh weak genes through many centuries of straight breeding. However, despite his attempt to rape Takagi and compliment hybrid breeding, he denounces his wifes suggestion of adopting Japanese children as he states "I want my own children..not some bastard of a Korean whore and an idot American soldier. I want my genes in my child." This is ironic in the sense that Takagi's father was a GI and her mother a Korean whore.
The issue of male domination leads into the occuring theme of what is specific to the individual and what is shared. The concept of I versus we occurs at several levels in the novel and is paralled between Akiko and Takagi when Akiko realizes that she wanted a child and that she never wanted John, and when Takagi decides to own her pregnancy and forget about Sloan. At this point Akiko has made a decision to individualize herself from "we" and Takagi then is faced with sharing the child with Sloan who keeps emphasizing the words our and we when referring to the fetus.
Within both of these topics there were references to meat and the cattle industry. The term cross breeding was used when refering to race, Mr. Ueno favors it in once sense and then criticizes it. When both girls were experiencing their pregnancies Takagi had dreamt of the dead cow as her child, and Akiko spoke that she knew she could concieve when the animal inside her did not come out.
In terms of the effects of cross breeding and the infilteration of American culture on Japanese tradition, I believe that authenticity of traditional Japanese culture will diminish and become a rarety. The other idea has already proven to be true due to an increase in the number of single mothers, divorse rates and cross breeding around the world.
To tie this into other class sources the stuggle to define ones own space and property may be referenced from several of the sources such as in the Holy Land where all the houses looked the same and the people adopted a similar standards, as well as in the Enacted Environment where fences and front yards either symbolized a welcoming entrance or closed off territory.

Moo, Lies, and Videotape

Cultural phenomena are useful for gauging the hearts and minds of the mainstream American citizens. They highlight not only what was important at that time, but also what events built up to the phenomena. Sometimes, two phenomena are idealistically opposed, and come to head in a very public manner causing radical changes. Two of these phenomena discussed in the book My Year of Meats are corporate values and independent journalism. Companies do not want their secrets exposed and go to great lengths to hide or ‘spin’ them, but journalists feel it is their duty to protect the people by exposing these greedy and harmful companies.

Companies do their best to hide the corporate values they do not want the public to know about. They are afraid of a public backlash against their product, which can bring companies and individuals to ruin. These companies, however, can comfort themselves with the knowledge that they are extremely powerful and often have underhanded government support. They are not afraid of being exposed, because the companies hide their practices so the public will not know about them. The beef industry documented in My Year of Meats had many deplorable practices such as using a chemical called DES to make the cows larger. Larger cows mean increased production, which leads to more profits. DES, however, has many side-effects for the human body such as premature puberty growth. Jane discovered one little girl, five years old, with adult breasts and pubic hair whose body chemistry had been affected by DES. Her family owned cow graze lands that used DES on the cows. Another common form of exposure to DES is doctors who prescribe it to pregnant women. Jane’s defective uterus was the result of her mother receiving DES, and Jane became more prone to pregnancy complications and miscarriages. If Jane and others, whose lives had been affected by DES, had known the dangerous side-effects, they may have avoided it as much as possible.

Companies want to protect their high profits by keeping unpleasant secrets hidden from public view. It is the responsibility of journalists, particularly those not bound to corporate responsibilities, to expose these secrets to the public. Those willing to investigate face hardships and pressures to stop at every turn. Jane was supposed to positively reflect the beef industry in the lives of wholesome American wives in the show she directed, My American Wife. Whenever she tried to deviate from her assigned topic, she received notes and criticisms from her boss. The beef companies wanted her to make propaganda, not documentaries on interesting individuals facing hardships. She featured one family, the Martinez family, who emigrated from Mexico and were therefore non-white. Jane’s boss disapproved of the subject because it deviated from the propaganda they wanted to portray. Another shock to the beef companies came when Jane showed off recipes that featured other meats. Recipes involving pork and chicken were highly discouraged. Jane’s most daring show featured a lesbian, interracial, lesbian couple that completely undermined the original intentions of the show’s sponsors.

In My Year of Meats, during the interview with Gale Dunn, he said something that struck me as rather odd.
"It's a growth hormone. Perfectly legal. You give the heifers Synovex-H, and the steers get Synovex-S."
"What's in it, do you know?"
He looked at me with scorn. "Estradiol, testosterone, and progesterone. All natural."
It's occurred to me since that this oddness I couldn't put my finger on was threefold; the legal, the natural, and [the absence of] the moral.
Though every person in every culture has a different conception of the moral implications of their actions, there are some common cultural institutions that are designed to guide our actions. As he tells Jane about the growth hormone, he tries to reassure the viewers and Jane that these hormones are legal and natural, but in fact he is really attempting to reassure himself that what he is doing is culturally accepted and that he is representing BEEF-EX to the best of his ability. At first I though that the look of scorn was in reference to the "do you know?" but it seems that the real question being asked was "does it matter [to you]?"
The day the bovine is born, it takes on the identity of food, it becomes a pseudo-living thing. By asking does he know what's in the growth hormones, Jane is questioning the standard of living as well as the role the animal is forced to perform. In Gale's mind, however, these moral questions have already been answered by cultural institutions, namely the law system as well as American culture (which deems that "natural" is inherently good). At face value, Jane appears to ask a relatively harmless question simply to extract information, but his look of scorn and the reader's knowledge of Jane's true motive assure us that it's a loaded question.
The interaction between Jane and Gale reminded me of the violent altercation between John and Akiko. It seemed to parallel Gale's relationship with the bovines, albeit in a more overtly violent way. In John and Akiko's case, the rape is an assertion of Akiko's intended role as a child-bearing woman. Though there extreme overtones of dominance (which are also reflected in Gale's case), the majority of the dialogue was regarding her duplicity, which (in John's eyes) was an attempt to undermine the institution of marriage and the foundations of a patriarchal society (which admittedly draw from the overtones of dominance).
Just as in Dale's culturally accepted relationship with the bovines , John is forcing Akiko's role upon her in a way he feels is culturally accepted. Both Jane and Akiko question cultural institutions that are intended to bring about order and the transgression is met with hostility (to say the least). To justify their dominance, and later hostility, both John and Gale dehumanize their subjects. Gale dehumanizes the bovines by viewing them as unprepared meat while John views his wife as a fraudulent, willingly unfertile mate. In each case the exposure of an outside influence has questioned the institutions that justify the farce (dehumanization).

Cultural Collisions

Throughout Ruth L. Ozeki’s “My Year of Meats” there are numerous examples of cultural phenomena that collide and consequently produce physical and cultural results. It is interesting, however, that when the collisions are due to corporate interests or cultural misunderstandings the affects are negative, but when done on a personal level in response to real community, the results are positive.

One of the main cultural themes in this novel is the introduction of American meat to Japanese families using a TV show that is sponsored by BEFF-EX. This is accomplished by emphasizing the positive American values, such as “attractiveness, wholesomeness, and warm personality” (Ozeki, 11), that Japanese families are fascinated with, and correlating this with meat. However, there is a cultural collision because although these values are beneficial, since the Japanese diet traditionally consists mainly of fish and vegetables, there are direct physical consequences. This is seen in Akiko who throws up the beef every night which consequently prevents her from getting pregnant. Thus, while the TV program may have shown authentic American values that enhanced understanding, the corporate interests in the meat industry had detrimental affects on individuals such as Akiko.

Other cultural conflicts can occur when races collide without any cultural understanding. This was this case when Jane and her film crew were in Montana and were accused of being a “band of Mexican terrorists with a rocket launcher”. (Ozeki, 189) This blatantly misguided accusation was based on “Gulf War fever” which caused many Americans to be on edge against seeming foreigners. This conflict had the direct physical result of getting the film crew thrown in jail, and also had more subtle cultural affects on Jane who was already frustrated that people do not recognize her as an American.

The one instance when the cultural collision was positive was when Akiko came to the US fleeing her husband. In this circumstance she was welcomed by Jane and the various American wives who showed her hospitality and gentleness. This is most clearly seen on the “Chick Bone Train”(Ozeki, 339) where the passengers gladly offer hungry Akiko their food. This situation was different than the other cultural collisions in the book because Akiko just wanted to experience an authentic American community and was not pushing an agenda or being prejudiced.

Cultural Differences Through the Eyes of Women

In the novel “In My Year of Meats,” sexual orientation and fertility are themes that collide within both Japanese and American cultures. In American society, sexuality is an open and commonly discussed topic, while in Japan, sexuality is strictly a private matter. The issue of fertility is important in both cultures, but more important in Japanese culture. Two women, Jane Takagi-Little and Akiko Ueno represent each lifestyle in each culture.

Sexual orientation plays a part in the lives of both women, as well as by representing a deeper sense of the entire story. Jane Takagi-Little is half Caucasian and half Japanese; she is too tall for being a Japanese woman. The abnormal height leads Takagi to follow the representation of a man as others have already labeled her as. She speaks men’s Japanese and cuts her hair short to go with the “polysexual” identification. She changes doesn’t question her sexuality but alters her appearance for it. Takagi tapes show about a lesbian couple and their struggles to establish a family. In American culture, the idea of transsexual marriage is common; the broadcast of their interview on American television would not be a shock. In contrast, the broadcast of the same tape in Japan would cause much fury, as it did to the producer of the show, John Ueno. Regardless, the story of the Lesbians touched a woman across the Pacific, John’s wife, Akiko. Upon watching the show, Akiko questions her own sexuality; she wonders whether she really wants a man and even kisses a girl friend in curiosity. Her thoughts are present but private unlike in American culture. Sexual orientation plays a role in an even deeper matter. The shows that Takagi directs aim to sell beef to the Japanese population. After researching, she comes across information as hormones, specifically DES. This drug is administered to animals to “fatten” them up by enlarging breasts on the males. Upon getting these hormones, the animals also go through their own share of sexual change, but without choice.

Fertility is an issue that causes pain to both women. Takagi was born a DES child; her mother took the drug to make pregnancy easier and the baby healthier. The effects of the drug took toll on Takagi such that she cannot easily conceive a child of her own due to complications of the uterus. Takagi tries to get pregnant with her husband but fails; she finally becomes pregnant with a long time on-and-off lover, only to lose the baby to a miscarriage. Her independent struggle represents the American life. As for Akiko, she is very able to get pregnant but purposely changes her diet so that her body will not allow monthly periods. The doctor tells John Ueno of Akiko’s unwillingness; he is furious for all the times they have tried to have a child. Akiko is made to eat healthier; she hides her periods so that John will not know. Akiko unlike Takagi does not want to get pregnant, but John is desperate to have a child. Regardless of Akiko’s choice, John’s desire overpowers, thus representing the man’s stance in the issue of fertility in Japanese culture. Akiko's husband’s authority represent the Japanese ideology of the role of the man being superior.

Cultural Clashings

It has been theorized that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. This holds true for My Year of Meats, where the television show My American Wife! attempts to bridge the cultural gap between America and Japan and encourage the Japanese to consume American meat products. Yet, when the cultures do collide, the results are not always positive and lead to problematic situations for those involved. Similar to The Edge, where it was said “They want the black everything but me and you,” saying white people are only interested in black culture while simultaneously afraid of black people, My Year of Meats represents the part of human nature that only wants to see the prettier comfortable parts of life, symbolic in My American Wife! and when things are not appealing, it is necessary to edit the material to present it in a better light, changing what people view and their ultimate beliefs about American life, although ironically even those involved prefer the ruse.

When making the television show My American Wife! in America for Japanese audiences, Jane Takagi-Little is forced to use an angle with many of her example families to create the image of the wholesome American lifestyle, even if it is not wholly truthful. The fabricated show that stars Suzie Flowers is ironically preferred, because she liked the way in which her family was portrayed, even though it was not truthful. On the other hand, in Japan where Akiko Ueno was watching the shows, she is getting a taste of American life that is so wholly edited that the glimpses she gets of life, appear better then the life that she has, and due to the shows and the bad behavior of her husband, decides to leave him to live in America. The fictitious nature of the show, collides with Japanese culture in a way that leads its viewers on a fabricated path that was supposed to just lead to higher consumption of meat, but ultimately leads to a lifestyle change for both Akiko and Jane who are adversely effected by the show. For Jane, the cultural colliding that she experiences when she enters the world of a meat packing plant changes her perspective about meat, which leads her to decide to sabotage a job that she desperately needs by trying to put the truth about meat on television. The cultural collisions that are created by the television show in the end change the course of every life effected but because the stories are built on fictitious events that are only meant to show the happy parts of daily life, we continue to focus only on the good while ignoring the negative aspects of the world around us.

The Phenomena of Sexuality

In My Year of Meats by Ruth Ozeki, there are several cultural phenomena that collide, from the collisions of race to the collisions of sex. The collision I found most interesting was Akiko's collision with her husband and her sexuality. After watching the episode of My American Wife! from Northampton, Massachusetts where lesbians Dyann, Lara, and their two daughters introduced their Pasta Primavera, Akiko begins to question her sexuality.
Several experiences lead to the questioning of Akiko's sexuality. Akiko's husband Joichi "John" Ueno, beats her when he has been drinking and controls her life to an extreme level. He makes her watch the show My American Wife!, cook the meat that was featured on the show, and then eat the meat in hopes of putting some weight on her so they can have children. The show featuring the Dyann and Lara the lesbians, sort of opens Akiko's eyes and helps her to realize that she does not want John has her husband anymore, she only wants to have a child. When she finds out that she is pregnant, her wishes are fufilled and she leaves everything she had in Japan and heads for America.
The cultural phenomena that are "colliding" here is Akiko, her husband, and her sexuality. She is heavily influenced by the episode in Northampton, Massachusetts and she decides that she can live her life without a man, or the man that she has. A combination of the influence from the episode and her husband's abuse propels her to want to start a new life in America with her child.

Sexual Relations

Contemporary American society is on the verge of a cultural crossroads when it comes to sex. American society condemns the concept of casual sex that lacks commitment and emotional attachment, yet there are many Americans who embrace the concept of sexual freedom and expression.

Therefore, in My Year of Meats when Jane Takagi and Sloan have a relationship based on around the country hook-ups, they are able to have sex without being in a relationship. Yet, as soon as “fucked without a condom” and conceived a child they became more attached to each other and had to accept that they were emotionally dependent on each other. This demonstrates a collision between comfortable relationships and sexual passion.

My argument is that relationships include both, sexual passion and comfort and commitment and that the two components are intertwined. Sex is often depicted as a very impersonal action, however, in reality; it is difficult to have a sexual relationship without a feeling of attachment and investing emotions into your partner. For Takagi, the point at when she accepted her emotional investment in Sloan was when she consented to unprotected sex with him and thus placing a large amount of trust in him. After that she expected more of him, whereas before she was not in a relationship with him and therefore did not expect anything of him.

When it is said that “sex changes things” they are talking about this collision between a relationship based upon security and comfort and a relationship that is based upon sexual desire and lust. The fact that you can trust your partner enough to be in a sexual relationship with them also allows you to trust that they will be there for you thus giving you comfort and security.

The Real America

In My Year of Meats, Ruth L. Ozeki writes, commenting on Yoshihiro Hattori’s shooting, “Guns, race, meat, and Manifest Destiny all collided in a single explosion of violent, dehumanized activity.” Several other “dehumanized” events and themes take place throughout the story, such as Akiko’s abuse and subsequent rape, the Dunn family’s chemical-induced deformities (as well as Jane’s uterus), and the show producers’ betrayal of Suzie Flowers. The theme that I found most interesting, however, was the realism that My American Wife! intended to portray, yet failed at completely.

In a description of the show, which was faxed to Jane, four things are listed as undesirable attributes of those to be filmed: physical imperfections, obesity, squalor and second-class people. BEEF-EX hoped to send a message to Japanese housewives that normal Americans are attractive, healthy, happy and wealthy — and through eating their meat they would be as well — yet it turns out to be that many are just the opposite. Toward the end, for example, we learn that Rosie and Gale Dunn have suffered physical deformities as a result of their family’s involvement in the beef industry. Many Americans in the story turn out to be squalid, indeed.

Interestingly enough, the only “wholesome” families turned out not to be so normal after all: Lara and Dyann are a vegetarian lesbian couple with two normal, happy daughters, and the Beaudroux family comprises of Caucasian parents and their two offspring, as well as their ten adopted Korean children.

The explosion Ozeki writes about is that of squalor. To her, it is a spiraling chaotic mess of lies, blood, rape and fear. Not only are droves of American families being infused with fetus-deforming, artery-stiffening, immunity-weakening meat, but the Japanese are being fooled into believing that eating meat just as the Americans do will give the opposite effect of potentially ruining their lives.

Clashes of Food and Culture

American communities have openness and their people feel free to express themselves emotionally. The Japanese culture is more formal and rigid; there is sameness and an expectation of how one should act. Akiko and John have been married for three years and John is embarrassed that she is not pregnant. When Akiko fell into the china cabinet, she stayed in her home until the injuries healed. Her husband did all of the grocery shopping and other errands. There was a shame to her injuries that had to be kept private. This is in stark contrast to what occurred in the Bukowsky family. When Christina Bukowsky suffered a serious injury, her family relied on their small town neighbors to help the healing process. Each visitor shared what was most important in his life with the comatose girl. The entire community participated in the healing. The United States is culturally diverse and there is no “correct” way to participate in family and community. Helen Dawes’ church with its outpouring of emotion is typical in many African American communities. John rejected using Miss Helen’s family in “My American Wife” in part because of their overt expression of emotion.
Food is another main category for “cultural collision” in Jane Takagi-Little’s description in “My Year of Meats”. An example of such a cultural confrontation occurs in the kitchen garden of the Beaudroux family. Suzuki, the Japanese cameraman, was awestruck when he saw Vern rip and destroy a kudzu vine as if it were a weed. He proceeded to show Vern how to turn the tubers into starch, and also how to make a salad from the plant. Suzuki even created a medicine to treat hangovers from the kudzu vine. This incident lead to a stronger focus on the kudzu vine in “My American Wife”.
There is a plant similar to the kudzu vine from my own experience in that it has separate meanings to different cultures. Americans use grape vines solely for harvesting the grapes. But my mom and her family use the leaves for a Lebanese dish called misha, and often completely ignore the grapes.

Cultural Collisions in My Year of Meats

Within the novel My Year of Meats, there happen to be a couple of cultural phenomena that are "colliding". An example I chose from the novel is cultural beliefs "colliding" with relationships. I believe that because of certain cultural beliefs, those belief can come between two people's relationship. Their relationship can end happily or just have a horrible/sad ending to it. In chapter two of the novel, Akiko have discovered that her periods have stopped coming. "Akiko's doctor had told her that her ovaries were starved and weren't producing any eggs" (20). Therefore leaving Akiko not able to become pregnant. This also lead "John", Joichi, to be very upset. In most cultures, I believe, find that married couples not being able to have children early on to be quite unusual. Personally, I find that usually when a couple gets married, they tend to have children right away. Probably no more into 2 years or less of their marriage that couples would have had a few kids already. Taking my family for instance, my mom had two kids right away before her 2 year anniversary of marriage. Also in my family, the grandmothers often urge their son/daughter to have kids as soon as possible. Maybe cause the grandmothers only want to be able hold their grandkids before it is too late. Or maybe they urge couples to have children soon because as women grow older it is much harder for them to have kids later on in life. Whatever the cause may be, most couples I know tend to have kids quite early right after their marriages. But with the belief of having kids soon right after marriage might cause some interuptions in their marriages. In the novel, in Akiko's case, because her periods have stopped coming, "John" tells her that "she must put some meat on her bones" (20). Therefore Akiko revolves her daily routine in learning about meat, cooking meat, eating meat and watching "My American Wife!". Akiko changes her way to satisfy what the husband wants. And within my family, my cousin had her first born right after her marriage. Due to complications and problems brewing in her relationship with her husband, they ended up getting a divorce. Some of my family members blamed it on how they got married to early in life but most of them blamed it on how they just wasn't ready to have children yet. Though there are cutural beliefs for couples to have children early in their marriages, it also really depends on if the couple are ready or not to even have children. Sometimes, such beliefs can really ruin a couple's relationship.

Blog #4- front yard, upholding an image

In Rojas's, The Enacted Environment, Anglo American suburbs have been described as a space dedicated to showing good citizenship and responsibility in community membership. This relationship highly contrasts with the Mexican usage of space in East Los Angeles where "personal and family identity is enclosed in the front yard..the yard is an area they can publicly personalize without interfering with thier neighbors."
Based on his references, I also believe that front yards are truly an expression of the values of the family living there. I feel that people more concerned with their image or their economic status tend to have a very empty, neat, and almost meticulous front yard. The front yard is the first thing that people see, just like your first name as Jane Takagi references in My Year of Meats, "just a name, name comes first." Maintaining an immaculate front yard is time consuming and difficult, it is like anything such as upholding your own image. I know I have found myself plenty of times resorting to pajamas and excessive caffinated beverages during my college years. Every latest product advertised by the media is a shortcut to look better, whether it is buying diet pills to lose weight or resorting to plastic surgery to deter the aging process. This is why America has the highest obesity and diabetes rates, because we don't like to spend time taking care of ourselves and thus we resort to spending our cash to buy time.
In his piece Rojas speaks about fences and their different uses. From what I can recall, it seems that the most wealthy houses are surrounded by fences, enclosing their front yards and essentially defining a territiory. To me, this is a way of cheating as well. It is like throwing all of your clothes into your closest instead of cleaning your room when you have guests coming over. Rojas, states "fences define boundaries between public and private space..boundaries not only mark separate ownership, they can also bring people together." The unseen or forbidden inspires curiosity, an example of such curiosity may be analyzed in the movie Charlie and the Chocolate Factory where a huge gate separated the town from the factory. Everyone ate the Chocolate but did not know who lived or ran the factory at that time. A large crowd was gathered at the gate to see the children with the golden tickets enter the factory.
Other class examples relating to the concept of designated space were presented by the field trip to Village Homes as well as in the film the Village. Village Homes was not necessarily surrounded by a physical gate, however, te defined space was evident from the unique living community and architecture of the specific location. In the film the Village, the Puritan like group isolated themselves from urbanization and moved to a location in which a strip of forest served as a divider from the city.

bagel goodness..

Smell. One of my top five favorite senses. In my imaginative map, I chose to map the smells found at one of my jobs, Noah’s Bagels (possibly one of the BEST places to eat in Davis, no lie). I chose to map smells because every time I leave work, the first thing that I want to do is to wash off the various smells that I have on me due to work, like the smell of bagels, garbage and cleaning supplies. Another reason I chose smell to map Noah’s is because smell aids the sense of taste, so smells makes sense to map a restaurant.

Smells can tell you a lot about a restaurant: how it’s managed, what happens where, what is served, the reasons for the placement of certain things, and the values and beliefs of the restaurants without the need for sight. For example, if Ivy Walker, from the Village came into Noah’s, she would be able to figure out a lot just from her sense of smell, due to the fact that she cannot see. At Noah’s, the smells can help determine how the dynamics of employee placement is. For example, at the registers, you have the smell of perfume, because the cashier tends to be female, because they tend to flash a great smile, in hopes of receiving a larger tip (NOTE: TIP AT NOAH’S. MOST OF US ARE POOR COLLEGE STUDENTS J).At the bar/food prep area, it smells like sweat (and food too), because we are tying to get your food out as fast as possible so you can enjoy your bagel goodness, but we cannot control the AC unit in our store (because corporate sucks) and we have the bagel proofer, steamer and oven going at all times and it gets really hot in there during the summer, THUS sweat. Since it is a bagel shop, no matter where you are at, there is the smell of bagels everywhere. The only thing that really overpowers the bagel smell would be the coffees that we serve, and the smell of coffees that travels over from Peet’s Coffee. As you can tell from the map, the smell of coffee is very limited due to the fact that Peet’s Coffee is next door, so coffee is not something that we make a lot of sales on. The smell of toast, also lets you know what is served in what fashion. For example, the smell of toast at the toaster tells the customer that you have the option of having your bagel or bread toasted. The smell of toast from the paninni press tells the customer that we offer grilled sandwiches. The smell of garbage near the entrance is from the garbage cans and it is placed there so as customers leave, they can throw away their trash, which makes it easy and efficient for the restaurant. The smell of cleaning supplies show that the restaurant cares about the cleanliness of the restaurant. Since smells do aid the sense of taste, the concentration of the cleaning supplies away from the areas where customers eat, helps customers enjoy their food more. As you can see, smell can tell you more about a restaurant than you think, especially about the management and employee placement, the reasons of placement of things, and its values and beliefs.

Link to a larger version of the map.

The Neighborhood Pets

Red-Houses
Dark Green-Backyards
Blue-4 Dogs or Cats
Light Green-3 Dogs or Cats
Purple-2 Dogs or Cats
Yellow-1 Dog or Cat
Orange-No Dogs or Cats
Black-Road

My neighborhood is very centered on pets. In the evenings there are a large number of people that come and hang out in their front yards and tie their dogs to the trees and all the kids play in their respective yards. Like in “The Enacted Environment” the front yard was a place to interact with the rest of the neighborhood so is the front yard in my neighborhood, only on a much smaller scale. The front yard serves as a portal to the rest of the neighbors but only during certain hours of the day and each family only really interacts with their neighbors instead of the whole neighborhood. It is a whole circle of older duplexes so two families share a lawn. Most of the neighborhood is full of young new families that are renting, but there are a few families on the street that own both sides of their duplex and turned it into one single family home. There are also a few of the duplexes that each side is owned instead of rented.

It seems that the owners tend to be the houses with more pets. The rent around the block can vary from $1350 a month to $800 depending on the condition of the house, the number of bathrooms and the size of the garage. The general pattern that can be seen is the larger the rent the more pets. This could be because of the income of the occupants. It may also be because the larger homes tend to have the families with children. The corner houses have the largest yards and they were the homes with the most pets.

Dying yards

Like Davis, Guam is a very small and laid back place where everybody knows each other. I have seen many cases where two people meet for the first time and find out that they are third or fourth cousins. On an island like Guam, there is no natural resource, therefore, must rely on other means such as tourism. Within the last century, Guam expanded very quickly only in certain areas that were successful in their business. These places included mostly of the coastal areas in the middle section of the island. The rapid expansion brought many big name hotels such as Hilton and Hyatt along that one section of the island. The streets doubled their sizes in width and consumed the bike lanes that were originally adjacent to them. Some telephone poles stand right in the middle of the sidewalks that were pushed back as a result of these widened streets. The lack of proper sidewalks and bike lanes discourages people to walk outside. Therefore, pedestrians are very rare for convenience and safety issues in any parts of Guam (except the tourists near the hotels).

Front porch activities are not too common but barbeques and parties can sometimes be seen held in people’s yards. I am sure that the unbearably humid tropical weather plays a large roll here. Because many communities are built with their backs surrounded by greens growing wildly out of control, stray dogs and even wild chickens can be sometimes seen wandering into the residential area. Some residents sympathize them and usually feed them in their own yards. Because of this, pet feeds and remaining can be seen lying around in yards.

Communities located near the air force base and the navy base have a “rotation” of people going in and out similar to the community from “The Edge.” The people sent to live in these communities only stay for two to three years, also discouraging them to individualize their yards in any way. For this reason, these communities are very plain and simple looking. Their houses have a common patch of lawn with a garage sticking out of a mass produced house. In some ways these communities are similar to the “Holy Land” by Waldie where all the streets are parallel and all the houses look the same.

With the lack of pedestrians in Guam, there are not too many people out on their front porches or yards. Some military housings are similar to that of “Holy Land,” but people still occasionally use their front yards as can be seen by barbeque grills and bowls of pet food lying in their yards.

The Quad

Legend

Left Map - How the Quad is normally
Right Map - How the Quad is during lunch

I chose to analyze the Quad because during lunch there would be a lot of people and this just shows where most of those people are. During lunchtime, you not only see people eating lunch but a lot of socializing. At the Coffee House is usually where all the Greek Life folks are at. The inside of the coffee house is usually where all the academic and professors eat lunch at. At Freeborn Hall, there isn't much people because it usually isn't open. At the MU however has more people because of the bus stops and the foot courts inside. Also, the Quads are filled with people on the grass areas just reading, eating lunch or just enjoying the sun light.

Not all lawns are created equal

Ever since I began the process of moving two days ago, I have been studying the differences and similarities in the front lawns of my old apartment, new apartment, and the rest of Davis. The front lawns on and near my new home on Hanover Street are all comparable. I consider the small rectangles of grass on the outside of apartments as the “front yard”. And the middle area, hidden from view, with grass and porches, is an apartment complex’s “backyard”. The trimmed shrubbery and bushes right up near the houses appear as though they all came out of the same cookie cutter. Like my previous apartment, the lawns are manicured so that they are all edged at the driveway and sidewalk; all blades of grass are seemingly of the same height. The well kept and almost fake front lawns discourage any sort of activities other than cleaning it. Conversations and social situations occur at the apartment parking lot or inside the complex, and not on the lawns. The only uses that the lawns seem to serve are for viewing pleasure of people passing by and to make the complex more appealing to potential renters. They may also satisfy the owner’s ego. From three days of observing Hanover apartments, most of the social interactions that I have seen on the front lawns have consisted of joggers passing who may say “hi”.
All of this is in complete contrast to James Rojas’ lifestyle in East Los Angeles. East L.A. lawns extend the houses and are meant to be used publicly. Rojas writes “Here, the residents put their faces on the street; the yard is an area they can publicly personalize without interfering with their neighbors. Enclosed front yards function as a work space, party area, or just a place to spend time.”
Of course, front yards of Davis apartment dwellers are not fair comparisons to East Los Angeles family homes. A better comparison would be Davis family homes. Yet even in this comparison the East Los Angeles front yards are more social than those in Davis. In some Davis family homes the house itself takes up most of the lot and the front is mostly driveway and garage. Very little spontaneous interaction is seen in these cases. People rarely just drop by to gossip or make friendly front yard visits in the Davis community.
I grew up in Davis so I understand that most inter-family interaction occurs between families in association through school events or soccer or Little League games.
They are more formal and include a more specific agenda as to subject of conversation than is the case for informal drop in visits.
There are those cases in older neighbor hoods of Davis where a couple make be going out for their regular after dinner evening walk and will stop and chat with a neighbor, sometimes for quite a long while. In these situations the subject of discussion could be children or vacation stories or even gossip about the other neighbors. Another popular topic may be, “What are you going to do with that tree? It’s tearing shingles off my house when a strong wind comes up. When are you going to trim it?” This sort of conversation came up frequently for my father. Not all conversations in the front yard are positive neighborly chats.
Another thing I noticed in my own neighborhood is that the front yards definitely extend in to the street right in front of each house. People seem to claim the public street that is in front of their own house, either for parking there huge RV or boat, or for parking second or third cars. They all seem to resent it (and say as much) when others park in front of their hose. Sometimes neighbors steal the shade of a big tree in front of someone else’s house, usually because they don’t have their own shade tree and do not like getting into a car after a 100 degree day.
Front yards in Davis are social at times but not in the much enriched way we see East Los Angeles. People do not live on their lawns as we see in east LA.

As I enter my uncle's house, located in the evergreen area of San Jose, I hear children laughing in the back yard. My five year old cousin Amir, ever the social butterfly, has invited some friends from school to come visit. As one of the children swings on a swing, I hear "I can see my house!" Now all the children are swinging higher and higher, each trying to get a glimpse of their home over the fence and almond tree. As I watch the children play, I realize that this is an aspect of childhood I have never known. This is a world of formal invitations from your five year old classmate, a world where being higher on a hill gives you privacy rather than a view. San Jose in particular adds another oddity to this strange suburban world; the turnover rate in Amir's neighborhood is ~2 years. That means that in all likelihood, most of Amir's neighbors will have moved by the time he celebrates his 7th birthday. Because of the exaggerated cost of living in San Jose as well as relatively poor job security, some neighborhoods (such as Amir's) are in a perpetual "getting to know each other" phase.
Seven months ago the Lee family moved in down the street and today there is a moving van in front of their house. I take Amir to say goodbye to their daughter cookie, at least that's what he calls her, we never did find out her real name. He doesn't understand that cookie won't come to see him after school anymore. They will be replaced with strangers, which he will probably get to know before either they move or he moves away.
There are no children playing in the streets, people greeting you from their front lawns, nothing except the occasional and necessarily polite "how's it going?" They never wait for the answer, they simply say it as a way to acknowledge your presence. This is a dead community because it lacks the inherent trust of familiarity. Formal invitations are extended when there is a lack in familiarity. Children are cloistered in the back yard when the safety of the street (which ends just four houses down and would serve as a prime "playground") is questioned, though not because of any potential traffic.
This community was dead before it had a chance. With every move, with every lost friend or neighbor, it seems as though the neighborhood has become that much more hardhearted. Though this prevents a local community, another seems to have formed through schools, jobs, etc. Amir might not be able to walk into his neighbor's door without knocking, but he'll probably have spent time with each classmate. In this case, proximity in the classroom is more influential to harboring community ties rather than proximity in the neighborhood.

LA Front Yard

As a child, I spent the majority of school holidays and summer vacations at my grandmother's house in South Central, Los Angeles. My cousins and I used to spend the majority of our time in the front yard playing jump rope and riding our "big wheels", with supervision. It was always a treat to be able to go in the front yard because my cousins and I always knew that we would see some of our other friends from the block outside ready to play with us. The back yard was never an option because the house trash and old junk took up the majority of the space. For my family, the front yard was a communal space where we spent time playing cards, learning how to ride our new bikes, and enjoying each other's conversation. When describing East Los Angeles homes, Rojas observes that those neighborhood residents also used their front yards as common areas, meeting places, and entertainment havens. The openness of the front yard, its manicured appearance , and size allow it to serve as a hosting area and an area of commonality for family and residents.
My grandmother's LA front yard was a multi-purpose area. I can remember many days when my uncle would come over with the barbeque pit in the back of his pickup truck to cook for the family and neighbors in the front yard. Often times, my uncles would pull their cars into the front lawn and wash them. This was most fun during the summertime when the weather would be in the 90s. We would squirt eachother with much needed water to cool down. The front yard was also the place where we taught my grandmother's dog new tricks. Although the spce was not big, it have him plenty of space to roll around, fetch frisbees and such in short distances, and occasionally use the restroom.
My grandmother always took pride in the appearance of her front yard. The grass never went uncut for more than 2 weeks, it stayed watered, and it stayed green....no yellow patches. She treated it as though it was her little garden, offering much care and attention to its healthly growth. If she was being critiqued by Frank, he would be pleased with her care and attention to her front yard. In his work "What's the matter with Kansas?", he criticized the Mission Hills community because of their lack of interest in the maintenance of their front yard, citing that it shows a disinterest in community interaction and laziness on the part of the residents. My family is the total opposite. We take pride in our front yard because it is the center of our outdoor activities and entertainment.

Front Yards

At this current state and time, my front yard is an uncanny representation of Mr. H’s disorderly mayhem. It’s time to move out for my housemates and I and there are bags on top of boxes on top of furniture all on our front yard to make the moving process more efficient. There are trucks and moving vans all lined up and perched viciously in front of my house to get the closest spot to the house. However, before this time of havoc, my front yard was a suiting representation for the demeanor of our house because we have gardening service paid by the management of our complex. It was important to maintain a presentable appearance of our complex since it needs to be attractive to prospective renters.

However, before my housemates and I moved out of this house, our front yard had shrubs and flower beds circumscribing our house in addition to a large, shady tree in the middle of our lawn beside an accessible walkway leading to our front door. Our front yard was replicable to the other front yards in my neighborhood; a monotonous sight of similarity. The signs that college students lived in this neighborhood was empty beer bottles in boxes by their trashcans in their front yards week after week to be thrown out. Other additions to their front yards were random pieces of trash, lawn chairs, barbeque grills, aged newspapers, and a bike parked right in front of their house. A bike parked in the front yard usually was an indicator that the individual was environmentally friendly or just wanted to exercise because there was a bus stop just a couple feet away from our complex.

The front yards in my neighborhood were seemingly average for college students but I then realized that no one ever had garages or the typical welcome signs or shingles, as those were common adornments in my neighborhood back home. These adornments that would normally create a warm atmosphere was not as nearly was welcoming as the front yards of the Latino Americans in East Los Angeles. They, however, were able to create a welcoming feel to their house even with gates surrounding the premise.

I next surveyed the residential areas in Davis. I did see shingles, “Welcome” mats and signs displayed, and gates. Their front yards were similar to my house: bushes, lawns, and flower beds in slightly different arrangements and sizes. Since these residential areas do not have do not have gardeners, you can oftentimes characterize the people and living conditions within the house based on their front yards. If their front yards are untamed and outgrown, that could indicate that they are busy or have been out town for quite some time. If they have nicely kept lawns that could indicate that they are tidy and organized people. Other front yards had garages with vans or motorcycles in them. Depending on the type of vehicle they drive, you can somewhat gauge their lifestyle. A van could indicate that there is a family residing in that house and a motorcycle could mean that the person enjoys living a fast-paced, spontaneous life. Another example of different front yards was when I was in the Village Homes and saw several front yards displaying their hobbies, like a kayak and materials for art projects. I even came across front yards that didn’t even have yards, but a slab of concrete and no foliage which was typical for houses that were closely built together. I also observed that there weren’t many houses with fountains or patios, which would be a regular sight back in my neighborhood at home. Depending on the area, front yards can display a lot of variance from neighborhood to neighborhood.

The Smells in My Apartment

Map color key:

solid black: walls
sky blue diagonal stripes: doors
sky blue and maroon diagonal stripes: windows
white boxes: furniture/closets
orange dots: front room
green open circles: hallways
red check marks: bathroom
dark blue slashes: kitchen
yellow "s"s: bedrooms

I chose the smells in my apartment as the subject of my imaginary map because it is one of the more difficult of the five senses to grasp, yet often the most overwhelming. An example of this lies in Farewell to Manzanar when Wakatsuki Houston's family ate their first meal at Manzanar and received their first impressions of their new home. Smelling the opposing smells of fruit served over steamed rice, she and her family understood that they were in a foreign place where no one understood their culture, their values or their feelings. Having just moved into this apartment, I am not yet used to its foreign and opposing smells. The smells in my house are vibrant and almost "colorful", which is why I chose to make the rooms stand out more with the color-coding on the map. I believe that the smells that I experience in each room are as important as the room itself and what is symbolizes for the people experiencing it, just like what the uneasiness and foreigness of Manzanar's mess hall signified for Wakatsuki and her family. Ultimately, the smell of one's environment is most important because it can tell a number of things to the "smeller."

1. Who or what has been there.
2. What values the inhabitants of that space have.
3. The habits of the inhabitants.
4. The first impression of a space, whether positive or negative, will be held when experiencing the rest of the space.

With this list of things a "smeller" can detect, it is obvious that an inhabitant of a space cannot hide everything. For even if the scent is of poutpurri or air freshener, the "smeller" can assume that there is a more offensive odor to be covered. Thus, I chose the smell of my apartment as the subject of my imaginary map because smell is the strongest, most persuasive, and most informative sense of the five senses.

Front Yard War Grounds

Blog Prompt #2: Front Yards

Ten miles from my Hercules suburb, lay the infamous Richmond, California. Once bustling with people working in shipyards during World War II, it is now in decay after postwar abandonment. When visiting friends in the nearby city, I see streets lined with Dollar Trees and Food Maxxes, buildings that are old and decrepit, and scarcity of nature.

As I pull into my friend’s neighborhood, the first thing I see is the metal fence bordering the front yard, backyard, and the entirety of house. His house was the only two-storied house on the block. Iron rods cover the windows so that robbers cannot break in. Furthermore, sometimes a pit bull sits in the front of the homes. These front yard accessories are evidence of the high crime rates of the city.

Living in the suburbs is the opposite of a city like Richmond. Children ride their bikes and play hopscotch in the front yards of my neighborhood but this is not the case in Richmond. Unlike the neighborhood I live in, children do not play in the street or in front of their houses. They are confined to the backyards of their homes because parents are afraid of kidnappers, rapists, and random drive-by shootings. Once, I went to the front yard to talk on the phone with my mother so I could have some privacy. I assumed I was relatively safe because I was still within the metal fencing. When I was found, my friends hurriedly escorted me back into the house. Later that week, there was a shooting and a bullet shattered a window in the front of the house. Even the iron rods could not protect the windows from danger.

Furthermore, a neighbor’s drive way and the grassy area of the front yard was covered with cars. Some homes housed multiple families. These families do not have enough money to own their own homes so they share with other families.

Two houses down, was an abandoned house where my friend’s little sister liked to go and pick flowers. This abandoned house was like her playground when she was sick of her own backyard. The houses’ windows were boarded but a few windows were still broken by trespassers. Her playground did not have the same safety of real playgrounds in community parks. Recently, her dangerous euphoria had a bittersweet ending. The abandoned home was remodeled and sold to a new owner.

Richmond parallels the history of Detroit. Both were bustling, industrial cities supporting the war effort during World War I and World War II. Detroit was a large automotive industry while Richmond was known for their shipyards. Both cities were abandoned after the wars ended and are now in economic decay. Similar to the Hudson Shopping Center, described in “Disappeared Detroit” by Jeff Byles, Hilltop Mall has begun to crumble. The building was built in the 1970s as a top-of-the-line shopping center but recently all the big-labeled stores have moved out and young teenagers loitering around after school have moved in. Richmond has begun to decay but has not reached Detroit’s level. The city is trying to restore their economic center so that it will not be abandoned like the homes of Detroit and Hudson’s Shopping Center. They struggle to bring back the memories of the lively Richmond before the war. Wars build communities quickly and then destroy them slowly and agonizingly. The front yards of communities become places of violence and fear. They become war grounds themselves.

Front yards

Davis homes lack unity among neighbors and community. For example, in the article “The Enacted Environment” written by James Rojas, he lets the reader know of how people in East Los Angeles live and make use of their front yards. Older adults in East L.A. like to socialize during the evening in their front porch to talk to the neighbors and people in their surroundings. While children and teenagers play on the side walks or on the yards with toys. The people from East Los Angeles spend their most time when home in their yards because it always has people doing something from listening to music from a parked car to neighbors talking about how their day went or just gossip.


Davis California is full of suburb homes where the majority of people isolate themselves from the rest of their neighbors and community. There are no daily activities where people socialize among neighbors. The houses in Davis are mostly nice large homes with a front yard and great scenery. Most of the houses do not have fences or porches in the front yard. To me, it seems that most people in Davis only have a front yard for luxury to make their house look very elegant. Others in Davis do make use of the front yard as an area to take care of plants or crops they might have for personal pleasure. The situation of how homes are in Davis reminds me oh the homes in Kansas from the article “What’s the matter with Kansas? How conservatives Won the Heart of America” written by Thomas Frank. In his article, Thomas Frank describes houses in Mission Hills as homes where people live in but do not even pay attention to take care of their own homes as he says, “Nobody mows their own lawn in Mission Hills anymore.” This gives people an understanding the gardeners do all the work for the people. In Davis many of the cases are very similar where people do not care for their front yard so they hire people to do the work.
In general, I believe that if people put input to care for their homes and become more sociable with their neighbors the community would feel much more alive.