Night Bus Travel
It was about nine thirty at night when I walked out of my studio. I have been hesitated to leave late for the whole day because I needed to wait for night bus to go home. The studio is in a quite industrial area. Buses there come and go like ghosts.
I saw a man standing by the street near the bus stop before I crossed from the opposite street. Even though I didn’t want to wait at the dark corner of the bus stop and preferred wait by the street, but in order not to encounter the man I started walking to the darker side. Obviously I wasn’t using my brain when I did that. When I walked pass the man, he looked back and suddenly say “it’s safer to wait here by the street”. His Mexican accent and humble attitude made me realized that he was just like me, trying to get home at night.
I smiled and stood next to him. “My grandson is Chinese and my granddaughter is also Chinese.” He said. I shocked. It felt like all the sudden I was able to relate everything with this old man. He was from Mexico and both of his sons married with Chinese women. What a strange feeling that when the world is so interrelated, and our human race is so hybrid. A little bit of you is actually contained in everything, or a little bit of everything is contained inside you.
Last generations of Chinese and Mexican immigrants exported themselves to US as labors. What’s going to happen when children of these immigrants start to have inter-racial marriage? How is this generation going to affect their parent’s immigrated country and their parent’s born countries? Sitting on the bus, all these questions excited my brain again…
I used to work with a Hispanic woman who is married to a Filipino and they have two children. Since I’m a Filipino, I could tell that she was glad to tell me that, by the smile on her face. She told me that she’d been to the Philippine many times and she loves pilipino food. Same thing with her husband they lived in Mexico City for a year. I think it’s a great way to learn other cultures, but then the original culture becomes blurry generation after generation. I don’t know if that’s good.
Comment by Marcius Noceda — September 7, 2006 @ 11:16 pm