by Diane Farr
I know in my own family’s cultures, northern Italians call southerners la gente de mura, which translates to “dirt people,” because they are darker in skin tone. In Ireland, the origins of the expression “black Irish” are debatable, but the subtext where I grew up was always the same: implying that dark-haired Irish people are genetically mixed with Africans. David joins in to say his family’s experience with shade is the same within the Middle Eastern culture. David is light-skinned but his father is darker. And his father diligently avoids the sun. For all his incredible achievements, Suzanne found it shocking to watch such an honored man jump between food stalls, desperate to stay out of the sun, in a city where he is the director of an entire hospital.
So, shade—within its own race, and to an outside race for sure—seems to conjure up a judgment about value. So much so that lightness or darkness seems inexplicably tied to the perception of worth. I think I was supposed to use the word class just then, but it’s not just class or money or caste that shade inappropriately categorizes people into. It actually implies more or less value. And it happens all around the world—in our Latino, Middle Eastern, and European cultures represented here tonight in my apartment but also in the Southeast Asian, Persian, Arab, and African cultures we’ve all personally encountered. So why is darkness deemed “less than”? And if it’s from something ancient, when major religions were first established or slavery was openly practiced, why does it still permeate today’s culture?
As mind-boggling as this is, I should get back to the only two people I’ve met who don’t have a race, culture, homeland, religion, or familial language in common—but no issues because their shades are equally matched.
“None of our parents had a problem with the other’s race,” David is saying. His family flew from North Africa to Chicago just to meet Suzanne. They immediately liked her “better than they like me,” says David. Suzanne learned to cook Palestinian dishes so well that David’s grandmother often says, “It’s like she is Palestinian!”
THIS IS THE FAMILY relationship every mixed-race couple I’ve ever met wishes they started off with. My heart usually breaks at this point of getting to know other multiracial love stories, as I bear witness to the years people have wasted trying to persuade their family to just look at the person they have fallen in love with, rather than fear the person they are imagining. Could it really just come down to color?
I must be oversimplifying. This couple also had the Big Three going for them outside of their lightness/darkness skin match. Both sets of these parents dated (and in this case married) someone outside their own culture, and both sets of parents are highly educated and also well traveled. Any two of these ingredients would make the acceptance of another race, religion, or culture possible, but all three make perfection. In my experience with Seung’s family, shade has nothing to do with our union. I believe what Seung’s parents are really fighting for is culture, even though they call it race. I wonder if it feels less offensive to consider the mixed-couple “issue” a shade and culture problem—rather than putting it all under the combustible heading of race.
David’s father took this whole discussion to the next level in a private conversation he had with his son. He told David he wasn’t bothered by what race or religion his children married. He asked only that they choose a partner whose parents approve of their union. “My father feels that life always has something tugging on you that can pull your marriage down—money, stress, kids, work, something. With the addition of one parent who doesn’t approve, your marriage will never survive.”
WITH ALL FOUR PARENTS on board, Suzanne and David got engaged nine months into their courtship and set a date. They then very quickly surmised how to do everything they wanted—while making minor edits to the perception of things that might cause alarm or insult to an elder relative’s feelings.
For instance: Their wedding was held in a church (even though Suzanne and her family do not practice Catholicism and David really wasn’t even clear on who Jesus is compared with God) because that was the setting Suzanne had always pictured. So she found a Presbyterian order that would allow them a church service without any classes, converting, or proselytizing. As a couple they then printed two sets of invitations—one with the location of the church and one without for David’s relatives in Palestine who might have taken this to mean David was disavowing his faith.
Maybe this seems hypocritical, but I find it thoughtful. It reminds me of my initial thoughts about Seung and me, before the war games began. I did not find it a burden to adjust my behavior to respect whatever Seung’s relatives needed to see—because I didn’t see it coming up all that much. Now that I’m listening to Suzanne talk, I’m thrilled to see it’s true. Having also completed one tour of duty on the front lines of “biracial family feud,” I also understand that I am allowed to holler back when my territory feels too encroached upon, allowing Seung and me to find our balance.
During their church ceremony, Suzanne’s brother did a reading from the Bible and David’s friend quoted Arabic poetry. “Our priest added an American Indian tone to the end of the ceremony, which everyone loved,” says Suzanne. David adjusts, “Everyone who saw it—as it was removed from the ‘Palestinian cut’ of the video.” A mariachi band came up full force as guests left the church and headed into the reception. During dinner Suzanne’s father and uncle sang Mexican opera, which was followed by a Middle Eastern belly dancer. An American big band played for the duration of the reception.
Now I just want to be Suzanne and David. I look at Seung and either this story or the third bottle of wine has completely erased my poker face. Before I can say a word, he says, “I have to go. My parents are all that matters in my family and they like you as much as I do, so now I have to tell them my plans. But your new BFF is going to stay here with you tonight so you don’t worry. Is that okay?”
Seung Chung arranged a babysitter for me because he knew I would be nervous? Can we just sneak into the bathroom again for another make-out session before he leaves? I’m overflowing with love and hope and ... wine. I kiss my lover passionately, completely forgetting that his friends are sitting across from us.
Seung gets up to go and David goes with him. (Their kids are back home in Chicago, but David still needs that advice about which city to take a job in, so he will head back to the hotel after walking Seung to Penn Station. Suzanne is having a slumber party with me.) We wave to the men as they leave, and Suzanne doesn’t miss a beat.
“What’s the scariest thing you want to know about being in a mixed-race marriage that you have been afraid to ask anyone?”
Wow. First, I ask if she will get me some water, to stall, so I don’t blow this opportunity. When Suzanne returns with hydration, I tell her I have two questions and I want to take them one at a time.
“Have your kids ever been teased in school for being Muslim or Palestinian?”
I’m not just gossiping about Suzanne’s family. Over the last nine months I have recalled every “Oriental” joke I ever heard in my childhood. I have dug up every slope, slanty, flat-faced, gook, chink comment—who smelled weird because of their weird food that they weirdly ate with sticks, all while wearing their pants too high, with thick glasses (because they can’t see through slit eyes), who ruined the curve on test scores for everyone else because they were such geeks. Who all grow up and move to California and can’t drive because they also can’t see through said slit eyes. I also quietly mulled over all the lyrics about Chinese dirty knees, turning Japanese, and the TV shows, movies, and news reports featuring Long Duck Dong, stick-wielding Singaporeans, Laotian children without teeth or limbs, geisha girls, Thai hookers, Cambodian killers, Vietnamese hustlers, and expressions like “Jap-ing” someone out. I tried every one of these slurs on for size because I thought I should brace myself not only for how much this could hurt the man I love and our possible kids, but for what hell it might feel like to be the mother of someone who is teased for being a minority, when I myself
am not one.
Suzanne also has the same cocktail of unique things in her offspring that I might. Which is an ethnic last name, specific to a cultural group that may be presumed guilty until proved otherwise, depending on world politics. (Yes, clearly, I have spent some time thinking about this. But it’s a closer reality than you might think. Suzanne’s bag is filled with a decade of hatred against Muslims and two decades of American judgment against Palestinians—in this country alone. And I live in abject fear of the United States going to war with anyone in Asia within my children’s lifetime, particularly Korea or China, and my husband or offspring being thrown into an internment camp. And as preposterous as this may sound to you, just consider—Guantánamo Bay.)
Suzanne says her kids have not been teased. But she has taken some minor precautions. When she and David found themselves pregnant not long into marriage, they both thought to give their son an Arabic middle name to honor David’s father. But David’s father said, “Please don’t.” Grandfather said he has always felt the pressure that a man from Palestine lives with when traveling the world. Every airport check constitutes secondary conversations about “what holidays do you celebrate at home?” David’s father had faith that his grandchildren would enjoy plenty of Palestinian culture and didn’t feel they needed a label in a passport to prove their heritage.
Suzanne and David named their son Alexander James Zuaiter, which is a wonderful mix of Egyptian, Muslim, and Christian names—none of which is specific enough to flag him. And not just flag him at the airport. When the coach is yelling at a soccer field or a girl is sending a Valentine’s Day card or when Alexander himself is applying to college—none of these names is so specific that he can be “preconceived” as anything. However, when Alexander’s sister came four years later, Suzanne and David were feeling more confident in their original idea. Sophia Iman Zuaiter was given her name to honor her grandfather’s life (in Arabic, iman means “faith”) and because Suzanne and David both thought it was beautiful. And so do I.
Today Alexander and Sophia are seven and four years old, respectively, and I wonder if this is too young to know if their cultural background will yield teasing. But I’ve got another doozy of a question anyway.
“Do your in-laws favor your son over your daughter?”
“Not really” is Suzanne’s answer.
We nod at each other. Suzanne is thinking something and so am I. Who knows if they are the same thing, but I am just going to sit here for a minute and hope she will elaborate. Because for the first time tonight, I’m not sure I believe Suzanne.
“My husband’s grandmother will ask me when I visit the Middle East: ‘When are you having more children, Suzanne? When are you having more boys? You need to have ten more boys like Alexander.” To add insult to injury, this woman’s daughter-in-law is translating these whopper sentences from one woman to another. Suzanne is not having more children, but that is not a cultural argument she feels the need to have with an octogenarian. But saying that sons are more important than daughters is an idea that Suzanne can’t quite let lie. So she softly asks David’s grandmother if all her daughters know she feels this way about sons. Grandmother says, “Of course!”
Because in Palestinian culture, daughters have to be married off. This still, today, requires monetary gifts at the time of a wedding. Daughters also have multiple opportunities to shame an entire family throughout any point in their lives. Nor are daughters privy to inheritances or owning land. They do not generally bring in income. If they can’t produce a child, they can be shunned and possibly left and their family has to take them back. But most important, sons bring a woman power and good social standing. Sadly, this thinking is prevalent in many cultures outside America. Including Korea, for different reasons but yielding the same result. Suzanne doesn’t feel it is her job to credit her daughter or any other with all they bring to the world—to an old woman she loves regardless of these views. She does feel comfortable schooling me, though.
“Diane, you’re imagining downsides of marriage and motherhood by what you can conjure up on paper. The things that will be tough on you are not those kinds of ‘issues.’ What will be hard are the small ones that take you by surprise.”
For Suzanne it was the inexplicable desire to baptize her son immediately after his birth. Her parents had warned her and David to talk about what religion they would raise a child in before getting married—but neither Suzanne nor David really had any interest in organized religion, so they didn’t listen. And this need to baptize was not something Suzanne imagined or worried that she might feel. She was just as surprised as David. She was more than surprised, though, when her husband told her, “You can’t do it.”
Under Muslim law, inheritance is subject to living life as a good Muslim. Meaning, if David’s father were to pass away and he wanted to leave his home or his books or even a pair of shoes to his son or grandson, any inheritance he wishes to give can be contested by any member of his entire extended family. Inheritance can be revoked if any family member could prove that Alexander was not being raised as a Muslim. If, for instance, Alexander had been baptized. If that were the case, the Palestinian state could override a deceased grandfather’s wishes.
Having never had any outside constraints put upon her relationship, Suzanne found this mandate grossly unfair. Given the horrendous weight the Catholic Church has put on baptism—that all babies go to purgatory regardless of sin without this sacrament (until early 2007, when the current pope revoked this notion)—the stakes were really high for her. As we are having this conversation seven years later, it is still through gritted teeth that Suzanne says they never baptized their son or daughter.
With an impending move to a bigger city, to one coast or the other for David’s work, Suzanne would like to find an institution her children can visit once a week to develop a relationship with a higher power. She is not sure if that will be “Saturday school” for Muslim teachings or Sunday school for Christian ones, but she is open to either. At home their family celebrates Christmas and Easter, as well as Thanksgiving, Halloween, and every American holiday in between them. To honor Palestinian culture, Suzanne and David offer food and music, as well as trips to the actual old city almost every other year. “We do not celebrate Islamic holidays, but we don’t celebrate other holidays all that much either because we try to revere our family members all throughout the year.” Suzanne and David’s children speak fluent Spanish with Mom and a cross between the Queen’s English and American with Dad.
All of which, Suzanne then tells me, really doesn’t matter. She says softly, trying not to offend me now, that I can’t plan who my family will be before they exist any more than someone can plan who they or their children will fall in love with. She then puts her glass down and leans in closely to me.
“The work you have done to support Seung is kind and thoughtful and earnest but you have to let it go now—and just be who you and he are supposed to be as a couple. The rest of the world will have to adjust to you now, not the other way around anymore.”
To which I am honestly left speechless. With no words, I pour the last few ounces of our fourth bottle of wine for Suzanne and myself and raise my glass to her. When she meets mine with hers, Suzanne says, “To love.”
CHAPTER 7.
GETTING AROUND MINE
“Oh, Diane! He has the most beautiful hair!”
—PATRICIA FARR
THE PEOPLE IN my family are rough. And unforgiving. They expect men to act like men, and their definition of “manly behavior” is narrow. I’m talking narrow enough to fit in a garden hose. I was pretty sure Seung was going to fail at his first meeting with my family because polite is not something in my brothers’ playlist of acceptable guy behavior. And although Seung is multifaceted, his family’s entire culture is based on respect. There is no disassociating this from him or, from what I can see, the rest of his people. Koreans are so polite they don’t even assassinate Kim Jong Il, and he is starving most of the popul
ation in North Korea. How long do you think a short, bald, fat guy wearing a green onesie and Jackie O sunglasses would last as the leader of Italy? Or the mayor of Brooklyn? If either of those were the case, his ass would be buried in Grant Park already.
Therefore, I know Seung won’t be able to just shut off his instinct to make a first meeting with the men of my family entirely about my father’s comfort. I’m just hoping to inspire him to tone down the earnest, gentle, nice-guy side of himself and allow a bit of the cigar-smoking, scotch-drinking, hot rod–driving, eager-togamble guy’s guy (that I like so much) to come out. Because my familial line of men respects a man you can’t ignore. They expect a new alpha entering our herd to make a statement. And if you don’t make one—they will make you into one.
So ten months deep into our relationship, two weeks after our D.C./N.Y. weekend, I still hadn’t gotten many details out of Seung about his final conversation with his father, but I was coming home to L.A. for the weekend. I hoped in our quiet time together I might unlock the vault of Chung family discourses. Mind you, my time would be limited because my dad and two brothers were also flying in from Florida, New York, and Costa Rica, respectively. I bought tickets to a Cirque du Soleil type of event at UCLA—specifically because I thought it would be the perfect way for my men to meet Seung for the first time. Perfect in that it would take up half the night and Seung couldn’t do any talking. Yes, that’s right, Seung—the guy who I was just so impressed with for speaking two languages—is the one I wanted to shut up. So much so that I bought $450 worth of modern-dance tickets.