#its just another way of othering chinese culture/food and saying 'look i made this food palatable and now im sharing my Secrets with you

[capfalcon]

every day i wait for the day that tofu food videos will stop infuriating me (tofu lover, chinese person)

[writingwithcolor]

Blending Mythos Respectfully

@sapphicq submitted:

Hi all! I’m trying to write an urban fantasy that explores oppression in a world that is basically the same as ours, except with magic, while incorporating magical systems and mythologies of multiple cultures. I’ve done an okay amount of research on each one that I’d like to include (still need to do more for sure, especially considering how colonization has effected mythologies). However, I’m struggling a bit on how they should coexist, since in the world I’m writing about they’re present and tangible. One example of this is fox spirits in East Asian mythology. Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Chinese mythologies each have a nine-tailed fox, and though my research says that the myth originates from Chinese mythology, it also says that each of the fox spirits carry different connotations of malevolence, benevolence, and how widespread they are, depending on which culture’s mythology is being referred to. 

The same sort of thing has been popping up quite a lot in a lot of my research. I started to wonder if I could explain these similarities within world as “different cultures have come up with different names and customs surrounding the ‘same’ thing,” considering mythology in the real world from an anthropological perspective. However I don’t want to overgeneralize, especially considering that these different mythological figures are meant to be present and tangible. If I went that route, I wouldn’t want to say something like ‘actually, benevolent fox spirits do exist, and Korean mythology about fox spirits is wrong since Kumiho are pretty strictly malevolent,’ which would obviously be an implication. All this to say: do you have any tips for multiple mythos coexisting in a way that respects the various cultures they come from?

Avoid Round Pegs in Square Holes

A mistake you sometimes see Western authors make when dealing with mythology in urban fantasy settings is to confine the universe’s worldbuilding to a particular mythology or force the rules of a single culture’s folklore onto other cultures. For instance, here at WWC, we get a lot of questions asking how to represent supernatural creatures from multiple cultures respectfully alongside fae from Western Europe, and it's fairly obvious that the author plans to treat all supernatural creatures as fae. Urban fantasy based on Greek mythology or Christian mythology often falls into the same trap. 

I think a writer can demonstrate greater creativity by embracing these differences. I think a potential way to deal with contradicting mythos between cultures is to come up with compelling reasons why differences exist. What world-building systems, philosophies and real-life phenomena allow for a framework that explains the simultaneous existence of commonalities and differences? As you know, in anthropology, there are theories that emphasize cultural diffusion as a way to explain similar customs within the same region, but there are also theories that hold that multiple cultures can develop the same traditions and principles independent of each other (See: existence of 0, lost-wax bronze casting, astronomical calendars and the use of wheels). The answers I’ve given are mostly technological. However myths and belief systems serve very real social functions as ways to keep people together and cultivate norms and mores. Lesya expands on the utility of intentional cultural diffusion below.

Similarly, within evolution, there are instances of species having common features because of a shared ancestor, but also instances where species without shared ancestors evolve to have similar features because they exist in the same environment. I believe flippers are examples of both types of evolution in marine animals.  Thus, I think you need to question your assumption that “different cultures have come up with different names and customs surrounding the ‘same’ thing.” As the world is daily proof, they sometimes do, but they also sometimes don’t. 

-Marika

First, props to you for sending us this ask. You have been thinking about this a lot and have done research into building an urban fantasy that doesn’t do the thing of putting all Asians under one umbrella. 

Second, I’m going to agree with Marika here. Rather than go for the generalization route, revel in everyone's differences. It's a way for you to acknowledge the variations in the mythology, that not all have the same origins though there may be some similarities. Instead, they may have reached the same conclusions. My advice for blending mythologies is to lean into it, and not create a homogeneous umbrella. You can make something amazing with that. 

-Jaya

Hybridity Through Diffusion

So a myth originated in China. This does not mean Chinese tellings have the monopoly on what a telling is. Marika and Jaya have gone into a possible solution, here, but what I’m going to examine here is a mental framework that a lot of people get stuck in that is actually ahistorical.

Cultural appropriation as we know it is shockingly recent when it comes to history. In the modern day, ownership boundaries of myths have become very strict because of primarily European colonialism picking and choosing everything it likes about a mythos, and, this is important: not letting up on the oppression of those peoples. There’s also a strong preference to kill those colonialism deems “wrong”, instead of creating a hybrid culture.

Historically, this got a lot more fluid.

What happened historically was primarily cultural diffusion, wherein open trade, intermarriage, and shared borders made it that myths, customs, and cultural practices were (mostly) freely exchanged without massive power imbalances happening, and then modified to fit local beliefs.

Key word: mostly. Because yes sometimes it happened that one place took over another place and imported all of its customs (see: China, Rome, the Mughals), but… often* the ruling power either backed off, was fought of, or otherwise left the region, leaving the common people to do whatever they wanted with the carcass of what had been imposed on them. Or sometimes, even, the imperial forces would actively create a hybridized culture in order to better rule others.

* in places where the ruling power has NOT backed off on oppression and assimilation, even if the colonialism is very old, then this is invalid and the power dynamics of appropriation are still at play.

Because, historically, there was a lot less incentive to simply genocide the peoples you took over (which is what made armies that did destroy all they took over so noteworthy). People were needed to keep providing food and materials, even if the new person got the resulting taxes. 

This meant there were a lot more common people to play with the stuff imported by the imperial culture. And there was a lot more incentive to hybridize your customs to the common people’s customs, leading to the sometimes-hilarious situations like “Rome assigns an equivalence in their pantheon for literally every mythology they encountered, which was a lot.” 

This also explains early Christianization, because it was a lot safer to simply adapt what you already had to make it better for your own ends than curbstomp everything that was “wrong” to your worldview. Ireland’s mythology survives in huge swaths, because it was either Christianized wholesale, or it was about “historical humans” and not fae. Norse mythology was similarly adapted for Christian worldviews, which means we unfortunately have no idea what the pre-Christian myths were.

So instead of thinking in terms of ownership, think instead in terms of diffusion. 

Myths get imported along with food, cloth, or anything else necessary for life. Myths were, historically, a way for people to explain the world around them, both in place of and alongside science. “Ghost marches” are really common, globally, because if you have wind howling in the forest, it’s going to sound like predators, and predators mean go inside and lock the door. Weaving goddesses are also common, because weaving was so necessary to survive the elements.

Sometimes trade relationships soured, and you get bad associations with the imported stuff. Sometimes the relationship stayed great for long enough it got completely adapted. This doesn’t mean any one myth is “right”, nor does it mean you have to erase historical trade links. It just means you look at the historical context, understand that cultural exchange often used to be a lot more two-way than it is in modern appropriation times, and figure out what that means for your worldbuilding.

~ Mod Lesya

[sketching-shark]

LMK fandom: Oh, what do we do about this guy who has nothing but hurt Xiaotian, tried to replace Sun Wukong and his crew, hurt Tripitaka and ordered servants to cannibalize a monkey? Oh I know! We’ll turn him into our little meow meow~ he’s so innocent and Sun Wukong is obviously the villain!

What doesn’t help is this idea is perpetuated by multiple fan fic writers and artists for some reason. Especially some aus they make that turn SWK into a bastard for the sake of the story rather than considering cultural context and thinking they should be respectful.

And almost everyone lets them get away with it just because the art or fanfic is good and they get so popular that no one can point what is actually wrong without feeling like they’re going to get attacked.

I'm starting to feel like my blog is the one anons go to specifically to vent their frustrations about the Six Eared Macaque in his lego monkey show form & the associated fandom lmao. But I guess this makes sense, as I’ve had fun quasi-dragging him before & will in fact use this anon submission as an opportunity to have my own, to put it academically, bitch fest about not just this fandom's favorite protagonist-traumatizing meow meow, but about the way villains are often treated in not just fanon, but increasingly in canon works as well. But same policy as with the last anon; I'll post my opinions below the cut, and as fandoms love to say, don’t like don't read if you don't want to see me dunking on the six eared simian & common fandom tendencies towards villains.

Oh man I would say where would you even begin with this but anon you’ve pretty much started yourself with my main gripe with a lot of ways that the Six-Eared Macaque is portrayed in fandom; there seems to be this unspoken agreement that his acts of violence towards Sun Wukong, Qi Xioatian, and Qi Xioatian’s loved ones are either to be framed as somewhat or totally justified, to be immediately forgiven/excused, or to simply & completely be ignored. Like friends maybe this is just me not seeing the proper posts but while the fandom is inundated with art and fanfics of Macaque as a generally decent individual & a true member of team good guy, I have yet to see one person address the fact that this monkey literally kidnapped & mind-controlled Xiaotian’s best friend and father figures & forced them to brutalize Xiaotian while ol’ Six Ear looked on and laughed (X_X). Like this kind of fandom villain treatment is definitely not something that’s solely at work for Monkie Kid, but it is kind of nutty how fandoms will swing between yelling that people should be allowed to like villains without even mild critique, and then will just flat-out not address the villainous behavior, and will even bend over backwards to frame even characters who committed genocide as just poor innocent widdle victims who need a hug. At its worst, I’ve even seen tons of people in a fandom get really angry at other people who don’t like a villain, and will even start accusing those people of hating real-life mentally disabled or abused individuals all because they don’t like the fandom’s favorite literal war criminal. The Monkie Kid fandom is FAR more chill & better than a lot of other fandoms I’ve come across in that regard, but that is an exceedingly low bar, & the tendency to woobify certain kinds of villains-- as with Macaque and the extreme emphasis on his bad boy/sad boy thing--is very much at work.  

 I’ve also talked before about a kind of monoculturalization of certain character interpretations and story beats in fandoms, and one of the more popular ones that seems to be applied to Macaque a lot is the “hero actually bad, villain actually good” cliche, as observable from the general fandom assumption that Mr. Six-Ears he wasn’t even slightly lying or remembering things through a rose-tinted or skewed lens when he gave his version of his and Sun Wukong’s past. Like at this point it seems the possibility that people WILL NOT even consider is that Sun Wukong never did & still doesn't care that much about the Six Eared Macaque (in JTTW they weren’t sworn brothers & in Monkie Kid the only thing the monkey king really said to Macaque before attacking him was a pretty contemptuous "Aren't you ever going to get sick of living under my shadow?," & responds to his "beloved friend" getting blown up with "You did good, bud" to Qi Xiaotian, who did the exploding), or that their original fight may in fact have mostly been instigated by Macaque. After all, to repeat what this anon summarized & what I've said before about their original JTTW context (& in an example of the things that do feel like it's often lost in translation) is that the Six Ear Macaque was a villain not just because he beat up the Tang Monk, but because he wanted to take over Sun Wukong's entire life and identity so he could have all that glory, prestige, and power for himself. To quote the macaque himself from the Anthony C. Yu translation, "I struck the T'ang monk and I took the luggage...precisely because I want to go to the West all by myself to ask Buddha for the scriptures. When I deliver them to the Land of the East, it will be my success and no one else's. Those people of the South Jambudvipa Continent will honor me then as their patriarch and my fame will last for all posterity." And in order to do this, the Six Eared Macaque had apparently made Sun Wukong's "little ones," his monkey family, his captives through either trickery or force, and gotten a number of them to take on the appearance of Tang Sanzang and the other pilgrims. It's also made clear that in very direct contrast to Sun Wukong, he doesn't care about these monkeys beyond how they might serve him. In fact, after Sha Wujing kills the monkey posing as him the Six Eared Macaque not only all but immediately replaces him with another, but also "told his little ones to have the dead monkey skinned. Then his meat was taken to be fried and served as food along with coconut and grape wines." So this monkey is not only willing to risk the lives of a lot of other monkeys for his own personal benefit, but is also a literal cannibal. And yes yes, I know a lot of people have argued that Monkie Kid shouldn't be considered a direct sequel to JTTW & that's fair enough (for example, Sun Wukong probably shouldn't be smashing anyone into a meat patty in a children's cartoon lol). And of course, it needs to be noted that there are a buttload of really out there & really cursed pieces of media based on JTTW & that were created in China. Yet the above description is the oft-ignored in the west original facet of the Six Eared Macaque's character. And it is this selfishness, entitlement, and treatment of other individuals as tools for his own self-serving ends  that is, from where I’m standing, still very much present in Monkie Kid. Like besides repeatedly going out of his way to physically and psychologically traumatize Xioatian, with the last episode Macaque seemed to be going right back to his manipulative ways. I’ve seen people frame their last conversation as Macaque softening to Xioatian a little bit, but personally that read a lot more like that common tactic among abusers where even after they’ve hurt you they’ll dangle something you want or need over your head (in Macaque’s case, the promise of desperately needed training and information about a serious looming threat), with the implication that you’ll only get it if you do what they want you to, such as, in this case, Xioatian going back to Macaque as his student even after having been so terribly hurt by this monkey, which would give Macaque power over Xiaotian and probably Sun Wukong as a result. And it is this violence and manipulation that it seems the fandom at large has tacitly decided shouldn’t even be addressed, instead leaning more towards a (and this is an exaggeration) “Six-Eared Macaque my poor meow meow Sun Wukong has always been bad & has always been wrong about literally everything” reading. 

And while it is the case that I am not Chinese and feel that as such it would be best left to someone who actually comes from that background to provide more context into how common interpretations of the Six Eared Macaque from China may clash really badly with the stuff the western fandom creates, it also must be noted that, as much as we all want to have fun in fandom & in spite of all the out-there versions of JTTW from China, we westerners should recognize that there is a very long and very ugly history of western countries stripping other cultures’ important religious and literary works for parts & mashing them into their own thing while implying or even insisting that what they present provides a true understanding of the original piece. And while I trust most individuals in regards to Monkie Kid are able to step back and think “this is a lego cartoon and not a set guide for how I should understand JTTW” (especially given the insistence that JTTW and Monkie Kid should be considered there own separate works) there does nevertheless seem to be something of a tendency to take the conclusions people come to, for example, about Sun Wukong’s characteristic in his lego form & then assume that’s just reflective to Sun Wukong as a totality. I imagine a good portion of this is due to people not reading JTTW & especially to not having easy access to solid information or answers about JTTW’s many different facets (like geez awhile ago I was trying to get a clear answer on what is considered the most accurate translation of the names of Sun Wukong’s six sworn brothers & got like 5 different responses lmao), but that tendency to take a western fandom interpretation & run with it instead of doing any background research or questioning said interpretation is still very much at play. As such, & as made prominent in the way people have been interpreting the dynamic between Sun Wukong and the Six Eared Macaque in the lego monkey show, tbh it does seem kind of shitty for western creators & audience to sometimes go really out of their way to ignore all of this original cultural & narrative context for the sake of Angst (TM) in Macaque's favor, demonizing Sun Wukong, and shipping the monkey king with his evil twin (X_X).

And speaking of which, even beyond the potential inherent creepiness & revulsion that can be inspired by this specific ship given common interpretations of the og classic's original meaning (again, it's my understanding, given both summaries of translated Chinese academic texts I've been kindly provided with, my own reading of the Anthony C. Yu translation of JTTW, & vents from a number of Chinese people I've seen on this site, that the Six-Eared Macaque is commonly interpreted in China as having originated from Sun Wukong himself as a living embodiment of his worst traits, hence why only Buddha can tell the difference between them & why the monkey king is much more slow to violence after he kills the macaque), I'd argue that in the face of all the uwu poor widdle meow meow portrayals lego show Macaque is, especially if you include JTTW's events, still in the role of “Sun Wukong but worse” as he is very much a violent & selfish creep. Like he was basically running around in JTTW wearing a Sun Wukong fursuit, but there he had the sole reason of wanting to replace Sun Wukong wholesale so he could have all the good things in the monkey king's life without actually having to work as hard for them. But if you combine that with Macaque now claiming that he used to be best friend with Sun Wukong in his pre-journey days (something that's made funny from a JTTW context given that that status actually belongs to the Demon Bull King lol), his original violence has now blown into this centuries long and really unhealthy obsession with the monkey king. Like he's apparently gone from wanting to literally be Sun Wukong to being so obsessed with getting revenge on Sun Wukong that he's got basically nothing else going on in his life. Like he's only appeared in two episodes but...does he have any friends? Any family? A career or even a hobby that DOESN'T center the monkey king? Anything at all outside of his "get revenge on and/or kill Sun Wukong/use his successor as my personal punching bag” thing? Like dude! That is extremely creepy and extremely bad for everyone all around! As I’ve said before, this seeming refusal to see beyond the past or to do something that doesn’t involve Sun Wukong in some capacity is a trait that makes Macaque an interesting and somewhat tragic villain--he even seems to be working as Sun Wukong’s reflection in a mirror darkly, with lego show Sun Wukong pretty clearly not being able to heal from his own past which is hinted to be defined by one loss after another, and with Monkie Kid even kind of having these two characters somewhat follow their JTTW characterizations in that in the latter half of the journey Sun Wukong often gets sad & starts crying in the face of what seems insurmountable odds (& Monkie Kid Sun Wukong does seem to be hiding some serious depression behind a cheerful facade), whereas the Six-Eared Macaque retains a worse version of Sun Wukong’s pre-journey characteristic of getting pissed and lashing out if things don’t go his way--but it’s also what would make any current friendship or romantic relationship between these monkeys horrific. Although to be fair even the fandom seems to recognize this in an unconscious way, in that a lot of the art & fanfic seems to swing erratically between them kissing & screaming at each other in yet another example of bog-standard fandom adulation of romanticized toxic relationships lol.  

At the end of the day, of course, this is nothing new. You'll find versions of this dynamic across a ton of fandoms and now even canonical work. And as such, I can only look at this kind of popularized relationship dynamic with a kind of resigned weariness whenever it pops up, & my frustrated question with the popularity of this kind of pairing is the exact same one that I have for a multitude of blatantly toxic villain/hero ships, given common fandom discourse & the tendency to either ignore or justify the villain's actions & demonize the hero: if you're THAT convinced that everything is the hero's fault, if you believe THAT much that the hero is the one in the wrong for the villain's pain and their subsequent actions, then why are you so set on them not only becoming a romantic pair, but framing this get-together as a good thing? Like I know we contain multitudes but that's waaay too many contradictions for me to wrap my head around. And it definitely doesn’t help that one branch of underlying reasoning behind this kind of pairing seems to be the ever-present “you break it, you fix it” mentality, where the assumption is that if you’re in a failing, abusive, and/or generally toxic relationship (platonically or romantically), if you put in enough time and effort & attempts to compromise, you’ll be able to restore/have the relationship you dreamed of, even with someone who hurt you really badly. And this assumption isn’t limited to fandom: I’d even argue that it’s everywhere in the culture, hence why a lot of people feel like they “failed” if they have to get a divorce or make the choice to leave an unhealthy friendship. Personally, I feel like people could really benefit from more stories about how it is not only the case that the people you hurt don’t owe you their forgiveness & you can still become a better and happier person without the one you hurt in your life, & that while it can be really hard it can also be a good thing to leave a relationship, even if it’s one that once meant a lot to you. 

  But in all honestly, from my own perspective this kind of pairing is starting to read far less like enemies to lovers and far more like a horrible fantasy where you can pull whatever shit you want, even on the people you "love," & never be held accountable for your terrible behavior or even have to consider that maybe you were in the wrong. It's another facet that makes me larf every time I see people insist that fandom is an inherently "transformative" or "progressive" form of storytelling like friends you are literally just taking status quo toxic monogamy & rebranding it as somehow beneficial & romantic (X_X).

But as to anon’s last frustration, it is hard to know what is the appropriate response with this kind of thing...like for my own part I’m keeping my frustrations to my blog & now increasingly to posts that you would have to click on the “read more” button to see what I have to say, but I totally get the hesitation to give even a mild critique to big names in a fandom. Like I've now seen it happen repeatedly where someone who has a big name in a fandom will make something that's kind of shitty for one reason or another, someone will message them with some version of "hey, that's kind of shitty, you shouldn't do that," and the typical response is either to blatantly ignore the issue completely, or more popularly to make a giant crying circus that seems deliberately geared towards stoking emotions on both sides of the, for example, fiction does/doesn't affect reality issue so that something that didn't even have to be that big a deal gets blown out of all proportion, with the big name often framing what often started out as a very mild critique into a long crying jag about how the initial response to their kind of shitty thing was so mean/cruel and they're just a poor innocent & that YOU'RE the true racist/sexist/bigot etc. if you don't agree with their opinion. It must of course be noted that there have also been numerous instances of people taking it too far the other way & sending not just big names but smaller creators literal deaths threats over stuff like innocuous ships which like holy hell bells people that’s a horrible thing to do. But for the big names at least, the end result of all this fighting is usually that once the dust has settled they have more attention/fame/money/power in the fandom than before, and with anyone who might have a problem with their stuff feeling afraid to voice their opinion lest they be swarmed by that person's fans. In that way fandom does often seem to increasingly be geared towards presenting an “official” fandom perspective about various facets of a piece of media instead of allowing for a multitude of interpretations, and with criticism, no matter its shape or form or how genuinely warranted it may be, being hounded out of existence. I feel like a lot of this could be made less bad if there wasn’t this constant assumption & even drive to think that a different interpretation of or criticism of your favorite work of fiction or your fanwork isn’t a direct claim that you are a thoroughly loathsome individual (& maybe also if people cultivated an enjoyment of learning things about important works from a culture outside their own, even if what you learn clashes with your own initial understandings), but I guess we’ll see if that ever happens. 

So these are my general thinks about the Six Eared Macaque’s current fandom meow meow status & some of my bigger gripes with fandom tendencies as a whole. I stand by my idea that the most interesting & beneficial route for Macaque moving forward would be a kind of “redemption without forgiveness from the ones you hurt” arc--as I think was done pretty excellently with the character Grace in Infinity Train--and if for no other reason than gosh dern this monkey really needs to cultivate some sort of identity beyond his “Sun Wukong but worse” persona. 

[violetwolfraven]

Okay. I am probably going to get hate for this, but I need to get it off my chest:

People on this site have this mentality of you have to hate it and boycott it and cancel it if it isn’t perfect and otherwise you are a bad person and I’m going to tell you why that mentality is not helpful at all.

This happens with many movies/shows/media, but I’m going to use Raya and the Last Dragon for my main example, considering I am of Vietnamese descent and therefore am more personally affected by this movie than any other controversial movie that I can think of.

Now, Raya has a lot of problems. For one thing, Disney acting like Southeast Asia is one big country with the creation of this fictional land of Kumandra, when in reality it is a really fuckin large region with many unique countries and cultures. Categorizing them all under one country is like trying to feed a shark and a beta the same food because they’re both technically fish. Completely inaccurate and ultimately ineffective.

Also, many of the leading voice actors are not Southeast Asian. Kelly Marie Tran is Vietnamese, but Awkwafina is Chinese and Korean. Even more of that old problem of generalizing Asia, here, as if casting any old Asian actor is the same.

And then there’s the whole ‘unifying all the regions under one banner’ thing. It’s pretty imperialistic. Just because the United States created a (relatively) harmonious union between states doesn’t mean it worked for everyone! This is especially not great considering most, if not all of the countries in Southeast Asia were conquered by China, Japan, and/or a western power at some point.

So, yeah. Lots of flaws. I’m sure there are even more than I listed that I haven’t thought of. But guess what? My family still watched that movie. My sister, my cousins, and I got hyped as fuck for it. We paid the fee to see it early because we don’t have any other mainstream representation and we cannot afford to be picky.

But let’s say we were picky, and let’s say everyone else was, too, so Raya and the Last Dragon completely flopped. What happens now? Hollywood learns its lesson and bows to our whims?

No. What would happen is that they would have an excuse not to make another movie featuring a Southeast Asian protagonist, because Raya got so much criticism and didn’t even make them a profit, so why exactly would they risk trying again?

Do you get it yet?

If you expect representation to be perfect the first time and tear it to pieces for not living up to that, it will never get better. Because Hollywood will have an excuse to keep saying those projects aren’t worth it. They will keep excluding writers and directors of minorities, approve projects where all the leads are white, cishet, and abled, and keep just enough people of minorities around in supporting roles both on and off screen that people can’t accuse them of only hiring and casting white, cishet, abled people.

I’m not talking about media that is blatantly bigoted. For example, Sia’s movie, Music? The public made that flop and it was a good thing, because Music was blatantly ableist and promoted practices that would get autistic people killed. In that case, that representation was so bad that no representation was a preferable option.

I’m talking about media like Raya, where the cast and crew clearly meant it to be good representation, tried their damn best to make it good, and made mistakes. We can call them out on those mistakes, but if we all cancel the entire movie for them, we will never get anything better.

I’m not thrilled that the only movie in which I’ve seen something like my culture and my family has so many issues. But you bet your ass I support it, because if I don’t, Hollywood won’t green light more projects like it.

I hope someday my generation’s grandchildren look back on the flawed representation we have today the same way we look back on old movies from the 50s, where female characters were just starting to have personality traits beyond ‘damsel in distress.’ But these things take time. Capitalism in the arts resists change, but it is improving. We just have to help it along. Also:

There’s a fucking difference between maliciously creating bad representation (blatant white-washing for example) and not fully thinking through the implications of creative decisions. Directors, writers, and casting directors are people, too. They have their own conscious and unconscious biases based on their environments. But if you mercilessly cancel them for a mistake, they never get a chance to do better another day. And again: what doesn’t get created? Better representation.

In short: stop cancelling things for flaws in representation that almost definitely weren’t intentional. The only thing you’re doing is making it harder for better representation to get created in the future.

You can enjoy something and acknowledge that it’s not perfect. God, people.

[drwcn]

Hello~ may i ask you something about Chinese culture? i'm a white person and i know that wearing traditional clothes from other cultures (for example as a street wear) simply because it's beautiful is disrespectful because it's also a form of cultural appropriation. A few months ago one of my friends and i were talking and exchanging facts about our cultures and lifestyles and i made a comment about how stunning some hanfu she showed me were and her first reaction was " oh you like it? what's your favorite color i can buy you that one! " and she was quite gleeful and seemed to be unaware of the ethical problem behind me wearing these clothes.. i kindly refused but it's been puzzling me for some time now and so I'd like to know a bit more about it so i can maybe educate myself on this matter and explain my position better next time such as why I can't wear these clothes. i'm really sorry to drop this important and not so simple ask on you but i actually don't know anyone else i could ask, also know that you don't need to answer this if you're uncomfortable or anything tho! it's such a long text omg again sorry for taking up so much of your time aldhsks i hope your day will be great 💝

Hi friend! 

From where I stand if you want one, you should get one, especially if your friend is willing to help you pick a nice one. :) 

Here’s the thing about culture appropriation - everyone has a different opinion on it, so even if I say something, another Chinese person can disagree and that’s valid. 

I have a feeling, just a feeing, that if you go to China and buy a hanfu and put it on and walk around in it, most Chinese people aren’t gonna come up to you and say hey! this is cultural appropriation! In fact they might ask to take pictures with you.

That’s gonna be different if you did the same thing in New York, or Montreal, or Sydney, or London. 

I’m not a sociologist or anthropologist or political scientist, but I am a young person who has a lot of incongruous feelings towards cultural appropriation. There are obvious answers. Any action whereby an item/accessory from a certain culture is used in a mocking or offensive way, or is used as a costume or a gimmick, is of course entirely inappropriate. This is the obvious answer. But, the question that is often asked, and the exactly thing you are getting, is: what if I’m not intending to be offensive? What if I just like it? What if I want to honour it and support it? 

And the answer to that is complicated. 

I am a CN diaspora, and from what I’m seen and experienced, the term “cultural appropriate” comes from a place of fear and feeling of threat. For countries like the US where the population is very diverse and there’s a pressure to assimilate and fit in, there used to be a time when immigrants felt they had to do everything in their power to be more integrated into the new community they landed in and that meant turning their backs on the culture that they’ve left behind. 

The movement we see more and more nowadays is the reclaiming of some of that lost culture and the embracing of every aspect of one’s identity. However, the part of us that’s not quite “white enough”, that we’re just starting to build up the courage to be proud of, is still so tender, so raw, so vulnerable to any kind of assault from outside forces. The fear that we used to feel, the fear of being completely ourselves, it never truly goes away. It’s in the memory of being embarrassed to bring cultural food to lunch at school and wishing your mom could just pack you pizza. It’s the awkward moments when you can’t wear the shorts you want like the other girls in your class because your immigrant mother/father says it’s not appropriate. It’s loving a wuxia story and having no one to share it with because all your friends are non-cn and you’re 14 and everything is embarrassing. Imagine carrying that your entire life, that heavy mixture of shame and fear, and waking up one day and suddenly some pop artist is using aspects of your culture in their music video. Just for the aesthetics. And for that they’re getting millions of hits on youtube and making a fuckton of money. 

The very thing that had caused you so much grief, so much mockery and stress, is being used and monetized. How could you be okay with it? Especially when commercialization often comes with sexualization and objectification as well.  Now what if it’s not some famous person, what if it’s just a random citizen who wants to put on a kimono or a hanfu? Is that okay? Then it really depends on who you’re asking and what their relationship is with their cultural identity. Personally, I don’t really care because the community that I grew up in was very accepting of my culture. I never experienced as much cultural threat as other cn disasporas in other communities. So, like your friend who is CN (I’m assuming), I don’t feel as though my own identity is being infringed upon if you were to wear hanfu. In fact, I would take it as you being interested in my culture.  But imagine someone who comes from a community where they weren’t allowed to freely express their unique cultural idiosyncracies, where they felt much more pressured to assimilate and fit in. I would think that you wearing hanfu would be absolutely seen as cultural appropriation in that case. Because the bottom line is, if they wore hanfu in their community, they would’ve probably been mocked for it, and so a person who is non-cn wearing hanfu just for fun, cheapens the struggles and the pain that they must’ve experienced ongoingly in their life. In simple words: imagine an unpopular kid at school had a mole on their face, a mole which earned them constant mockery from the popular kids. One day, however, one of the popular kids decided having a mole is “cool” and “sexy”, and drew one on their face and began sporting it around. Suddenly everyone is doing it. That kid with the mole is probably thinking having a mole is my thing, it’s part of who I am, I can’t change it, and you made my life hell because of it. Now, not only are you being a complete hypocrite, you’re also taking away a part of my identity. You’re removing the mole from it’s origin, from its context, and you’re drawing it on your face just because you like the look of it. 

There’s a reason why Chinese people from China don’t care if you go to and buy all the hanfu you want. A) it’s generating business, but more importantly B) Chinese people in China are secure in their cultural identity. Being Chinese is their every day life, it’s their norm, their background, their default. By you wishing to try Chinese clothes, eating Chinese food, to them you’re simply going with the flow of their society. Diasporas on the other hand have a completely different relationship with our culture. We’ve had to fight to carve out a space that’s just for ourselves, and no diaspora’s experience is going to be the same as another. Therefore, our relationship with our culture, and with the term “cultural appropriation” is going to be very different. 

[sartorialadventure]

As a new book is published on African wax print textiles, Vogue speaks to its author about the complex origins and stories behind eight of the most vibrant prints. Once a craze confined to Africa’s Gold Coast; now, African wax prints have gone global. Take Beyoncé, who rocked the printed cotton fabric for her baby shower last year, asking her guests to wear African-centred gelées, kufis and wax-printed pieces. “It is everywhere but at the same time people don’t know really the story and the meanings of this textile,” says Anne Grosfilley, author of a new book, African Wax Print Textiles, published by Prestel this month (£45, available here). The book is a detailed exploration of the fabric’s origins, techniques and cultural currency as well as a showcase of vibrant, eye-popping designs. “There are colours you would not see in other types of textiles,” Grosfilley says, citing deep blue with orange. These are also clothes with deep meaning: often, fabrics have hidden messages. African wax prints actually came from the Netherlands. In the second half of the 19th century, fuelled by the industrial revolution and colonial expansion, new markets opened in the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) as well as Africa. With the Netherlands securing its presence in Java, its textile companies began competing with the local artisanal batik techniques, producing their own cotton prints. These Dutch wax prints, however, bombed as the Dutch dyes created cracks, so new markets had to be found. In 1893 the first Dutch wax prints landed in the African Gold Coast (now Ghana), where they became style and status symbols. During the 1950s, their appeal spread across west Africa, when the Mercedes-Benz driving female entrepreneurs (known as the Nana Benz) bought the fabrics into Togo and gave them names to add mystique. Africa’s fight for independence in the 1960s led to wax prints being made locally. More recently, cheap Chinese copies have made wax prints more accessible to the rest of the world. Now, wax prints are worn with denim and other Western styles with men donning the print too. Here, a selection of the most intriguing wax prints and the unusual stories and meanings behind them.

Alphabet, 1920

Created in 1920, this alphabet design was worn mainly by people who went to the colonial school, and could read, write and count with the new mathematics. “People were very proud of it and they would wear this wax print to say, 'look, I’m literate and an educated person’”, says Grosfilley. Today, the design still retains this symbolism, even used by political parties for propaganda, "as if to say, 'look, this is a good value design and I am a good value president, so you should support me because I am as good as education,’” she says. Modern motifs have updated the design with computers replacing blackboards.

© Original HKM Design, 1920. Holland, Netherlands © Vlisco Group

Elizabeth II, 1956

Designed for Queen Elizabeth II’s first visit to Nigeria in 1956, Grosfilley believes this wax print was given away to ensure a crowd gave her a warm welcome - as the visit was shortly before the country gained independence. It’s an African tradition for people to wear the same fabric for a specific occasion, whether it's close family and friends at a wedding, or at a political rally where the crowd wears a print with the president’s face, or to show solidarity with a group or community. "In Africa, we are less individualistic than in the western cultures,” argues Grosfilley, though explains that each person wears print in their own way. “So you are part of a group but at the same time you are unique." Don't miss the imperfections of the wax process that appear as cracks in her fur and the early wax print colours, brown and indigo, on the original white of the fabric.

© Elizabeth II, first visit to Nigeria in 1956. Elson & Neill Wax Print A13922 Flag and Crown, United Kingdom © Cha Textiles Ltd

Fly-Whisk, 1950

A fly swatter may seem like an everyday symbol, but actually it symbolises power and prestige. Why? These are the brooms used to swat away the mosquitoes and other flies from the kings and traditional chiefs of the Akan people who live across the Ivory Coast and Ghana. Once wielding great economic power selling gold and ivory to the British and other countries, today these kings and chiefs are more symbolic. Designed in 1950, the pattern is set in big squares à la Adinkra, Adire and other African handmade textiles and has a decorative background to prevent any cracks caused by the batik process being seen.

© “Fly-Whisk” Vlisco 12188. 1950 © Vlisco Group

Darling, Don't Turn Your Back On Me, 1980s

This abstract pattern from the 1980s was inspired by paper used to wrap meat in a French butcher. According to Grosfilley: “This is the magic of wax print, as you see a design and you project something which may be completely different from the original meaning.” For women in Toga, it's known as, “darling, don’t turn your back on me,” when they think their man is not looking at them anymore, but another woman. “In real life, the men don’t understand or don’t care as they don’t pay attention to the meaning of wax print. So although the message is to the man, really it is to the other woman,” she says.

© Vlisco 11728, called “Darling, don’t turn your back on me” © Vlisco Group

[I am suddenly visualizing women wearing clothing with the boyfriend meme printed on it!]

Shell

One of the earliest wax print designs, produced in Ivory Coast, this is now a classic. Depicting the wings of the Garuda bird, Indonesia’s national emblem, this print symbolises how Indonesian designs have been re-interpreted in Africa. Take the Ghanaians, who see the design as a bunch of bananas, as “it’s part of their basic food as you’d eat it as a fruit or in a stew,” says Grosfilley. Or the Togans, who call the print, “the snail coming out of its shell,” after the snails they eat (and local phrase meaning "busybody"). Wearing the design, according to Grosfilley, means that “you should look at your own business instead of looking at what other people are doing,” she says.

© Uniwax wax print 12003, Painted in Ivory Coast © Vlisco Group

Michelle Obama's Handbag, 2008

Some designs take on famous names. There’s Kofi Annan’s brain, the heart of Barack Obama and this one, named after Michelle Obama when her husband first became the president of the United States, in 2008. The basic appeal translates as: “You cannot afford to be Michelle Obama or buy the same bag as she carries, but because you can buy the pattern on wax print it’s like you’re part of it,” says Grosfilley. Yet, the connection to Obama is accidental. “Vlisco just designed a nice bag but then it’s the African market who said, 'Wow, we should make a connection between Michelle Obama and the bag',” she says. Made from Super Wax, which is softer, thinner and has an extra colour, wearing this more expensive fabric symbolises prestige.

© Vlisco A1106, called “Michelle Obama’s Handbag”, 2008. Holland, Netherlands © Vlisco Group

Violent Eyes, The Mouth Says Nothing, 2011

The surrealist shoe with its tongue-like heel and multiple red-varnished toes is a detail of a larger design, created in 2011, in the Netherlands. Called "the eyes see, but the mouth does not speak,” the print is dominated by a huge mouth with a finger against it to say "shush, don’t speak" in the centre with little mouths in the background which also say nothing. “It’s about being an elegant woman and at the same time full of humour,” says Grosfilley. “We are saying, wear something just to see the good side of things.” The quirky design is accentuated by a bright red outline instead of the classic indigo, showing new ways of using the batik technique.

© Vlisco A1315, called “Eyes see, but the mouth does not speak", 2011. Holland Netherlands © Vlisco Group

Reproduction Fan Print, 2000s

When electrical fans were introduced to Africa in the 1980s, they appeared on wax print as signs of modernity (as did mobile phones). Now, as fans are only bought by those without air-conditioning, the meaning has changed. “It is casual. You’ve got chairs, table, so what, there’s no point,” the author says. Printed on polycotton from China rather than cotton, bright new colours have been added, like the maroon and yellow and green combo since the original design debuted.

© Wax Mitex 12033307. China.

[ouyangzizhensdad]

Do you think that making Chinese food is cultural appropriation? I'm white and started making some of the foods I saw in the shows I've watched since the untamed, but now I'm worried I'm appropriating the culture.

Hi anon,

As a fellow white person, I am also someone who needs to critically reflect on how I engage with different cultures. I can't give you the definitive answer you seek, the clear absolution from any potential wrongdoings; in its stead, I can only offer to share my current thought process on this topic. I’d still encourage you to seek other perspectives, and many people have written or spoken on this topic.

I believe we must first acknowledge that, on the terrain of the internet, discussions regarding cultural appropriation have reached a certain... extreme where some people view all forms of cultural exchanges as inherently suspect. They purport that so long as you stay within the bounds of ‘your’ culture, you will problematic behaviours. That perspective is inherent flawed. That is, it relies on a vision of culture as ‘bounded entities’ that exist in themselves. In reality, the ‘stuff’ that makes culture is emergent, existing only relationally, dialectically--it is a not a ‘thing’ that moves through time but an idea which is constantly negotiated and reproduced in relation to power and changing material realities to remain relevant and intelligible. The boundaries of cultural and ethnic groups are fuzzy, overlapping, and constantly being reworked and made meaningful. As an illustration, many of the food I grew up eating was influenced by ingredients and recipes immigrants brought in the 19th and 20th centuries, yet these dishes were understood as 'typically ours’. And it needs to be acknowledged that most of what is currently considered ‘white people food’ relies on ingredients that were introduced to our diet through colonialism and the violent dispossession of indigenous peoples (and, often, the current day exploitation of workers in the South and of migrant workers). No food can be truly ‘traditionally ours’, whatever the purported ‘we’ ends up being brought into the equation, and no eating behaviours can avoid the historical legacy and continuity of violence and power.

Of course, as people who exist in the world, we know that there are cultural differences. Bakhtin’s insights on language through the tensions between centripedal (ie towards uniformity, a common meaning) and centrifugal (toward diversity and change) forces can be expanded to help us conceptualise how we make sense of the way a ‘culture’ is perpetuated through time as something meaningful in our daily lives. Uniformity allows intelligibility, sense-making, but diversity and change are inescapable by-products of individuals and groups repeatedly going through life, meeting and trying to create intelligibility and sense together in a world that cannot stay the same. It is at the intersection of these two conflicting forces that something can be different yet considered the same--that we can create continuity out of change. But something perhaps less emphasized in Bakhtin’s discussions is how much power and material realities work on these forces. Power influences both centripedal and centrifugal forces, if only in orchestrating circumstances that shape how one encounters ‘different cultures’ or reproduces their 'own' culture.

We live at a moment where the world seems to have reached an apex of connectivity--where goods, people, ideas (and viruses) move across distance and borders at speeds that defy comprehension. Yet the way goods, people and ideas move (through which canals and systems? in which direction? to the benefits of whom? at the expense of whom? to what reception or use? in the service of which institutions and ideologies?) or are, inversely, incapable or unwilling to move, is influenced by power and material realities. It is inescapable.

In a roundabout way, what I’m trying to say is that it's useless to try to live life in 'your lane' by turning to a baseline 'culture' because we simply do not have a baseline culture to return to that is 'safe' from the influences of other cultures or the taint of the historical legacy and continuity of violence. So how do I personally reconcile that with how I engage with content that is produced from different cultural contexts, and how I engage with cooking food that is influenced by different cultural contexts? For me the guidelines I take into consideration are respect, attribution and avoiding forms of dehumanisation. These emerged out of witnessing how other white people have acted as well as critically reflecting on how I have acted in the past, and trying to do better (including of course, by listening to different perspectives on the topic). [just in case, warning for examples of racism/micro-agressions] I've been in China with white people who would praise the cooking we were eating in the same breath they were making jokes about dog meat. I've witnessed in Japan a dude decide not to come to an izakaya with Japanese colleagues, fucking off on his own to Akihabara instead, because he was disappointed he couldn’t talk about anime with them--too obsessed with the idealised version of Japan he’d created in his head to treat the Japanese people he met as people. The internet is full of white people telling you how to cook food from places they've never been and taking credit for 'popularising' that dish or 'making it better'. That's not even talking about the tendency for food to become a mark of a cosmopolitan, metropolitan identity in the West--the open-minded, the liberal, the traveler, the hip white person up with the times and beyond the mainstream. Hell, I've even seen people who act as if eating ‘ethnic’ food prepared by immigrants is the singular proof that they were people who cared about immigrants' well-being.

Food is rarely just about food, even when consumed at home. At the same time, we’d be remiss in all these discussions of power to dismiss how food is also one of oldest things we, as humans, want to share with others--including strangers. Feeding is nourishing and giving, eating is accepting into ourselves something made by others. Most people appreciate it when the value of a dish that holds importance for them is recognised by others--although, of course, many might understandably also resent that they have been discriminated against or mocked for eating that same food. Every time I’ve been invited in an immigrant household or at events with mostly immigrants, I’ve felt this sense of almost trepidation emanating from them, waiting for my reaction, and satisfaction once I was seen eating and appreciating the food they had served me--as if the acceptance of the food that was tied to their identity was a form of acceptance of who they were. Of course this can’t be disentangled from past experiences where other people might have been disrespectful, dismissive or outright racist: but the excitement they had in sharing food that had meaning to them and seeing others appreciate it was genuine.

Beyond situations of clear cultural sharing, where we get closer to what appears to be ‘cultural appropriation’, I believe that we cannot act as if there is something inherently sacrilegious in the idea of adapting recipes or using a specific ingredients in new ways--that’s centrifugal forces at play, and they have provided us with many dishes we love today: from immigrant creations like butter chicken to things like spicy kimchi. We cannot work with the assumption that people will only react with hostility at the idea of other people cooking the food they grew with, even in ways that are different from how they’re traditionally used and are thus “not authentic”. I still remember an interaction I had in a Korean grocery store, once upon a time when I lived in a metropolitan city. A man in front of me at the cash register who had been buying snacks and chatting with the employee in Korean looked at my stuff and suddenly asked me if I knew the name of the leafy green I was buying. I wasn’t necessarily surprised because I had overheard in the past customers and employees commenting in Korean about being surprised about the ingredients I, a white person, was purchasing, thinking I couldn’t understand them. I confirmed to him that I knew I was buying mustard greens. He then asked me what I was planning to do with them, and I explained that while I didn’t think it’s a traditional or common way of using it, I personally liked to add them to kimchi jjigae because it compliments their bitter/strong taste and I like leafy greens in my soups and stews. He said it was interesting, and that he was kind of impressed. The employee chimed to tell me I should be honoured at the compliment because the man was actually a chef who owned famous Korean fusion restaurants in the city. That was clearly someone who took Korean food very seriously and clearly had a certain degree of suspicion regarding how white people interacted with it, but he was also curious and interested in seeing how I approached ingredients without having grown up eating them.

Another point of contention is also that we cannot ignore that food is a sensual experience and that, while tastes are greatly influenced by our environment, they are not solely so. I grew up hating most of the food my parents would serve me, and started cooking in my early teens to avoid having to eat it. Before I started cooking, I would often just eat rice with (in hindsight horrible) western-brand soy sauce instead of the meal my mom had made. When I ate Indian food for the first time during a trip at the ripe age of 16, it blew my mind that food could taste like this. Of course I never wanted to look back, and with each years I discovered that a lot of Asian cuisines fit my palate better than what I grew up eating or other cuisines I had tried. When I was a teenager we visited my mom’s friend in France and I hated what she served us so much I’d simply choose to nibble on bread, prompting her to try to stage an intervention for my ‘obvious’ anorexia. Yet, being in China made me realise ingredients I thought I hated had just been cooked in ways I disliked. Do my taste buds absolve me from any need to think critically about how I interact with food? Of course not. But sometimes the reason we want to cook certain recipes and foods is just that it tastes great to us, and we want to reproduce the recipes we enjoyed with the ingredients and the skills we have. Or, really, sometimes we just want to try new tastes because we do a lot of eating throughout our lives, and it seems a waste to limit ourselves to a narrow number of dishes for decades to come.

So that’s where I currently am in my thinking about this topic, as a white person who cooks dishes influenced by a number of different places but who is also not trying to cook in a way that is necessarily authentic. Some things that I keep in mind that you can ask yourself now that cdramas and cnovels have made you interested in Chinese cooking is: are you taking this as an opportunity to support immigrant businesses when getting your ingredients? are you supporting white creators when looking for chinese recipes (some suggestion of youtube channels: Made with Lau, Chinese cooking Demystified, Family in Northwest China, 西北小强 Xibeixiaoqiang, 小高姐的 Magic Ingredients)? are you being respectful (not reproducing harmful stereotypes in how you talk about chinese food and the people who eat it)? do you use your interest in Chinese food to create a narrative about China and Chinese people that denies them, in some way, of their complexity and humanity? are you using your interest in Chinese food to create a narrative about yourself?

In conclusion I will leave you with a picture of some misshapen baozi I’ve made.

[painted-crow]

Okay this is wildly off topic but I saw that you cook japanese food. Can you recommend some dishes to try or ways to get myself to like it? I want to like Japanese food so bad but I haven't liked anything I've tried aside from super basic stuff like sushi, teriyaki, and gyoza. I've even tried making curry and omurice at home and everyone except me loved it.

Japanese cooking resources

Ah, I have been called upon! Lemme dig some stuff out of my Bird nest for you :D

Disclaimer: I'm not Japanese or an expert on this. I'm just a cooking nerd who thinks Japan has the best food and experimented a whole bunch with Internet recipes and stuff from the Asian market.

Recipes

I learned a lot of what I know from these two foodie blogs:

Just One Cookbook

No Recipes

(the latter site does, in fact, contain recipes, but the blogger would encourage you to build the confidence to cook without them)

Since you're having trouble finding dishes you like, I suggest starting with udon: thick, chewy noodles often served in dashi broth, perhaps with fried toppings. You can prepare udon a bunch of different ways, that's just a classic one--but no matter how you make it, udon is a pretty easy sell. Tonkatsu is another dish that's hard to dislike, and makes a good topping for your udon if you want to make both at once!

Fun travel memoir

There is a fantastic book called Pretty Good Number One: An American Family Eats Tokyo.

It's a foodie travel memoir and it's exactly what it sounds like: this guy went to Tokyo for a month with his wife and daughter and they ate a bunch of food, his daughter made friends with half of the entire population of Tokyo, and he wrote about it. He's a really entertaining writer, and it has great descriptions of all kinds of Japanese food, so from there it's easy to go look up recipes.

Shopping

You'll want to go to an actual Asian market if you can find one locally. Use Google, they're often tucked into odd buildings.

Different Asian markets cater to different cultures' cuisines, so there might be one market with a full assortment of Indian MTR spice blends but no kombu or katsuobushi in sight. They usually have a variety though. If you can find an H Mart, you're golden (H Mart is Korean, but will have the stuff you need for Japanese food). Be willing to explore a bit! Last resort, go ahead and use Amazon, but trust me--the Asian markets are cheaper, and I much prefer supporting them to feeding Amazon.

Just One Cookbook also has a list of Japanese pantry essentials, which is really good, but it's also really completionist (I don't even have all of those premade sauces) and stretches the definition of "pantry" a bit, so it seems more intimidating than it should.

Here's my version.

Pantry essentials:

Good soy sauce. Just get something that says "traditionally brewed" and you're fine. If you spot dark soy sauce: it's smokier and less salty, very different, it can't replace normal soy sauce but you might grab it too.

Short grain "sushi" rice. Try not to overpay for it. If you're in an Asian market you're fine. If you're in the fancy organic section of Hy-Vee, you're gonna get ripped off.

Mirin. A seasoned cooking wine. Unfortunately, bad mirin is easy to find and is loaded with corn syrup. Try to find some that isn't; remember, ingredients are listed on the bottle proportionally. It's very worth paying $10 for a good bottle of mirin. I don't *think* you have to be 21 to buy it? Drinking it would probably be unappealing. Mirin is very important, and it's a versatile cooking ingredient; once you know what it does you might find yourself putting it in everything.

Sake. You do have to be of legal drinking age to buy this. Which kind you get for cooking isn't a super big deal, and you can get by with just mirin most of the time.

Kombu and katsuobushi. The former is a kind of seaweed/kelp (it may look dusty with white powder; that's natural MSG and it's a good thing). The latter is shaved dried smoked skipjack tuna and looks a bit like pencil shavings; you might see them labeled "bonito flakes." They're common ingredients for dashi (basic Japanese cooking stock), but you'll see katsuobushi used as a topping on lots of savory dishes. If you can't find these, try looking for dashi powder or tea bag type dealies.

Toasted sesame oil. Not hard to find.

Rice vinegar. Same.

Panko bread crumbs. These are special, lofty, crispy breadcrumbs. They're different because of SCIENCE and are what happens when you electrocute bread dough. I'm not joking.

Cornstarch/potato starch. I slightly prefer potato starch (good texture), but they're not that different.

Nori. These are those pressed algae sheets you use to wrap sushi, but they're used for other stuff too, like onigiri, or shredded as a topping.

Noodles. Obviously, if you want to make udon, you need to buy some. You can easily find dried udon, but if you spot frozen or even fresh udon noodle packs, grab them.

If you can find an Asian market that stocks all this, you should be able to get the whole list for around $50. Asian markets tend not to be expensive, which is yet another good reason to learn to cook Japanese food. (Other reasons: healthy, tasty, easy to cook in a small kitchen...)

Of course, you also don't need to get the whole list at once! It's not cheating to just get what you need for a particular dish.

Fun stuff you can find at Asian markets

With the basics out of the way, here are additional tasty things you might want to look for:

Furikake. Not strictly necessary, but I like it. It's a topping/seasoning blend you can mix into your rice, and it comes in lots of flavors, some fishier than others. Start with a nori or vegetable flavor if you're uncertain. Tamago flavor = egg.

Ramune. If you've never had marble soda before, don't deny yourself the adventure of trying to figure out how to get the bottle open. Lots of flavors.

Good instant ramen. Nongshim's Shin Ramyun is what I usually get, and even Walmart sells it. You'll never buy Maruchan again.

Candy. So, I don't know who's in charge of Japanese fruit flavored candy, but it actually tastes like fruit, which is wild.

Yuzu and/or sudachi juice. If you can find these, grab 'em. They're citrus juices. Yuzu is a bit like lemon but less strongly sour and more... clean? Crisp? while sudachi is a bit like lime but more green and complex. I'm describing these poorly. You might also be able to find candy or drinks with these flavors.

Sugary drinks with nata de coco in them. Nata de coco is a firm jelly-like dessert type... thing. It's made from coconuts and it's got a unique jelly/crunchy texture and is odd but good. You might be able to find nata de coco on its own, but I'll warn you: the kind you get packed in jars will be Very Sugary.

Tapioca pearls. If you like bubble tea, here's the place to get your boba.

Umeboshi plums. These sour/salty pickled plums are a tasty ramen topping.

Ice cream. Those square melon popsicles are delicious, but get them home quickly, their texture is very temperature sensitive! And if you spot individually wrapped ice cream cones, grab one.

Euro cakes. These look kinda like round Twinkies, but Twinkies only dream of being this tasty. I like the pandan flavor best. Don't be put off by the green color.

Soft tofu. So good 🥰 and weirdly hard to find in supermarkets. It's got a texture like custard, and apart from its fairly neutral, fresh flavor, will easily pick up any flavors you put on it. An excellent addition to udon soup; add it last, the tofu is fragile (and doesn't actually require cooking). Silken tofu sometimes comes in shelf stable packages. My experience with those has been fine, but the general consensus is that the tofu you get from the fridge section is better.

Frozen pork buns. They might be labeled "siopao" or "bao" (Chinese names) or "nikuman" (Japanese name). Lil bread buns with bbq pork or other fillings. You steam them in the microwave and they're delicious.

I'd recommend having fun getting a few of the things off this list, rather than being a completionist about the first one, if you find yourself choosing between the two. That said, make sure you get the stuff you need for the thing you want to make!

Okay, now I want a pork bun. I wonder if my brother's eaten them all yet...

[i-did]

A guide for proper terminology for Nicky Hemmick:

Written by me, a Mexican-American.

Latin American: someone from Latin America, this includes Mexico but not Spain. Latin America is multi ethnic, and not just Spanish speaking, the non Spanish speaking countries of Latin America are Brazil, Belize, Suriname, Guyana, French Guiana, and the Falkland Islands.

Latino: decent from Latin America, similar to saying Latin American, but can include people born in America of Latin American decent. People don't really say "Latin American American," they say Latino American. (Latina = woman, and Latine = neutral but not commonly used, often typed Latin@s online for shorthand to include both). Latin American countries are very diverse, some are dominantly black/Afro-Latino.

Afro-Latino: Afro-Latin Americans are dominantly from African decent, some Latin American countries are majorly black/Afro-Latino. when used outside of Latin America it can mean someone who’s mixed black and Latino. 

Latinx: "gender neutral" term for Latino, but probably made by white people because .... Spanish words don't end in x, and x isn't pronounced that way in Spanish, for example the name Xitlali (sometimes spelled Zitlali and other variations, but pronounced like an S). Honestly say Latino/Latinos or Latin@s, and in online queer spaces Latine/Latines.

Chicano: Latin American decent but born in America.

Hispanic: related to Spain, colonized by Spain, so this includes Spain but not Brazil, which is a Latin American country.

Mexican: a person from Mexico living in America, for example Nicky's mom, but often also casually used to mean Mexican Americans (or Latino/Chicanos in general).

Mexican American: Latin American decent born into America. Unlike chicano, it is associated more with the idea of assimilation into white America, but not always.

Mexicano: what Mexicans call themselves in Mexico (feminine is Mexicana).

TexMex: people who were living in Mexico, and then America bought/stole the land and said "this is also America now, you can leave or stay" and they stayed. They became Americans, Texas Mexican American culture is different than for example SoCal Mexican American culture because of this, (but still more in common with each other than not).

Anglo: someone who is non Latino, usually in reference to someone who lives in the America's that were colonized by British people and English is the standard spoken language, ex/ North Americans and Canadians who aren't Latino. Usually in reference to white people but not always. If someone is Asian American and constantly purposefully mispronounces my name, instead of being like "🙄white people" I can be like "🙄 Anglos" (or I could say gringo, which is not as nice of a term for anglo). I honestly don’t know if I can call a spaniard anglo, but I assume not, since they're not Anglo-Saxon, which is where the term comes from.

despite what the media represents, not all Latino’s are Mexican! although the two terms are often used interchangeably when they’re really not. there are 32 other countries besides Mexico in Latin America.

Mexican is technically a nationality, but because of colonialism it’s not that simple. Race dynamics work differently in different countries. Most Mexicanos are not connected with their mixed indigenous ancestors, while some still are, like the Maya. It is something that has been taken from us and has evolved into its own thing. Some Mexicanos are lighter than others, sometimes by being more related to the Spanish than the indigenous. Mexico has a huge problem with colorism and class divide as well as overall racial tension.

Mexico is also not only "white/more Spanish" "more brown" and "fully indigenous, culturally and ethnically", there are afro-latinos (like mentioned before), and also Asian latinos, specifically a large amount of Chinese immigrants from when China became communist, middle eastern latinos, etc. Latin America has immigrants too! 

I have a friend who is fully Korean but grew up in Guatemala, I have another friend from Brazil who is 100% of polish and Ashkenazi decent, her grandparents having escaped to Brazil during WWII, but she and her parents grew up and spent their whole lives in Brazil, they are Latin Americans. 

List of things Nicky's mom Maria is:

Mexican, Mexicana, Latina, Latin American, 'Hispanic' but like.... outdated term and usually when people use this they just mean Latin@.

List of things Nicky is:

Mexican-American, Latino, "Mexican" in the broad sense of the word.

Describing Nicky or his mother as "looking hispanic" doesn't really make sense because he takes after his mother who is described as very dark and therefore less Spanish decent and more indigenous decent, she's from a Spanish speaking country so... its not technically wrong, but Nicky is from and English speaking one and doesn't speak Spanish, so it doesn't really make sense.

He isn't Chicano and neither is she, she wasn't born in America and Nicky doesn't identify as Chicano or in general much with his mothers culture beyond visible features. He is never mentioned to make Mexican food, listen to Latin American music, or other aspects of Latino culture in general. He chose to go to Germany instead of Spain or Latin America, and he talked Aaron out of taking Spanish in exchange for German so Nicky could help him with his homework, (meaning he doesn't know Spanish, which many Mexican Americans don't know).

saying Nicky “looked Mexican” or “looked brown” isn’t a bad thing, Neil in the books says he’s two shades too dark to be considered tan, so... stop tip-toeing around it and call him brown instead of tan. It’s not a bad thing to be brown, and It’s not a bad thing to be Mexican. maybe I’m just from somewhere with a lot of Mexican-Americans, but when I look at people I can tell they’re not Anglos, or I think to myself “oh another Mexican” or at least “brown person” vs when I see a white person I think “white person.” I’m not face blind, I know that different races exist and look different and can see such trends in real people in the same way that when I look at a little girl I go “oh a little girl” not “what sex is this weird hairless animal, what is this alien”.

these concepts are a lot more complicated in practice, I get told often I don’t “look Mexican” but so does one of my cousins who’s afro latino and plays professional basketball in Mexico. Gender is fake but the majority of people we see are still falling into two categories on sight, it’s how we’re socially trained. 

I'm also not an encyclopedia, if you think I made a mistake let me know and I'll check it out. A lot of this was just off the top of my head and words I just learned from.... existing, I didn't exactly look them all up in the dictionary.

Also if you’re writing Nicky, don’t be afraid to get a sensitivity reader, @sensitivityreaders is a good resource for this, and so is @writingwithcolor

[olderthannetfic]

It's really surprising that you're so well versed in older fandoms and yet participate in new popular ones (that cdrama, kpop) is this by design? Im in my twenties and my interest turnover is already way slower than it used to be

You know, that’s a really interesting question. I wouldn’t say it’s by design exactly in that I do tend to just follow what strikes my fancy, and I can’t force myself to want to write fic for just anything. (I find it easier to like reading fic without serious involuntary emotional investment, but writing takes more. Vidding I can do on command most of the time, but I don’t usually bother unless I have a lot of feels or I’m fulfilling someone’s prompt.)

However, me getting into BTS was 100% due to me wanting to understand BTS enough to explain to people who weren’t very interested but wanted to know what was going on in fandom lately. Under normal circumstances, I run the dance party at Escapade, the oldest extant slash con. We borrowed vividcon’s thing of playing fanvids on the wall--all of them set to dance music--as the soundtrack for the dance party. This means I’m creating a 3-hour mixtape of fannishness, which has amazing potential to make people feel in the know about Fandom Today... and equal potential to make them feel alienated if nothing they care about shows up. Only about 100-150 people attend the con, so it really is possible to make a playlist that feels inclusive yet informative--it just takes a huge amount of work.

Every year, I do a lot of research on which fandoms are getting big and look for vids from vidders people won’t have heard of, so there is an element of consciously trying to keep up with things. Generally, I only get into these fandoms myself if I had no idea what they were and then suddenly, oops, they’re my kryptonite, like the buddy cop android plot in Detroit: Become Human, which sucked me in hard for like 6 months on the basis of a vid.

(So if you’re into cross-fandom meta and associated stuff as one of your fannish interests, you tend to have broader knowledge of different fandoms, old and new, than if you’re just looking for the next place you’ll read fic. It’s also easier to love vids for unfamiliar things than fic.)

But though I was only looking for a basic primer on BTS, BTS has 7 members with multiple names and no clear juggernaut pairing, not to mention that AU that runs through the music videos and lots of other context to explain. The barrier to understanding WTF was going on at all was high enough that to know enough to explain, I had to be thoroughly exposed... And once I was over that hurdle, oops, I had a fandom.

--

In terms of old vs. new, here’s the thing: kpop fandoms in English and c-drama fandoms in English right now feel a lot like anime fandom in English did in the early 00s. I had a Buddy Cops of the 70s phase in the middle, but my current fannishness is actually a return to my older fannishness in many ways.

What do I mean about them being similar?

Yes, I know some wanker will show up to say I think China, Korea, and Japan are indistinguishable, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the way that I used to routinely meet Italian and French and German fans, Argentinian and Mexican, Malaysian and Indonesian and Filipino too. English-language fandom of SPN or MCU may have all those fans from all those countries, but it feels very American most of the time. English-language fandom of a non-English-language canon is more overtly about using English as a lingua franca.

It also tends to attract people who as a sideline to their fannishness are getting into language learning and translation, which are my other passion in life after fanworks fandom. (I speak only English and Spanish and a bit of Japanese, but I’ve studied German, French, Russian, Mandarin, Old English, and now Korean.)

Nerds arguing about methods of language learning and which textbooks are good and why is my jam. This is all over the place in English-language fandoms of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean media. Those fandoms also tend to be full of speakers coming from a Germanic or Romance languages background who face similar hurdles in learning these languages. (In other words, if you’re a native Japanese speaker trying to learn Korean, the parts that will be hard for you are different than if you’re an English speaker, but you’re also usually not doing fandom in English.)

There’s also an element of scarcity and difficulty of access and a communal attempt to construct a canon (in the other sense) of stuff from that country that pertains to one’s fannishness. So, for example, a primer explaining the genre of xianxia is highly relevant to being a n00b Untamed fan, but just any old thing about China is not. A c-drama adapted from a danmei webnovel is perhaps part of the new pantheon of Chinese shit we’re all getting into, but just any old drama from decades ago is probably not... unless it’s a genre precursor to something else we care about. Another aspect here is that while Stuff I Can Access As A N00b Who Doesn’t Speak The Language may be relatively scarce, there’s a vast, vast wealth of stuff that exists.

This is what it felt like to be an anime fan in the US in 2000. As translation got more commercial and more crappy series were licensed and dumped onto an already glutted market, the vibe changed. No longer were fans desperately trying to learn enough of the language to translate or spending their time cataloguing what existed or making fanworks about a show they stuck with for a bit: the overall community focus turned to an endless race of consumption to keep up with all of the latest releases. That’s a perfectly valid way of being fannish, but if I wanted that, I’d binge US television 24/7.

Anime fandom got bigger, but what I liked about anime fandom in English died, and I moved on. (Okay, I first moved on to Onmyouji, which is a live action Japanese thing, but still.)

Hardcore weeaboos and now fans of Chinese and Korean stuff don’t stop at language: people get excited about cooking, my other other great passion. Times a thousand if the canon is something like The Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty, which is full of loving shots of food preparation. People get excited about history! Mandarin and Japanese may share almost nothing in terms of grammar or phonology, but all of East Asia has influence from specific Chinese power centers historically, and there are commonalities to historical architecture and clothing that I love.

I fell out of love with the popular anime art styles as they changed, and I’m not that into animation in general these days. (I still own a shitton of manga in art styles I like, like Okano Reiko’s Onmyouji series.) I’ve become a filmmaker over the last decade, and I’m very excited about beautiful cinematography and editing. With one thing and another, I’m probably not going to get back into anime fandom, but it’s lovely to revisit the cultural aspects I enjoyed about it via live-action media.

BTS surprised me too, to be honest. I really dislike that early 90s R&B ballad style that infests idol music (not just Korean--believe me, I resisted many rounds of “But Johnny’s Entertainment though!” back in the day). While I like some of the dance pop, I just don’t care. But OH NO, BTS turn out to be massive conscious hip hop fanboys, and their music sounds different. I have some tl;dr about my reactions in the meta I wrote about one of my fanvids, which you can find on Dreamwidth here.

--

But back to your comment about turnover: I know fans from the 70s who’ve had one great fannish love and that’s it and more who were like that but eventually moved on to a second or third. They’re... really fannishly monogamous in a way I find hard to comprehend. It was the norm long ago, but even by the 90s when far more people were getting into fandom, it was seen as a little weird. By now, with exponentially more people in fandom, it’s almost unheard of. I think those fans still exist, even as new people joining, but we don’t notice them. They were always rare, but in the past, only people like that had the stamina to get over the barriers to entry and actually become the people who made zines or were willing to be visibly into fanfic in eras when that was seen as really weird. On top of that, there’s an element of me, us, judging the past by what’s left: only people with an intense and often single passion are visible because other people either drifted away or have seamlessly disappeared into some modern fandom. They don’t say they’re 80 or 60 or 40 instead of 20, so nobody knows.

In general, I’m a small fandoms and rare ships person. My brain will do its best to thwart me by liking whatever has no fic even in a big fic fandom... (Except BTS because there is literally fic for any combination of them, like even more than for the likes of MCU. Wow. Best fandom evar!) So I have an incentive to not get complacent and just stick with one fandom because I would very soon have no ability to be in fandom at all.

My appetite for Consuming All The Things has slowed way down, but it also goes in waves, and a lot of what I’m consuming is what I did back in 2000: journal articles and the limited range of English-language books on the history of m/m sex and romance in East Asia. It’s not so much that I have a million fandoms as that I’m watching a few shows as an expression of my interest in East Asian costume dramas and East Asian history generally.

I do like to sit with one thing and experience it deeply rather than moving on quickly, but the surface expression of this has changed depending on whether I’m more into writing fic or more into doing research or something else.

But yes, I do do a certain amount of trying to stay current, often as a part of research for fandom meta or to help other people know what’s going on. Having a sense of what’s big doesn’t automatically mean getting into all those things, but I think some fans who are older-in-fandom and/or older-in-years stop being open to even hearing what’s new. And if you’ve never heard of it, you’ll never know if you might have liked it.

[rigelmejo]

I’ve read parts of this article on Pride and Prejudice translation three times now and so I suppose I should share it.

Misinterpreting Jane Austen? A Feminist Perspective on the Chinese Versions of Pride and Prejudice

http://jasna.org/publications-2/persuasions-online/vol38no1/yi/

It really makes me think about how easy it is to have huge themes in a work just lost or muddled intensely if they aren’t paid particular nuanced focus to during translation. How each line could have more nuance to it then a surface level “any synonym will get the point across” and how just lacking cultural context can cause big points in a sentence to be abandoned in translation (the use of “rational creatures” in Pride and Prejudice is a huge reference to bringing up feminist thoughts, but read literally could be translated as ‘i think’ or ‘i’m reasonable’ or ‘i’m regular’ and could miss a big chunk of meaning being conveyed). Meaning is usually lost somewhat in translation because its hard to maintain the nuance of the original words, even if you know all the context and are prioritizing themes in each sentence! So of course its a struggle.

I just think its something to be mindful when engaging with translations in general. And certainly webnovel ones where so often the translators are fan translators with various skill levels in language and/or translation and/or in meaning of the deeper themes of a text, and paid translators on big webnovel sites, often translating under time constraints to do a job Fast rather than ‘as close to accurate as possible’ which could take a lot more time. That’s not even getting into the machine translations (and cleaned up mtls) of webnovels, that some actual webnovel sites use (which can have very little if any editing done), and some fans do when its the best/fastest chance to ever read the novel (in which case even if its edited by people for improvements over time it will be constrained by the original mtl translator program’s failures in word choice and unawareness of story nuances). It’s already a mess to judge a work of art made in another culture, without being aware of that culture’s artistic goals and norms and expectations etc. Those values must be acknowledged, because to judge it as something outside its context removes so much. That applies to translations too - which can maybe be interpreted on their merit as localizations. When there is one - like maybe Drakengard 3 and if its localization changes were a good or bad thing for its story in the context of an english speaking market? or if Final Fantasy XV localization changes were? which i imagine the localization teams themselves had to judge its work on. On the case of like “how does this work as a localization” but still the questions of its original context in its original lanuage, intent, comes up. Do you get rid of ramen in favor of a different food? Do you get rid of San and say “Mr” - what is kept, why is it kept, does it require outside understanding of context, is that worth keeping even if it does? 

Like perhaps the pride and prejudice translator changed “rational creature” to “ordinary person” because they wanted to abandon explaining the feminist idea of “rational creature” altogether, considering that context too far removed from a translation, and instead decided on making the line mean more broadly “like a normal person my rejection is serious - i’m not playing a silly game with you.” which is roughly fair in meaning, but has lost the concept of “i’m rational like Any Person, even though you consider women irrational that is incorrect.” I see why the translation could have made sense to do - and its what i’m sure localization translators deal with deciding every day - “what do we keep for overall story’s meaning understood by this new target audience?” versus “what details do we abandon at the cost of nuance, because it might make it harder for this target audience to connect to the overall story?” etc.

My point i suppose is just, sometimes I see arguments about webnovels and their meanings as understood BY the translation. And many people much better with words than me have made good points that one can’t judge a work based on english speaking culture standards when it wasn’t made in that context, was not aimed at that target audience, and has context surrounding it that in general an english audience will not be aware of. Just to add to that - the translations themselves.

The translations also are going to have context missing, or have changed some context and nuance to translators tastes. Like localizing to try and make it more comprehensible to the audience, or because the cultural reference needs some ‘equivalent’ the translator thinks the english audience will be more likely to know - i immediately think of Word of Honor choosing “chevalier” for “daxia” and “river of lethe” and greek myth metaphors, instead of the actual concept the dialogue refers to (and Word of Honor was professionally translated). Even among professional differences - just look at The Untamed that has different versions translating “zhiji” as bossom friend, good friend, soulmate, and gongzi as Childe, and names as just a whole range of weirdly varying ones different from what’s actually said. A lot of webnovels are not professionally translated (and of the ones that are, if they have speed deadlines they also might not get an ideal amount of time to decide how to ‘most accurately’ maintain the nuance, if that’s even a goal of a specific translator because different translators have different goals). 

Not only is it not something created in the english audience culture (so why compare it on those specific cultural expectations it wasn’t made for), but also each translation is not going to be a fully accurate depiction of the original. Every translation will vary. Some translations will leave out cultural nuance, or even change it, or just not notice it was there to begin with. Word choice alone will change the meaning of some sentences and dialogue - and it can be as simple as one seemingly straightforward word change (like “rational creature” in Pride and Prejudice). Translation changes can affect the meaning you get from a story when its done professionally, when its been done and tried different ways multiple times for decades! Surely translations done for webnovels are going to have points where its like... to judge it is to at most interpret this translator’s work. Because there isn’t a full picture of the original work, a translation can’t give you that. Like others have said, its not great trying to expect works from different cultures to match up to a different culture’s expectations/aspects, but then also translations themselves will fail to retain aspects - or will all highlight such aspects in different ways and also in different ways for the reader to interpret (leaving more original context with footnotes, simplifying details and removing authors nuance, changing context to try and come up with an equivalent the reader might understand easier, etc). And that doesn’t even cover how any machine translator usage is going to also be destroying so much nuance, context, meaning, and even changing it in random ways - if its used for any of the steps, before the translator’s personal goals even start affecting the translation’s shape and meaning etc.

I have a huge newfound respect for the people translating Haruki Murakami... if Pride and Prejudice is this easy to change themes on/interpret differently even though its overall a very straightforward novel structure, I can only imagine how hard Haruki Murakami’s meanings and themes are to preserve...

[amenomiko]

Aaaaaa Thank You so much for the looooooooooooong wait! I was too occupied and writer's block makes me tired more than ever 😭. Thank you so much for the request @ashavazesa ❤❤❤❤❤

A/N: I don't really take ALL Southeast Asia countries in this as I'm not really familiar with it. If you have questions regarding the culture, you may PM me or comment here ❤. Or you may google it, especially Butod 😏.

Lords x Southeast Asia Culture

Nobunaga - Hungry Ghost Festival (Malaysia / Singapore)

-It is a festival to honor the dead and so the gate from hell is opened.

-Mitsuhide: Most probably when the gate from hell is open, there will be Hideyoshi, practically running here and there upon his arrival ( ͡^ ͜ʖ ͡^).

-Masamune: Exactly. With the red carpet and rose petals. Heh.

-Hideyoshi: ಠ_ಠ.... Still- Nobunaga-sama's presence itself is majestic, so I have to agree with both of you *cough*

-Mitsunari: But I don't understand.. Hideyoshi-sama is kind, why would he be in hell (´；д；`)?

-Hideyoshi: Now, now, Mitsunari. Not everyone will go to heaven easily.

-Mitsuhide: Indeed. One of the main reasons why he goes to hell is because he sister-zoned every maiden in the world.

-Hideyoshi: H E Y (　☉д⊙)!

-Back to Nobunaga: I demand my offering to be a pack of armies, thousands of konpeitos, and MC's candid pictures 😏😏😏😏.

-Shingen: How indecent. To hell with you 😒.

-Kennyo: Go somewhere else, don't take my place 😒.

-Nobunaga: Excuse me? Hell would not be yours as I am the Demon King

-Kennyo: Excuse you 😒. My sin is bigger than yours.

-MC: Is it me or is this a White Girls Sengoku Version ಠ_ಠ?

-Ieyasu: ...Why would anyone want to fight over hell in the first place =_=?

Hideyoshi - Everyone is Addressed as Boss / Uncle / Aunty (Malaysia)

-So he went to a restaurant..

-"Boss. What do you want to order?"

-He look left. And right.

-"Eh Boss. You want to order or not?"

-"Huh? M-me??"

-Then he went to a public place, and his wallet fell from his pocket,

-"Uncle. Excuse me."

-Uncle-- WHAT- He is not THAT OLD-- "Wh- Wha??"

-"Aiya Uncle. Your wallet. Later people take your money how?"

-"Uh--" What kind of language is that anyway??

-Sasuke: If you are wondering what kind of language they speak, it is called as 'Manglish', Hideyoshi-san.

-Hideyoshi: Ma- Ma what?

-Sasuke: Manglish. Malaysian + English casual ways of talking to someone.

-Random person: Eh Boss, excuse me. Do you want to enter or not? If not please move lah! You are blocking the door!

-Hideyoshi: ........*Stressed 101*

Masamune - Butod (Sago Grub) (Malaysia - Sabah)

-Le butod: *Wiggle wiggle wiggle* OwO

-And MC: *FAINTS*

-"So this is a.. Grub from sago tree, you say? And it is recommended to be eaten raw."

-"It looks like MC when she was struggling to get away from my grip when I try to kiss her."

-MC, who has fainted, woke up "Excuse me?? Are you saying that I am-"

-Butod: *Wiggle Wiggle on Masamune's Palm* OwO

-MC: *gasssppp* 😱😱😱😱 YOU..! DON'T TOUCH ME WITH THAT HAND TONIGHT ˚‧º·(˚ ˃̣̣̥A˂̣̣̥ )‧º·˚!

-Masamune: Eeeeh but why? *Pulls its head and eat it raw* Hmm.. Taste like chicken.

-MC: .....*Takes a bottle of sake and shove it into his mouth* Wash it down with this! WASH IT WITH T H I S!

-Masamune: MMMMF ��😵😵😵!!

Mitsuhide - Chinese New Year Celebrations (Malaysia / Singapore)

-He was offered with lots of CNY treats and of course, he ate it without refusing it.

-Only to get the bewildered reactions from the people around him when he mixed the rice + fish + dumplings + sweet rice balls + spring rolls + glutinous rice cake in one bowl and eat it like nobody's business.

-Hideyoshi: Even if you can't taste it, don't eat it in that way (　☉д⊙)!!

-"Why Hideyoshi? This foods represents luck, you see. I need this luck so I can always escape from your endless 'love' ( ͡^ ͜ʖ ͡^)."

-Learned about Ang Pow.

-"So you will give away money if you are married, and will receive it if you are not married. I see..."

-MC: What's wrong, Mitsuhide?

-"Hmm? Oh, I was just concerned about Hideyoshi. Because he will give away Ang Pows throughout his life." *Shakes his head* "That's what he gets when he sister-zoned everyone."

-Hideyoshi: ʕʘ̅͜ʘ̅ʔ.....

Ieyasu - Sambal (Hot Relish made with veggies / fruits and spices) (Indonesia)

-At first he was skeptical.

-Until he put some in his dish.

-Cues Ieyasu hugging the Sambal Jar.

-Growls when Masamune said "Can I have a look what they put inside-- Hey, hey, I said I want to have a look, not that I will eat it, lad. Calm down."

-Nobunaga, the usual demon on your shoulder: It's that precious, hmm? So you'd rather choose that than MC?

-MC: Please don't make me an option between food, Nobunaga ಠ_ಠ.

-Mitsuhide: Or maybe.. You can eat her by pouring all over her ( ͡^ ͜ʖ ͡^)?

-MC: I will become a living swollen red bell pepper, no thanks (눈‸눈).

Mitsunari - Vietnam and the amount of motorcyclists on the road (Vietnam)

-The gangs be all flustered with their surroundings, especially Hideyoshi.

-"Stay close, all of you! It's dangerous!"

-Masamune & Mitsuhide: Yes mom ( ͡^ ͜ʖ ͡^)~

-Hideyoshi: Who is your MOM (　☉д⊙)??

-Sasuke: It's alright, they say you can cross it casually as they will automatically avoid you.

-Hideyoshi: Impossible, isn't it dangerous? Besides, it's too close one after another!

-Sasuke: Here, let me give you an example. *Gives Mitsunari a book and whispered "You may cross now."*

-Our pure angel be like "O3O ooooh~~" And there he goes, walking straight ahead, with head buried in a book.

-Meanwhile, Hideyoshi: *Were pulled by both Masa and Mitsuhide* GAHH LET GO OF ME! MITSUNARIIIII \(Q A Q)/!!!! *GASP* NOOO NOBUNAGA-SAMA DON'T CROSS THE ROAD WHILE EATING YOUR KONPEITOOO!!!

-And Ieyasu, who has been watching Mitsunari who crossed the road safely to the other side: TCH. There's no one that hit him (•ˋ _ ˊ•).

Kenshin: 5 People on one Motorcycle (Indonesia)

-The first thing that he ask Sasuke was...

-"What is that?"

-Sasuke: Oh, as you can see, Kenshin-sama. Some people from a poor family will ride their motorcycle altogether as one. And so,.. Kenshin-sama?

-"Bringing the motorcycle back to the past would cause unnecessary scene, but an idea of 5 people in one ride is not bad. Hm."

-"Imagine, when you go to the battlefield, with 5 people in one horse, you can kill 5 people at one time."

-"Also, if they bring sake supplies, and 1 person hold one sake each, and there's 10 horses, I would've get 500 bottles in an hour."

-Them: ........

-Sasuke: Can't do, Kenshin-sama. Please pity our horse and if you work here, in this era, please don't be a math teacher. You will give a bad example in your class.

-Kenshin: Don't stop what I want to do, Sasuke (눈‸눈). Fine. Let's change that 5 person into me, and the killed people to Shingen instead. So it will be 5 of me, killing Shingen in one strike.

-Shingen: Psssh. If I were you, there will be 5 of me on one horse, so all of us can kiss MC in one go 😏✨✨✨.

-Yukimura: PLEASE STOP GAH MY BRAIN @A@

Shingen - Thailands... and their Kathoey (Thailand)

-Welp. His eyebrows wouldn't stop wiggling here and there to every pretty woman that he spotted.

-'Woman'. Heh.

-Sasuke about to warn him but Kenshin hold him back.

-"Let's teach him a lesson." He said. "It will be interesting." He said.

-And so they go to one place for dinner, when they were surrounded by a bunch of pretty women.

-"Hey handsome~~ wanna have fun with us?"

-Yukimura: Eh- uh- eh- I- I- o//////o

-"Oh come on~~~ *grope*"

-Yukimura: *Genuine Girlish Voice* KYAAAAAAAAA!!! *Fainted with foams*

-Shingen: Now, now, you girls are pretty attempting, but we need to fill our empty stomachs first, you see?

-He was occupied in talking to the girls when Sasuke whispered something to one of them without him realizing it. Then the girl went to Shingen's side, hugging his arm, "Please~ have fun with us~~ I will give you a reward if you say 'Yes'~"

-Shingen, playing along: Oooh? What would that be?

-Le girl, changing her voice into a manly one, "A lick of my lollipop, bro."

-And he fainted next to Yukimura. With foams in his mouth too.

Yukimura - Bali and their.... 'Souvenirs' (Indonesia)

-The first thing that came out from his mouth when he arrived at Bali is "Wh- wh- wh- r-romantic island?? Wh- who would show their intimacy in public--"

-*Shriek to a statue with a peculiar s*x position*

-*Shriek to almost everything*

-*Got stuck in one place until Sasuke had to pulled him out from the shop*

-Sasuke: Forgive me, bro. It's Shingen-sama's idea to enter this shop. It's normal for you to be culture shocked as one of their famous souvenirs is wee wee keychains (´・д・｀).

-"Don't say that casually OAO!"

-MC, takes one wee wee display and called out for him, "Yukimura~ come here for a sec. Look! Your wee wee (✿❛◡❛)!"

-"MMMMMCCCCCC ୧( ಠ////Д////ಠ )୨!!!!"

-Also Yukimura: *Gasp* This shop sells your kind! *Points at the restaurant that displays Rolling Pig*

-Scene of Yukimura got slapped by MC unfolds.

Sasuke - Sarawak's Blowpipe (Malaysia - Sarawak)

-Tour guide: One of the ethnicities in Sarawak is Iban people. They are known to hunt their prey with a blowpipe, which contained with a poison-coated needle.

-Sasuke: Oooh. *looks at the blowpipe* It's like detective conan but a poisoned needle ones (´・д・｀)✨✨✨

-Tour guide:

-Others:

-Tour guide: Would you like to give a try?

-Sasuke: Yes please (´・д・｀)✨✨✨ which target should I shoot it with?

-Tour guide: The balloon, next to the pole in front of you ☺.

-Sasuke: Okay. *Takes a deep breath*

-Kenshin:.......*monotonous voice* Ah, a mosquito. *Kicks Shingen to make him land in front of Sasuke*

-Shingen: H-Hey-- OAO

-Sasuke: Mmf- *Instantly pushed the pipe to shoot something else*

-*Stab*

-Mitsunari who happens to pass by: Hmm? Oh my, I don't remember this book has a needle attached to it (ㆁᴗㆁ✿).

-Other tour members: EEEEEKKKK 😱😱😱

-Ieyasu who also happens to be not to far from the group: Tch. Books from the future must not to be underestimated ಠ_ಠ. It's too thick.

[gcdlyfury]

( wan qian, female, she/her, thirty nine) ** ♔ announcing XIA DAIYU, the LADY IN WAITING from PORTUGAL ! upon closer look, they resemble WAN QIAN. it is a miracle that SHE survived the last five years, considering they are ADVENTUROUS, MELANCHOLIC, and POLISHED. i hope the plague has not changed them. they are FOR working together with the other kingdoms. 

Born in China, she never imagined her life being so involved with international trades and conquest. If anything, her ancestors before her made sure she was guaranteed a position up on the royal throne one day, preparing her to be presented to the Emperor when she turned sixteen. After all, her family was one of the few people that tolerated any European visitors into their beloved China and was able to raise in ranks when the successful leasing of property known as Macau was finalized and established in 1544. Trade had increased immensely, and one could say an amicable understanding came from it. 

However, the plan changed when she stepped on those imperial steps and made her way to face that throne. She saw foreigners there, and all she could do was kneel and bow and wait for whatever commands he gave. she was never much one for emotions, but a single teared streamed down her face as she felt her parents and brother hold their breath at the sound of being part of the political game that was ensuring Portugal would continue their trades to China. No protests were allowed, and so they all agreed and spent some time in the Macau colony before heading to Portugal. She was bitter, yet, it proved easily curable since she was easily swayed into a wonderful whirlwind romance with a Portuguese Merchant who would turn out to be the Captain for their voyage and the one who taught her how to speak Portuguese and Spanish. in return, she would help with his Chinese. One could say this was her only experience of pure true love. however, that was short-lived as his calling was to the sea. a part of her wished she could have given up everything and instead been the beautiful siren that blessed and protected him and his ship. however, her duty called for her, and even if she didnt like it, she had prepared to serve the emperor in whatever way she needed to. 

When she arrived to Portugal, she was wedded of to a duke and the all attended court. Daiyu hated the cultural divide, the looks she was given. the remarks her husband would make of her birthplace. one could say it was this bitterness that brought her close to Leonor. One of the very few woman who saw how dignified she was, how she bit her tongue so she wouldn’t forsake the elegant and graceful features of her face, and how even the smallest of words held the most venom from her. Daiyu was a woman with a mask, a mask that would only come down for those she trusted the most. When that mask came down, it was almost as if God Himself Became the Devil. 

From there, her entire life was to learn the patterns of international trade and commerce like her family and get good at understanding the ways of the Europeans without every giving up her identity. It helped her a lot when she birthed a beautiful baby boy and she was able to teach him everything about where she came from. 

Unfortunately, destiny awaited and alas, she lost all of her family to the plague. She remembers when the first case hit, and the isolation she went through from her husband and son. she couldn’t even get near her son and it pained her. it was worse when they told her that he wouldn’t make it through the night, and how her husband had died in his sleep. She remembers wanting to run to his room and hold his hand one last time. her son, already seventeen, yet to her was so small still. yet, a friend of hers kept her back and that was Leonor. She spoke sense into her and she said her last goodbyes to her son through his door. 

Now, she is forever indebted to Leonor for being their in her time of needs and is even more honored to serve her as a lady-in-waiting. Yet, as grateful as she is, she is ever so melancholy for her birth country, and for all the what-ifs she wishes she would have taken. yet, she only writes down such worries and thoughts. she cannot let her emotions get in the way of something great she finally has. she is more than just a wife and a bearer of children. To Leonor, she is a confidant, a friend, a prized ally. the equality Daiyu never knew she needed. 

FUN FACTS ABOUT DAIYU ; 

She has more of an “european” name, of Daniella de Silva. Daniella since it was something Daiyu could easily remember and De Silva after her husband. However, once he died, she proceeded to use her maiden name once again. 

her favorite color is red, and you’ll find that any letters so writes are sealed with a red lotus printed stamp. 

she loves to sing, and she is so amazing at it. in another life, she could have been an opera singer. but for now, she only sings at the shores or coastline of wherever she ends up at and singing sweet melodies to the lover she let go of long ago. 

she is proficient in the arts of chinese dance, music, and poetry. she has only ever performed a couple of times in her life, but she is consistently practicing on her own free time for the sake of seeing rather she can maintain such steadiness and precision. 

she never talks about her son, its a sensitive topic for her to this day. yet, she will have a picnic for him with all of his favorite foods and drinks. 

despite the little that she eats, she is a big fanatic for her food. she will only eat the most perfect dishes. if it needs a bit of a spice or a hint of a certain juice, she will ask for it and make it so, but if the dish is not to her liking, she will take a bite politely and then proceed to excuse herself from the table or begin eating any fruit around her to attempt to cleanse her pallet once again throughout the night before she can excuse herself. 

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO PLOT WITH HER, JUST LIKE THIS POST OR REACT TO MY DISCORD PLOTTING CALL AND THEN WE CAN PLOT!!

[neo-culture-mafia]

무서운 평온

previous chapter

이제노 Lee Jeno

If I were to know what I knew now...I would've gotten out with the rest of the boys when I had the chance.

The seven months we were back under Taeyong's care, nothing but hell and heartbreak is what the rest of the Junior Forces and I experienced. We were housed, clothed, and treated like nothing had ever happened, but the three empty chairs that plagued the dining table was a painful reminder that life was full of pickers-and-choosers.

"No. Renjun. You can't take Benadryl for diarrhea." "I wasn't asking for me! One of my students asked!" Renjun said as he was following me down the school corridor. "Oh?" I laughed as I could see smoke coming out of his ears. "Sup' nerds." Jaemin walked up smoothly as he flicked my glasses. "Hello, you social reject. Up to mischief, I presume?" I asked as Jaemin could only roll his eyes. "For your information Professor Bozo, I'm actually up to some very secret business." We could see Jaemin's eyebrows wiggling. His eyebrows would disappear as quickly as they showed up behind the rims of his sunglasses.

"And what is this 'very secret business'? Solving world hunger?" I asked with a humorous chuckle, but I could tell he was getting pissed off as his arms crossed over his chest. "You can always start smaller with a specific country. Like, China," Renjun suggested, "there are so many starving people in China, but, more importantly, there is a starving Chinese person right here. So, I'll be heading off first." Renjun concluded and walked away with a wave towards the cafeteria.

"He has a point-" "I'm going to convince Taeyong to let Mark and y/n back in." Jaemin deadpanned. It felt as if the passing students were tuning into the conversation at the mention of those forbidden names.

"Come with me now." I gripped the top of Jaemin's arm and pulled him down the hall to my classroom, where no students sat yet. "Ugh. You can at least ask me out to dinner first. Jaemin chuckled as I shut the door with a bang.

Jaemin took a seat on my desk as he stretched a couple of rubber bands on his fingers and hands. "What the hell are you saying, Jae." My voice was in a whisper in fear of anyone hearing this conversation.

"I was going through Mark's discharge papers." Jaemin pulled out a packet of paper that was hiding in the inside of his jacket. "Don't worry. It's a copy. Not the actual document, you neat-freak." As Jaemin unfolded the individual papers, I realized he had been doing his homework.

"It says here that, 'Due to the unwillingness to follow orders given by Hierarchy, Lee Taeyong, that was given to the elite soldier, Lee Minhyung. Minhyung has been dishonorably discharged from the Neo Culture Mafia clan as the Management Coordinator of the Junior Forces subdivision and all subdivisions thereof." Jaemin's smile made me uneasy as I was having a hard time following where he was going with this. Jaemin reached in his pocket to grab the cherry suckers he had been snacking on since we returned to the family.

"y/n wanted me to stop." Jaemin reasoned. "But, y/n's not here anymore." Chenle fought as he was abruptly punched on the upper arm. "Well, I am. And I'm going to honor her wish for me to stop." Jaemin said, shoving the 5th lollipop in his mouth for the first night...the withdrawals not setting in yet.

"So? He was discharged." I concluded. "Turn to the first page and read his work title." Jaemin's eyes disappeared by his cheeks as his growing grin set an uneasiness in my stomach. I took the first page and flipped it, so it was laying on it's back.

이름: Lee Minhyung

D.O.B: 1999년 08월 02일

일자리: Management Coordinator of Junior Forces Subdivision; Promoted - Head Supervisor of Junior Forces; Elite Soldier

"...I'm still not following your train of thought," I confessed, and he rolled his eyes, flipping the pages once again.

"Mark was discharged as the Management Coordinator of the Junior Forces subdivision blah blah blah. In reality, that wasn't his position at the time of his discharge." The lightbulb went off in my head, "He was technically discharged for the wrong position. A position he wasn't in when the papers were authorized." Jaemin finished, and I felt like jumping for joy.

"What about y/n?" I asked, and he grabbed another packet. Hers wasn't messed up. It was filled out correctly. I sighed as my eyes ran over the black ink and saw nothing but the correct answers.

I turned to the authorization pages and saw that only Taeyong signed it when I knew that it had to be Taeyong and the Underbosses. There was still only one signature meaning that it would be voided once brought to the elite's attention. "Is the actual authorization page? You didn't alter it or anything?" I asked in a hurry as I saw that we only had 15 minutes left before class. "Yeah, it's just copied. I didn't touch anything, why?" He asked, confused.

"You. You're absolutely amazing." I said, pinching his cheeks roughly. I grabbed the papers and started running. "Out of my way!" I yelled as I sprinted down the hall with Jaemin hot on my tail.

They were going to be coming home.

I screeched and almost fell as I rounded to hall corner to go into the soldier offices. I slammed the wooden doors open and was looking for the man I could guilt into helping us.

There he sat, a sandwich hanging out of his mouth. "Johnny-hyung!" I yelled, and everyone stared at me.

"You didn't sign these papers!" My voice was getting louder, and I could feel the tears prick the sides of my eyes. "Then bring them here, I'll sign 'em right now-" "No. They're already authorized. They're y/n and Mark's discharge papers." Doyoung dropped his food, and Taeil choked on his coffee.

"Mark was discharged in the wrong position. Also, both of their papers weren't correctly authorized. It is missing both the underbosses signatures." I took a breath looking at both Johnny and Taeil. They only looked at each other.

"It's been 90 days since they've been relieved from duty, meaning that no changes can be made to these documents, and they are as they stand." I held the papers up to my face making sure I wasn't making a complete fool of myself.

"They've had 7 months of non-described inactive duty, meaning that...they don't exist, basically." I pieced together. Once an elite soldier went 6 months without an authorized hiatus, titles would be revoked from the elite as they would become m.i.a.

I turned around as I spoke, looking at all the elites and teachers. Everyone looked shocked. I could see Chenle, Renjun, and Jisung sitting at their desks at the back of the room. Their expressions were unreadable.

I turned to Johnny again.

"Technically, they were never kicked out," I concluded. Johnny turned to Taeil, who sat next to him. "I thought you signed the papers for me." He asked as Taeil shook his head, 'no.'. "Taeyong said you signed them for me," Taeil confessed. They knew that they fucked up.

I had them exactly where I wanted them.

"Johnny." I started walking closer, one foot in front of the other. This was it.

"Remember when we returned without Hyuck? You confided that you were the one to shut the tunnel's door? And, you told me as I took the oath to become the new supervisor of the Junior Forces: 'I would do anything to try and make up for what I did.' ?" I looked down at the papers and went to my desk that sat 5 feet away. I tossed the messed up discharge papers towards Johnny and Taeil and made a b-line for my own desk.

I opened the old wooden drawer and grabbed my own authorization papers. It was a copy that I held. Taeyong held the official documents, but this would get the point across.

"Well, I know what you can do." I nodded.

"My order is that once the Junior Forces track down and retrieve Mark and y/n," I took a breath, grabbing my supervision authentication.

"You recruit Lee Minhyung to take my position as Supervisor of the Junior Forces."

"Jeno. Stop." I heard Jungwoo call out for me from his nearby desk.

"As Lee Jeno, the Head Supervisor of the Junior Forces Subdivision, I resign my title by the turnover of the position. You will swear in Lee Minhyung and y/l/n y/n by the end of the month." And, with that, I took my title papers in my hands and gripped the stack of paper roughly.

"No-" rrriiipppp

I dropped the ripped paper in my trashcan and kicked it to the center of the aisle. I grabbed some matches from my desk and lit one. I dropped it, and I walked out of the office with a small blaze leaving my mark.

I walked down the hall just in time for the class bell to ring.

I took my time walking to my class. The killed and missing soldier memorial sat next to the auditorium, where we would read a complete list of all those killed and missing at the end of each month.

Donghyuck's picture hung in the middle in the 'Hierarch' section. All the other junior soldier's pictures were formal and well displayed. Yet, the Junior Forces didn't want to remember Hyuck as something he wasn't. So, we all went through our phones and found the most appropriate photo that would capture his personality and well.

A picture that Jaemin took was hung in its place. A laughing Donghyuck greeted all who looked at the memorial. It's who he really was. Laughing and spreading brightness wherever he went.

"I miss you, dude." I sighed.

"I'll bring back Mark and y/n. I promise." I bid my farewell and walked down the hall towards my class, ready to start the day with my students.

I knew deep down that this was only the calm before the storm.

[fatehbaz]

On soil degradation and the use of non-native plants as weapons to change landscapes and sever cultural relationships to land; and on the dramatically under-reported but massive scale of anthropogenic environmental change wrought by early empires and “civilizations” in the Bronze Age, Iron Age, and ancient world (including the Fertile Crescent, Rome, and early China): I didn’t want to add to an already long post.

This is a Roman mosaic, from when Rome controlled Syria, depicting an elephant (presumably the Asian species, Elephas maximus) interacting with a tiger (the Caspian tiger, a distinct subspecies of tiger, lived in Mesopotamia, the shores of the Black Sea, and Anatolia up until the mid-1900s). This mosaic is striking to me, because I guess you could say that this is clear evidence of the higher biodiversity and more-dynamic ecology of the Fertile Crescent in the recent past, until expanding militarism and empire led to extensive devegetation. After all, does the popular consciousness really associate elephants and tigers with the modern-day eastern Mediterranean and Anatolia? Not really. But for the majority of human existence, lions, tigers, elephants, and cheetah were all living alongside each other in Mesopotamia. Pretty cool.

Anyway, I wanted to respond to this:

Which was in response to a thing I posted:

Pina: Thanks for the addition! I don’t know much about the technicality Rome’s devegetation of the Mediterranean periphery, but - like you - I’ve read some cool articles about it, and then forgotten to bookmark them. (I know that I have at least one good article in print form, about Roman devegetation; I’m going to try to find it.) I’m glad you mentioned it!

The first image is in the public domain and depicts a rhino-shaped ritual wine vessel made of bronze, from about 1100 to 1050 BC, during the Shang era. (The piece is housed at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.) The second image is another bronze wine vessel from a site in Shaanxi Province, this time inlaid with gold and hailing from later in history during the Western Han period, about 205 BC to 10 AD. (Photo by Wikimedia user Babel/Stone.) The rhinos in both of these pieces are depicted with two horns, meaning that they likely depict the Sumatran rhinoceros; this is corroborated by the existence of fossil remains of Sumatran rhinos from across China prior to 1000 AD.

On devegetation in the ancient world:

Yes, it feels like the ecological effects of empires prior to the Middle Ages are not just “under-discussed,” but dramatically overlooked. Some “quintessential and iconic African fauna” like lions and cheetahs lived throughout the Fertile Crescent, until devegetation during the late Bronze Age and, a few centuries later, the ascent of Rome. Caspian tigers (a distinct subspecies of tiger) also lived nearby, in Anatolia, the Caucasus, the shores of the Black Sea, and Persia - right up until the 20th century, in fact! (Other iconic species present on the periphery of ancient Mesopotamia were Asian elephants; leopards are still present.) Aside from the devegetation of the Fertile Crescent and the later landscape modifications of Rome, I also don’t see a lot of popular discussion (there is academic discussion, though, obviously) of ecological change in Zhou-era and early imperial China, either. While early Mesopotamia is famous for the amount of social prestige ascribed to irrigators and engineers, who were evidently essential to maintaining the domesticated crops so important to “hydraulic civilization,” early China (apparently) also revered irrigators and engineers. At least according to folklore and written histories, before the Han period, seasonal floods, especially in the Yangtze watershed, would regularly destroy human settlements. Also, there far more tigers, leopards, rhinos, and elephants present; rhinos and elephants lived as far north as the Yellow River until empire really expanded, and the animals lived as far north as the Yangtze River into the European Renaissance era. So, those people with the technical expertise to “tame the wilderness” by damming rivers or calming floodwaters were given prestige and sometimes treated as folk heroes. [Chinese history is not a subject that I really know a lot about. I’m just relaying the observations made in one of the better books on environmental history in East Asia, which is Mark Elvin’s The Retreat of the Elephants - 2006.]

------

On empires’ use of soil degradation to “sever connections to land” and “indirectly” destroy alternative or resisting cultures:

Seems that empire uses ecological degradation to enact a “severing of relations” (in Zoe Todd’s words). Basically: If you destroy somebody’s gardens, then they have to come to you to buy food. Furthermore, destroying someone’s connection to land will also harm their cultural traditions rooted in that land, eliminating a threat to the imperial cultural hegemony and erasing “alternative possibilities and futures” from the collective imaginary. (And destroying the imagination doesn’t just harm the invaded cultures, it also prevents the relatively privileged people living in the metropole or imperial core from “achieving consciousness” or whatever, wherein someone living in 150 AD Rome or 1890s New York City might imagine an alternative system and potentially dismantle the empire from within.)

It’s violence; destroying soil, cutting forests, it’s violence. But when empires destroy soil, they get to maintain a little bit of plausible deniability: “Ohhh, it’s not like we outright killed anybody, we just accidentally degraded the soil and now you can’t grow your own food. Damn, guess you have to rely on our market now, which also means you have to assimilate/integrate into our culture.”

Europe, the US, and the World Bank did this in West Africa after “independence.” They said “oh, yea, sure, we’ll formally liberate you from colonial rule.” But since the palm and sugar plantations were already installed, and many of the ungulate herds of the savanna had already been killed, what were new West African nations supposed to do? Miraculously resurrect the complex web of microorganism lifeforms in the soil? So what the US and its proxies are essentially doing is saying: “If you want loans, you have to keep the plantations and also install supermarkets to sell Coca-Cola.”

Todd: “The Anthropocene as the extension and enactment of colonial logic systematically erases difference, by way of genocide and forced integration and through projects of climate change that imply the radical transformation of the biosphere. Colonialism, especially settler colonialism – which in the Americas simultaneously employed the twinned processes of dispossession and chattel slavery – was always about changing the land, transforming the earth itself, including the creatures, the plants, the soil composition and the atmosphere.” [Heather Davis and Zoe Todd. “On the Importance of a Date, or Decolonizing the Anthropocene.” ACME An International Journal for Critical Geographies. December 2017.]

-----

On the use of non-native plants as a sort of “biological weapon”:

The use of non-native plants and agriculture to enforce colonization and empire is the whole focus of this influential book from Alfred Crosby. (I have some issues/criticisms of some of his work/theories, but his work is generally interesting.) Crosby popularized the term “neo-Europes,” and he proposes that European empires attempted to subjugate the native ecology of landscapes in Turtle Island, Latin America, Australia, etc., while attempting to introduce European species, cattle ranches, pastures, dairy farms, gardens, etc. in an effort to “recreate” a European landscape.

-----

Speaking of Rome’s devegetation of the Mediterranean: One of the famous cases of Roman devegetation that made the rounds recently was that of silphium. A couple of excerpts:

[From: The Original Seed Pod That May Have Inspired the Heart Shape This historical botanical theory has its roots in ancient contraceptive practices.” Cara Giaimo for Atlas Obscure, 13 February 2017.]

Silphium, which once grew rampant in the ancient Greek city of Cyrene, in North Africa, was likely a type of giant fennel, with crunchy stalks and small clumps of yellow flowers. From its stem and roots, it emitted a pungent sap that Pliny the Elder called “among the most precious gifts presented to us by Nature.”

According to the numismatist T.V. Buttrey, exports of the plant and its resins made Cyrene the richest city on the continent at the time. It was so valuable, in fact, that Cyrenians began printing it on their money. Silver coins from the 6th century B.C. are imprinted with images of the plant’s stalk -- a thick column with flowers on top and leaves sticking out -- and its seed pods, which look pretty familiar: 

[End of excerpt.]

Silphium is extinct now. There is a lot of conjecture about what, specifically, caused the extinction. But it looks like the expansion of Rome across the North African coast of the Mediterranean, and Rome’s development leading to soil degradation, is a likely cause.

-----

Thanks @pinabutterjam​  :3

The scale of ecological imperialism’s effects ... planetary, no escape. It’s exhausting.

[ameliarating]

I read through @pumpkinpaix‘s deeply thoughtful post about cultural appropriation and dismissal of Chinese cultural concerns (two related but distinct phenomena) in non-Chinese MDZS/CQL fan-spaces and should-be-obvious-but-painfully-is-not disclaimer: 

When it comes to these things, the voices that should be rising above the rest are the Chinese fans speaking out about what they’ve seen.

I’m only here because I feel I have what to say on this bit here: 

For context, we are referencing two connected instances: the conflict described in these two threads (here and here), and when @/jelenedra tweeted about giving Jewish practices to the Lans. Regarding the latter, we felt that it tread into the territory of cultural erasure, and that it came from a person who had already disrespected diaspora’s work and input.

Context

The Lans have their own religious and cultural practices, rooted both in the cultural history of China and the genre of xianxia. Superimposing a different religious practice onto the Lans amidst other researched, canonical or culturally accurate details felt as if something important of ours was being overwritten for another’s personal satisfaction. Because canon is so intrinsically tied to real cultural, historical, and religious practices, replacing those practices in a canon setting fic feels like erasure. While MDZS is a fantasy novel, the religious practices contained therein are not. This was uncomfortable for many of us, and we wanted to point it out and have it resolved amicably. We were hoping for a discussion or exchange as there are many parallels and points of relation between Chinese and Jewish cultures, but that did not turn out quite as expected.

What happened next felt like a long game of outrage telephone that resulted in a confusion of issues that deflected responsibility, distracted from the origin of the conflict, and swept our concern under the rug.

Specifically, we are concerned about how these two incidents are part of what we feel is a repeated, widespread pattern of the devaluing of Chinese fans’ work and concerns within this fandom. This recent round of discourse is just one of many instances where we have found ourselves in a position of feeling spoken over within a space that is nominally ours. Regardless of what the telephone game was actually about, the way it played out revealed something about how issues are prioritized.

(Big surprise, I’m going to talk about Jewish things and MDZS)

I haven’t read the fic in question, but I have certainly made many posts about Jewishness and the Lans, imagining certain traditional Jewish educational settings and modes of learning and argumentation as superimposed onto the Cloud Recesses. I’ve also written other posts, mostly for me and the three other people out there who would find it funny, imagining different sects as different Jewish sects - or at least, who they have most in common with.

Never was I imagining these characters or worlds to be actually Jewish, but, as people often do in fandom, I was playing around in the spaces, delighting in overlaps I found, out of a deep-seated wish that I could have anything like MDZS or so many of the other fantasy I loved with Jews.

I’m jealous. I’m so jealous. 

Here’s how I was relating to it: 

China is a country of billions with an immense media audience of its own, its own television, movies, books, comics, etc. The only Jewish equivalent could ever be Israel, very tiny, and while there is a lot of good Israeli television, books, etc out there, it doesn’t approach what’s available from China, and certainly none of it has broken through to be a fandom presence of its own, not even in Jewish only or Hebrew speaking spaces. And even when that happens, the creators don’t often draw on Jewish history and myth. (One example I can think of a show that does is Juda, a Jewish vampire show from Israel, but I know exactly one (1) person on tumblr who’s seen it.)

So I was treating MDZS the way I treat American media - as a playground. Since I can’t find Jewish stories, especially in fantasy, I’m going to play around with it in non-Jewish stories.

Here’s how I should have been relating to it:

There are so many people who, like me, have been hungry to find themselves and their stories and their magic in fandom spaces. They have a show that’s made it big. Is it fair to, even playing around in tumblr posts, set so much of that rich cultural context aside in order for me to find room for my own? 

In the U.S., at least, where I am, it’s not the same as doing the same thing with, say, The Lord of the Rings (where I wrote a fic making use of Jewish mourning practices and assigned them to the Beorians) or Harry Potter, because that’s taking a dominant culture which is all I usually ever see and make room for myself. 

In MDZS, especially in the English language fandom where the Chinese cultural context is never dominant and is often shouted over and overlooked, and where there just aren’t many other examples of media that made it big in the fandom, I am only making room for myself by shoving aside something else that barely has any room at all.

In many ways, I became the fan that frustrates me, that writes about Jewish characters celebrating Christmas, rather than the fan that I wanted to be, which gets excited about cultural overlap and similarities. I’m sorry and I apologize.

My first reaction was not to. My first reaction was to say it’s not the same. Because it isn’t the same. It’s never the same when minorities do things to each other. But even if that’s less destructive, in some ways it’s more painful, because that’s where we should be able to look to each other for solidarity. (Obviously this is in English language fandom - Chinese fans are not a minority in Chinese language fandoms!)

I do believe that there should be room to make silly posts about the Lans doing things that Jews do, because the Lans do do things that Jews do. When I made an edit where Lan Wangji was responding to Lan Qiren quoting in Hebrew from the Jewish prayerbook rather than the sect rule to distance from evil, I did that because he was saying the exact same thing. It was wonderful to me, that a Lan sect rule could be exactly the same as something I pray every morning.

That’s very different from when I wrote imagining the Lans as Jews which left no more room for the Lans as Chinese Buddhists. It’s those later things I apologize for and what I’ll be careful about in the future.

I do still want to return to something I said just above, however: “Because it isn’t the same. It’s never the same when minorities do things to each other.”

I worry, as I wrote in a separate post, about the tendency I see in anti-colonial, anti-imperialist spaces to look at Jewish practices and laws and culture and see it as an example of Western hegemony rather than as a survivor of it. Especially in a post that talks about the Chinese diaspora experience, where the very word diaspora was coined to describe the Jewish scattering across the globe and only much later was used for other cultures and peoples.

I don’t object to its now much more universal use as a word. It’s useful and it’s powerful and I believe it can be used to build solidarity. I do ask for, however, recognition that while Jews, especially in the West, might reproduce Western hegemony and use it against others, our own ethno-religious experiences bubbling up is not one of those reproductions.

In other words, when we erase, accidentally or purposefully, the Chinese cultural and religious contexts of characters in MDZS/CQL in our rush to write in Jewish cultural and religious contexts, we are doing harm as ourselves, not as representatives of Western/European/Christian hegemony. And in fact, what inspired us to write in our own contexts is that there are certain things (deference to elders, life carefully regulated by a series of laws about everything from interpersonal-ethical behavior to food habits to modes of speech, cultural horror regarding desecration of the dead, etc) we find in these stories that we don’t find in many Western stories that resonate with our own cultural background.

Which is not to erase the harm itself. I am sorry for it and I will do my best going forward to write about overlaps without erasing or replacing what is already there from the beginning and should remain so.