GAH!

I got home from work and was happily (re)compiling the Asian Women's Carnival* when I heard a strange rustling noise. After determining it was not, in fact, me, I peeked over to see yarn. On the floor. And a half-eaten piece of the rats' lab blocks...

Yes. Ed- and Al-rat somehow managed to escape from the cage and terrorized my yarn! Thankfully, none was chewed up, although a lot of it is now on the floor. Also, thankfully, unlike Ruki, they did not manage to spill all the precious laceweight from the top. Still!

Also, someone (AL I KNOW IT WAS YOU) chewed up Tiny Laptop's cord as well. ARGH!

EVIL. SO EVIL!

I should have known something was up when both of them finally figured out how to escape from the bathtub over the weekend...


* It was almost done, and then I foolishly did not save, my computer crashed, and... yeah.

2nd Asian Women Carnival: Intra/inter/transnationalities

ETA: please read this before reading the carnival

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I'm sorry this is so late. I wrote up a giant post, and my computer crashed and I lost it.



These are the posts I didn't write: golden lotuses and size 9 feet; mismatched eyelids and tape; broken palms and murdered husbands; lucky nose and skimpy ears.

These are the words I can't say; not because I don't have them, but because I have too many, because they overflow and I choke on them, unable to get them out.

But, oh, my sisters and friends write—not for me, but for themselves—and sometimes I find myself in their words, and sometimes I find who I need to be in them.

I've tried and tried to write entries for this carnival and for the first one, but there is too much, and I cannot. But I can respond somewhat to what others have written.

As noted in the call for submissions, the optional theme for this issue is "hyphenates and sourcelanders and diasporas and being a minority Asian in a majority Asian country and majority Asian countries and minority Asian countries and third culture kids and thoughts about being refugees, immigrants, expats, nth generation, FOBs*, about generational gaps and cultural expectations and growing up in one place and then another and speaking one language at home and one outside and and and..."

* I think of myself as a FOB in many ways and dislike any mockery of fobbishness. Also, if you aren't one, don't use it.

Also, white people, when you're reading, don't co-opt. Don't take these pieces and use them against us. We know about intra-POC and intra-Asian racism and bigotry; we know how frequently our words stripped from us to be used against each other. Forming identities among inter/intra/transnationalities is hard; it is harder still when it is never a purely personal process, when every move we make for ourselves is taken from us and used to tar and feather all of us.

( Nationality, ethnicity, and identity )

( Language )

( Gender and sex )

( Story and remyth )

Many thanks to everyone for posting and submitting, and especially to ciderpress for starting the Asian Women Blog Carnival. Please contact her if you would like to host a future issue!