Mother’s Day with 8Asians: My Mother, Forever Mommy

8Asians is celebrating Mother’s Day all week (Pssst…Don’t forget, it’s May 8th!) by doing what we do best: writing about the women who raised us, nurtured us, taught us, spoiled us, protected us and occasionally for some, drove us up the wall. We love our moms and wanted to share personal stories as a tribute to their hard work.

This is hands down my favorite photograph of my mother. I have no idea how old she is but I do know it’s at my grandmother’s house in Japan, that her father was an avid photographer and this picture is one of the many we still have that documents their family life in the Saitama prefecture outside of Tokyo.

This picture encompasses everything I love about my mommy: she’s spirited, she’s youthful and she’s strong willed–a total opposite of any stereotype about submissive Asian women. Though I’ve never actually witness her whine like she is in this photo (but I have seem to have inherited this personality trait), I’m familiar with the energy behind the face, making her one of the most interesting person I’ve come across in my life.

My mommy grew up in Japan in 1950, witnessing the social and technological change that the country underwent after the American Occupation. I almost can’t believe that the place I see in her photographs is the same neighborhood and streets we visit today. Rice wasn’t cooked in a fancy gadget that sang a melody when done and working as an airline stewardess was considered a glamorous job. Now, she owns her own keitai-denwa, she travels between the US and Japan every other month, she plays around with her iPad and loves to talk about the last season of Breaking Bad.

This hybrid of experiences is what I love most about my mommy: she is full of contradictions. My mother is my direct connection to Japan and made sure to instill a sense of pride for my culture and my family. She sent me to Japanese school every Saturday throughout elementary school and to continue my language skills, shipped me off to spend my summers at her friend’s daughter’s public school in Japan. She fed me enough onigiri and umeboshi to ensure that I would appreciate all that Japanese food had to offer. (I drew the line at natto, though. That stuff is gross.) My sister and I went to weekly math classes after school and sat through private tutors to help boost our SAT scores. And don’t forget the years of piano lessons.

On the other hand, my mom threw any sort of traditional Asian parenting styles out the window because it just wasn’t her style. She never encouraged us to become scientists or doctors–how could she, when she herself used to be a theater actress? She took my sister and I out of the weekly Japanese school because she knew how awful they were. She sent me home early one summer from Japan because she saw how tired I was after two months dealing with the humidity, heat and mosquitoes. Amidst all the plates of onigiri and tonkatsu, my mother taught herself how to whip up delicious dinners of pasta, mashed potatoes or spring salads. She forced me to pierce my ears, canceled my piano lessons, cooked dinners for our high school drama rehearsals and let me bleach streaks of my hair in high school. With my father, she made sure we traveled around the world so our trips weren’t limited to only Japan; we saw St. Petersburg in the winter, spent New Years Eve in the Czech Republic and once drove around the Scottish Highlands. My mother is adventurous and fearless, compensating for all those times I cowered in fear, discomfort or hesitation.

Growing up with an Asian mother–especially in a non-Asian culture–wasn’t always the easiest thing. Like others, I sometimes wished for a more American mother: someone who would write me notes in my lunchbox, allow me to order a Coke for dinner when we went out, or even someone who would understand how important it was for me to fit in with my Caucasian classmates in elementary school. I wanted a mother who could speak English without any accents and could actually be a friend with whom I could share angsty thoughts and opinions. I envisioned a scene straight out of The Babysitters Club where mothers sat down on their daughters’ beds just to “chat” (except for poor Claudia). I wanted a “mom,” not a “mommy.”

Now, I’m perfectly happy with my mother being a mommy–the irony being that I’m now at an age where it’s kind of creepy to even call her that in public. I’ve come to terms with the fact that my mother is not supposed to be my colleague or friend; she’s supposed to be my mother: a role model, a leader, a parent and someone I will always respect…even if that means still fighting with her over how she keeps asking me to fix her Macbook while I’m busy at work. Now, I don’t want a mom because I need a mommy.

So Happy Mother’s Day to my Mommy! I’m horrible at thanking her in person but I hope she knows how much I appreciate her both as a mother and as a strong woman of fun contradictions.