Monday, August 07, 2006

Lane is me, and so is her mum

Yesterday's episode of Gilmore girls had this really hilarious scene in it, one which was especially poignant for me.

It's the episode where Korean American Lane gets married, with her ultra-conservative Christian mum receiving the worrying last-minute news that her own mum, a Buddhist, has decided to attend. Lane's mum had obviously never had the guts to tell the matriarch about this slight change of religion; the sight of her sweating buckets to replace all those crucifixes in the house with two enormous Buddhas, is priceless.

I've always identified with Lane because she too, has been occasionally forced to live a double life* ever since she discovered her American/Western side (it's what makes us first generation Asians "bananas" **).

It was interesting to see a member of the older generation suffering a similar dilemma.

* Some of the myriad facts about my life that I hid from my mum:
- that, at the age of fifteen, I bought myself a guitar and practised secretly in my room. She didn't find out for about six months even though we lived in the same house.

- whether I was still a virgin

- that I was a social drinker until that Asian drinking curse caught up with me (not content to merely make me go beet red at the second sip of gin & tonic, now I get physically sick after a drink)

** banana: White on the inside, yellow on the outside

9 comments:

flying kiwi said...

I think your mum might have guessed the status of your virginity by now...

Ms Mac said...

I love that episode! I love Lane too. Im hoping that your Mum knows your "status" by now. But I wonder the same thing about my mum!

ps. Do you know you have pop-ups attached to your blog?

darth said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
darth said...

i thought it was us 3rd gen. asians that were bananas!

and i always had the asian drinking curse-even a sip puts me to sleep.

Violet said...

flying kiwi: you mean, that whole "virgin birth" story maybe didn't cut it?

ms. mac: yes I know about the pop-ups but I don't know how to get rid of them. I've asked Blogger, but they never reply...

darth: I guess it's not just a generational thing then :-)

Jon said...

I watch the GGs (not to be confused with The Golden Girls) from time to time. While I find Alexis Bledel (Rory) to be a horrible actress, I still love the show. The Mrs Kim character is so dead on of a Korean mom- pushy as hell and a Jesus freak.

How caught up are you on current episodes. Did you see when Lane got married?

Violet said...

jon: well, DUH - that's the episode I was talking about!

LK said...

I've never heard of the asian drinking curse or the banana term. I always get educated when I come here.

Violet said...

nyx: really? You live in NZ's Asian capital and you didn't know about the Asian drinking curse?