I Love You So Mochi by Sarah Kuhn

On my first day in the NCSCL office, I did what any avid reader would do: pull book after book off of the shelves in search of something that would fill the next seven hours “productively.” Sarah Kuhn’s I Love You So Mochi was an instant eyecatcher, a bright splash of pink amid book spines in varying shades of blue and black.

For this Vietnamese American, the title’s mention of mochi and the cover’s gorgeous background of cherry blossoms evoked a further attraction: a sense of affinity with the novel. As I read the dust jacket flap, I was introduced to one of the novel's most intriguing aspects – its juxtaposition of relatable Asian American teenage experience with unexpected subversions of the expectations that are imposed upon that identity. 


The novel depicts Kimi Nakamura, an American high school senior whose painting talent has guaranteed her early admission to a prestigious art school. The stereotypical Asian American parent’s distaste for any non-STEM/medical field career would seem to be the main conflict in the story, but it is not. Rather than disappoint her parents, this accomplishment is a great source of pride for her Japanese-born, American-educated mother, who is only recently able to pursue her own dreams to be a famous Asian American artist. Her fourth-generation Japanese American father runs a restaurant that “features ‘the best of Japanese, American, and Japanese American comfort food’” (23). But even with supportive parents, whose careers convey a well-balanced blend of Japanese and American identity, Kimi is completely uninspired to paint. When she receives a plane ticket to Japan from her estranged grandparents, she leaves her problems behind to explore her motherland. Kimi teams up with a (cute) aspiring doctor whose knowledge of the sights of Japan help her figure out what she wants to do with her future. As Akira takes her to different locations such as a bamboo forest, a temple, and a pug cafe, Kimi finds the courage to face the problems she had wanted to leave in America. And alongside her, the reader learns much about Japanese culture, customs, and sights.

What I appreciated the most about this novel was that Kimi experiences Japan as a tourist. Kimi knows very little Japanese. Her lack of etiquette knowledge makes for an embarrassing commute and immediately strains her relationship with her grandmother. She recognizes immediately the disjuncture between nature and nurture in identity formation: “It strikes me how discombobulating it is to be in a place where so many of the faces look like mine, but where I clearly don’t belong” (51). Even so, Kimi’s actions expose readers to Japanese interpersonal relations: small bows as greetings, use of last names with strangers, and even slang for cluelessness.

I Love You So Mochi’s treatment of language is one of its most striking aspects. Kimi is fortunate that her grandparents and Akira speak English well despite never leaving Japan, but they mix Japanese terms of assent such as “hai” (80), “sou da ne” (102) and filler words like “eto” (81) and “ano” (106) into their otherwise English conversation. Akira even describes “gairaigo––loan words. There is quite a bit of Japanese-style English” (100). The reader can easily pick up Japanese vocabulary without a dictionary, and nothing comes off as overtly didactic.

Additionally, food – be it shrimp burgers from Japan’s McDonald’s, a secret stash of limited-edition Snickers, or peanut butter and chocolate mochi from her father’s restaurant – helps Kimi find common ground with the people she wants to get to know and experiment with what is unfamiliar.

This novel is a delightful journey through a young girl’s search for her own identity in the land of her heritage. Her sketchbook accompanies her everywhere she goes, and her descriptions of clothing provide insight into her moods, values, and dreams. With each deepening relationship, Kimi investigates how determination, culture, and her own family’s history shape the future she wants for herself. Readers will delight with each step Kimi takes, whether running from deer, strolling with her crush, or towards her real passion.

- AN

Miyazaki Land- Where Children Come Back to Nature

In recent news, Japanese filmmaker and childhood animator Hayao Miyazaki announced a plan that is as enticing as Disneyland and chocolate cake mountains. Seventy-three-year old Miyazaki is spending about $2.5 million US dollars to build his own imaginative playground, replicating scenes and images from his movies that bring nature and childhood together in yet another way. This new “utopian” theme park will be built on a remote island with an                                                                    intended completion date set for 2018.

Miyazaki is a name that contains a vast area of study amidst the academic community, from the imagination, to the steam punk influence, to childhood fears of parents and the unknown. With nothing but the most satisfying fantastical and steam-punk-esque stimulation of the senses, Miyazaki’s animation no doubt holds creativity and world building that prevails in the film community. These children’s films contain a variety of intriguing tales that are closely woven into representations of the adult world around us from a “childlike” perspective. The stories become even more powerful because they easily become embedded within the imaginations of all who watch them and also simultaneously provide a sort of social commentary. These not-so-subtle hints of “what our world has devastatingly come to,” one might say, are sure to be lessons for children to learn the responsibility of improving our planet from both an environmental and social standpoint. All Miyazaki’s films are told in a playful, carnivalesque tone that includes a contemporary and realistic view of the world, where soiled land and forgetful parents tend to be seen alongside the climatic hook of the movie. Ponyo, is one example. With underwater scenes of trash filling the beautiful ocean scenery, the movie furthers the call to action from the ocean king’s didactic voice of how the unconcerned human pollutes these waters and creates a major gap between man and nature.

One critic and researcher of Japanese mass media and popular culture, Alistair Swale, discusses Miyazaki’s work in context of nostalgia and learning form our past, followed by the influence or use of magic. “We might also describe it as a "culturalist" approach, given that it tends to prioritize the aspects of Miyazaki's work that engage in nostalgia as a means to reclaim a lost past—an attempt to retrieve something essential to Japanese culture” and might also be one we can all learn from. With the use of magic, what is found is the connection between the imagination and viewing the past, helping the continuation of nostalgia. This is quite apparent in Spirited Away, the title that Swale focuses on most carefully, with the transformation of the real world for Chihiro into a fantasy world where her parents get turned into pigs and she must learn to be brave all by herself—a similar sort of advice a child moving to a new city might hear, which is Chihiro’s story.

In this sense, the past that these movies convey is lessons children must learn when they are growing. Miyazaki’s movies manifest dream-like worlds and characters, becoming costumed real world experiences and current issues, to allow children to interact with larger and often scary ideas these movies encompass. It will be a hard wait until the completion of this very special theme park, which will work to bridge the gap between children and nature, moving them into a space closer to nature.

Notes:

• Swale, Alistair. "Miyazaki Hayao and the Aesthetics of Imagination: Nostalgia and Memory in Spirited Away." Asian Studies Review, 39.3 (2015): 413-429.
• http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/hayao-miyazaki-is-opening-a-nature-sanctuary-for-children-on-a-remote-japanese-island-10488123.html