The Games We Play
Let’s just say there have been a number of “invasions” lately. You could even call it the word of the week. Some of them were quieter. You didn’t even think about it, but suddenly its spring, the days are longer, the flowers are blooming and yes, it’s baseball season. That all-American past time has got a few new faces with the likes of Japanese baseball superstar Ichiro Suzuki playing outfield for the Seattle Mariners. You would never have guessed it, but there are some 19 Asian and Asian American major leaguers out there shining under the stadium lights, standing up for the national anthem and hitting home runs. With star power like Suzuki, whose bound to show his skills this year, experts are predicting that recruiters will be heading East more often.
Meanwhile Wang Zhizhi, a seven foot, 225 pound officer in the Chinese military, was the first Asian-born player to ever join the NBA when he signed with the Dallas Mavericks last week. But the reality is that it took two years of negotiations for Zhizhi to be released to play. News stories clearly detailed how “a Chinese army officer dressed in uniform” was at the press conference to sign Zhizhi over.
There were also unintentional invasions. Just days after Zhizhi accepted his number 16 jersey from his new coach, a United States “surveillance plane” collided with a Chinese fighter jet, sending the smaller aircraft into the sea. The United States claims the American plane was on a routine mission in international airspace; the Chinese say the Americans should halt flights so close to China. Delays in contact with crew have President Bush sending stern messages to the Chinese, and international security secrets are rumored to be lost. It seems as many bridges we try and build with sports, it’s the war games that will always tear us apart.
And then of course there’s Harvard University student Juice Fong’s “The Invasian,” a swiftly written opinion piece published in a student magazine that dissects the college’s Asian American population. Fong says he was trying to shake people up by pointing out the pitfalls of self-segregation. But his inflammatory comments, i.e., “The stereotypical Asian female is a super-erotic personification of sensuality – a sex fiend hottie whose bones everybody wants to jump. Harvard’s Asian women are no different” — managed to incite a protest and a nationwide response. It also sparked a wide-reaching discussion on self-segregation, racism and freedom of expression.
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