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Tiger and mom.

Tiger’s Asian Roots

By the time you read this we will all know exactly the real prospects of an Asian Pacific American winning this week’s British Open golf tournament.

And I don’t mean Shigeki Maruyama.

Maruyama is playing in Muirfield, the site of the British Open. But while he lives in Los Angeles, he’s technically Japanese — an Asian in America.

No, the APA golf champion to whom I refer is one Tiger Woods, of course.

Most of the media describe him as “black,” even as they say he “transcends race.” Or they don’t describe his race at all, preferring to see race in golf as just plain irrelevant. He’s just what he is. A big man who hits white golf balls. There’s your relevant fact. Nothing more needs to be said. End of issue.

So they think.

In this era of the census standard I call “you are what you say you are,” Woods, by right, is “Cablanasian.” That’s the word he came up with to describe his mixed parentage, which makes him a little bit Caucasian, black and Asian.

But who calls him that?

No one.

As an APA of Filipino descent, a golfer of much enthusiasm and little skill, and an inveterate Tiger watcher, I find that what everyone calls Tiger this week is critical for our community’s sake.

Tiger’s trying to keep the third leg of a calendar year golf grand slam in order! He could make history. He will be the most watched human in the world. And he really is one of us. After all, as APAs, we derive pride and joy by watching Tiger’s world domination.

He’s our surrogate. It’s much the same way the Japanese must have felt earlier this month when Takeru Kobayashi emerged as a champion wiener eater.

Did you notice the Japanese walking with a certain swagger after Kobayashi smashed the world’s record up in Coney Island? The man ate 50 hot dogs in 12 minutes to win the top prize established in his field. Now here’s a guy who never met a wiener he didn’t like.

The Tiger phenomenon is similar. Just replace the wieners with golf balls.

And to what does he owe his dominance?

According to Tiger, it’s his Asian-ness.

On my way through an airport this month, I happen to stumble upon the July-August issue of T&L Golf, an offshoot of Travel and Leisure. I pick it up. It features our Tiger as a coverboy and an interview with the star by John Paul Newport. It is the first piece I’ve seen in a mainstream outlet that really puts into context Tiger’s Asian background.

Why not? Newport had to find something interesting. He admits to being disappointed as he talked to Tiger about golf. It appeared that the champ was just going through the motions. Newport was looking for something unexpected to emerge. And nothing did, until he asked Tiger about his favorite place to play abroad.

“For me, I love going to Asia,” Tiger said. “I have a wonderful comfort within me when I visit there, specifically Thailand. That’s where my mom is from, and whenever I land there in Bangkok, it’s like I’m home again.”

Think Tiger gets his Asian roots?

Here’s how he talks of his initial trip to Thailand. “It was just my mom and I on that trip, and it was neat to have her show me the things that are part of my heritage,” he told Newport. “We were visiting her family, where she was raised. I got to meet her parents when they were still alive. I remember so much of it.”

Tiger didn’t return to Thailand until he was 18, but he told Newport how Asian influences were a major part of his upbringing. “I think people have a misunderstanding of my family,” Tiger told Newport. “People think it was my dad who disciplined me, the one who was always so hard on me, insisting I do things by the letter — it was actually my mom. My dad was very lenient. I was always trying to get my dad on my side. I’d say, ‘Dad, can you help me out here? Mom’s being like this or like that.’ But it was my mom who was always by the book. She’s the one who taught me how to be disciplined.”

Ah, that mom, Kultida!

Tiger described how it was primarily a matter of cultural differences. “If I didn’t say, ‘Yes, sir. Yes, ma’am’ or ‘Thank you, sir. Thank you ma’am,’ I got smacked right on the back of my head,” Tiger told Newport.

Mom?

“Oh, yeah,” Tiger responded. “Without a doubt. She was the one, because in Asian culture you have to show respect to a person who’s older than you, and if you don’t do that, it’s seen not only as disrespect to that person and to yourself but to your entire family. That is something that we don’t have here in the United States.”

The other thing Tiger acknowledged getting from his mother was his introduction to Buddhism, especially meditation. “I can still do it,” Tiger told Newport. “And I do it every once in a while just to make sure I can.”

Is he serious?

“At this point, it’s not something that follows me around in life where I do it every day,” Tiger said to Newport. “I think now it is one of those things that’s of unwritten significance. I’m not really aware that I’m actually doing it — but it’s definitely a part of who I am.”

There you have it. A Buddhist momma’s boy. The secret to his success.

Pick up the T&L Golf magazine for insight on Tiger. But I must hand it to Newport and the editors; it was really the first Tiger interview I’d ever read where Tiger’s Asianness wasn’t obscured by his golf prowess, nor his African American father. It wasn’t in the shadow, it was germane to understanding the greatness of Tiger.

Make no mistake. He’s an APA. And because of some cultural aspects of his upbringing, he’s the best damn golfer in the world.

Reach Emil Guillermo at emil@amok.com.