Blog 2

After reading Geeta Kothari’s article entitled “You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?” it really made me sit back and reflect upon how difficult it would be to learn how to cook food from a completely different culture then the one you are used to. She did a great job contrasting the Indian food that her family prepared on a regular basis to the food that her childhood friends would eat. In particular I found a striking visual contrast of the tuna sandwich that her mom makes versus the tuna salad sandwiches that her friend’s parents made. “The tuna in those sandwiches doesn’t look like this, pink and shiny, like an internal organ.” (Geeta Kothari) For me the comparison of the tuna to some sort of internal organ was very striking, it also helped to illustrate Kothari own “otherness” to the reader. The food that she and her sister want to eat so badly is usually “American” style food, the good stuff like donuts and fried chicken. However as she gets older she realizes that the food she misses the most is the home cooked meals that her mother and father had cooked. That is the same way I start to feel after being away at college. It is the little things, like the homemade glaze that my mom puts on her ham. Or the homemade meatloaf that my dad makes. It is this feeling of homesickness that drives Kothari into a whirlwind of fear that after her parents pass away she will no longer be able to have those favorite foods that still mean so much to her. I enjoyed the analogy she uses at this point, “I prepare for this day the way people on TV prepare for the end of the world.” (Geeta Kothari) to me it made perfect sense, in my minds eye I could visualize her frantic efforts to capture the foods of her childhood.
Geeta’s mother throughout the essay exhibited a strong ability to adapt herself to her new found situation in America. The fact that she took the cooking classes helps to illustrate to me that she is actively trying to learn how to assimilate into the larger American culture, but at the same time it is sweet how she still retains her own heritage through her traditional cooking skills.
One part of her essay I didn’t particularly like is her references to her husband and how he likes to eat meat. It almost seems at times like she thinks she is better then he is for abstaining from eating meat, he has to learn how to cook around her tastes, but no mention is made concerning things she has given up to make him happy. Or when she writes about how she doesn’t like the smell that lingers on him after eating meat. “I hope he doesn’t notice me turning my face, a cheek instead of my lips, my nose wrinkled at the unfamiliar, musky smell.” (Geeta Kothari) It seems like she doesn’t completely accept him, that the meat that he enjoys somehow is so different from how she was raised. At the same time she worries that he will leave her for a woman that is a meat eater, someone that is not put off by the smell of cooked hamburgers or steak. I know I would have a hard time being with a vegetarian, and I just wonder what her husband thinks of it all. Is he fine with her choices, or does he wish that she would be able to enjoy a nice juicy steak with him at supper time.

Blog 1

Slave Moth written by Thylias Moss is a story about a slave girl named Varl living on a small plantation owned by Master Peter Perry. It seems that Master Perry has a taste for the odd things in life, going so far as to collect an albino slave girl named Pearl, and a midget slave named Sully. Master Perry even goes so far to turn his grandmother Irene Perry into a tourist attraction. The grandmother dies on the porch while drinking whiskey and this apparently leads to a collection of bees moving into her mouth and turning her into some kind of human hive. Master Perry even goes as far as having his dwarf slave Sully harvest the Grandmothers mouth for the honey that is able to be collected. That scene was one of the scenes that stayed with me through the book and for me it is very indicative of the strangeness that is Master Perry.
I did have some confusion however during one of the more important parts of the book, the scene where Varl is in the woods stitching together her “cocoon” when Master Perry comes upon her. For me this was the only part that I had some trouble following her particular style for the book. At times I had some confusion as to who was speaking during this part and what really was going on. The chapter for this was called The Harvesting of Mysterious Ways. Not only was it a little confusing it was also one of the best illustrations of the power play going on behind the scenes between Master and Slave. Who can push whom, and how far they can take things and still not end up on the hanging rope.
Some issues I had with the narrative would have to include how Thylias Moss wraps up the end of her story. The entire time I was reading the novel I was waiting for Varl to attempt to escape, to flee from the slave situation. And while she does talk about fleeing Varl never really escapes from the plantation that ends up bearing her name. Even at the end of the story it is not completely clear to me whether or not Varl even is able to escape with her lover Dob. Apparently Dob has a stash of guns to be used for slave rebellion, however shots are never fired. Instead she just writes that the slaves just end up not doing the duties of a slave anymore. The albino Pearl stops tending to the chicken and Sully quits looking after the livestock. All Perry has to say about this however is “Peter Perry noticed and complimented the strangeness. Marveled at what it had accomplished-perhaps his ways had helped-“. I do not understand why a slave owner would be so calm and collected about his slaves no longer being slaves. That just seems like a rather large investment in both time and money that he just lets go. But I guess that is what sets him apart from the other slave owners mentioned in the novel. He is not deliberately callous or really cruel to the slaves under his watch. From what the story mentioned they seemed to be well fed and taken care of, and I know this is no excuse for his being a slave owner but at least he is not cutting letters into his slaves or making them burn themselves in the face with a hot iron.