you say it's your birthday...

1.25.09

Not only have I moved to a more fattening zip code (Culver City, the Napa of Southern Cal), but I am now in the mecca of stylish parenthood. West L.A. is home to hundreds of upper middle to affluent families, all of whom apparently decided to have kids at the same time, resulting in two-thirds of the city's population being between two and seven years of age.

My nephews are among this number. As befits their station in life, as well as that of their parents, they are ferried daily from prestigious language immersion school to afterschool Lego engineering to swimming to taekwondo. The weekends offer no respite for these pint-sized bon vivants and they have to attend at least one birthday party per weekend to keep their place on the social register.

The elaborate protocol to these parties is an experience to behold. First, the birthday boy or girl has to choose a theme, as dictated by the cartoon character du jour. Right now, it’s all about Disney Princesses for the girls and robot-oriented shows like Bakugan or Pokemon for the boys.

My sister considers every email a contractual agreement to deliver on any action promised in said communique. In casual conversation, you cannot expect a casual verbal answer to a question that you may have emailed her earlier, because she will always insist that she emailed the answer and therefore is not responsible for a response to you now.

That being said, Jolene lives and dies by the Evite. No longer are invitations to social gatherings merely friendly gestures of inclusion. You can find out who is attending (provided they play along), how many people they are bringing, or why they are not going to be there. Convenient, yes. But I cannot help but think that nobody needs to know all this information up front. Because if they do, what will we talk about at the party?

The party’s theme, as prescribed by the celebrant, is sacrosanct to the festivities. It must be portrayed consistently throughout the event, in everything from the icing on the cake to the right paper party goods. Jolene spent a sleepless night performing cosmetic surgery on a piñata she bought in the toy district downtown, because she could not find the acid yellow Pikachu that Kenzo requested. Fortunately, most popular cartoon characters are shaped somewhat like a chubby raccoon, so it was not impossible to convert Uniqua from the Backyardigans into the lemon-hued Pocket Monster.

The ideal menu is made up of foods that are eaten with the fingers and since there are kids involved, tends to be as dry and easy to clean up as possible. No slippery brie en croute or delectably greasy rumaki here, although a pizza's succulent ingredients can be tidily contained, depending on how substantial the outer crust is (Pizza Hut's stuffed crust makes for a good retaining wall). In a vain nod to conscientious nutrition, crudités and fruit are optimistically served, although both juvenile and adult guests ignore them in favor of more interesting fare.

Of course, the highlight of the party is the cake and gifts. This is probably the first introduction for children to observing a strict ritual, preparing them for church services or the conformity of America. You must interrupt them from running in circles around your house, a neighborhood park or Chuck E. Cheese’s to celebrate the guest of honor with song and flaming baked goods. Again, messiness is frowned upon and the festively decorated gateau of yesterday has been replaced by hygienically individual desserts such as cupcakes.

With kids, it never pays to get too exotic. Kenzo’s last birthday, which we celebrated on a sunny December day in a regional park, was marked by traditional Japanese mochi pastries filled with ice cream instead of red bean paste. While the kids were momentarily appeased with a sweet, the mochi didn’t hold them in the same thrall as a cake would have. The adults had to take up the slack and eat the melting confections to avoid wasting them. We were not too put out by this sacrifice.

Not only does the birthday child receive gifts, but each guest must go home with a bag of appropriately-themed swag. On Kenzo’s aforementioned “Furious Five” birthday (the name refers to characters from the animated film, “Kung Fu Panda,” not his age and disposition - although the latter could not be more aptly described- we had to come up with items that were suitably evocative of the martial arts and China in particular.

Our sister Joselyn was home for the holidays and the three of us had to decide what be suitable. While I thought fortune cookies would have been nostalgic kitsch, they were rejected by the other committee members as passé. However, we all agreed that those little Chinese spinning drums http://www.instructables.com/id/Karate-Kid-Spinning-Drum/ would be perfect.

We racked our brains trying to think of where we could locate 18 of them by the next day – we’re also incurable procrastinators. I insisted that the only place you would be sure to find them was naturally, Chinatown. So Joselyn and I went downtown, searching for the drums, braving pre-Christmas traffic, and our trepidation compounded by our understanding that our sister routinely turns into the Party Gestapo.

During the 90-minute journey from Long Beach, where Joselyn had stayed with a friend to the environs of Chinatown, we joked, listened to music and blanched each time Joselyn’s cell phone rang. We expected a call from Jolene with another eleventh-hour demand or simply to rage at us the way only siblings can because we weren’t at her house yet with the required booty. After parking the car, we ran into into the first store we saw, hoping to accomplish the mission quickly.

We got lucky and found them in that first store. But modern communication – and Jolene’s discriminating eye- be damned: Joselyn suggested we send her a picture via camera phone of the party favors. We reassured the eager storekeepers, who had quickly assembled the needed quantity, that we just needed to make sure that they were what our sister wanted. I eyed the toys warily, thinking that they would not by any stretch, meet parental standards of safety, being made in China of what were most assuredly toxic materials by factory workers infected with SARS.

Finally, I heard Joselyn’s voice in its most appeasing tones (and believe me, Joselyn doesn’t appease anyone) from across the store, talking to Jolene over the phone. “No. Yes. Yes. No.” And I knew the search was not over. I sheepishly brought my other purchases to the proprietor – when in Rome, you may as well shop – and apologetically thanked them for their efforts.

Dejected, we and I walked out onto the street and warily eyed the endless rows of tchotcke- laden retailers. But that scene from “The Karate Kid” kept playing over and over in my head, as if the crowd that was cheering for Daniel-san was playing the drums to cheer us on to a shopper's victory. We pressed on and came upon a number of kiosks in the middle of a shopping center food court. We found another version of the drums, of slightly better quality with a plastic handle that was made to look like carved rosewood. We sent Jolene a photo of our discovery.

Again, we waited. Major retailers ought to take a tip from the streetvendors in Chinatown. While they may not care if you ever return, they are bound and determined that you get what you ask for now. Again, the man who ran the kiosk quickly got the quantity of drums together for me. This time, Jolene called back a lot sooner. I got on the phone this time and used all my powers of persuasion. She said these would be fine.

When we got them home, they were packed neatly into brown paper lunch sacks that were each sealed with a tiny mask of one of the Furious Five characters. They were distributed at the party and torn open distractedly at the park, their contents strewn across the tables we were trying to clear after the party ended, the grass, various parents’ cars.

I’m sure the allusion to “Karate Kid” was chuckled over by the parents, but we’ll never know if the kids liked the drums. During the course of the party, what I observed they liked: playing with their friends, eating and playing some more. There were noises of recognition at the Kung Fu Panda plates and napkins and the paper Chinese lanterns garnered some interest. But most of the preparation ended up to be for the adults’ benefit.

Today, I accompanied Jolene and the boys to a new organic café. The place was packed with trendy Westside parents and offspring in their organic cotton best. Self-righteously cool anti-war pop art hung on the walls. The coffee menu, which had us drooling as we perused it online, was depleted of many of the specialty drinks it had promised. The space was poorly laid out to accommodate the teeming masses of brunch eaters with wriggling kids and bustling servers who wanted you to get out of their way.

I could have forgiven a lot if the food was good, but it wasn’t. The mayonnaise that should have been in the chicken curry sandwich was replaced with yogurt as a healthier alternative, which only made it dry and crumbly. The mocha I ordered was too sweet, with no hint of espresso. The staff was indifferent and slightly rude and never brought Jolene her latte.

After we ate, she went back to the counter to ask for her latte and I took the boys outside, the better to not be glared at or trampled upon. I didn’t want them to stand in the busy parking lot, so I directed them to the empty patio space, where there was nothing except a red-orange safety cone, which covered some kind of outdoor faucet or gas fixture.

While I kept an eye out for my sister, I marveled at the fact that Seiji and Kenzo had, in less than two minutes, figured out that the cone would make a perfect hurdle and had commenced to jump over it again and again. The lesson here is that most of the time, kids don't care what gift you give them, they often would prefer the box. And they are way more inventive than we are.

I don't know where we lose that creativity and inventiveness along the way. My birthday wish this year will be to get that back somehow. I have a feeling that two little guys with boundless energy are going to have a lot to do with it.

this is why...

1.23.09

First off, I guess I now have to explain why I’m a Republican. Working in not only an academic environment, but one that is also snugly installed in Southern California (aka Los Angeles), it is assumed by all my friends, family and associates that I am an environmentally conscious, George Bush-hating liberal. When I sheepishly reveal the truth, they act as if I admitted to drinking the blood of young male virgins to preserve my youthful appearance. If I do look young, I can only attribute it to clean living and good genes.

Which brings me, albeit in a roundabout way, to the reason I’m a Republican - you can blame my parents. They came to the United States from the Philippines, each before they met and married, to make a better life for themselves. They jumped through the appropriate hoops of the time to gain their residency and citizenship through legal means and brought up their three daughters to regard America as their home.

As children, we saw them prosper and succeed. They made a comfortable home for us in a neighborhood that wasn’t predominantly Caucasian, nor predominantly anything. Kids were kids, neighbors were neighbors.

We began our education in parochial schools, where we met and befriended kids from all different backgrounds. We didn’t look to race as a way to decide who our friends were. We looked to having drill team or student government or the school paper in common. We never played the race card to get scholarships, we looked to our grades for that, which is probably why we never got scholarships.

As a “(Wayne) Roy Senior” at Redondo Union High, I was impressed by our government teacher’s passion for the Grand Old Party and when twenty-seven of my classmates and I turned out to vote for the first time, I would bet that more than half were registered Republicans.

Working at a university, I’ve learned more about the left and often, the extreme left than I probably ever could have imagined. Most of it goes against everything I believe in, infringing on personal choice more than any conservative dogma can. As a woman, I believe that abortion should be a personal choice- that includes choosing not to have one. Science has proven that global warming is a natural phenomenon, occurring every few thousands or millions of years. I don’t think we’re responsible for it, but I think there is a lot we can do to offset the damage.

This may be a purely regional issue, but I don’t think we do the United States or any other nations a favor by allowing illegal immigrants to enter illegally without any ramifications. There many short and long term issues that have led me to believe that issues like this only serve to divide us further. We can’t decide what our main language is. Should people who can’t read English really be allowed to vote on policy and to our elected officials?And just because there are so many illegal immigrants driving around, should we grant them licenses?

I do my part to help save the environment, but I draw the line at recycled toilet paper. And while I am aware of G.W.’s many foul-ups, grammatical and otherwise, we did not have another 9/11 on his watch. We even got used to the indignity of taking our shoes off and relinquishing our Swiss Army knives at the security check before boarding an airplane (to date, I’ve given up three for the cause). I don’t blame him for the economy any more than I can blame him for the weather. It’s a tough job and apparently for the last eight years, my fellow Americans - at least the ones who cared enough to cast a ballot- thought he was the right man for it.

That is why I am happy about President Obama, although I tend to vote the party ticket. This time, not only my fellow Americans, but the next generation of them, decided who the best man was. His election was historic, not only because he is the first African American president, but because he appealed to the younger generation, which for now, I can still claim to be part of.

On the surface, claiming him as the first black president is easy, but superficial. As with Tiger Woods, we can all have a piece of Obama, whose parents were African and Caucasian and who has Asians and Europeans in his immediate family. He’s the Benetton president, “black enough,” yet with a family tree that reflects the face of the nation today.

A conservative friend recently quipped on Facebook that doing the right thing was now in vogue because President Obama has made it so. He’s having a hard time with Republicans losing the White House and Congress. I’m hoping that “the right thing” will somehow be redefined by both parties in the next four years. My wish list for the new administration includes ending the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq responsibly. The economy and the state of education will not be repaired by handouts, but by holding individuals and institutions accountable for results.

Most of all, I want liberal America to see that conservative America has a point too, and for both parties to see the merits in both ideologies. We need to respect human rights, but we need to keep our country safe. We need to make education and health care accessible for all, but we need to set a standard and have those who enjoy the privileges of these systems pay their share as much as possible.

Hopefully, they can create a hybrid of thought that like Obama’s family tree, reflects where we are now. For however flawed some people think our system is, it’s still one of the best, if not the best in the world. And it can be better, if we can return to being a nation where people try to pull themselves up by their bootstraps first before calling upon the government – or blaming it when things don’t go their way.

No where else could people like my parents have helped to build a nation. No where else could a man whose ancestors were once captives in this country, attain the highest office of the land. We have placed an unprecedented amount of expectation on this one man, but we all need to let him and his advisors know what we need. Not since the days of John F. Kennedy, whom my parents also admired, have we stood in such a hopeful place in our history. Let us make the hope and change more than just buzzwords, but a lasting reality.