Blind Spot

Two-thirds of the way through Yang Shuang-zi’s Taiwan Travelogue, a shift occurs, a shift in both plot and tone. As I mentioned last week, the novel’s protagonist Aoyama, asks her Taiwanese interpreter, Chi-chan, to accompany her to Japan where they will live together and Chi-chan can pursue her interest in translation. However, Chi-chan refuses and says that Aoyama has a “blind spot.” The two women continue to travel through Taiwan but, looking back from the vantage point of when she’s writing the story (of course, as we’ve noted, that’s a fiction), Aoyama realizes there’s been a change in their relationship, a return to more formality and less intimacy.

Then, after warning Aoyama about continuing to ignore her blind spot, Chi-chan says: “’If you really cannot change your attitude toward me, I will have to resign my post.” …

“’Chi-chan!’

‘Please lower your voice.’

We were in public; I didn’t care. ‘No matter what you say, nothing will change the fact that I see you as my best friend. You are the only person in the whole world—in all of heaven and on all of the earth—who has regarded me and the so-called monster in my stomach seriously.’

(This is a reference to Aoyama’s appetite for food).

The winter daylight, filtered through the cafeteria’s glass windows, shone a halo around Chi-chan’s body…

‘That’s why I can’t bear that you have to settle for a lesser life here on the Island. What can you do after marrying a man like that? If you can’t work as a translator on the island, then why don’t we go to the mainland?’”

This is the point at which Chi-chan resigns her position, saying that Aoyama can instead be assisted by her original interpreter, a man, and that she, Chi-chan, will return to her family home, the whereabouts unknown to Aoyama.

Aoyama is stunned.

“I had enraged her.

But how?”

Aoyama does indeed have to use the help of a different interpreter, Mr. Mishima, whom she doesn’t like. However, Chi-chan returns, and the two women share marvelous meals. Ultimately though, Chi-chan refers back to the mise en abyme I mentioned last time regarding the two girls at the school, the Japanese (mainlander), Ozawa-san, and the Taiwanese, Tan-san, who were in love with each other but also in conflict. Chi-chan says; “’Ozawa-san shielded Tan-san from falling flowers and from blinding sunlight—she acted like a knight in shining armor, but did Tan-san wish for this? In a girl’s school where Mainlanders are the majority, it is likely that such special treatment only makes Tan-san’s situation more difficult, yet Ozawa-san may not have realized this at all. I believe Tan-san’s resistance was an act of protest against Ozawa-san’s misguided treatment.’ …’You are noble, considerate and kind, Aoyama-san—you are willing to go above and beyond on my behalf. But it is precisely because you would never let me sleep in the servant’s room, because you are outraged when someone looks down on me for my status, that I have no idea how to make you understand.  How do I explain myself so that I don’t seem like an unreasonable child who covets your equal treatment yet paradoxically defies your kindness? The truth is that I am the same as Tan-san. The truth is that gentle Aoyama-san never once asked me: Do you want this protection?’”

Chi-chan explains that the problem is that Aoyama thinks she offers true friendship but is blind to how she patronizes Chi-chan, and this prevents them from being equals and true friends. Chi-chan leaves for good.

Among other things, this is a strong statement about, well, colonialism. Aoyama, a Japanese woman (called the mainland in the book) views Chi-chan as a downtrodden “lessor” person, a diamond in the rough, who needs Aoyama’s help and protection in order to blossom. Aoyama believes she has found someone who stands out from the crowd of Taiwanese, someone who, with a little help and affection, can overcome her humble origins and shine. She makes an implicit assumption that the Taiwanese are inferior to the Japanese even though Aoyama resists the Japanese expansionist policies and is made angry by their expression.

Chi-chan senses this condescension and calls it out even though the two women genuinely care for each other. She doesn’t want the “protection” which implies a one-down relationship.

So is the story “really” about this racism? I don’t think so, best B. The story touches on any kind of prejudice—against women, against gay women; it shows the injustice of any situation where people are judged not for who they are themselves but for their outer characteristics. And it’s all set in an intricate narrative framework. More about this next time.

Till then.

#TaiwanTravelogue #YangShuang-zi #AlanBray