October 27, 2016 - 22:42
Before I came to the United States, for me, different races are just an abstract concept, because I lived in an only-Asian-environment for 18 years. I even mixed up Latino and African American sometimes. I have a clearer understanding of the Latino and African American culture after this trip, and I was just impressed by all those plants that I never heard and seen (and tasted) before. They are fascinating, and some of them, delicious. As Ruth Ozeki wrote in All over creation, “God in His great wisdom has given us this abundance.” (p.67) I realized that America is actually a large contact zone, in which different cultures meet each other, and in which collisions and integrations happen every day, and while I’m carefully looking at the other cultures, they are also keeping a curious eye on me. The garden is part of this contact zone, so am I.