valentine's day marriage proposal

i'm drained--literally drained. i got sick again and everything is
going...out...of there....

i just washed down 4 mg of loperamide hydrochloride to shore up my losses.

sipping my sprite (from a glass bottle) and eating stale crackers (individually wrapped in plastic), i'm playing solitaire while i wait for web pages to load. i'm not sure which one is more agonizing: playing solitaire or waiting for the little progress bar on the web page to make it to the other side.

i'm a little dazed by yesterday's proposals. finding myself 34 hilly kilometers from mong cai, i poked my head into a small restaurant to see if anyone was serving. minutes later i was chopsticking washed salad greens (a likely culprit of the sickness i now endure), meat (probably chicken), more meat (maybe pig's stomach?), celery soup, and rice (good 'ol reliable and safe rice).

the family's 10 year old daughter, han, sat down at the table next to me. she set her english language workbook in her lap. the book's pages hung down toward her ankles. with her feet on the tips of their toes, she fired questions at me while i scarfed down my meal. where are you from? how old are you? why do you come to vietnam? what is your work?

han's older sister joined in, too. their listening comprehension prevented our communication so we wrote one-sentence questions and answers back and forth throughout my meal. during our conversation, curious eyes started to gather round in a circle. laughs, conversations, giggles. smiles. before i knew it there were fifteen people hovering around us. everyone had something to say; everyone had a question to ask. it was their father that scared me in particular.

he pointed his finger toward his daughters, and then to me. and then with a careless whip of his arm motioned outward and away.

i was a little freaked out by the uncomfortable interpretation, so i made some laughter and let it blend in and fade away within everyone else's conversation. errr. i gripped the arm rest of my miniature plastic chair. wait. maybe i don't understand. fidgeting with my toothpick, i turned to look at the older daughter (about my age). she was blushing.

crap.

and then one of the boys (about my age) who could read and write english scribbled: "what do you want to drink? you marry vietnamese girl?" just like that. one soda pop...and one wife, please. objects. just objects.

i answered by saying that i have an american girlfriend, which didn't seem to derail the conversation. finally i said: "no, i don't want to marry a vietnamese girl". but the father continued with his ugly hand waving.

i could feel the pressure of the crowd getting bigger. and their eyes--their eyes--looked more intently. i had to get out and away. "how much dong for lunch?" i asked han. "30,000" she wrote back. i paid and got up to escape.

a girl who spoke english told me her father could show me to a motel. (earlier i was set on staying in that town. i didn't want to push myself too hard after having knee problems). then she said: "he wants money". i should have said "no thanks" but i said "how much?" and she said "20,000". my knee-jerk reaction was laughter. i felt pressed. so i ran. hopped on my bike midsprint, and pumped my pedals hard for 50 more kilometers to get away from there...to get away from that ugliness.

but on the way "it" was there...again. a grandmother, a aunt, or perhaps even a mother sat in front of a house by the roadside. a few feet next to her sat a 20-something granddaughter, a niece, or perhaps even a daughter. and as i passed, the less young of the two people pointed to me and then to her younger friend. and then pointed back to me. my eyes swung back to the road and i peddled more furiously than before.

i believe that women should be treated like the wonderful human beings that they are. and it rips me in half to see someone suggest discarding a woman--their own daughter--to a man they don't even know. to a man that doesn't even know her.

from what i can gather the motivation is racial and economic in nature. in western racial logic white people are rich--or at least have access to wealth. and so (i think) the thinking goes if a vietnamese girl marries a white man, she will go to america and live "the good life." (in this way, the father's intent isn't as ugly as i once perceived). and perhaps she will be able to funnel from america to her family in vietnam where the dollars go farther. at least this is what is perceived.

i indirectly encountered the same social pattern in china. my friend jason--who is teaching english in china--frequently receives the attention from chinese women who want to marry him. if you're interested in reading about jason's misadventures look for a link to his blog in the right-hand column of my home page.

when i studied in cuba three years ago a professor talked about how many cuban women have two husbands--a cuban man and a foreigner who gives the family money. in my mind, the disposal of women to white foreigners with the hope of it providing economic prosperity is really a form of subtle prostitution. it's a system that treats women like objects. women's thoughts, feelings and desires are unaccounted for. she is a 'thing' to be traded in exchange for other 'things'.

chris, my friend from donxing, told me about how he has helped white canadian men find wives in china. i reserved my criticism and asked more questions. i found out the situation is more complicated than i thought, at least for chris' matches.

while working in canada, he employed and befriended a man who was missing one ear, and needed a device to allow him listen with his other ear. another man he knew couldn't fully extend his left arm, and also had a prosthetic leg. so, as chris said, "they weren't handsome, and they had trouble finding girlfriends". and so he set them up with chinese women wanting to marry canadian men.

they couldn't speak each other's language, but that didn't keep them from continuing their relationships. all of them are happy, or so he said: "you can tell that it is real love when they are together. they always hold hands. and kiss. they are always together. not like unhappy couples."

who knows? maybe they are happy. but everything in my mind tells me that this kind of international trade is really messed up. why would the women want to meet them in the first place? could it be love if they didn't know each other beforehand? can a healthy relationship blossom from a foundation built on financial gain and the objectification of women?

feeling damn lucky that i have the power and privilege to choose my partners, charlie.