The Reptile Sage with a Mobile Home

For those of you who don't know, I am in both Creative writing and Nonfiction (both because I love English more than STEM classes and because the only credits I needed to graduate were P.E. and English, so I wanted to make sure I got that needed English credit). In Creative Writing, we recently did an "Open Genre Assignment", where we were allowed to do a project of our choosing in the genre of our choosing. I (being the visual and fine arts centered person I am) decided to draw a simple picture and write a semi-poem/semi-essay piece to go with it. The picture I drew was of Master Oogway, from Kung Fu Panda, because who doesn't love Master Oogway? At least, I certainly connected with him and some of his (very wise) quotes that I could apply to portions of my life:

Everyone seemed to have relatively positive feedback, but several people made the comment that they “weren’t really sure what genre this was” and/or that it “would be great for a blogpost in Nonfic”, so I decided to listen to their feedback. Here’s the writing the drawing accompanied:

Master Oogway

Do you know where the name comes from?

Oogway is the word for “tortoise” in Chinese

Hence Master Oogway is an elderly Galapagos tortoise

A mentor, A teacher

Of Po in Kung Fu Panda

But he’s much more than that

He’s the previous Senior Master of the Jade Palace

He’s credited as the creator of Kung Fu

Oh, and by elderly,
 I don’t mean somewhere in his 90’s or even 100’s

He’s estimated of being nearly one thousand years old

No wonder he imparted us with so many words of wisdom:

“You are too concerned with what was and what will be”

Many people are too hung up on their pasts or busy planning for the future, overlooking the current moments in their lives. To quote Macklemore in the song Good Old Days, “You are too concerned with what was and what will be”Many people are too hung up on their pasts or busy planning for the future, overlooking the current moments in their lives. To quote Macklemore in the song “Good Old Days”, “Been scared of the future, thinking about the past, while missing out on now.” Before the accident, I has never been very appreciative of "now" and how I am much more fortunate than billions of people on the planet.

“One often meets his destiny on the road he takes to avoid it.”

We should all try our bests in life and do what’s good for us and our futures. Sometimes though, life will throw you a curveball and you end up running straight into the ball trying to avoid it.

“There is just news. There is no good or bad.”

You never know if something is “good” or “bad” until everything truly plays out. There’s a phrase in Cantonese; 塞翁失馬. It roughly translates to “Mr. Wēng lost his horse”. The story behind the saying is that Mr. Wēng lived on the border where he raised horses for a living. One day, he lost one of his prized horses. After hearing of the misfortune, his neighbor felt sorry for him and came to comfort him. After a while, the lost horse returned and with another beautiful horse. The neighbor came over again and congratulated Mr. Wēng on his good fortune. One day however, his son went out for a ride with the new horse. He was violently thrown from the horse and broke his leg. The neighbors once again expressed their condolences to Mr. Wēng, but Sāi Wēng simply said, “How could we know it is not a good thing for me?” One year later, the Emperor’s army arrived at the village to recruit all able-bodied men to fight in the war. Because of his injury, Mr. Wēng’s son could not go off to war, and was spared from almost certain death.

“There are no accidents.”

You never really know is something that occurred was an “accident”. Perhaps that was just fate, and the world was taking you in that direction, or maybe it was simply trying to teach you a lesson. Don’t think of things as “mistakes”, think of them as “lessons learned” or “opportunities”. The car accident I was in definitely not intentional, making it at least somewhat an accident. But I prefer to think of it as a huge lesson teaching me not to be so fond of "fun" without accounting for my health and wellbeing.

“When the path you walk always leads back to yourself, you never get anywhere.”

If you only think about yourself all the time, you won’t get very far in life. Knowing how to care for/love another person is even more gratifying. People in Statistics with me have seen the TED talk discussing how people who gave to or bought things for others were happier when they were asked to rate their happiness at the end of the day.

“Your mind is like this water, my friend. When it is agitated, it becomes difficult to see. But if you allow it to settle, the answer becomes clear.”

When we’re agitated or mad, the decisions we make aren’t usually very sound ones. People make rash and unintelligent choices when they’re not calm. So, if we can relax for a moment and come back to the issue after we’ve taken a “chill pill”, it’ll be much easier to make good decisions. I've definitely had times where I made a rash decision, looked back at the decision at a later time, and thought to myself "What were you thinking? Oh wait, you weren't."

“Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called present.”

This is my favorite quote from Master Oogway that encapsulates that whole idea. Stop thinking about what happened/ “could have been” so much or overthink what will happen in the future. You can’t do anything about the past anymore, so stop wasting energy fretting about it.

Usage of Racial Slurs

The talk Ms. Majerus gave us about the terms "white trash" and "cracker" and the countless other racial slurs out there really got me thinking. The note at the end about how it's slightly more acceptable (but still unacceptable) to use a slur if you're of the race the slur is referring to brought images into my mind (or a movie scene, I should say). The images from the scene I'm thinking of are ones that some of us may have seen before. The scene I thought of was one from the original 1998 Rush Hour film starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. Do you remember the scene yet? In case you don’t or have never seen the movie before, I’ll try my best to describe it.

I’ll give some key information and fast forward to the key parts of the scene. Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker have just entered a bar to see if they can get some information about a man they are looking for. Before entering the predominantly African-American bar, Chris Tucker (Detective James Carter) tells Jackie Chan (Detective Inspector Yang Naing Lee from China) something along the lines of “Do everything I do.” to minimize the chances that Jackie Chan will do something to offend or provoke people in the bar, since Jackie has no experience at a bar in America.

The duo walk into the bar and Chris Tucker, who is African American, casually asks a patron of the bar “What’s up, my nigga?” They proceed to enter a room with a group led by Detective Carter’s cousin. Detective Carter sends Inspector Lee into a separate room so he can stop his façade of being a tough guy who doesn’t know the people in the bar (even though he’s friends with all of them). Inspector Lee listens to Detective Carter and is now sitting outside in the main portion of the bar.

         Remembering Chris Tucker’s tip of “Do everything that I do.”, Jackie turns to the bartender and asks him “What’s up, my nigga?” The African American bartender is taken aback that the Chinese Jackie Chan would say such a thing and asks Jackie “What did you just say???” out of anger. Jackie, not knowing better and thinking the bartender legitimately didn’t hear what he said, repeats the phrase slower and more clearly. The bartender promptly grabs Jackie by the suit and tries to choke him until Jackie hits the bartender with a chair to stop him. The rest of the bar, which is also all African American, then swarm Jackie in an attempt to beat him up. If you want to hear more, I simply suggest you watch the movie yourself when you can.

         Tying back to the point I was trying to make, it is definitely true that a racial slur will become slightly more tolerable if said by a person of the race of the racial slur. The phrase “When in Rome, do as the Romans do” definitely has its merits and can help you in many situations. If you note everyone doing a certain action in a certain situation, you should do said action. But be careful. In some situations, you may have to be a full-fledged Roman to be allowed what you saw a Roman do.