It’s Tuesday night in Folsom, and that means it’s trivia night at the local watering hole. The pub is called The Streets of London, and judging from my co-workers who go regularly, it’s THE after-work spot in town. And that is quite a tragedy, as they all came to admit later on.
The place is nice enough, a pub that seemed to cater to a young, college student crowd. And oh yes, an all-white crowd at that. I might as well have been at Malone’s or Zapata’s, sans clinging Chinese girls out to loot foreign pockets.
I always felt a little uncomfortable in these situations, even before I moved to China. I’m sure if I applied myself I could come up with some correlations between my minority childhood and the unease I feel in a predominantly white environment. The feeling is slightly amplified now, having spent three and a half hours playing the role of ethnic majority.
I remember when I was a sophomore in my high school choir class. Talk about a sea of white! The leader of the class was a thoroughly obnoxious soprano named Rebecca, who had managed to avoid talking to the Chinese kid throughout most of the school year, until at the very end when the teacher had given her the task of giving me some instruction related to…I don’t even remember What I do remember is that she sat down next to me, looked me in the eye, and then proceeded to speak to me as if I was a deaf-mute.
“Ooooooh Kaaaay Eric, caaaaaaaaaaan yoooooooooou doooooooooooo thisssssssss thinggggggg fooooooor meeeeeeeeee?”
Who did she think she was talking to? If it had been 8 years later, I probably would have reminded myself of the South Park episode where Sally Struthers’ foundation accidentally ships over a skinny Ethiopian kid to South Park in exchange for Kenny. Was she really so ignorant as to think that anyone who didn’t share her color was somehow English impaired?
The reason I bring this up now is because, sadly enough, I’ll always remember Rebecca and that moment for the rest of my life, and she probably forgot me right after she had that profound little exchange with me. Being looked down upon really fucks me up, and I think a part of me is always afraid that the next person I talk to is going to be another Rebecca. In China, I can be liberated from that; in Folsom, I am paralyzed with fear.
Of course, I internalize this and never show it. That’s the way it goes, I guess. In the meantime, there’s trivia to play. I join a team of co-workers in the back corner. The bar owner screams out questions to what appears to be about 18 to 20 teams of about 4-6 people. There are thirty questions in all, and here are the ones that I help my team answer:
Q. What 90’s film about a terrorism and martial law in New York starred Denzel Washington, Bruce Willis, and Annette Bening?
A. The Siege
Q. Which record company got Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, and Johnny Cash their first start?
A. Sun Records
Q. “Abomination of a well wisher” is an anagram for what popular TV show?
A. Who Wants to be a Millionaire (I have no idea how I got that one)
Q. Which two teams played in the first Super Bowl?
A. Green Bay Packers and Kansas City Chiefs
Q. In which Angelina Jolie movie did she play a television reporter who is told by Tony Shalhoub that she is going to die?
A. Life, or Something Like it
I have to say that I’m quite proud of the last one, given that it’s a film I didn’t see (somehow, Angelina Jolie as a blonde just never appealed to the Angelina Jolie fan in me), and it appears that no one else in the bar knows that one. It does take me a good 45 minutes or so of pounding my head against the table to remember the titlbe, but at the end of the day it’s all worth it as our team wins 1st place (and a $30 gift certificate that I’ll never use) by one point.
And it’s telling that this turns out to be the highlight of my stay in Folsom. That, and the bag of Funions.
