From awhile back

A couple of nights ago, I watched a documentary on Point of View about Grace Lee Boggs, a person whose existence I had not known of prior to last night. It was a well-made documentary (I must stress this), certainly thought-provoking, but it left me with a feeling of sadness, of helplessness, and of profound disappointment in human nature. Even more than that though, it made me worry about aging and loneliness.

It's a few days out (which is perhaps the appropriate amount of time to determine which parts of analysis actually stuck in my mind), but here's a brief overview of points I remember from the documentary. Grace Lee Boggs is a woman who has been living in Detroit since 1953. She is currently 99 years old,  and has spent the last 50 years of her life fighting "to improve" the city of Detroit through community improvement and civil activism. A large part of the documentary is devoted to her emphasizing that protest should take the form of revolution and not just rebellion - the distinction between the two being that the former brings progress while the latter does not. In addition to this distinction, Grace goes on to address many general discursive topics about friendship and philosophy throughout the film, emphasizing the value of discussion and conversation in solving social problems.

If I were to break the documentary into two parts, I would say that the latter half of the documentary moves away from a focus on her civil activism and centers instead on Grace as a "person" functioning within society. In this regard, as I mentioned before, of all the things that got to me most were the documentary's observations on race and on age. On one hand, Grace seems to be hyper-aware of the socioeconomic race issues in Detroit, perhaps a consequence of having been married to an African-American, but it is interesting to note that she barely recognizes the issue of race in herself. I like this about her. She is an "Asian-American" that has never really thought of herself as such, nor associated herself with any Asian-American movements. To her, being an "Asian woman in America" ascribes no additional benefit to her quality of life - this is a mindset I think we all should have, and it bothered me that so many Asian-Americans in the documentary were reaching out to her and asking her about Asian identity in America. She becomes frustrated at some point, after being asked the question yet another time, that she puts it in the only way that is acceptable to someone who doesn't get that it just wasn't that important to her actions in life. "When I was growing up, there was no 'Asian-American' movement, and there was no 'Women's' movement," she says, "that is why I cannot tell you what being an 'Asian-American woman' in America means."

Have we, as a society, regressed? I'm not quite sure how to formulate all my thoughts, there's too many (a discussion of black race and "rise to power" in Detroit also occurs in the film), so let me focus on just one point. It seems to me that a growing emphasis on race is certainly not something we want - we have enough problems in that regard already, in impoverished cities of America. So why do we keep focusing on it? Look at Grace. She has spent her life in civil rights and activism, tried to improve a city that has fallen further and further economically, is 99 years-old and the last surviving member of her family. Here she is, conscious that she is in the process of dying, still sharp as a tack and advocating a life of reflection, but instead is being interrogated on what it is like to be Asian-American, something she doesn't even quite think of as that important. Do you see the conundrum here? 

She at one point tells you audience, "You cannot comprehend how alone you feel," when describing how age has affected her life, but a little part of me feels that she feels alone because of all the clueless people that surround her. She is constantly telling people to "stop applauding" and "think." At some point, another commentator in the documentary says, in response to a Police Commissioner's speech about race, that "he cried and cried (in response to the speech), because he realized that we had so much farther to go." 

I know that this point is not as isolated or simple as I am currently presenting it. I know that people just want to find a niche and connect with people like themselves, find "their place" in the world, but maybe humans should stop trying to "find a place" and instead "find meaning." I believe in acknowledging differences, not obsessing on them. Does understanding your cultural identity and how it is "un-American" bring anything to the table? Why does being "American" come with so many conditionals if you are of a different ethnicity? It just seems like that is something we should move on from - your race may help to define you, your cultures may bring you some uniqueness, but you should not be defined by your race nor should you act based upon it. I don't want to bring this post too far down, but it is something to think about. Good job, thought-provoking documentary.

Anyway, we made curtido awhile ago, right when the weather was getting warm. Out of three jars, we consumed two - this jar has been sitting in the fridge for about a month (we put it in there after about one and a half weeks of room temperature fermentation). It's still delicious, and no one's died eating it yet!

White Cabbage Curtido

a massive amount, fills 2-3 med-large jars

1 large cabbage, grated

2 large carrots, grated

1 white onion, grated

2 jalapeno peppers, grated

salt (3 TB per 5 lbs of vegetables)

Place all of your grated vegetables in a large bowl. Salt based on the 3 TB per 5 lbs of vegetables rule, making sure to evenly coat all the vegetables in salt (if you do not, then you will have to deal with pockets of mold later on). In this large bowl, continue squeezing and massaging the vegetables for about 10 minutes. Do not discard the liquid that comes out of the vegetables - this is your brine.

Pack the salted vegetables into a clean or sterilized jar (or jars) and punch all the vegetables down. There should be about 2 inches of brine above the vegetables. You want the cabbage to be completely covered by liquid - if there is oxygen touching the vegetables, mold will grow. You can scrape the mold off...but I just prefer to avoid it altogether.

Lid the jar, place a plate under it (to catch the liquid that gets pushed out of the jar by carbon dioxide gas rising during the fermentation process), and leave it sitting out at room temperature for about a week (or as long as 2 weeks). During this time, if the liquid bubbles out and brine level lowers, meaning vegetables are exposed to oxygen, open the jar, pack the vegetables down more, and add more brine (1 TB of salt for 2 C of water). If you want to ferment longer, go ahead - the more probiotic bacteria, the better - but if you're satisfied with the taste, place the curtido in the refrigerator. It will stop fermenting then and you will no longer have to worry about mold.