Eyes Behind Belligerence By K.P. Kellenborn
Eyes Behind Belligerence is a powerful and highly relevant novel about racism, xenophobia, cultural identity, patriotism, and what it means to truly call oneself an American even when others won't define you as such.
The Japanese-American population of Bainbridge Island, Washington State felt the impact of the attack by the Japanese Imperial Army on Pearl Harbor. Suddenly, barely tolerated racist jokes and stereotypes become the norm. Members of the community are ostracized or treated with outright hostility by white neighbors, schoolmates, church members, and authority figures. They are forbidden from having possessions that might be used as weapons or short wave radios believing that they could be used for spying. Finally, they are sent to internment camps.
This is a heartbreaking novel about a shameful time in American history which unfortunately is still in practice today just with new names, faces, and targets for racist and xenophobic abuse. It's staggering how quickly certain groups are seen as enemies and how easily many can be swept up in paranoia and propaganda.
The moments before and during the times in the camps feature dehumanizing practices used to isolate, divide, and internally destroy the people who are targeted. Some of the more insidious actions result in detainees not only trusting the white officers holding them but in their fellow inmates. Some act as inside informants. Others resort to random acts of vandalism and for mini gangs for survival.
Sometimes division between Japanese born immigrants who came from Japan and settled in the US (issei) and those with Japanese ancestry but lived in the US their entire lives (nissei) is revealed. If they can be divided, it becomes easier for the American authority to break them.
The book is largely told from the points of view of teenage boys Goro/Russell Hamaguchi and Jimmu/Jim Yoshimura who are swept up in that generational divide within the camps and their own families and the racial and cultural divide from the government surrounding them.
Both are Japanese-Americans whose parents fled to the US either before they were born or as children. They consider themselves more American than Japanese. They adopted American names, hardly understand their families’ first language, and have fully assimilated into the society around them.
Russell in particular is fond of the country in which he lives. He mocks his parents’ traditional ways and scoffs at their ideals like honor and family loyalty ahead of individual liberty. He considers himself just as American as the white kids that he attends school with, maybe even more so.
Unfortunately that patriotism serves little use for him in a country that shows right away that it has no love for anyone who was born different. They don't see an American boy. To them Russell is Japanese and is treated like an enemy. Unfortunately his Japanese elders aren't any warmer either. Some like his siblings basically think that he sold out and question his loyalty. A fistfight with one of his closest friends reveals the buried resentment and lack of belonging simmering within him.
Jim also is torn between embracing his cultural heritage and assimilating into the world around him despite its rejection. Unlike Russell who treated assimilation like a calculated strategy for survival, Jim’s dismissal is fueled by personal trauma.
Jim’s journey is probably the most emotional even before the war begins because of his older brother's suicide. His grief over the death, his family's reaction to it, and the reasons for those actions lead him to question and defy his heritage. While many see community, Jim sees emotional abandonment and it takes a long time within the book for him to recover from the loss.
The two young men’s outlook changes inside the camps. Russell goes through periods of defiance such as defending himself from a racist guard, continuing correspondence with a Filipino-American girlfriend, and joining a gang of troublemakers in the camps. He ultimately tries to adapt, adjust, and find ways to ensure his friends and family's survival.
Jim does the opposite. He starts out as a mostly pacifistic sensitive kid unwilling to fight alongside Russell and the other tougher kids. He tries not to do anything that would result in punishment and be the complacent dutiful detainee.
Jim eventually tires of the mask of obedience that he is forced to wear because the officers don't care. He will always be considered an enemy and in moments of self-fulfilling prophecy, he becomes that defiant rebellious enemy. They could only push him so far enough by dehumanizing him before he pushes back. When he finally does, it's a moment of catharsis for himself and the reader.
Reading a book like this makes it easy to see the conflicts that are still relevant today so we can study them, read about them, learn from them, and maybe someday do better.
How to Lose a Life You Love: A Memoir of Conditioning, Collapse, and Sovereignty is a meaningful, moving, and inspirational memoir about having and losing it all, and what happens afterwards. Mostly it's about having the resilience to pick yourself up and seize a second life.
Author Mike Karame had a childhood and young adulthood of strife and conflict. His parents’ tense marriage was rocked by bouts of temper, arguments, accusations, and emotional breakdowns resulting in a divorce.
Karame describes his childhood in war and battle analogies because the arguments felt like a disruption of the peace that he sought. He and his siblings had to navigate their home like a minefield waiting for the next explosion to occur from their father's angry tirades and their mother's tearful silence.
Karame’s childhood in Beirut was also surrounded by outside wars as well. He describes life in Lebanon as a “simple brutal algorithm. Your religion determines your power. Your sect determines your identity.”
Karame recalled explosions occurring during innocuous moments of watching television or studying in class. Tanks rolling down the streets, soldiers marching in formation, and people sprinting for shelters were commonplace. With wars occurring both inside and outside Karame's home, it's no wonder that he wanted to escape any way possible.
Karame later entered a law career but eventually felt unfulfilled by it. His interest in caring for and riding horses led him to a different path: opening up a horse club. Even though his friends thought that he traded a life of luxury for training horses, he said that he wasn't trading down, “(He) traded up.” It gave him a chance to do something that he loved and gave him personal satisfaction. He loved teaching people to ride and connect with horses and added to his own pursuits by learning kitesurfing, paragliding, deep sea diving, and other outdoor adventures.
This would normally be the end of the story. Someone leaves the life that tied them down and made them miserable and finds the career and life path that makes them happy. In Karame's case however, this is the middle of his story which means there were a lot more changes for him to go through and far more experiences for him to learn from.
A series of problems including a failed romantic relationship, the deaths of his parents, separation from his twin brother, and financial struggles culminated in Karame having to sell the horse club and leaving Lebanon. He had to find the strength and courage to start over in a new country where he was virtually a stranger, Australia.
Karame described his life in Australia as a “collapse” when he encountered dishonesty from colleagues, unpaid bills, and potential bankruptcy. Despite this he purchased and worked in a bar/restaurant and maintained a relationship with his companion, Kate. He referred to the end as a demolition because a demolition “when you finally stop fearing it, is the beginning of clean ground.”
Karame and Kate traveled by caravan through the Australian outback. The connection to nature, vastness of travel, and the quiet privacy gave the couple a much needed slower pace. They ended up traveling for almost two years heading nowhere in particular. This trip gave them the freedom that they needed.
The tour also helped Karame look at and listen to himself objectively. In the silence, he examined what went wrong in his life and what needed improvement. Sometimes one needs to remove all of the barriers and noise before they can discover who they really are. That is what this tour meant to Karame: an opportunity to find himself.
This book is a memoir that shows readers that a person might have many opportunities and live many lives. They just have to
be ready to find them.
