My first experience of being invited to a home party was in my second term at OIT. The first experience of anything comes with some surprise and uneasiness. The home party itself brought nothing to surprise me. I just simply could not find what to do to kill time, as I was not so sociable as to enjoy constant conversation with strangers. But it was okay. Everything is worth experiencing in this country. Yes, the party was nothing particular until I came across a middle-aged woman there.
It was at the school president’s house. The president, Dr. Blake, invited all the international students to his home party. Probably it was because he wanted to cheer these foreigners up, who often were alienated or isolated from other “ordinary” students. The international students, in fact, were treated like preserved animals there. People surrounding the international students were professors and their families. They observed us first. They assumed or obtained information on where we had been from. They chose topics to talk. Then, they approached each of us and gingerly started their conversation. They did not have sufficient knowledge about our homelands. But they were clever enough to understand that there must be some extra taboos in the conversation other than politics, religions, and races.
I was sort of entertained to see these people face their challenges one by one. There came a woman to test her guts with me.
“Hi. How are you?” she said.
“I’m fine.” I returned one of a few alternative replies.
“Are you in your freshman year?”
“Yes. This is my second term here.”
“So you started studying last term. Was it hard studying in English?” “Cliché! The same old stereotyped questions,” I thought.
“Well, yes. But not that bad. My GPA last term was better than I’d expected. It was 3.60. And I became sophomore from this term.”
I did know that I was obnoxiously conspicuous. I still preferred to be obnoxious than to be patient to another cliché. Once appeared to back off, the woman began to be extremely inquisitive. She must have determined that she can spend some time digging whole story out of me. She asked me how I had become sophomore in one term and how I could possibly record high GPA. It was very much boring to me except that I could kill time with little effort. I continued and explained how.
Then suddenly she challenged the burning question. She was surely a daredevil who would not retreat until her curiosity got satisfied. She said, “Well, I know that this may be too personal to ask you. But would you mind if I ask what your religion is?” Religion! It must have been a very important issue to her. She could not hold her itchy desire to confirm her belief that good things can happen only with God’s support.
“Oh, it’s completely okay with me. I’m an atheist.” I was aware that my answer would not satisfy her.
“Oh, my God! What? This can’t be. This can never be. You can not achieve such a good grades without God’s help. You may think you are an atheist. But deep inside of you, you are not. I’ve never heard of such a great academic achievement. You said this was your second term. You said you had never been in college before even in your home country. I am telling you that this is God’s act.”
I utterly lost my words. I thought “There’s no cure for this religious woman. This woman hardly know me, but she’s telling me something deep in myself.”
“Excuse me, I think I have to say something here. Well, I am not sure what to say. But I have been being me for twenty-five years. I know myself. If I believe in no God, that means I am an atheist.”
I was not upset. I kept my voice low. Maybe the conversation until then was one of the successfully long lasted ones at the party. The content of the conversation had attracted a few listeners around the woman and me. And another few more came close as tension rose. Her husband interrupted the conversation politely and rescued her out of the conversation by telling time to leave. I did not know the husband, either, who was supposed to be an instructor at OIT. One of the audience, quite possibly a friend of the woman, murmured to me, “Hope that you don’t mind what she said to you.” I was not upset at all. The first experience of something came with surprise without fail. Since the day, religious beliefs in this country remained as one of the most interesting topics on my informal study agenda.
I am not quite interested in Christianity. Just as much as I am not interested in Buddhism. I was not back then, either. Their lessons are valuable. But to me, even without wondering whether God is or not, I can live with no problem following my common sense. The idea that all the virtues belong to God was fresh and unique to me. Religious lessons are reflected on the Japanese people’s moral. They are so no matter how many of us, the Japanese, attend Buddhism temples and Shintoism shrines. They actually form our culture. And the Japanese people do not have to give any credit of the creditable conducts to the God.
One day Mr. and Mrs. Armstrong asked me a favor in their serious faces. They said that one of their friends wanted to talk with me. She wanted to talk to me because I am a Japanese. And probably I was the first foreigner that she had ever talked to. But why are they so serious? They continued.
“Well. She is a unique person. We told her about you. Particularly what you do at the college and your personality. She seems more interested in you as she heard more about you without seeing you.”
“Okay. I don’t see anything special about me that interested her. But I’ll do it anyway. It’s your favor. So. What exactly do I expect to be asked?”
“She would ask what you think about things around you in this country. She might ask some personal questions. If you don’t like them, you don’t have to answer them. If you want us present when she visits here, we’ll be here. If you don’t want us, we won’t.”
“I want to meet her here. And is there anything that I should not tell her? I’m kind of wondering if there’s something I might say that possibly damage your relationship with her.”
“No, Masato. You are free to say anything you want to say. You don’t have to worry about us.” I told them that I would see her alone.
She appeared at my pseudo-home (This is what I called Mr. and Mrs. Armstrong’s house.) with several same old typical stereotyped questions in her mind. She started, just like the people at Dr. Blake’s home party, with probing greetings and social questions. I responded. Then she explained what she wanted to know. All of her questions were stereotyped questions that I had been asked hundreds of times. I excused myself for a moment to bring all the assignment papers in writing classes back to her. These questions included “Is it hard to learn English?”, “What is your major difficulty in your life here except for the English problem?”, “Why did you choose OIT?” and so forth. My assignment papers had covered answers to most of the questions. I adopted these topics because they appeared significantly creative works among others’ in the writing classes I attended.
I handed the papers to her. She enthusiastically read them line by line without a sound of her breath. She liked them. I was happy as I could save my time for the same old explanation over and over. I was reading a magazine while she was absorbed into my assignment papers. I was thoughtless. I found that the papers appeared as logically structured not only to my writing teachers but also to her. It was my big mistake showing them to her. She finished reading. Her eyes were blazing.
“Masato. These papers were well written. Though there are a few points that are not quite clear to me, I see your points. These are insightful and fun to read. I can’t believe these were written for class assignments.”
Indeed, they had not been beautifully written. As my English writing had not been polished back in the first couple of terms. That was because I needed to take the classes. She began comments I had exactly expected.
“Did you complete all of these analyses by yourself?”
“Basically yes. I did not use any reference books on these cultural or social topics. Actually I can’t. The books in English in unfamiliar fields are very difficult to read. I just observed people around me and analyzed them. I did ask some questions to my friends here, though.”
“It’s your creativity, Masato. You are so creative.”
I do not think I’m creative. I didn’t think so back then, either. I didn’t as I knew those who I regarded truly creative. What is more, it is the Japanese virtue to deny any praise to myself to be polite. So I told her what I wanted to tell her, as Mr. and Mrs. Armstrong had literally advised. This was when her comments got into religious coerciveness.
“Oh, yes, Masato. Yes, you are. You know? The word ‘gift’? God created people. God made us creative because He is creative. You know God is. God made you creative.”
I did not like this kind of idea. It was completely okay if she believed that her God had made her creative. But acting like she knew all about me was too much. I could not stand this type of arrogance maybe because of my confidence in knowing myself and because of the Japanese social system of politeness planted inside of me.
Incidentally, I was often asked by some Japan maniacs or Japanese language students when they should use polite forms in Japanese conversation. Compare “I want it” and “I would like it.” The latter is more polite. In Japanese language, virtually all nouns and verbs have their polite forms to construct polite expressions. The maniacs and the students tend to misunderstand that the polite forms are used to the seniors to the speakers. In the conversation, the polite forms are used by a subordinate speaker toward his manager younger than he, or by a lecture attendee toward the instructor younger than he. These show that the age is not the only key to the usage of the polite forms. Social hierarchy and expertise play some roles, too.
Decision-making has the same system as that of the polite forms. One who is older, higher in the organization, or more learned has more authority to decide than others do. Others can ask, or answer when asked. But they can’t assert or even comment.
This woman sitting in front of me violated the behavioral rule. Obviously she knew less about me than I did. When I said I was not creative, she dared to deny it.
“If I said that I was not creative, that means I am not creative. You do not know me enough to comment on it. Your God may have made you creative. But I don’t believe your God. Actually I don’t believe in anything.” I contended.
“Oh, poor Masato. You should realize that how merciful God is” she replied.
“International students from Arabian countries would say Allah made me creative. Poor you. You must have been made creative by Allah according to them. Since I am an atheist. I would take your comment as an insult to my parents. Because they gave life to me and prepared the environment where I could be creative…Provided that I am creative. I don’t believe it, though.”
As I anticipated, the word “insult” defeated her. She was no longer Mrs. Know-all. She was upset. She didn’t know what to do and left. She may have been sobbing. I don’t remember it well.
I experienced several more incidents that showed some group of American people’s coercive behavior on religious issues. People in general are highly tolerant for cultural differences. Whenever I made stupid mistakes or silly misunderstandings, they, in most of the cases, wonder why and try to understand the background reasons. Religious issues, however, allowed people to have no room to compromise. Even though they proudly said it was a free country where everyone is free to do anything, but the believed God must be only one. They did not consider that there might be more Moslem people out in the world than Christians. They did not recall so called Monkey Trial where people had spent whole time and money in arguing in the courts if the Bible must be taught. I may not able to comprehend this gap in the people’s tolerance for good.
I did find some of my friends in the United States who did not act pushy on religious issues. I did not act pushy, either. Eventually I learned how to stay away from those pushy people and had fewer problems than before. “Maybe the pushy are the minority in this country,” I came to think so.
I was wrong. One day I received a new one-dollar bill with absolutely no wrinkle that made me take a close look at it. It says, “In the name of the God we trust.” Seemed like animism worshipper were not approved to use the bill. I was disgusted. And I still think it over. Who is “the God”? And who are “we”?