The Celtic Side of the Coin
I've talked a lot about being Korean on here because I feel like that's, uh, one of the more defining characteristics at first blush rather than the amorphous Caucasian mix but that's only ever been half of the equation. With Saint Patrick's Day on Saturday, let's shift the focus to where my dad's from: Northern Ireland. More specifically from a town called Lurgan about 18 miles outside of Belfast in County Armagh. He's second-generation Northern Irish which effectively makes me third. But there was always reminders and relics of that heritage around growing up, Celtic crosses and other Irish iconography nestled in between Korean ink brushed artwork like someone took two countries literally on opposite sides of the world and threw them together in a bit of interior decorating.
There's probably a metaphor for me somewhere in there. I've been doing this shit for over thirty years, it all kind of blends at this point.
I know an inordinate amount of time on this blog has been spent meditating on my cultural background and I think a big part of that comes one of the strong unifying threads between both sides of my family was a stressed importance to remember where we came from; there is a strong argument that this entire blog explores that on some abstract level. My grandparents would always talk fondly about the old country and would go back to Europe semi-regularly and every now and again, they would take us with them; I was an experienced world traveler before I could tie my shoes. I get restless when I’m in one place for too long; that siren song of the open road and clear skies constantly calling me.
Being Irish whenever I was at my grandparents was more than just eating corned beef and cabbage while watching The Quiet Man and reading Angela’s Ashes (though that all totally happened too). The cultural rituals were all there: the tea and shortbread, the Irish sodabread my grandmother brought from the Emerald Isle (I still have a copy of that old family recipe), the Irish proverbs my grandmother would spout off at the right time (and occasionally at the wrong time too).
I've written on here that I see Seoul, Busan, and Korean culture in general as this idealized city on the hill; East Asian futurism with swirling apple and cherry blossom by day, pulsating neon and bass by night. When I'm walking the streets of Dublin, there's an old world quality to it, a sense of comfort you get by visiting your grandparents with all the ambiance of a warm coffeeshop or musky bookstore. The Irish countryside kind of has this serenely mythic quality to it too that you only really get hiking along those emerald hills or riding through that omnipresent mist on horseback. I don't think it's any great coincidence that my favorite bars (Spirits of '76 in Clarendon, The Auld Shebeen in Fairfax, Exiles on U Street, The Slaughtered Lamb in Greenwich Village) are all pubs; there's a recreation of that sense of comfort there.
When most folks enter their teens and start to forge their own identities and figure out who they are, I feel like that's when people start to look back to their cultural roots and ancestry, when the flags started to adorn AIM profiles and pins started to emerge on backpacks. By my teens, I was kind of over being viewed as "the Asian kid" (c'mon, at least get the nationality in there, guys) so I consciously started leaning more Irish in those days and I did it in the only ways I really knew how: Music and fighting.
Everyone in guitar ensemble had their own thing: Thrash metal, Spanish guitar, Southern rock riffs; I was going to be the Celtic guitar guy. As we've kind of covered before, whenever I come in to a place full of arrogance and swagger, it usually (rightfully) ends with me getting knocked down a few pegs. Musically, East Asian stringed instrumentation emphasizes slides and vibratos whereas Celtic instrumentation favors speed and hammer-on/pull-off techniques. A preferred tempo in Irish music usually runs at 6/8 which, for all you music theory majors, is a standard waltz rhythm in double time. That means I was not only playing some of the most technical stuff of my life, but playing it as fast as possible. That's really fucking hard. I might've volunteered to play Celtic guitar this weekend too so it's been interesting and frustrating to dust that style off again lately as I've been practicing for the past week.
I wrote in an earlier post about dropping Tae Kwon Do because I felt a little embarrassed about leaning into the Korean stereotype. A couple years later, I picked up boxing with the rationale being I had gotten pretty adequate at a Korean fighting style and now I would balance the cultural influence. Like most East Asian fighting styles, there's a grace and precision to Tae Kwon Do, almost like ballet. Continuing that analogy, boxing is straight up jazz it just happens to be jazz where you end up getting punched in the face. A lot. If you look at me closely straight on, you'll notice my nose has a slight crook in it; it wasn't always like that. There's a faded scar on my right hand from accidentally splitting my knuckles. Boxing is where I learned that Irish sense of endurance and how to be too stubborn to quit even while literally getting whupped on in three minute intervals; to pick yourself back up off that canvas and keep on keeping on.
There is absolutely a metaphor for me somewhere in there.
So what does being Irish mean to me? Like most things, it's probably best described in contrast with the other. My Korean self tends to be more analytical, pragmatic, the hard-worker. It is also tends to be more a little more coldly detached and a lot more self-critical. My Irish self is the passionate, emotional side of things: The part of me that loves to laugh, that has the fiery temper under the surface, that knows it's okay to let them see you bleed every now and again. The two absolutely balance each other out, the logical, mindful half paired with the one always looking to live life to the fullest, damn the consequences. I'm not Spock, my mixed heritage is not at war with itself: both sides are unified by a love of art, travel, and nature and just generally blend well; no identity crisis there. Having said that, if you know what to look for, you can probably tell which hand is on the wheel at a given time. It's been a weird experience growing up mixed but it's been an enriching one (To be fair, I also have no basis for comparison). This week, I'm going to be a little more Irish than usual, the whiskey, the literal song and dance, and effusive celebration of life's possibilities. This week, I'll be playing loud, proud, and most importantly, I'll be playing for Ireland.
There's probably a metaphor for me somewhere in there. I've been doing this shit for over thirty years, it all kind of blends at this point.
I know an inordinate amount of time on this blog has been spent meditating on my cultural background and I think a big part of that comes one of the strong unifying threads between both sides of my family was a stressed importance to remember where we came from; there is a strong argument that this entire blog explores that on some abstract level. My grandparents would always talk fondly about the old country and would go back to Europe semi-regularly and every now and again, they would take us with them; I was an experienced world traveler before I could tie my shoes. I get restless when I’m in one place for too long; that siren song of the open road and clear skies constantly calling me.
Being Irish whenever I was at my grandparents was more than just eating corned beef and cabbage while watching The Quiet Man and reading Angela’s Ashes (though that all totally happened too). The cultural rituals were all there: the tea and shortbread, the Irish sodabread my grandmother brought from the Emerald Isle (I still have a copy of that old family recipe), the Irish proverbs my grandmother would spout off at the right time (and occasionally at the wrong time too).
I've written on here that I see Seoul, Busan, and Korean culture in general as this idealized city on the hill; East Asian futurism with swirling apple and cherry blossom by day, pulsating neon and bass by night. When I'm walking the streets of Dublin, there's an old world quality to it, a sense of comfort you get by visiting your grandparents with all the ambiance of a warm coffeeshop or musky bookstore. The Irish countryside kind of has this serenely mythic quality to it too that you only really get hiking along those emerald hills or riding through that omnipresent mist on horseback. I don't think it's any great coincidence that my favorite bars (Spirits of '76 in Clarendon, The Auld Shebeen in Fairfax, Exiles on U Street, The Slaughtered Lamb in Greenwich Village) are all pubs; there's a recreation of that sense of comfort there.
When most folks enter their teens and start to forge their own identities and figure out who they are, I feel like that's when people start to look back to their cultural roots and ancestry, when the flags started to adorn AIM profiles and pins started to emerge on backpacks. By my teens, I was kind of over being viewed as "the Asian kid" (c'mon, at least get the nationality in there, guys) so I consciously started leaning more Irish in those days and I did it in the only ways I really knew how: Music and fighting.
Everyone in guitar ensemble had their own thing: Thrash metal, Spanish guitar, Southern rock riffs; I was going to be the Celtic guitar guy. As we've kind of covered before, whenever I come in to a place full of arrogance and swagger, it usually (rightfully) ends with me getting knocked down a few pegs. Musically, East Asian stringed instrumentation emphasizes slides and vibratos whereas Celtic instrumentation favors speed and hammer-on/pull-off techniques. A preferred tempo in Irish music usually runs at 6/8 which, for all you music theory majors, is a standard waltz rhythm in double time. That means I was not only playing some of the most technical stuff of my life, but playing it as fast as possible. That's really fucking hard. I might've volunteered to play Celtic guitar this weekend too so it's been interesting and frustrating to dust that style off again lately as I've been practicing for the past week.
I wrote in an earlier post about dropping Tae Kwon Do because I felt a little embarrassed about leaning into the Korean stereotype. A couple years later, I picked up boxing with the rationale being I had gotten pretty adequate at a Korean fighting style and now I would balance the cultural influence. Like most East Asian fighting styles, there's a grace and precision to Tae Kwon Do, almost like ballet. Continuing that analogy, boxing is straight up jazz it just happens to be jazz where you end up getting punched in the face. A lot. If you look at me closely straight on, you'll notice my nose has a slight crook in it; it wasn't always like that. There's a faded scar on my right hand from accidentally splitting my knuckles. Boxing is where I learned that Irish sense of endurance and how to be too stubborn to quit even while literally getting whupped on in three minute intervals; to pick yourself back up off that canvas and keep on keeping on.
There is absolutely a metaphor for me somewhere in there.
So what does being Irish mean to me? Like most things, it's probably best described in contrast with the other. My Korean self tends to be more analytical, pragmatic, the hard-worker. It is also tends to be more a little more coldly detached and a lot more self-critical. My Irish self is the passionate, emotional side of things: The part of me that loves to laugh, that has the fiery temper under the surface, that knows it's okay to let them see you bleed every now and again. The two absolutely balance each other out, the logical, mindful half paired with the one always looking to live life to the fullest, damn the consequences. I'm not Spock, my mixed heritage is not at war with itself: both sides are unified by a love of art, travel, and nature and just generally blend well; no identity crisis there. Having said that, if you know what to look for, you can probably tell which hand is on the wheel at a given time. It's been a weird experience growing up mixed but it's been an enriching one (To be fair, I also have no basis for comparison). This week, I'm going to be a little more Irish than usual, the whiskey, the literal song and dance, and effusive celebration of life's possibilities. This week, I'll be playing loud, proud, and most importantly, I'll be playing for Ireland.
