- One of the things I learned when I was reading “Bahadur: How could I write about women whose existence is barely acknowledged?”, with just the title itself left me surprised as in I already had an idea on how they treated women: that they had to bear children, preferably a boy and that they had no voice, but I thought they were still treated as human beings. The fact that she had to turn into unofficial sources because there was nothing about women in the official ones by looking for clues on at least how women were in the culture during those times such as with folk songs, oral histories, pictures, and colonial era-postcards.
- The person that I chose for the interview was Kitty Wong Okamura. And some things that I’ve from her was that she is a 4th generation of a Chinese family that emigrated in San Francisco, California. Her grandfather, Lim Tai, who went to the Hoping Area in Guangdong Province near Canton when he was a teenager in 1880. According to Kitty’s mom, he was a laborer when he arrived, he would go to work in the slaughterhouse near Hunter’s Point, and he worked the night shift. Meaning that he was a hard worker that worked his hardest in order to provide for his family. Also, something that she mentions about the railroad in which I really found fascinated was that her great-grandfather Lim was in Deadwood her other great-grandfather Wong worked in Deadwood and it’s a curiosity if they actually knew each other. The oral history kind of challenges the idea and the information in a way because some things in the memory get rewritten or they could have been forgotten, but on the other hand, it mostly confirms what was life like during those times.
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Hey Valery, your take on your oral interview sounds pretty interesting. Even in this storyline of a family from China moving to a place like California, it is always going to be hard in a different setting. From this I can tell that a change in environment is definitely huge, especially going into that new setting as a family. His work was a priority in order to fit in and make ends meet so I’m not sure if it was something that run in his family, but it is scary that both great grandfathers worked in Deadwood.
I do agree with you Valery on how the oral history challenges the idea of what people remember and what is rewritten. Even though the interviews might not remember all the details of their childhood or younger adult years, they still were able to share the good and bad memories of their life.
I definitely agree with you Valery when you stated, “The fact that she had to turn into unofficial sources because there was nothing about women in the official ones” is ridiculous. Even now many women are kept silent on certain matters they want to speak on which is 100% not fair at all. In addition to the oral story, I would not be surprised if both of kitty Wong’s great grandfathers knew each other, since everyone communicated a lot back in those days compared to the way people are now.
I agree with your statement about oral history often being rewritten and how it might be changed a bit due to people forgetting parts of it and etc. but at the same time I believe that oral stories may provide a more realistic insight on what life was like in the past. Stories that are passed on from generation to generation over a long period of time are a great alternative into learning about life in the past for when written records may not be present.