Missing Context

The visitor center from the caverns entranceI was so angry at an Asian man today, I went into tunnel vision complete with red prickles up through my neck and scalp, and I nearly beaned him. For those of you who know me well, you'll be shocked and disbelieving, I know. I usually adore and idealize people from Asia, where I was born and grew up. They feel like family to me. So why was I that angry? Here's the story.

We were at Kartchner Caverns state park here in Arizona, waiting for our tour to begin. I had approached a model of the hills and the rooms in the caverns. I briefly noticed a number of loudly chattering Asian kids (speaking Cantonese, as best I could tell) circling the model, banging on the buttons that light up different parts of the model to acquaint the viewer with the layout of the caves. That's a bit rude, I thought. They're more badly behaved than most Asian kids I know. And then I looked for a place where I could get in close to at least one side of the model and get acquainted with the caverns via the buttons.

I reached in and touched a button, seeing where it lit up in the back of the model. Around it other buttons were lighting up wildly as the kids continued to bash on the buttons, but after a couple of pushes I recognized where my button was activating the model.Then one of the kids slapped my hand away and went for the buttons where I'd been exploring. Okay... I moved over to some other buttons, ignoring the rudeness and continuing to look into the 3-D model.

After a minute an Asian man approached me. "You don't touch my child's hand," he said. His accent was either Hong Kong or Taiwan.

I looked up, startled. "Excuse me?"

"You don't touch my child's hand," he repeated, clearly furious. "You are very rude. You don't move children away. You are the adult."

"I did not touch your child's hand, " I said.

"Yes, you did," he said.

"Excuse me," I said, my voice rising. Out of the corner of my eye I could see my husband approaching, alerted by my tone of voice. "I did not touch your child's hand. Your kid slapped my hand away, not the other way around."

"You are the adult," the man said. "You should be considerate of the children."

I was seeing red by now. "Sir. I did not shove your child aside," I insisted with rising voice and gritted teeth. "Your child shoved my hand away, and that's exactly what happened."

I was so angry, I don't even recall how it ended. He didn't back down. I didn't back down. I walked away with my husband, trying hard to breathe deeply and calm myself, and once we were out of earshot I turned to Husband and asked, "What would you have done?"

"I probably would have gone on the attack," he said. "I probably would have told him off for his rude, misbehaving kids."

The incident wrecked my tour. It wrecked my afternoon. I stewed about it for the rest of the day. I tried to figure out why I had become so angry that I'd actually felt one of the most intense physical anger reactions I've ever experienced. So far I can think of several things.

One is that I have always seen myself as respectful of kids--it's a matter of pride with me, an experienced teacher of children, that I treat young ones with respect--and it made me furious to be cast in the light of someone who would mistreat a child. Second, the man didn't ask me if I'd done it; he accused me. And he didn't listen to my explanation or clarification when it was given, but instead lectured me as if I was some worthless abusive trash-woman assaulting his precious little hellion.And finally, I was deeply disappointed and confused at that behavior from an Asian. Asia is still home in my heart, and I know as well as Asians do that you don't confront people aggressively if you perceive some slight has been given in public. If you feel mistreated, you tuck yourself or your kid safely aside and move on. As I told Husband, it was so odd to be publicly verbally attacked by an Asian man who would not let up. It felt as though I was some symbol for him of whatever mistreatment has been done to him or his people by someone who looks like me. I just could not figure it out. I'm sure there's an explanation that makes all the sense in the world from the perspective of the man.

Sometimes a little piece of missing context would help.