Love + Shrimp Chips
Joanne (second from right) and classmates
When it came to crushes in grade school, I did not discriminate based on race or ethnicity, the color of his hair, or the style of his dress. I didn’t care about the neatness of his handwriting or the speed to which he can recite the times table. The only crucial factor to whom I like-liked was if he sat near or around me. Love was easy to find when it was dictated by a seating chart.
Corey (name has not been changed) was no different in that respect. We sat at the same table in fourth grade. He had dirty blond hair gelled into points. He wore braces with lime green brackets. He had a proclivity of talking in class and getting me in trouble, but I didn’t care. We would touch elbows sometimes and I thought it was love. And this crush on Corey would have been just another desk neighbor crush like that of Josh or Shane or Patrick or Julio or Alan or Julian (names have not been changed) if it had not been for one small thing: shrimp chips.
Oh, glorious glorious shrimp chips. Shaped like crinkle-cut French fries, dusted with a fine shrimp powder, baked to a crispy perfection. Shrimp chips were as emblematic to my childhood as Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. The big difference was, I would happily eat Flamin’ Hot Cheetos in front of my peers. I wouldn’t dream of eating shrimp chips at school. “Shrimp”, fourth-grade me astutely observed, is not a typical American flavor like nacho cheese or cool ranch or sour cream and onion. There will never be shrimp Doritos or shrimp Lays chips. I doubt even Goldfish, which you think would have a fish-flavored option, would ever adopt seafood-inspired seasoning. So I gleefully ate shrimp chips in the privacy of my own home, licking the sea salty powder off my fingers.
So you can imagine the internal conflict I felt when I opened my 101 Dalmatians lunch box one day and saw a bag of shrimp chips, looking very un-American in its pink, polka-dotted packaging and Japanese script. My mother, bless her, never quite understood the vital distinction between the “Asian food” we eat at home and the “American food” we bring to school. But even in the face of potential judgment and shame, my love of shrimp chips perseveres. I tore open the bag.
“What’s that?” asked a curious classmate as she peered into my lunchbox.
“Shrimp chips!” I exclaimed, attempting to sound more excited than nervous. “Want one?”
“No thanks...” she responded, crinkling her nose.
“Shrimp chips?” Another classmate leaned across the bench. “I wanna try one.” He bit off an end of a chip. “Blechh that tastes weirddd.”
Before I knew it, my beloved bag of shrimp chips was passed around the lunch table, each person making a face before daring the next to try it. I was horrified. I wanted to fold into myself and disappear forever. Just when I thought I could bear it no longer, the shrimp chips were passed to Corey.
He picked out a chip and waved it in front of his nose like you would a cigar. He popped the whole chip in his mouth.
“These. are. AWESOME!!!”
Corey jumped up from the lunch bench and ran over to me. “WHERE DID YOU GET THESE???”
“At...an Asian supermarket...” I said, shocked and pleased that the two loves of my life got along so well.
“THEY’RE SOOOOOO GOOD!” he exclaimed. Then he raced off, offering shrimp chips to anyone and everyone he came across. “TRY ONE THEY’RE JOANNE’S THEY’RE SOOOO GOOD!” he cried between mouthfuls.
I have never been so thrilled by an act of theft before and since. Inspired by his enthusiasm, more kids tried it and some even liked it. I felt the shame of enjoying “strange foods” melt away.
"Shrimp chips were as emblematic to my childhood as Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. The big difference was, I would happily eat Flamin’ Hot Cheetos in front of my peers. I wouldn’t dream of eating shrimp chips at school."
Now, this probably won’t go down in the textbooks as a momentous event, when white and Asian people sat together at the lunch table of brotherhood and developed a deep understanding and mutual respect for one another. But, just for a moment, there was this white kid proclaiming his shrimp chip love and spraying his fellow classmates with chewed up shrimp chip crumbs, infecting others with something little ol’ me deemed so very important. And that is pretty cool.
Joanne has been Taiwanese American her entire life. She has also had to explain the difference between Taiwan and Thailand her entire life. And the politics between Taiwan and China. Joanne is now realizing that being Taiwanese American is very complicated. Joanne enjoys knitting shawls, hanging out with her cat, and having thoughtful conversations about race in the United States. Not with the cat though. Cats don’t give a crap.
You can contact Joanne on Twitter at @acupofJoanne
