Mute in an English-only World Chang-Rae Lee

　　When I read of the trouble in Palisades Park,/New Jersey,/over the proliferation of Korean-language signs/along its main commercial strip,/I unexpectedly sympathized with the frustrations,/resentments,/and fears of the longtime residents.// They clearly felt alienated and even unwelcome/in a vital part of their community.// The town,/like seven others in New Jersey,/has passed laws/requiring that half of any commercial sign in a foreign language be in English.//
　　Now I certainly would never tolerate any exclusionary ideas/about who could rightfully settle and belong in the town.// But having been raised in a Korean immigrant family,/I saw every day the exacting price and power of language,/especially with my mother,/who was an outsider/in an English-only world.// In the first years we lived in America,/my mother could speak only the most basic English,/and she often encountered great difficulty/whenever she went out.//
　　We lived in New Rochelle,/New York,/in the early seventies,/and most of the local businesses/were run by the descendants of immigrants/who, generations ago, had come to the suburbs/from New York City.// Proudly dotting Main Street and North Avenue/were Italian pastry and cheese shops,/Jewish tailors and cleaners,/and Polish and German butchers and bakers.// If my mother’s marketing couldn’t wait until the weekend,/when my father had free time,/she would often hold off until I came home from school/to buy the groceries.//

　　Though I was only six or seven years old,/she insisted that I go out shopping with her/and my younger sister.// I mostly loathed the task,/partly because it meant I couldn’t spend the afternoon off/playing catch with my friends/but also because I knew/our errands would inevitably lead to an awkward scene,/and that I would have to speak up/to help my mother.//
　　I was just learning the language myself,/but I was a quick study,/as children are with new tongues.// I had spent kindergarten in almost complete silence,/hearing only the high nasality of my teacher/and comprehending the little but cranky wails and cries/of my classmates.// But soon,/seemingly mere months later,/I had already become a terrible ham and mimic,/and I would crack up my father/with impressions of teachers,/his friends,/and even himself.// My mother scolded me for aping his speech,/and the one time I attempted to make light of hers/I got a roundhouse smack on my bottom.//
　　For her,/the English language was not very funny.// It usually meant trouble and a good dose of shame,/and sometimes real hurt.// Although she had a good reading knowledge of the language/from university classes in South Korea,/she had never practiced actual conversation.// So in America/she used English flash cards and phrase books/and watched television with us kids.// And she faithfully carried a pocket workbook/illustrated with stick-figure people/and compound sentences to be filled in.//
　　But none of it seemed to do her much good.// Staying mostly at home to care for us,/she didn’t have many chances/to try out sundry words and phrases.// When she did,/say,/at the window of the post office,/her readied speech would stall,/freeze,/sometimes altogether collapse.//

　　One day was unusually harrowing.// We ventured downtown/in the new Ford Country Squire my father had bought her,/an enormous station wagon/that seemed as long as an ocean liner.// We were shopping for a special meal/for guests visiting that weekend,/and my mother had heard/that a particular butcher carried fresh oxtails,/which she needed for a traditional soup.//
　　We’d never been inside the shop,/but my mother would pause before its window,/which was always lined with whole hams,/crown roasts,/and ropes of plump handmade sausages.// She greatly esteemed the bounty with her eyes,/and my sister and I did also,/but despite our craving cries/she’d turn us away/and instead buy the packaged links at the Finast supermarket,/where she felt comfortable looking them over/and could easily spot the price.// And, of course,/not have to talk.//
　　But that day she was resolved.// The butcher store was crowded,/and as we stepped inside,/the door jingled a welcome.// No one seemed to notice.// We waited for some time,/and people who had entered after us/were now being served.// Finally an old woman nudged my mother/and waved a little ticket,/which we hadn’t taken.// We patiently waited again,/until one of the beefy men behind the glass display/hollered our number.//

　　My mother pulled us forward/and began searching the cases,/but the oxtails were nowhere to be found.// The man,/his big arms crossed,/sharply said,/“Come on, lady,/whaddya want?”// This unnerved her,/and she somehow blurted the Korean word for oxtail,/soggori.//
　　The butcher looked/as if my mother had put something sour in his mouth,/and he glanced back at the lighted board/and called the next number.//
　　Before I knew it,/she had rushed us outside and back in the wagon,/which she had double-parked because of the crowd.// She was furious,/almost vibrating with fear and grief,/and I could see she was about to cry.//
　　She wanted to go back inside,/but now the driver of the car we were blocking/wanted to pull out.// She was shooing us away.// My mother,/who had just earned her driver’s license,/started furiously working the pedals.// But in her haste/she must have flooded the engine,/for it wouldn’t turn over.// The driver started honking/and then another car began honking as well,/and soon it seemed the entire street was shrieking at us.//

　　In the following years,/my mother grew steadily more comfortable with English.// In Korean/she could be fiery, stern, deeply funny, and ironic,/in English/just slightly less so.// If she was never quite fluent,/she gained enough confidence/to make herself clearly known to anyone,/and particularly to me.//
　　Five years ago she died of cancer,/and some months after we buried her,/I found myself in the driveway of my father’s house,/washing her sedan.// I liked taking care of her things;/it made me feel close to her.// While I was cleaning out the glove compartment,/I found her pocket English workbook,/the one with the silly illustrations.// I hadn’t seen it in nearly twenty years.// The yellowed pages were brittle and dog-eared.// She had fashioned a plain paper wrapping for it,/and I wondered/whether she meant to protect the book or hide it.//
　　I don’t doubt/that she would have appreciated doing the family shopping/on the new Broad Avenue of Palisades Park.// But I like to think, too,/that she would have understood/those who now complain about the Korean-only signs.//
　　I wonder/what these same people would have done/if they had seen my mother studying her English workbook/—or lost in a store.// Would they have nodded gently at her?// Would they have lent a kind word?//