I AM OBSESSED WITH MY NEIGHBOR WHO IS AN UNHOUSED ASIAN MAN

This man has endured these streets, hustling at the end of my block on the corner for the past two and a half years. He walks and talks like every elder Asian man I know. He shares similar physical features to my dad, to my uncles, to my dead grandfather. Naturally, I believe we are related. Asians are all each other's 5th cousins somehow.

Growing up around my grandfather, my mom’s dad—my Gong Gong, my Ông Ngoại was challenging. My mom, my grandma, the aunts, literally everyone in our family just accepted that my grandpa was a grump. He growled unhappily at surprising things–noises we never heard, the news, the weather. The women hushed us quiet if more than one of us kids laughed at the same time all the way over at the kids table because it upset him. "Grumpa" disliked the sound of his own grandchildrens' joy. Grumpa was our nickname for him.  

I am being hyperbolic: elderly Asian men are rarely left alone, and for this man to be out here brown bagging, wandering shoeless like this on the streets?  I can't help but wonder–where are his people? Where are all people without homes' people? And it is most likely that I am Asian, that I am possessed by this familial peculiarty when I have observed squatter dwelling homeless Asians in Asia. In China, Vietnam, Korea, even Japan. In Oakland, Portland, the Tenderloin and segments of Chinatown SF. I am so curious about this Asian man's family, extended family. In my experience, Elderly Asian Men are the Wise Golden Ones who are always protected by each other or a nest of women, as they were once boys. Asian boys and men are favored so so so so much, and I can say as an Asian woman with an Asian brother, it is truly the sharpest dagger experiencing the endless prejudice and discrimination directly from the people you love and care for most. We Know particularly among my Black and Asian queer and women friends. I mean, all women experience it whether they acknowledge the manner in which our societies organizes around men. This patriarchy is literally carved in our history.

Did they know about his situation, and if so, wouldn't they take him in? 

Did they take him in, and he was like, nah, I'm good out here?

  The world of Asians I am familiar with is one in which we all got each other whether we like it or not.  There is usually an endless line of second cousins and sister uncles to borrow money from. I have lent a couple here and there, been sent cash from family in Canada I literally did not know existed til then. They never ask, or arrange terms. I have set up sheets on the couch for a distant relative during a struggling time. There is no wealth in my family or extended family. We are however, bountiful in deep shame and guilt over familial obligations and money. The whispernetwork (usually Wechat, Weibo) travels internationally and operates like a Gofundme disguised as an Asian Dishonor Tracker. You are disgraced and demoted in the culture if you are not

persistently. 

overextending. 

help. 

I have confirmed this reality among fellow Asian friends and their family circles. Women especially are goaded into embracing burdens. I will always sit up straight, ears ringing when I overhear my mom, aunts and their friends gossip about our other aunties and their mom friends protecting their shit ass adult sons who beat their wives and children; they will lie to authorities that he is not hiding there —a whole criminal offense(!) is how I know the women in the Asian community. Some of us possess empathy. And some are perpetually, habitually in a caretaking role. 

When this man with his features that remind me of my grandfather...of my uncles...stands there gently with no damn responsibility in the world... or place to live, crouched in his blanket on the corner smiling into the sun I am, um, pontificating endlessly in journal entries and essays about his life. I head to him with my dog (who is just as curious) bringing him swag hats he endlessly refuses despite me pointing out how sun scorched his bald head is getting. He shoves them back in my hands or tries to place them on my beagle. He will smell of booze. I always see empty bottles on his blankets of the cheapest 40s purchaseable at our neighborhood liquor mart. I’ve observed him water half filled 40s down with the bottled Arrowheads I bring him. He is always so smiley with his one cracked front tooth, and soft spoken as he accepts the tuna and bread. I study his hands, cracked and tanned. My dog sniffs his whole world. He doesn't seem to mind. He never asks for anything; he always kind of turns away. He avoids my eye contact, and laundry list of questions. I can tell he wants to be left alone, obviously.

Why am I so Mariah Carey style OBSESSED? It is annoying, but I am the cycle I am convinced Asian women are trapped in. It shows up in all ways. I am allowing this man to occupy space in my mind. Occasionally, I feel responsible for him. I tell myself, I should learn his story! He does not appear to want to know me, though. He does not seem to want the responsibility of knowing me. He does not want to live in my head house mind. It seems too transactional for him, an obvious freebird with no apparent interest in belongings. He does not seem to want to know anyone—and that too is what I am so obsessed with. I am captivated by the notion of not belonging, of not being a part of anyone's life, not existing to anyone, not owing anyone anything. Existing duty free. I think of all the Debt (yes, capitalized D) we owe to family, to ancestors, to our mothers and fathers, to children, to the world, to our community, to our future, to The Future, to our Past. This person came from somewhere and belongs to someone somewhere. This man is away from family, a house of family, a family home. A quiet, mildly drunk Asian man with no seeming commitments or obligations. He has no attachments. Rarely get to see that, I guess. A unique specimen in the wild in my culture, I guess.