1. Date of Birth

  Chih-Chung Tsai

Rivera-Garza

LTWR113 – Intercultural writing

Writing Exercise 1: Date of Birth (a)

Ron Silliman (Aug. 5 1946 - 2011)

On August 5^th, 1946, in the shadow of the war that consumed a globe, the stories of war gave way to a tale of humanity. A small newspaper clipping on this day boasted a headline proudly in bold, “Fraulein eligible for visa to wed civilian in U.S.”. In a time when the nation's wounds still dripped with the blood of patriot's lives, individuals strove to live a life not marked by the desolation and anguish of this war. Risking the hatred of an entire nation, Frauleins took up the offer they were granted, to have access to come to the United States to find and wed their fiancées. The European Theater Army Command had prohibited marriages with Germans. Travel of German nationals were heavily restricted.

                      “The Congressional law, which applies to all aliens not included under the American exclusion law, stated that the American must offer a statement of his intentions of marriage, corroborated by other suitable evidence.”

                     War machines had finished trampling the earth. The beautiful sound of heroic gunfire no longer claimed the air, for silence and seasons were sweeping back like a tide claiming the beach. The title “German” has become such a tainted term over the course of these years, and every bullet had seemed to have a German's name inscribed on it. They were the enemy, a face as horrendous as nightmares and as vile as sin.

                  To leave your country, which has been ravaged for the crimes she has committed upon the world, and go to a new place, the land of your enemies, and marry one of their men, bear his children, speak his language, and eat the crops that push forth from the dirt where your people had once dropped bombs on. This is the nature of their travel. This is the vastness that they cross. They reach out, and America reaches back.

In a case of love being appropriated, we find solace in the peace of transcendence. In the souls of people exhausted by the roar of global fury, there is silence in the intimacy of this small act. Of reaching out.

                   

                      October 9, 1989. In the city of Voronezh, in the Russian Federation, a very peculiar incident leaves many wondering, and perhaps even afraid. The Russian newspaper TASS reports, which is later reported in the United States by the St. Louis Dispatch, that a U.F.O has been sighted.

                  “The TASS account stated that the UFO landed in Voronezh on September 27, 1989, at 6:30 P.M. Young boys playing soccer witnessed the event, stating that a pinkish glow preceded the descent of the unusual flying craft. The pink glow became a deep red as it touched down. Most witnesses described the object as a flattened, disc shape. A crowd quickly gathered, and peered through a hatch that opened. They saw a 'three-eyed alien' about 10 feet tall, clad in silvery overalls and bronze-colored boots and wearing a disk on his chest. " (case briefing, BJ Booth, http://www.theblackvault.com/wiki/index.php/Voronezh,_Russian_Federation_(9-27-1989) )

                        A group of children, accompanied by adults, witnessed this event. They later on proceeded to recount the description of the event, including details regarding the ship and the aliens. They remained shaken by the event, and there was a lack of discrepancy in the witnesses' retelling. Experts claimed that the publication TASS took too much creative liberty with the accounts of the witnesses, and the words of the scientific experts.

                The UFO was said to disappear, then reappear, with a alien emerging from the ship. They produced a pistol shaped weapon, and pointed it at a young boy, firing a beam at him in front of the crowd. The boy disappeared in front of all the witnesses.

                What makes this event poignant, regardless of whether it truly happened or not? Was it the futility of reaching out to another race, one that has the ability to vaporize our sons? Or was it man's fascination with a simple story, expanding on it to create an illusion that cannot be discounted? Perhaps it is the obsession about the other, creating another frontier of enemies, against whom we must defend ourselves. This tale of an alien encounter shows the elusive nature of history. It shows that people have the power to believe it, and to recount it. That as a collective body, they can look back at what it was, and only they will know what truly happened. But most importantly, only they can decide where they want to go with what they have seen. The collective memory of a people can be scarred by an event, a decision, or a collective sin. But in the same way, it can be collectively redeemed. In the power of memory, there is catharsis, liberation from the agony of despair. The past is not a chain that forever burdens an identity, but rather, it can be something that unites people, and let them be marked by their decisions for the future.

                    But perhaps none of this matters. It would be suffice to say that human social concerns are not important, when faced with a possible intergalactic being with a ship and weapon that is vastly superior to ours. If this story is true, then I was born on the day of our undoing, the demise of humanity. Who cares about what one country did to another several decades ago, when tomorrow could very likely be the promise of global enslavement to a race of superior beings? Maybe the beauty of an extra-terrestrial lies in its ability to make us forget the sorrows of our past, and forge our swords in preparation for tomorrow. In the shadow of a powerful UFO, we are reminded of how small we are, insignificant, and there is some comfort in knowing this.