WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.540 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.540 --> 00:00:05.010 align:middle line:84% So my family and I immigrated to Los Angeles 00:00:05.010 --> 00:00:09.540 align:middle line:90% when I was 12, in 1984. 00:00:09.540 --> 00:00:11.850 align:middle line:90% So we ended up in LA. 00:00:11.850 --> 00:00:13.510 align:middle line:90% And it was during the Olympics. 00:00:13.510 --> 00:00:18.790 align:middle line:84% So this poem is actually set during that time, 00:00:18.790 --> 00:00:22.660 align:middle line:90% and it's called "Hamburger." 00:00:22.660 --> 00:00:26.140 align:middle line:84% And that's actually an epigraph by the chef 00:00:26.140 --> 00:00:31.780 align:middle line:84% Dan Barber, who owns the Blue Hill Farm upstate in New York. 00:00:31.780 --> 00:00:36.560 align:middle line:90% He's a big farm to table guy. 00:00:36.560 --> 00:00:41.780 align:middle line:84% So the epigraph goes, "The great curse of American food culture 00:00:41.780 --> 00:00:44.533 align:middle line:84% is that we have no food culture." 00:00:44.533 --> 00:00:46.900 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:46.900 --> 00:00:47.650 align:middle line:90% "Hamburger." 00:00:47.650 --> 00:00:50.440 align:middle line:90% 00:00:50.440 --> 00:00:54.880 align:middle line:84% In 1984, when I arrived in these United States, 00:00:54.880 --> 00:00:58.540 align:middle line:84% pastel neon in the dream pastiche desert 00:00:58.540 --> 00:01:04.180 align:middle line:84% of Olympics-fisted Los Angeles, I wanted my first meal to be 00:01:04.180 --> 00:01:09.160 align:middle line:84% a hamburger drenched in tomato, not banana, ketchup, 00:01:09.160 --> 00:01:13.660 align:middle line:84% squeezed between white sesame seed buns, not pandesal-- 00:01:13.660 --> 00:01:19.370 align:middle line:84% Filipino morning roll eaten sweetly any time of day. 00:01:19.370 --> 00:01:21.230 align:middle line:90% That had to wait. 00:01:21.230 --> 00:01:24.080 align:middle line:84% On arrival in a town called Bell, 00:01:24.080 --> 00:01:27.620 align:middle line:84% I was served rice under pork chicken adobo, 00:01:27.620 --> 00:01:32.450 align:middle line:84% and the rest of my first week, a feast as if I've never loved-- 00:01:32.450 --> 00:01:36.740 align:middle line:84% pancit garnish with shredded veggies for longevity, 00:01:36.740 --> 00:01:42.440 align:middle line:84% oxtails, pork hocks, calves feet bisque in peanut butter sauce, 00:01:42.440 --> 00:01:49.750 align:middle line:84% pig stewed in shrimp paste, bitter melon, chayote, achiote. 00:01:49.750 --> 00:01:52.810 align:middle line:84% The women live practically in the kitchen. 00:01:52.810 --> 00:01:57.430 align:middle line:84% How things had not yet changed, my grandmother chopping, 00:01:57.430 --> 00:02:02.560 align:middle line:84% stir frying, frying, boiling, steaming, mashing, 00:02:02.560 --> 00:02:06.940 align:middle line:84% melodious sounds that carry the bewildering loneliness 00:02:06.940 --> 00:02:11.850 align:middle line:84% of a foreign home momentarily out of doors. 00:02:11.850 --> 00:02:13.860 align:middle line:84% Since the table was not big enough, 00:02:13.860 --> 00:02:16.170 align:middle line:84% we ate together, scattered throughout 00:02:16.170 --> 00:02:21.390 align:middle line:84% the two-bedroom, one-bath house shared by three families. 00:02:21.390 --> 00:02:23.790 align:middle line:84% On mats on the floor, we children 00:02:23.790 --> 00:02:27.190 align:middle line:84% love sleeping side-by-side, hot dogs 00:02:27.190 --> 00:02:31.020 align:middle line:84% rotating on a carnival seller's grill. 00:02:31.020 --> 00:02:33.120 align:middle line:90% But I was growing impatient. 00:02:33.120 --> 00:02:37.020 align:middle line:84% The fast food that would transform me into an American, 00:02:37.020 --> 00:02:42.240 align:middle line:84% I hadn't ingested, a kind of superhero pill, 00:02:42.240 --> 00:02:46.890 align:middle line:84% until my first day of school in my 7th grade cafeteria 00:02:46.890 --> 00:02:51.060 align:middle line:84% where I was served a round patty of compressed meat-- 00:02:51.060 --> 00:02:56.820 align:middle line:84% boiled, charred, yawning, open face, next to curly potatoes 00:02:56.820 --> 00:03:01.210 align:middle line:84% glowing a cartoon meteorite orange. 00:03:01.210 --> 00:03:03.520 align:middle line:90% I could not contain my joy. 00:03:03.520 --> 00:03:06.880 align:middle line:84% I tore and poured on packets of ketchup, 00:03:06.880 --> 00:03:11.170 align:middle line:84% discarded the wilted iceberg like fabric softener, 00:03:11.170 --> 00:03:14.620 align:middle line:84% clamped the hamburger between my shaky hands, 00:03:14.620 --> 00:03:21.480 align:middle line:84% and chomped momentously into my first taste of America-- 00:03:21.480 --> 00:03:27.570 align:middle line:84% salty, starchy, chewy, beginning to a lifetime consumption 00:03:27.570 --> 00:03:31.380 align:middle line:84% powdered with sugar, melted as margarine, 00:03:31.380 --> 00:03:35.340 align:middle line:84% deep fried, blue dyed, iced, over 00:03:35.340 --> 00:03:40.410 align:middle line:84% jell-oed, marshmallowed, popcorned, bite size, 00:03:40.410 --> 00:03:42.320 align:middle line:90% on the run. 00:03:42.320 --> 00:03:43.220 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:03:43.220 --> 00:03:45.070 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE]