Being Eurasian: Memories Across Racial Divides

Chapter 6: Jean Gittins

6 Jean Gittins Ethnic Indeterminacy: The Eurasian Girl in a Chinese Famil y My leanings, for some reason unknown to me, were always towards the British, and none of us looked altogether Chtnese in appearance, this complicated situation was therefore a continued source of embarrassment to us (Gittins, 1969 , 11 ) Even though there is never a perfect correlation between one's self-identity and one's perceived identity, identity can ebb and flowdependingupon the response they receive Those that receive the most support will gain prominence, while those that are demeaned or ignored will become less conspicuous (McCall and Simmons, [1966] 1978 , 77) O ut of the three lives examined in this book, Jean Gittins's is probably the most traumatically 'marked' and painfully 'branded ' by history. Joyce Symons, as we saw in the last chapter, was a bitter witness and an indignant spectator of the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong. Yet, the war remained ver y muc h a historica l deluge , whic h sh e wa s protecte d fro m through her shelter in Macau. Placing the two narratives side by side, the subject in Looking at the Stars remains, to a large extent, a keen observer of the violent forces of history, watching anxiously from a relatively safe distance the unfolding of the brutal historical action . Gittins, on th e othe r hand , wa s not onl y caugh t i n th e whirlpoo l of history bu t a t times , w e se e tha t sh e willfull y chos e t o collid e head-on 1 108 Being Eurasian Memories Across Racial Divides rather than t o side step the forces o f history. The changing circumstance s had instille d i n he r a danngness t o tak e chances . Immediatel y afte r th e surrender, she ventured onto numerous dangerous trips to Shamshuipo camps to 'sight' her husband an d t o Stanley camp bringing supplies and news t o the interne d Universit y staff . She collaborate d i n the escape of Professo r Gordon King, the Dean of the Medical Department, whe n the universit y staff wa s held i n a kind o f parole. As daily survival became difficult fo r a single female , sh e decide d t o submi t hersel f t o cam p internment . Sh e sustained drastic physical, psychological, emotional changes during and after her internment . I n man y ways , the Eurasia n subjec t tha t emerge d i n th e narrative epitomizes the physical embodiment of the cataclysmic effects of historical realities. The subject becomes, in many ways, 'a site where history is experienced and transacted' (Eakin, 142). The firs t par t o f thi s chapte r focuse s o n Eastern Windows - Western Skies (1969) 2 b y Jea n Gittins . Eastern Windows i s th e longes t mos t comprehensive retrospectiv e accoun t o f Gittins's autobiographical works , which covers much of her childhood and young adulthood. Gittins's other autobiographical texts , I Was at Stanley (1946) and Stanley Behind Barbed Wire (1982) , dea l wit h he r Stanle y cam p experience . He r las t autobiographical text, A Stranger No More (1987), concerns her settlement in Australia. Most memoirs do not have the kind of radical break or emotional trauma which i s found i n Gittins' s tha t quit e literall y disrupt s th e sens e o f flo w from pas t to present. I n most cases, the voice s of the matur e narrator s i n their memoirs may sound quite different from those of the narrated childhood or teenage selves, but usually there is an organic continuity and no strongly felt break that interrupts the sense of the self constructed in the narratives. In Symons' s case, her quie t refug e i n Maca u durin g th e wa r years hardl y constitutes a marked stage which may divide her pattern of existence into a 'before' or 'after'. Nor does Irene Cheng's sudden widowhood in April 1942 constitute an y marke d change . Fortun e ma y chang e bu t th e sel f i s continuous. But in Jean Gittins's case, the spiritual and physical deprivation, the nervous anxiety, and the humiliation and isolation she suffered durin g the camp years distinctly mar k...