Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Belonging, Bigotry, and Identity
Silence vs. Communication
Family Dynamics and Inheritance
Memory
Love and Self-Sacrifice
Summary
Analysis
A week later, the evacuation of Bainbridge Island is “old news.” Henry and Keiko make plans to have lunch with Keiko’s family on Saturday. Henry feels disoriented by the “restrained and peaceful” atmosphere at school—as if his white classmates don’t even know about what is happening to Japanese families in their city. Henry’s father insists that Henry wear his “I Am Chinese” button “on the outside” of his clothes “where everyone can see it.” Henry’s mother and father both begin wearing their own buttons, too.
The rapidity with which Henry’s white classmates dismiss the Bainbridge Island evacuation emphasizes how readily society at large suppresses collective memory of atrocities. Henry’s heightened sense of alienation at school further emphasizes how isolating an experience it can be to grow up as a minority. Finally, the fact that both Henry’s parents begin wearing buttons of their own suggests that both the Lees are aware of how easily anti-Japanese feeling (and policy) might be converted into anti-Asian feeling writ large.
Themes
On Saturday, Henry and Keiko meet in front of the Panama Hotel. In Cantonese, Keiko asks Henry, “How are you today, beautiful?” “I can be Chinese too,” she jokes, telling Henry that she looked up the translation at the library. Embarrassed but pleased, Henry shyly replies, “Oai deki te ureshii desu.”
Henry and Keiko meet Mr. Okabe and Mrs. Okabe for lunch in the Japanese market. Henry is intimidated by Mr. Okabe’s beautiful English. He worries that “the cadence of his [own] words seem[s] to have more in common with the fishermen who came over from China than with the English Keiko and her family [speak] so fluently.” Mr. Okabe explains why he wanted Keiko to attend Rainier: “I warned her,” he says, “that [her classmates] may never like her, some might even hate her, but eventually, they will respect her—as an American.” Henry thinks guiltily of his own parents: “Why hadn’t anyone ever explained it that way? Instead he got a button and was forced to speak his American.”
Meeting Mr. and Mrs. Okabe is an eye-opening experiencing for Henry in more ways than one. Henry’s sense of not belonging anywhere is amplified when he hears Keiko’s father speak. Even though both Mr. Okabe and Henry are first-generation immigrants, Henry suddenly feels that he is too dissimilar from Mr. Okabe to count himself part of the same category. Nevertheless, Mr. Okabe’s thoughtfulness and clear communication puts Henry at ease—while at the same time contrasting with Henry’s own father, and making Henry wish his parents helped him to better navigate his complex identity as a first-generation American.
Themes
Mrs. Okabe invites Henry and his parents to join her family for a free jazz concert that night, featuring Oscar Holden. Henry knows his parents would be appalled by the kind invitation; his parents don’t listen to music on the radio—only the news. Before Henry can politely decline, army trucks begin rolling down the street, unloading soldiers and armed military police. Henry and the Okabes step outside and are handed a flyer called Public Proclamation 1, which contains instructions about what Japanese families will be allowed to bring with them in a few days’ time, as they are “being forced to evacuate, for their own safety.” Keiko touches her heart and points to Henry; he touches his own chest and feels his “I Am Chinese” button against his fingers.
This is a climactic plot point in the novel, as Proclamation 1 confirms that Henry and Keiko are to be separated. Even earlier in the scene, Mrs. Okabe’s invitation to Henry and his family is significant because it suggests that not everyone in the nonwhite communities of Seattle has succumbed to resentment or prejudice. Mrs. Okabe is willing to get to know Henry’s family, and her kindness emphasizes to Henry how mired his own parents—particularly his father—are in their fear and suspicion of Japanese Americans.
Themes
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