From TROPIC OF ORANGE by Karen Tei Yamashita

Page 127
"...And how about those Caucasian Japanophiles who talk real Japanese with the sushi man?
Can we count them too?"
  "Sure.  Why not." Gabriel felt generous.
  "There's even white people here."
  The woman sitting next to Emi turned and glared momentarily.  Emi absorbed the glare like 
it was a tanning lamp.  Gabriel looked the other way.

Page 128
  "Do you know what multicultural diversity really is?"
  "I'm thinking."
  "It's a white guy wearing a Nirvana T-shirt and dreds.  That's cultural diversity."  Emi 
looked up at the sushi chef.  "Don't you hate being multicultural?" she asked.
  "Excuse me?"
  The woman next to Emi bristled under her silk blouse and hadcrafted silver.  She looked 
apologetically at the sushimaker and said, "Hiro-san, having a hard day?"
  "Hiro," Emi butted back in.  "I hate being multicultural."
  "Can't you calm down?"  The woman never looked at Emi, but offered up a patronizing smile 
for Hiro-san.  "We're trying to enjoy our tea.  But the way, Hiro-san, it's just delicious 
today."
  "See what I mean, Hiro?  You're invisible.  I'm invisible.  We're all invisible.  It's 
just tea, ginger, raw fish, and a credit card."
  "Whatever is your problem?"
  Gabriel knew better than to introduce more ammunition.  He said plainly, "I'd like a 
California roll."
  Thw woman went on.  "I happen to adore the Japanese culture.  What can I say?  I adore 
different cultures.  I've traveled all over the world.  I love living in L.A. because I can 
find anything in the world to eat, right here.  It's such a meeting place for all sorts of 
people.  A true celebration of an international world.  It just makes sick to hear people 
speak so cynically about something so positive and to make assumptions about people based 
on their color.  Really, I'm sorry.  I can't understand your attitude at all."
  Emi stared into a compact mirror and reapplied a glossy layer of red lipstick before she 
turned around in her seat to meet her sushi bar neighbor in her full frontal glory.
  "Emi--"  Gabriel felt a sudden panic.
  Emi sighed.  She noticed the woman's hair was held together miraculously by two 
ornately-lacqured chopsticks.  Maybe there was some precedent for this hairdo.  Gabriel 
later remembered something about Oedipus blinding himself with his mother's hairpins.  Not 
an Asian myth however.
  Emi said, "Hiro, could we have two forks, please?"
  Hiro quickly motioned and signaled for the occidental eating utensils.
  Emi examined the forks carefully and held them up for her neighbor.  "Would you consider 
using these in your hair?  Or would you consider that," Emi paused, "unsanitary?"
  The woman blanched.  Gabriel missed chomping into his California roll.  For some reason, 
the entire sushi bar seemed to tilt and sag with an indescribable elasticity.  Gabriels 
albow lost its surface, and that seaweed, rice, crab, and avocado delicacy tumbled and 
tumbled.

Page 182
Sun-kissed;
radioactive whispers through
licking tongues blue on fire,
grinning white ash and glowing gums,
molten lips pressed, consumed.
Orange of its desire:
C pearls succulent,
health encased in sheer tissues and
lacey webs, leathery skin and fragrant oils.

The myth of Columbus:
eyeing the interuppted flight 
of a moth, crossing that orange globe,
its wings--miniature sails unfurled-- 
skirting the edge of its curved horizon, 
making his case 
for a round world.

The myth of discovery: 
when we--a sun-kissed people--
were watching, 
from the halls of Moctezuma, 
from the seat of Atahualpa, 
from the fires of Patagonia, 
from the song of Guarant, 
awaiting the moth's return,
searching for the great golden eyes painted 
across its wings, singed irreparably, but 
holding in those pupils the memory,
the sin of paradise lost, 
transferred, absorbed, become 
the language, 
the Church, 
the round world. 
Mi casa es su casa. 
Mi tierra es su tierra.
Mi mundo es su mundo.

Sun-kissed.
Orange of its desire.