Tastes Like War: A Memoir

Koonja (1941-2008), Grace Cho’s mother, was born in Korea when the country was a Japanese colony. Koonja endured the oppression of her native tongue, forced labor, and poverty. The American invasion of 1945 and the subsequent Korean War brought further hardship, as Koonja’s family was separated and her brother likely disappeared in what became North Korea.

Prevented from attaining higher education, and seeing no better option of advancement or escape, Koonja used her good looks and capacity to learn English to earn money as an entertainer and sex worker for the American army. This work ostracized her from mainstream Korean society and left her vulnerable to sexual and physical violence. She met her Cho’s father, a former client, in the camp. Koonja hoped that moving to America would provide relief from trauma and oppression. However, in Chehalis, she found herself considered as an outsider, with few friends or opportunities. She worked nights in a juvenile detention center and used her cooking and hosting skills acquired in Korea to empower herself and her family. Food was the means by which she cultivated belonging. While Koonja became a renowned chef in her community, her cumulative trauma contributed to auditory hallucinations, paranoid delusions, and reclusive behavior—all symptoms of schizophrenia. Koonja’s tribulations were exacerbated by an unstable family life, owing to her husband’s mistreatment. Before the end of her life, Koonja was able to benefit and improve from displays of love and attention, such as Cho cooking her favorite dishes.

In Tastes Like War, Cho attempts to reconcile Koonja’s complex personal history with her own memories and perception of her mother. Cho places Koonja’s history in juxtaposition to her own development, exploring how their differences and similarities manifested through their very different life experiences. Cho creates a testimony to Koonja’s experiences, connecting her story to the many Korean women of Koonja’s generation who faced similar hardships. By insisting on this cultural-historical context, Cho explores how geopolitical injustices, war, and racism are expressed on both the personal and global scales. By extension, Cho suggests through Koonja’s alleviated symptoms and repossession of her Korean heritage before her death that community healing requires cultural relativism and the dismantling of oppressive institutions.

A Chehalis native, Cho’s father (who died in 1998) studied agricultural science at the University of Washington in 1937 and aspired to be farmer, but he sought other work after the Great Depression. In the 1960s, he became a merchant marine met Koonja while serving in Korea, eventually bringing her and their two children to live in the United States. While he espoused the racist myth of a white savior rescuing a helpless woman of color from poverty and war, the reality was more complex. Cho’s father verbally, emotionally, and physically abused Koonja, and openly held white supremacist beliefs. His conflicted attitude toward Koonja aligned with his contradictory beliefs: He would praise Koonja’s intelligence and defend Korea’s progressiveness but also make derogatory remarks about Black people and supported the campaign of David Duke, a white supremacist. In the manner of an old-fashioned patriarch, he felt threatened by his wife’s strength during her foraging years while he endures a heart attack and does his best to sabotage her.

While Cho’s father was “a blue-collar man with a strong intellectual streak” and happily funded her education (167), his prejudices made him prefer the classics of white, anglophone literature to the postcolonial texts favored by Cho. This resulted in their ironic estrangement as a result of the education he funded. Although Cho loves her father, she recognizes him as part of the institutions that oppressed her mother and made her unwell. These conflicting emotions leave her unable to process the feelings she has around his death. Cho’s insistence on not naming her father in the memoir contributes to his characterization as Koonja’s antagonist, as Cho observes her father more academically and reserves her most intimate characterization for Koonja.

Cho’s brother and his wife complete Cho’s immediate family dynamic and highlight how racism, Koonja’s illness, and the family’s shared experiences facilitate and limit emotional intimacy.

Cho’s older brother spent his early life in Korea with his mother working at the American army camp. He claims to have memories of his mother dressing up to receive clients, a fact that he conceals from his younger sister. He would have also experienced racism as an Asian American child in Korea. Cho and her brother are not close, having a matter-of-fact relationship rather than intimate one, as they sort out the practical matters of their mother’s care. An investment banker who maintains that life in Chehalis was not as bad as Cho makes out, Cho’s brother is less rebellious than her and does his best to be dutiful toward his parents and minimize conflict. He accepts that by the tradition of Korean families, it is his duty as the son to take care of his elderly parents and provides the bulk of accommodation for his ailing mother. However, while he tries to fulfil his mother’s needs, only Cho, with her developing understanding of Korean cooking and the symbolism of food can nourish her.

A white woman from Arkansas, Cho’s sister-in-law accepts that as the wife of a Korean first-born son, she is responsible for her mother-in-law’s care. Cho’s sister-in-law plays the role of liaison between the distant siblings, passing messages about Koonja’s condition and history. Although Cho does not mention this fact explicitly, she implies that her sister-in-law, a newcomer to the family, is the one who most witnesses Koonja’s symptoms firsthand. Cho’s sister-in-law applies American methods to Koonja’s care, such as giving her scientifically nutritious foods like powdered milk, despite the horrific associations for a formerly colonized Korean. This indicates that like Cho’s brother, Cho’s sister-in-law insufficiently considers Koonja’s spiritual condition and cannot provide the type of nourishment she needs.