This Jade World

This Jade World follows the author as he visits Thailand and his family a year after his divorce with his first wife, Katie. The chapters are short and polished, jumping from moment to moment, weaving the story of Ira through his life, with a focus especially on his mental state in the last year.

We see the effect his body, through race and fatness, had on him growing up as a Thai boy in America, and we see how much the relationship and divorce of his own parents affected him. We also see his fight with the idea of love and how he tackles with the fact he's similar to his father. We meet a lot of his family, getting to know more of how Ira became Ira, and inadvertently, Thailand as the author himself sees it.

I don't usually read biographies or memoirs, and I kept forgetting this isn't a work of fiction too. I enjoyed getting to know Ira's life through well crafted and poetic chapters, and seeing the catharsis the finally received.

"This Jade World" provides readers with an intimate look at the grief and longing that follows Sukrungruang's divorce. The honest memoir hones in on small details, like stopping to photograph flowers that he sends to his current wife, his fury over when he's fat, his lunch after his ex-wife (then current) picks him up at the airport after his travel to Thailand, where she emailed him the break up missive while he was staying with family on their wedding anniversary, and how they have remained close friends, his online dating that seems excessive and exhaustive, and his memories from his annual visits to Thailand. For three years, he more or less ignored his elderly father, then finally reconnects with him on this last visit where much of the memoir takes place, hinting about their similarities, but never really delving into why he cut his father out because, from what we see in this encounter, is a father who is not only proud of his only son, but who cares deeply about his son, and one has to wonder when he gives him a fortune reading, if he makes it so hopeful regardless of what's in his stars to keep his son moving forward with the woman he's currently dating.

I loved the sections with his aunt and mother, their lively conversations, the way they argue, the way they care for each other. To some degree, even though I'm glad he remarried and now has a son, I almost wish the memoir didn't include his new wife, but perhaps that would have complicated that relationship, or perhaps he wanted to write a memoir that showed his love for the women in his life, his mother, his aunt, his cousin, and two wives.

The chapters are short, lyrical, humorous, and unexpected.

The American Lives series by the University of Nebraska Press brings the multitudes of life in America. The title This Jade World is a beautiful metaphor for Ira’s life back home in Thailand, a country from which he hails from which looks green when looked at from the sky just like the colour of a jade stone. As the son of Thai immigrants, his life has been revolving around the United States and the annual summer holidays in Thailand. Ira Sukrungruang’s memoir begins in a comic tone that mocks life itself, with a scene of him being in the same room with a woman who was not his ex-wife, for the first time sleeping with someone he met online through dating sites.

But then, there are honesties in Ira’s story, of describing his vulnerabilities post-divorce, and his difficulties in accepting how his body looks like, much less with his inferiority complex about his Asian identities that shielded his confidence to date women. Ira’s story is about accepting the human conditions, our vulnerabilities, the complex situation that befalls people even when they have already done their best, such as in the marriage between him and his ex-wife, Katie. Ira’s healing process comes from the acceptance that sometimes things just couldn’t work, about letting go, and there are many Buddhism values incorporated in this memoir that does not sound forced.

I think this book will be relatable for someone who is having trouble organising his/her life after making a big decision, or someone who has just broken up or is confronting a post-divorce situation. Ira’s story is a story of healing, of finding a grip back on life after a thunderstorm. Not all parts of the stories are sad. Ira’s ability as a poet is shown here in his lyrical description of his breaking marriage, while at times he could also wittily throw funny and comical remarks to change the tone of his story. It’s also about recognising our fear of loneliness as human beings, the yearning to be touched by someone else, and finding one’s place in this world.