Kodama's Ramen Shop Sparknotes

I read “Kodama’s Ramen Shop” by Ellen Oh, and I have finished this short story. It is about Jessie, a teenage girl, who is fighting with her Obaasan (grandmother). They are fighting about ramen, their family business, and school. Even though these topics may seem like the source for all their fights, their fights are primarily caused by Obaasan’s discrimination towards Jessie’s Korean descendant and how they view each other differently.

(Outline and Paragraph)

G- “Kodama’s Ramen Shop” is both a window and a mirror because I can relate to some parts of the story but other parts I can’t Y-Window R- fight, japanese/korean R- haven’t experienced discrimination R- difficult views Y-Mirror R- owns a family business

This short story can be a window for many reasons. One portion of this book is related to racial discrimination. Jessie and her grandmother are always fighting about the ramen. Turns out it’s not only the ramen that they are fighting about, they are fighting about their cultures too. Jessie’s grandmother is always making derogatory comments about Jessie’s Korean culture and doesn’t ever acknowledge what Jessie says if it is related to her Korean lifestyle or even her mother. I chose this as a window because many people are unaware of what it feels like to be looked down upon just because of our accent, skin tone, ancestors, or cultural beliefs. This is a good example of a window for many reasons one of which is that I personally can’t relate to it because I’ve always just fit into the environments I’ve been in and always been seen as “normal”, so I learned a really valuable lesson from this short story. On the other hand, this story can also be a mirror because I can relate to owning a family business. Owning a business can be very difficult and stressful. A lot of the time my parents go to work early and stay late while I try and do what I can to help out, whether it’s at home, doing the dishes, cleaning the living room, cooking dinner, or actually going to help out at the actual store. This is also very true for Jessie as she goes straight to the ramen shop after school to help her family. Even though Jessie did what she could to help out at the ramen shop, her Obassan still would not let her help with certain things because she was skeptical and didn’t trust that Jessie would be able to complete these tasks to her liking. I can also relate to this part of the story. A lot of the time when I try and help out my parents, I’m given the