Open Arms and Mr. Green by Robert Olen Butler

 Open Arms and Mr. Green by Robert Olen Butler

Good, if tragic short stories

Robert Olen Butler has spent one year in Vietnam, as intelligence officer and translator.

This helps explain his knowledge of Vietnamese people, customs, differences.

Open Arms

In the first short story from the acclaimed collection, we have some awkward situations.

The story teller appears to have a grudge against another Vietnamese man.

They happen to be in the same film projection room when a bizarre thing happens.

They were expecting a comedy with Norman Wilson.

This was a British actor, who was short and the other characters took advantage.

The hero of the story does not like the sort of comedies where this discrimination and abuse, as he sees it, takes place.

But the surprise is that instead of Norman and his shenanigans they get Swedish actors.

And the genre is different.

We are talking porn.

And the one Vietnamese is staring at the other.

The other' s wife had been killed by the communist guerillas and as a consequence he has joined the Allies.

They are in an Australian camp now.

Throughout the movie, or during most of what they watched, the widower glanced down and not at the screen.

This abhorrent projection- in his eyes- made him do something dramatic, outrageous and totally unexpected, if you ask me.

I will not divulge what.

Mr. Green

Mr. Green is a parrot.

So I would love this story, just on account of identifying with the owners.

I have two resplendent macaws.

The owner is the grandfather of the girl telling the story.

She grows to be a woman at a certain point.

But as a child she is mesmerized by the way her grandfather interacts with animals.

Birds in particular appear to have taught this man some of their language, throughout the years.

He takes his granddaughter to market, where they stop near the bird cages and the old man makes gestures and makes sounds that intrigue other people.

Mr. Green has a vocabulary and he repeats

What then?

One time, they take from the market swallows or sparrows.

When the mother takes them, back home, she breaks their necks.

I could not believe it!

Indeed, I read again to see if I did not make a mistake.

But they eat those poor creatures.

And it is all downhill from here, if not in literary terms, in the matter of emotions caused by what happens.