Nostalgia is a familiar stranger. A friend you have known for so long that you take them for granted, even when they had gradually crept out of your life step by step, so softly you do not notice. And as they faded away off to the distant past, you have learned who you are without them, but you also forgot who you were before.
Then, the memories return to you, so discrepant from your current reality, so beautiful it renders your surroundings ugly, so gentle it hurts. You think to yourself, as naive and ignorant as it is, I wish things would go back to the way they were.
For me, the nostalgia that struck me was about Mario Kart. Every Friday my dad, brother, and I would convene in front of the TV and eagerly await the menu to appear on the screen. Of course, there were a few preliminary steps. Our family may have owned a Wii gaming system, but we did not own any actual Nintendo games — at least in the traditional sense. Thus, whenever my friends came over and wanted to play a game of Mario Kart, I would have to describe how my uncle bought a disk in China that held dozens of games that were in Japanese, and thus we had to go through a grand total of 3 loading screens to finally arrive at a game, and no, we could not change the language setting.
Now, with quarantine and the many preoccupations of life, I have not had friends over to play Japanese Mario Kart for a long time, and even if I did, I would probably just shrug in lieu of explaining why the game is in Japanese. That’s something that changed too, as I no longer babbled on, not quite knowing how to grasp my words.
Of course, my needlessly convoluted explanation was not helped by not being able to read Japanese. Whereas my friends would bring up the names of the circuits — Mushroom Cap, DK Summit, or Coconut Mall — they held little meaning to me. Instead, I knew these courses by the ways my kart would bounce high off impossibly tall mushrooms, the way my character would be shot through a canon with a boom to land in the soft snow of the mountain peak, or the way I would sometimes wound up on the wrong escalator in the mall and despair in the resulting loss of my 1st place title. With no knowledge of the official titles for the circuits, my family lovingly called them “the mushroom one,” “the snow one,” and of course, “The Mall.”
To my eternal chagrin, my brother had a monopoly on playing as Yoshi, who also happened to be my favorite character. But of course, like the magnanimous child I was, I graciously chose to play Princess Peach instead. My dad, meanwhile, chose whichever character suited his whims at a time. And so we would choose our karts and begin.
Eventually, however, the most anticipated event of our Friday nights lost its vibrancy and importance. My brother became indifferent to the Wii games that captivated his younger self’s imagination, and my dad would not always have the time to participate in a match. In the next few years, Mario Kart became an occasional time-filler, and as I zoomed through the courses, improving my time for each course little by little, I found that the fun to be found in my memories came mostly from the people around me.
In that sense, nostalgia is a familiar stranger, but it is also a friend. Occasionally, when our schedules happen to realign again, we would turn on the TV and play another round.
For a moment, things are the way they used to be.
Hi Jennifer,
Reading this made me reflect on a lot of similar memories I have with my dad and sister, playing Wii Play or Mario Kart as a kid. These experiences faded away a lot like you described, and as I’m sure is common for many people. As we got older and more busy, the Wii sessions became less and less frequent. During quarantine we managed to play a few times again, which I really enjoyed. As much as I’d like to go back to those simpler times, it’s also nice to know that those memories will always be there, and while we’ll never have quite the same experiences, we can always look back and enjoy those times. Reading about your Japanese version of Mario Kart was quite interesting, I’ve never come across a CD quite like that so that was funny to read about. The last line about things being like the way they used to be for a moment was really impactful. It can be hard to recreate those special moments but when they arrive naturally, it’s a great feeling.
Hi Jennifer,
I loved the humorous nostalgia in this piece! I really felt the joy and sweetness of the moments you were describing between your dad and brother when you were little. My favorite detail was the part where you mentioned that you didn’t own any real Wii discs and you had to use pirated Japanese ones from your uncle. It’s honestly hilarious! I don’t know if you feel the same way, but I firmly believe that every Asian American child can probably relate on one level or another of having a ratchet equivalent of a quintessentially American practice. For me, it was a sketchy streaming service that I watched the Disney channel on while Chinese viewer commentary ran in the subtitles.
Anyways, the sweetness of childhood memories is truly unmatched. As you said, even a tiny moment spent revisiting them feels like everything is right with the world. Hopefully in the future you’ll find more time to spend reminiscing, because however small the detail or pastime, they’re always powerful. Thanks for sharing this beautifully personal piece!
Ella
Jennifer!!
Reading this was – pun intended – a trip down memory lane for me. The title hooked me in immediately, and rainbow road is arguably one of the most iconic settings of our generation.
I’m not gonna lie, the ending made me a bit sad. I think there’s a very bittersweet feeling to be associated with the realization that you’ve grown past some important aspects of your childhood, and reading your post made me miss some of my childhood memories.
I don’t have any siblings, but Mario Kart was what my cousins and I would play together whenever we met up – the last time we played, I recall it being in my cousin’s dorm at his college in Australia, and I won’t say that blood was shed, but I will say that both of us got pushed off the couch by the other multiple times.
Jennifer,
First, I have to start by saying I love the way you described the feeling of nostalgia. A familiar stranger is such a unique yet accurate way to describe it. For me, my go to Wii game used to be Just Dance, so I totally relate to your nostalgic feelings. I used to play this every day with my friends and would ask for the new edition each year for Christmas. Now, our Wii is broken and these games collect dust on a shelf in our basement. It is sort of sad actually, but we have to remember the good memories we made and not dwell too much on it. I love how this post has a sarcastic tone to it as well, you write in a way that is engaging and also really powerful. Describing the way your family matured past Mario Kart as “losing vibrancy” is really powerful and definitely relatable. As kids, everything seems so colorful and joyful but eventually we mature and the color begins to fade. Overall, I really like how you tied humor into a topic that also brings a bit of sadness.
Jennifer,
I loved this piece and I can definitely relate to the nostalgia that you were talking about! I absolutely love Mario Kart and even begged my parents to buy it when I was little. I was only ever good at Moo Moo Meadows though. Luckily, practice benefited me and I definitely remember the feeling of accomplishment I got back then from finally getting first place.
My parents were never too into Mario Kart, but as a family, we always played Wii sports or Just Dance and there’s definitely such a sweet sense of nostalgia from that. Although Wii Sports or Just Dance definitely got us a little more active, I always thought the illustrations and animation of Mario Kart was unmatched. A racing game seems so simple compared to all the complicated games that exist, but I love its simplicity. For my family, playing a game like that was always a go-to way to spend some time together and it helped that it was really easy to play. Although it truly is just a video game, it’s become a marker of our childhood.
My favorite character to play has always been Toad and my favorite courses are the mall and Mario’s Circuit. I actually never knew that a shooting star was a racer falling off, but it just goes to show that there’s a ton of cool easter eggs in the game- all which help make its magic.I’ve actually never been able to finish a run on Rainbow Road, but maybe one day I will!
– Christina
Hey Jennifer!
As always, your piece was so beautifully and elegantly written. This specific topic, however, hit so close to home that I felt it physically touch my heart–it was so accurately portrayed and well described. The concept of nostalgia has always been one of my favorites, but I think more recently it has been especially prevalent in my life as I’ve gone through many difficult changes these past few months. I’ve always been (and still am) absolutely TERRIBLE at this game though. Maybe it’s a reflection of my driving skills in real life, but I always ended up dead last, as I would inevitably drive myself off of a cliff at least twice every second. Rainbow road was my absolute least favorite because it was so hard for no reason: I couldn’t last half a second on the slippery path that flashed its rainbow colors so aggressively all the time. Overall though, I really enjoyed reading this blog (as always with your work), and it really generated a lot of emotions within me as your writing about nostalgia spoke everything I have been feeling into the words that I have been unable to describe or find, and I think I can say the same for a lot of other people as well.
Keep up the good work!! 🙂
Excellent post, Jennifer. Nostalgia is powerful!