I hated the Old One; Grandmother never let me get on with my movie-star daydreams.
Jook-Liang is sometimes resentful of her grandmother, and this quote illustrates the tension between generations and culture. Especially because of their shared gender, Grandmother tries to place her cultural expectations upon her granddaughter. She wants Jook-Liang to be docile, domestic, and modest, while accepting that she is less important and valued than her male siblings. Jook-Liang, however, sees new opportunities for herself in both a new generation, which allows greater freedom for young women, and in the more fluid Canadian culture. However, while she is confident, ambitious, and hopeful about her future, Jook-Liang is also somewhat naive. She imagines herself as a movie star like her idol Shirley Temple, without understanding how rare it is for someone to achieve fortune and fame. She also does not realize how much of a barrier her Chinese identity would be if she was truly going to pursue those dreams. While it is easy to be sympathetic to Jook-Liang's ambitions and dreams, she does not fully realize or appreciate that her grandmother is trying to prepare her for some of the harsher realities of life.
I did not, then, in the days of our royal friendship, understand how bones must come to rest where they most belong.
At the end of her section, Jook-Liang reflects on the memory of watching Wong-Suk sail away to return to China. There are no further mentions of him in the novel, and given that Wong-Suk is elderly, it is reasonable to assume that Jook-Liang never sees him again. The quotation represents one of the rare moments in the novel when the narrative voice of the older Jook-Liang breaks in, highlighting the difference between how she felt when she experienced the moment, and how she feels when she looks back on it later in time. Jook-Liang acknowledges her childish selfishness, because at the time when Wong-Suk left, she simply wanted him to stay with her forever. She highlights the value of their relationship by calling it a "royal friendship." Jook-Liang also shows how she has matured, and developed a different relationship to her culture and heritage; by the time she looks back, she has deep respect for why Wong-Suk made the choice he did, and why it was important for the bones to be repatriated.
For some reason, as I lifted up my fourth sweet dumpling, hearing my name over and over again, I knew I belonged.
In this quotation, Jung-Sum reflects on his memory of the first night he spent with his new family. At first, he was afraid and sad, but this quotation shows the moment when he started to feel welcomed and safe. When he is given his new name, Jung-Sum experiences a feeling of belonging in the family; this moment juxtaposes with times in the novel when individuals are renamed, or referred to by Anglicized names. In those latter cases, people tend to feel alienated or confused by being renamed, but this moment shows that a new name can also be positive. The quotation also shows that the simple act of a family sharing a modest meal together can be healing and grounding; throughout the novel, families gathering to eat together acts as a source of solidarity and comfort. Sau-Ling Cynthia Wong has noted that eating is often an important motif in both Asian-American and Asian-Canadian literature, and links that motif to resilience and adaptability in immigrant communities: "Physical survival is incompatible with a finicky palate; psychological survival hinges on the wresting of meaning from arbitrary infliction of humiliation and pain; survival of family and the ethnic group not only presupposes individually successful eating but may demand unusually difficult 'swallowing' to ensure a continued supply of nourishment for the next generation" (26). The quotation is also important because belonging is a key theme in the novel, and this moment reflects a happy example of a time when that belonging is achieved. While many Chinese characters struggle to feel belonging in Canada, Jung-Sum is able to achieve belonging because he is made to feel truly welcomed into his new family.
Your old ways are not the new ways. Your grandchildren have to live the new ways.
In this quotation, Father scolds Grandmother for her superstitious talk about dying, and for her old-fashioned ways in general. Grandmother is very traditional, and continues to hold many beliefs and values that she developed while growing up in China. In contrast, the children who have grown up in Canada are much more open to what they perceive as modern ways of seeing the world. Father is caught in between, and this quotation reveals his attempt to act as an intermediary. Father is not necessarily happy about the many Western influences that his children are exposed to, but he also accepts the inevitability of their life as immigrants in a new country. The quotation shows multi-generational conflict, and how Father also struggles with some of the same challenges that his children encounter. Like them, he also at times has to defy his parent, and struggle to find a way to fit in. The quotation also shows that while Father is often busy with work and the need to support his family financially, he does think deliberately about what is best for his children, and how to give them a good future.
Beneath the surface, of course, nothing was simple: I was the Canadian-born child of unwanted immigrants who were not allowed to become citizens. The words RESIDENT ALIEN were stamped on my birth certificate, as if I were a loitering stranger.
This quotation reveals Sek-Lung's awareness of his strange position within Canadian society. Like the other children, Sek-Lung was born in Canada, and he identifies quite strongly with some aspects of Canadian culture. However, he also knows that he is not truly accepted by Canadian society, because he is aware of all the ways in which Chinese-Canadians are disenfranchised. After the passing of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1923, very few Chinese individuals were able to come to Canada, and even those individuals born in Canada like Sek-Lung and his siblings were not considered citizens. Chinese-Canadians could not vote, attend university, or practice certain professions. Sek-Lung's sense of feeling unwanted limits his ability to imagine a future for himself, and this is reflected in the simile in which he compares himself to a loitering stranger. He is not able to imagine himself truly integrating and contributing to Canadian society because he knows that he is being rejected by it.
No one wanted to believe me, though no one really wanted to doubt me either, for the world of Chinatown was the world of what if ...
This quotation describes the response when Sek-Lung speaks about seeing the ghost of Grandmother. Most people, especially his siblings, are somewhat dismissive of Sek-Lung's claims, but at the same time, the idea of ghosts and supernatural events are not completely out of the question. Grandmother's beliefs reveal that the idea of ghosts and superstitions were sometimes part of the mindset of older and more traditional members of the Chinese-Canadian community. On the other hand, for children who have grown up in Canada, the idea of believing in ghosts seems somewhat ridiculous. The notion that Chinatown is "a world of what if" highlights the liminal, in-between experience of many Chinese immigrants. They struggle between entirely abandoning traditional ideas and values, and clinging to them too tightly in the face of change. No one quite knows how to respond to Sek-Lung's claims because many Chinese-Canadian individuals are trying to navigate their relationship between cultures and belief systems.
At recess, our dialects and accents conflicted, our clothes, heights and handicaps betrayed us, our skin colours and backgrounds clashed, but inside Miss E. Doyle's tightly disciplined kingdom we were all ---lions or lambs--- equals. We had glimpsed Paradise.
This quotation reveals Sek-Lung's experience once he starts attending school. While there are not many Chinese students at the school, many of the other students are also immigrants from different backgrounds. Miss Doyle is a strict but fair teacher who shows respect to all of the children, regardless of their background. The classroom functions as a microcosm of what Canadian society could be like if individuals from many different backgrounds were truly respected and accepted. By comparing the classroom to Paradise, Sek-Lung shows how meaningful the experience of the classroom is for him; however, it also hints that this experience was fleeting and not likely to appear in other areas of their life. Significantly, the classroom is a place where Miss Doyle is quite strict, demanding, and unafraid to punish the children; nonetheless, they love and admire her because she takes them seriously.
For a moment I forgot I was watching the enemy. And that one of them was standing too close to Meiying.
This quotation occurs when Sek-Lung first goes with Meiying to the park in the Japanese neighborhood. He has had limited contact with Japanese people, other than a few students at school, and he is startled to see that the Japanese boys are excellent baseball players. The quotation shows that even while Sek-Lung and other members of the Chinatown community have experienced xenophobia and racism, they are still capable of displaying those same behaviors to others. Sek-Lung has such a strong preconception of what Japanese people are like that he is startled when he sees them engaging in joyful everyday activities. The quotation reveals that spending time with people from different backgrounds can challenge stereotypes and assumptions; however, this change will only ever be gradual. Sek-Lung simply refers to Japanese people as "enemies" because that is how he is used to thinking of them.
"I chose? I was bought!" Stepmother said, for all at once she could not stop herself.
This quotation occurs close to the end of the novel, when Father and Stepmother get into an argument about Japanese-Canadians being sent to internment camps and losing all of their possessions. Usually Stepmother is a very quiet and reserved character who does not show any emotion, even when she experiences terrible losses such as a stillborn child, and the death of her best friend Suling. In this quotation, Stepmother finally bursts out, and expresses her frustration. She does not have much influence in the household because Grandmother was typically in charge, and bossed Stepmother around. Because she was an impoverished orphan in China, Stepmother was purchased to be a concubine for Father. Before this point, readers never learn about her perspective on this experience, but this quotation hints that she is angry about her lack of agency and control. The emotions Stepmother expresses in this quotation also show why she feels empathy and compassion for Meiying, and tries to help the young woman.
"Mother," I said. "I'm here."
This quotation occurs at the end of the novel, after Meiying's death. Sek-Lung goes to comfort Stepmother and, for the first time in the novel, he calls her "Mother." This moment is significant because Stepmother is the biological mother of Jook-Liang and Sek-Lung, but has always had that status and role denied to her. Calling her "Mother" reveals that Sek-Lung is showing a new type of intimacy and closeness with her, and also highlights the importance of truth and honesty. Meiying dies because of secrecy and shame; she cannot tell anyone about her illegitimate pregnancy. Although it is too late for her, other characters can choose to live with more truthfulness moving forward. Sek-Lung has previously been close with Grandmother at the expense of other family members, but now he shows openness to new bonds. Finally, the quotation marks a moment of maturation for Sek-Lung because as a child, his mother would typically be the one comforting him, but he is now old and wise enough to reach out to comfort her.
