Personal Reflections on ‘An Inquiry of the Chinese American Identity’ by Stephanie Chia

At the end of my stay in the Bay Area, I was presented a Song dynasty comic collection, a gift from Victor, one of our interviewees, and an acquired friend. He message to me was – that the Chinese culture is rich in history and the Chinese language is beautiful in its own right, hence we should be proud to be ethnically who we are. Perhaps, after asking so many of our interviewees what it means for them to be Chinese, I should also take the opportunity to answer the question for myself. What does it mean to me to be Chinese?

Just like the Chinese American, I am not purely ‘Chinese’ in the sense that I was not born in China, but rather my maternal grandparents migrated to Singapore from China during the 1940s, hence I am a 3rd generation Chinese Singaporean. Moreover, my paternal ancestors come from a unique heritage called ‘the Peranakans’ or ‘Baba-Nonya’. The term refers to the descendants of very early Chinese immigrants who were born and bred in the Melacca Straits and who have partially adopted Malay customs in an effort to be assimilated into the local community. While adopting the language and culture of the Malays, most Peranakan do retain some of their ethnic and religious origins such as marrying within the Straits-born Chinese community or ancestral worship. Over the centuries, the Peranakans have evolved a unique culture that maintains many of the Chinese traditions, while adopting the customs of the land they settled in as well as their successive colonial rulers. They have their own distinct foods and a are normally categorized as having a natural propensity to embrace new cultures.

My father and my grandparents are perhaps a classic example of Straits-born Chinese. Despite being ethnically Chinese, neither my father nor his parents were able to speak the Chinese language; they were however, fluent in both English and Malay. Hence, a common colloquial Malay phrase that is often used to describe the Peranakans was ‘Orang Cina Bukan Cina’, which means, ‘of Chinese origin, but not entirely Chinese (because they cannot speak the Chinese language). It is perhaps because of this inability to speak the Chinese language, that most Peranakans of my father’s and grandparent’s generation were much closer to the Malay community than they were to the Chinese community.

As for myself, because the Peranakans are classified by the Singapore government as ethnically Chinese; I received formal instruction in Mandarin as a second language, according to the ‘Mother Tongue Policy’ in Singapore. However, despite being fluent in Mandarin, I have never felt fully ‘Chinese’ as oppose to my peers who were 3rd generation Singaporean Chinese and whose ancestors came directly from China. Hence, I never really grew up thinking that the Chinese language and traditions were of any value, simply because my father and my paternal grandparents could not speak the language and did not practice Chinese customs and traditions. In fact, the clothes which my grandparents wore were more Malay in origin (the baju kurung) than they were of Chinese origin. And yet, despite not fully embracing Chinese customs and traditions, there was no distinguishing me and other Chinese Singaporeans. I shared the same skin color and hair color. In fact, because I am fair-skinned I looked more Chinese than I was Malay, and so did my paternal ancestors. We looked Chinese, but (saved for myself) could not speak a word of the Chinese language and did not practice much of the customs and traditions. So where do I stand?

It was only upon the completion of this project that I realized that I had no excuse to forgo my ethnic Chinese identity. For me, ironic as it may be that this project was done in the Bay Area and not in China, it was still a form of going back to my roots and understanding the value of the Chinese heritage. If there was one thing I learned from the interviewees themselves, was that retaining one’s ethnic culture requires a conscious effort to find a balance between holding on to one’s roots and being able to assimilate into the new environment. Not forgetting that while one tries to assimilate into the new environment, one should be proud of one’s ethnic heritage and seek to find ways and means to constantly keep in touch with it. Perhaps, it was also in Victor’s intention that by presenting me with the Song Dynasty comic collection, it was his way of encouraging me to rediscover my Chinese ethnicity. Hence, I believe that being Chinese means going improving on my Chinese language and being cognizant of the rich cultural history that China has to offer, because Tu Wei Ming said, ‘the meaning of being Chinese is intertwined with China as a geopolitical concept and Chinese culture as a lived reality’.

And so, in the aftermath of the project, my next stop would be to rediscover my Chinese identity by understanding the evolution of my Peranakan heritage. In some ways, both the Peranakan heritage and the Chinese American heritage share a similarity in that people of dual heritage straddle between embracing their new surroundings, but at the same time grapple with how and what part of their ethnic heritage that they should retain.

Apart from making a personal discovery of my ethinicity, this project has given me a more holistic impression of the Chinese American Community. Before embarking on the project in the Bay Area, my impressions of the Chinese American Community were formed through academic journals which hypothesised about what the cultural identity of the Chinese Americans and novels such as The Joy Luck Club and Hunger, which constantly dramatized the identity crisis which the Chinese Americans faced. However, undertaking this research project gave the Chinese American community a three-dimensional feature. Through the eyes of several Chinese Americans, we saw how their Chinese identity can coexist with their American one, and this made them unique. The Chinese American Identity is a century and a half old, but is still continually evolving. Nevertheless, the people that we’ve met and the places that we’ve visited plays testament to its dynanism. I was unexpectantly surprised at how self-supporting the community was, and as one of our interviewees remarked, ‘One could go by without speaking a word of English in San Francisco Chinatown’. Furthermore, the community was not just another tourist attraction. Like every community, it has also had its social ills in the form of troubled youths who turn to Chinatown gangs, hence, disclaiming the notion of the Model Minority, given to the Chinese.

This project also could not have been possible without my co-partner, Janice Chua and I certainly could not achieve as much in this project had I done it alone. In many ways, our work together has also made me realise both my strengths and my weaknesses, as well as how we seek to compliment each other in terms of personality and working habits. While I was generally more interested in having a thorough theoretical and historical understanding of the Chinese American Diaspora and their evolution since the 1850s, Janice pulled the scale to balance through the practical aspect of the project. Crucial to our project, the varied interview sample size we obtained cannot have been achieved without her; she never fails to miss the oppurtunity to talk to strangers whom she thought would be an interesting case study for our project and engagement them in a conversation and thereafter an interview. Moreover, while I was always more concerned about having a narrow focus, Janice was always there to remind me that we should allow the door to remain open just in case a golden oppurtunity arrives, and true enough, having a broad mindset in this project proved to be rewarding.

Finally, in my years at Warwick, I have met an overwhelming number of Mainland Chinese overseas students. Prior to this project, I have asked a few of them what it means to be Chinese and whether they would consider the Hua Qiao (The Chinese Diaspora) in America to be at all, if not the least bit, Chinese. While some of them have been to San Francisco, others have only heard about the large Chinese American Diaspora there, and yet, many mainland Chinese students do not consider the Chinese living in America as ‘Chinese’. More often than not, these Chinese Americans are termed by them as ‘Xiang Jiao Ren’ (Banana people) yellow on the outside but white on the inside. It is with all intent, that this project seeks to tell the Chinese American story through the accounts of 20 Chinese Americans and an experience in the Bay Area. It is with hope that others, especially the Chinese from the Mainland, will take an interest in the lives of their cousins overseas and what they face, being geographically displaced from the cultural entity.

Book Review

Title: The Chinese in America

Author: Iris Chang

Publisher: Viking, The United States, 2003

Synopsis

In an epic story that spans 150 years and continues to the present day, Iris Chang tells of a people’s search for a better life and the determination of the Chinese to forge an identity and a destiny in a strange land and, often against great obstacles, to find success. She chronicles the many accomplishments of the Chinese immigrants and their descendents in America: building the infrastructure of their adopted country, fighting racist and exclusionary laws, walking the racial tightrope between black and white, contributing to major scientific and technological advances, expanding the literary canon, and influencing the way we think about racial and ethnic groups. Interweaving political, social, economic, and cultural history, as well as the stories of individuals, Chang offers a bracing view of not only what it means to be Chinese American, but also of what it is to be American.


Thoughts and reflections

I came to the Bay Area not having done much reading except for Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club and May Tung’s psychological book on identity (Thankfully Stephanie provided the balance by reading a lot and photocopying stacks of background reading for me to read on the plane) Upon arriving in the Bay Area, the inertia for reading increased as I kept thinking to myself: “If I want to read I could always do that back in Singapore or in the UK. Why should I fly across half the globe only to coop myself in the library? I should be going out to meet people and talk to them.” However, chancing upon Iris Chang’s book in Victor’s (one of our Chinese American interviewee who became our friend) home, I decided to pick it up and the book was so engaging that I could not put it down till I’ve finished reading.

I remember that prior to reading this book, most of the time I displayed little interest in dates and I could never figure out how Victor and Stephanie could remember things like “ The Chinese Exclusion Act” or “ Paper Sons” etc as if it was in their blood. Despite explanations about how the Chinese Exclusion Act passed in May 6 1882 restricted the number of Chinese immigrants to the US, somehow to me, these were merely distant dates. It was only after reading Iris Chang’s chapter on the Exclusion Act that I manage to get a better picture of the history of the Chinese in America. I saw how difficult it was for them to settle down in the United States, the kind of subtle racism that they faced. Sometimes I find it difficult to tell people exactly what I learnt from my readings. It could be because I didn’t learn much or learn well, or perhaps reading and understanding the history just provided me with some sort of “invisible glue”, such that next time when an interviewee says something, I’ll be able to piece the pieces together based on what I’ve read. It is the “Oh yes, Iris Chang also mentioned something like that about the Chinese American in her book” kind of response that tells me I have not read the book in vain.

I had such experience in the Silicon Valley. Having read the chapter “High Tec vs Low Tech” prior to interviewing the Chinese American in the Valley, I felt that I could identify a lot of their responses with what Iris Chang wrote. Somehow because our interviewees were mainly white collared workers in the Valley, I felt that when asked about their identity, most of them were able to bring out their professional identity readily. They also appeared to be more confident and comfortable about their Chinese identity, perhaps because they are able to look beyond their outward appearance, and are fully aware of their value to their respective organizations.

Learning points on identity

In her introduction, Iris Chang clearly states that in this book she seeks to

1. Identify the push and pull factors of immigration
2. Chronicle what happened after immigration. Did assimilation take place?

She also highlights an important caveat that immigration does not occur overnight, rather it happens in different waves. Hence, the identity of the Chinese American immigrants would most likely differ based on their different experiences and circumstances.

· The first wave (1849 era) of Chinese immigrants was known as the “gold men” who came primarily because of the gold rush in California. They came to the United States in search of a better life and fortune. However, many also suffered as miners and countless died while building the railway linking the East and West coast.
· The second wave (post 1949) comprised mainly anti-communist elites. They also had smart and scientifically directed children.
· Finally, the third wave (1980s onwards) encompassed Chinese of all socioeconomic groups and backgrounds, who arrived as Sino-American relations thawed and as the People’s Republic of China began its rocky transition from a pariah communist state to a tenuously connected capitalist one.

Understanding the reason for Chinese immigration provided a sense of history which aided in my understanding of why perhaps first generation migrants felt more attached to China and their Chinese heritage, as compared to the second wave of migrants who came to America because of the push factor back in China.

Chang also introduced two pertinent principles relating to identity formation

· Judicial principle of jus soli which means the “law of the soil”
· Racial principle of jus sanguinis which means the “law of blood”

According to Chang, ethnic identity is a matter of personal choice as much as indisputable racial appearance and heritage. Increasingly, the concept of Chinese American is being replaced by a new racial identity of “Asian American” because of interracial marriages. In 1967, the number of interracial marriage soared after the Supreme Court declared all anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional. The word “Happas” which originated in Hawaii was originally used to describe children of white merchants and native Hawaiians. Now “Happas” is used to describe all mixed race people of some Asian ancestry.

As the Happas grow in number, they are asserting their freedom to celebrate the richness of their heritage, as are other multiethnic individuals. These trends provoke new questions like: What is racial identity? Who gets to decide it? The government? The experts? Or the people themselves?

Below is an excerpt from Chang’s conclusion that I believe help to shed light on the trenchant questions raised.

“ Though some find it convenient to see race as solid blocs of humanity, easily organized and controlled by bureaucracies on the basis of shared interests, the reality of individual life defies such neat compartmentalization. In reality, race is----and has always been---a set of arbitrary dividing lines on a wide spectrum of color, blending, almost imperceptibly, from one shade to the next.

Perhaps one day we will rediscover a basic truth---that while identity may be shaped and exploited by the powerful, its essence belongs, ultimately, to the individual. America was founded on this concept, but never achieved its ideal.

The subjugation of individual rights to the group, leading inevitably to ultranationalism, has long been a cause and justification for war and genocide across the planet. It was to escape the oppression of group identity---the burden of racial antagonisms, inherited by blood---that thousands of Chinese and other immigrants abandoned the homes of their ancestors, for unknown future in a strange land. Only time can tell if their journey will have been successful. This will depend entirely on whether America can continue to evolve towards the basic egalitarian concept upon which it was founded--- that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creators to certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. For it was the haunting, elusive dream that such a place really existed that first drew many of the Chinese to American shores.”

Dear Janice,

Hope you’re back safely in Singapore, I’ve posted our structure of the report below, or course subject to change. Will see you back in UK, email me on any changes.

Steph

Main title:
An Inquiry into the Chinese American Identity in the Bay Area

Date: 29th Aug 2006 – 22nd Sept 2006

Introduction:
• Why we decide to do this project
• What is the purpose/objective of the project
• Who is intended for, and why we think it is beneficial for them
• Why we chose to do it in the Bay Area (defining the boundaries of the project) and why we decide only on mainland Chinese and Hong Kong in the interviews (definition) – geopolitical entity, culture, Singapore experience
• How we categorize first and subsequent generations. `


History of the Chinese in the Bay Area
Etc..

Methodology
• Methodology means the methods used to fulfill/achieve our objectives of the project
• Qualitative methods
• Why did we choose these methods and not other things?
Background reading
Interviews: 45mins to 1.5 hrs (tape recorded interviews, video recordings)
Photography
Experience: dinner, objects, houses visits
Excursion: Chinatown, Angel Island, Silicon Valley, Museums, Library, Berkeley Campus, CHKA organization meeting, Sunset District, Pacific East Mall

Limitations and what we would have done differently
1. Problems with getting group interviews
2. Perspective of other races looking at the Chinese American
3. Skewed towards students from UC Berkeley because we have the most connection with,
4. Focus of the interview. Interview was not structured? The interviews were a learning process in itself and each interview was evolved into a more structure manner, hence cannot be taken to be a standard template used across all interviewees. Why is this a problem, but how we learnt from it.
5. Conversational nature of each interview – Merits and limitations
6. We were caught up with the ambiguity of the English language on what it means to be Chinese.
7. Some interviews were not tape recorded because of technical faults.
8. Unable to find those who spoke no Mandarin/Cantonese – hence given more time, we would have interviewed other ABCs who spoke no mandarin and ask if you can be a Chinese without knowing the language at all.
9. Respect for the elder generation
10. No photography of certain houses because of interviewee disapproval.



Analysis:

Structure for Analysis ( points below are collated under these headings)
1. Does my future lie in America or China? (Citizenship)
2. Preservation of Heritage
a. Parents – see homes, interviews
b. language
c. Family – see interviews
d. Living Chinatown
e. A forgotten heritage – Angel Island
f. Loss of Heritage
3. Avenues of assimilation at present
4. False Identities and Imagined Communities
5. Beneath the Stereotype

Sample size: 20 Interviewees
American-born Chinese:
• Christine
• Philip
• Jessica
• Victor
• Jenny (LA)
• Alice (White, Indiana)
• Emma

2nd Generation Chinese Americans (came in their early childhood)
• Beatrice (SF)
• Linda Lu
• Linda Chen
• Serena Wang
• Hua
• Mike (came when he was 13)
• Alex
• Nicole
• Yip Hei Ming

1st Generation
• Lei qi
• Karen
• Ye Zhou
• Chen Jian Long

2nd Generation
• One group says that they see themselves going back to China as tourist but not living there – ( Alex, Philip, Jessica, Victor, Linda Lu, Alice, Christine)
One group says that they see themselves shuttling between China and America or potential going back if there is a job – (Nicole, Jenny, Beatrice, Linda Chen, Serena Wang, Hei Ming, Hua)
• Being a bridge across China and America (culture, assimilating new immigrants)
• Language – the ability to speak Chinese fluently how comfortable they were with they’re Chinese Identity. Language determined how readily they identified themselves/ associate themselves as Chinese.
All parents made a conscious effort to impart the Chinese language to their children when they were young, a conscious effort to preserve they’re cultural heritage.
• Location – helped to preserve the Chinese heritage. Because of the growing number, it reduced the Chinese American Identity conflict that so dramatically played up in the Joy Luck Club. Most of the interviewees did not give a second thought to they’re identity and did not see it as a crisis or extreme conflict. In fact they never thought of whether there was anything conflicting between being a Chinese American.
• A lot of avenues to Chinese heritage, which is taken for granted (Supermarkets, festivals, holidays, library books, community of support) – deeper exploration of Chinatown
• Does it make you less Chinese if you did not adhere to the Chinese traditions? i.e.: using chopsticks, or not speaking the language. What happens if you were to contrast yourself to foreigners who adhere to these Chinese traditions, as oppose to yourself. – personal reflection on Peranakan.
• Dressing makes a difference
• Is it your own blood that makes you what others perceive you to be.
• What makes you authentic?
• Does having an American passport make you American?
• Confused Identities, when do they take what Identity?
• Dilution of culture and loss of authenticity: Lack of dissemination of culture ( Emma, Victor)
• Multiple Identities and False Identities – psychological. Loss of information because of the fear that others will discover, and partial embarrassment. (Victor)
• Imagined communities: once you leave SF you tend to be alienated. (Alex, Victor)
• False Identity of being an American and Imagined community. (location, employment glass ceiling, political realm).
• Mass Exodus to Silicon Valley (economic realm).
• Diaspora within Diaspora
• Categories of Chinese – location, language and customs, looks
• More Chinese: exposure and social interaction (what you do to keep in touch with Chinese culture)
• Does language come first or appearance come first – biological
• Historical and Cultural context : disprove the hypothesis that the cultural gap is not only a result of historical and cultural context, but it is further widened by the ‘loss of information’ handed down from one generation to another.
• Interview: effort to make them think about their identity – personal reflections for Janice.
• Cause for assimilation: Melting pot and Salad bowl theory
• Social aspect of America (Hua, Jenny,
• Family as a integral part of the Chinese culture: importance of family
• Stereotype, Amy Tan and her book, whether the book was true reflection of Chinese Americans. What is they’re opinion of the Chinese American stereotype, how would they like to portray themselves as Chinese Americans.

First Generation
• Reason why they left China (关系, economic opportunities, American dream, the American institution)Are these the same reasons as those of their forefathers who left 2 centuries ago.
• Previous generations coming: Most of them came because of family ties.
• The American dream: whether this is a reality for them is a different thing altogether.
• Link it back to Does my future lie in China or America (1931)
• Comfort ability with the Chinese language
• Parent-Child gap, and how they view they’re children in the future and how they would like to bring up their children. It is an acceptance on they’re part to compromise. (Ye Zhou, Lei Qi) i.e.: teaching the Chinese language
• Professional identity
• Contrast between work ethics of Chinese and the others. (i.e.: reserve about politics because they have different train of thought) – contrast with the 2nd generation/ ABCs, that they are more politically involved.
• The passive nature of the Chinese
• Glass ceiling in the work place
• Mass exodus into Silicon Family
• Having the family in mind, their specific purpose to make money and are therefore not readily involve in politics. (Link to family)

Chinatown:
• Underside of the Chinese community Street community/Tongs, Chinese Playground
• Living Chinatown: Closely knit network among the Chinese living in Chinatown because of the people that Victor knew
• Chinatown represented one part of China, Southern China/ Cantonese. (Karen)
• Chinatown SF more culturally contained. as oppose to NY, LA Chinatown. (Jenny, Hua). More isolated, culturally contained, not exactly adaptable.
• East-West influence, unique to the Chinese American culture is also present (churches and temples, the Luck and Jessica’s Dad doing Qing Ming Jie)
• How everything co-exist, unspoken harmony. Coexisting of vice and virtues (i.e.: Portsmouth, Chinese Playground, Mah Jong at Hang Ah Alley) – a society of their own, isolated community. (Imagined community or distinct community: Tangible and Intangible)
• How Living the Chinatown is – dirt, schooling, buying from the market and the sights and sounds
• Basis of comparison is with Singapore Chinatown
• Struggle a balance between the western influences coming in, and preserving its own heritage. But has it done well in preserving its heritage or has its heritage been diluted by Western influence
• You can’t get a cultural experience visiting Chinatown, but a more historal experience. Chinatown as a sanctuary with no evolution and cannot be reflective of a modernizing China. None of the interviewee said that Chinatown reminded them of home.
• Identity of the Chinese American from a particular period

Angel Island – the forgotten Island
• Emma and False Identity
• Victor and Emma’s similarity and conversation
• Angel and Alice Island
• Was coming to America worth it? Relate to the first generation, was it worth giving up the Chinese Identity? How much you would want to sacrifice for the American Dream
• More avenues for assimilation for the new Chinese immigrants because of the new legislations and policies (trial and error) which accommodate the large Chinese population living the Bay Area (road signs both in English and Mandarin and Sunset District, Richmond)
• Vested interest of Emma in discovering her Chinese American Identity and contain a rich of history of lot of neglect.
• Embarrassment for the people who were kept at Angel Island. (refer to poetry about a sense of injustice and historical embarrassment, Brother’s sense of jail in Angel island) ‘Lost of Face’, ‘Want of Face’ – loss of information.
• Funerals – secrets to the grave
• Angel Island Vs Chinatown

Palo Alto and SF Comparison

• Demographics was different (1st generation movement towards Palo Alto, white collar vs blue collar)
• Dynamism and vibrancy
• Multicultural
• See Bay Bridge newspaper
• ‘High Tech Low Tech’
• Northern China (family)
• Mobile, touch and go. Not as many racial issues as oppose to SF. Not as historical.
• Economics overshadows politics and racial issues
• More risk taking spirit
• Comfortable in assimilation.
• Everyone has a purpose in PA, and that is to make money
• SF Palo Alto comparison, wealth vs race

Houses
Alex: (Sunset District) 2nd generation
• Chinese Calendar and the Kitchen utensils were very Chinese
• Language
• Table manners
• Cantonese TV
• Jessica’s room: expressions of Chinese Identity
• More westernized
Victor’s place: 1st generation home
• Typical blue collar worker
• Chest, luggage, pictures of their ancestors.
• Play station and infiltration of Western culture – generation gap
• Respect for elders
• Dorm consistency

Vincent’s house, silicon Valley:
• Cooking utensils gave it away
• Different lifestyle from the other two houses, i.e.: artifacts
• Hei Ming helped to set table
• Responsibility of the elder son
• Compromise on the parents part by having the Confucius sayings written in English

• Forming of the Chinese American Identity in the house
• A lens into the present era of the Chinese American

As a 桥 between both China and America

Nicole was born in Hong Kong and moved to the LA when she was about two. She has been residing in Sunset District in San Francisco since 1989. Her parents are now separated and she lives with her mother and grandmother.

When Nicole was asked whether she could identify the elements which were ‘Chinese’ in her and the elements which were ‘American’ in her, Nicole attributes much of her Chinese influence from her upbringing. She was taken care of by her grandmother who instilled in her Chinese values and traditions such as celebrating Chinese festivals and respect for elders. Like most Chinese families, the emphasis was also on studying hard at school. Furthermore, Nicole feels more incline to follow Asian fashion and keep up with Hong Kong and Chinese serial dramas

At home, she speaks Cantonese “at least 90% of the time”, and feels comfortable with the language because “sometimes, there are things that I can express better in Cantonese than in English”. Does she also use Cantonese among her friends? Nicole uses English a lot more among her friends, especially because some of her friends are non-Chinese Americans or American-born Chinese who could not speak the language.

So what does going back to Hong Kong feels like for her? Now that she is much older, she appreciates going back to Hong Kong more often and does not see herself as a tourist. Nicole goes back almost every year to visit her father who resides there. She says that her father “demands that she goes back to Hong Kong every year to see my (her) elders, and keep in touch with family members”. Thus, she “can fit in” naturally back in Hong Kong, and enjoys the “Asian nightlife and style” a lot more.

When asked if she could see herself residing back there, Nicole was hesitant and did say she would think twice about it because majority of her friends are in America. However, she can see herself shuttling back and forth between the two countries, “kind of like working there and traveling back and forth”. After all, “China is now a major economic power” and she does see it as an opportunity to find a good job in Hong Kong. Hence, as a Chinese American, Nicole sees herself like uniquely as a bridge ( 桥)between both China and America

When asked whether she was more of a Chinese American than an American Chinese, Nicole said she sees herself more of as a Chinese American because the values which she hold are very much “still Chinese in nature”. Her frequent use of Cantonese and adherence to Chinese traditions such as celebrating Chinese festivals and practicing table manners, the Chinese way, make her still very much a Chinese who happens to be “living in America”.

Just a quick note on Palo Alto:

Closing the San Francisco Chinatown chapter and moving on to Palo Alto has given us some interesting insights. We met up with Vicent and family the night before and interviewed his 16 year old son and Shanghai-nese wife (Vicent is a ex Singaporean diplomat during the LKY administration and now resides in Palo Alto).

Bunked in for the night at Chin San's place and conducted 3 interviews the next day. Special thanks to Chin San and his housemates, all of whom have been extremely hospitable, Janice and I cannot thank you enough.

A few things to note about the three interviews we had:
a) All of whom were working adults and 1st generation immigrants from China
b) None of which were from Guan Zhou or Toishan (the bulk of whom we inevitably kept bumping into in SF and Berkeley)
c) While one is applying for an American citizenship, the other 2 are holding onto a green card and are unsure of getting an American citizenship
d) All felt more comfortable having the interview conducted in Mandarin
e) Age ranged from 30s - 40s, all have American born Children
f) Occupation wise: All are working in companies around Silicon Valley, one is a researcher, the other two are engineers.
g) All have lived in the Bay Area for the last 10 years.
h) All cited the lack of '关系’in China which lead them to find work here in the Bay Area.

A few observations:
* There is a remarkable difference between the Palo Alto crowd and the San Francisco crowd in terms of type of people we interviewed as well as they're opinions.
* It was quite difficult to find fresh of the boat immigrants in SF as oppose to Palo Alto. I cite the article from the San Francisco Chronicle: Bay Bridge to Beijing which cites Palo Alto as the new Golden Mountain, AND Iris Chang's Chinese in America, Chapter on 'High Tech and Low Tech' which talks about the movement of Chinese immigrants into Palo Alto.
* Since Janice read Iris Chang's chapter on High Tech Low Tech' before the interviews, while I read it only after, we went into the interviews with very different perceptions. However, the difference between SF and PA are extremely evident even without prior knowledge of academic material.

There are alot of material which I'm still consolidating for the Palo Alto phase, but comparisons will become alot clearer in answering the question of 'Why is there a Diaspora within a Diaspora'. This will also tie in with our objective in finding out the multi-faceted identities of the Chinese Americans.

I just visited the Ethnic Library to get some books from Victor who works there,
1. Bridging the Pacific (SF Chinatown and its People)
2. Songs of Gold Mountain - to compare with Mr Luo's anthem

Till then,
Steph

骨肉情深 最难忘 (The most difficult thing to forget is that blood relations run deep)

Mr Luo’s anthem, which he wrote for the anniversary of the table tennis team in December 2003 is a poignant reflection of what most of the first generation Chinese immigrants hope for.

While they celebrate a new life in America with opportunities for wealth and prosperity, there is also a deep-rooted allegiance to their country of origin and a longing that one day they may return back home and make their country proud of their achievements. Like most Chinese immigrants, the new life comes with the need to work hard and perseverance, hence, the constant reminder to the youths to study hard, for studying hard will bring about a brighter future ahead. There is also a reminder for the younger generation to remember what their parents have done for them – they have worked hard and brought them up in a new land to provide for them a better life.

The title: 骨肉情深 最难忘 expresses something that I’ve been trying to find out through the last three weeks. 其实, 你已经不是 一位中国人民， 但是你还是一位华人。 I think most of the interviews that we have had so far, regardless of which generation of Chinese Americans, all of them have said the same thing – they are first and foremost Chinese, but they are American. I think it became clearer in the interviews conducted in Mandarin what it means to be ‘Chinese’ and yet not American.

I was reading a chapter of Iris Chang’s book: The Chinese In America, which argues that the Chinese Americans are still regarded as being closely affiliated to the People’s Republic of China, ‘no matter how great their contribution to U.S society, virtually all of them have had their identities questioned at one point or another’ (Chang, p13). I spoke to Janice earlier about this, and the topic was raised on two occasions; the first, was a conversation with an ex-Singaporean diplomat living in Palo Alto, and another in our interview with a first generation Chinese working in Silicon Valley.

The problem with the word ‘Chinese’ in the English language creates much ambiguity because ‘Chinese’ is used to describe someone of Chinese ethnicity, but at the same time, that very word is also used to describe someone of Chinese nationality. When we mention loosely that a person is ‘Chinese’, it almost becomes inevitable to assume that such as person has some form of affiliation with the country where the Chinese tradition ad culture has originated from. Hence, the common misperception that the phrase ‘I’m Chinese’ tends to have connotations that the person has affiliations with China. In the Chinese language, however, there is a distinct definition between a person who is of Chinese ethnicity (华人) and a person who is of Chinese nationality from the People’s Republic of China (中国人民). In 华人, the character ‘化’ expresses a people of rich culture and tradition, where as , 中国人民 has no relation or root word whatsoever to 华人, and 中国 (China) refers instead to what China was originally called, the Middle Kingdom.

I’ve translated the song in English for the benefit of the Lord Rootes Memorial Fund archive, the following is a loose translation of the song, which is subjected to correction once I get hold of my Mandarin Dictionary.

骨肉情深 最难忘

人生什么 最难忘 骨肉情深 最难忘
人生什么 最重要 保养好身件 最重要
读书 为 的是什么 读书 为 事业 为前途
多 少数的守候 多少辛筋的关爱
人生什么 最快乐歌唱我们的新生活

海外的亲人常思念，唉咳喻。。。 终于回到自己的守园

强身健体要坚持，唉咳喻。。。身体强健才 有夺钱
筋学苦练为自己，唉咳喻。。。 前途光明才有出息
养育着你们步步的成长，唉咳喻。。。是爸 妈恩情忘不了
祝愿 早日完成祖国 一大业，唉咳喻。。。 祝庆我们全部欢聚在一堂



“为献上我对会周年庆祝 而欢呼歌唱吧!”
罗威


What is the hardest thing for one to forget? The hardest thing to forget is one’s own blood relations which run deep.
What is the most important thing for a person? The most important thing for a person is to take care of one’s health
What purpose is there to study? Studying is for ambition and for future
No matter how much waiting and upholding your dreams, no matter how much perseverance and love,
What is one’s happiest moment? To sing a song about our new life.

Overseas people always dream, always about returning to one’s own sanctuary （or home, which in this case refers to mainland China）.
A strong health must, only if one’s health is strong can one have wealth
Persevering hard in one’s studies is for one’s own good, only then can one’s bright future be possible
To bring you up step by step is your father and mother’s responsibility which cannot be forgotten.

Steph

Hang Ah Alley and 'Chinese Playground: A Memoir'

Hang Ah Alley

Janice and I spent Thursday mid-morning walking around Hang Ah Alley which is next to the Chinese Playground. Although the Alley was not crowded with people, we could hear the sound of Mah Jong tiles coming from the Benevolent Family Associations situated on the side of the Alley opposite the Chinese Playground. Peeking through half open doors, I saw the older folks playing Mah Jong in all three benevolent associations.


Older folks playing mahjong at the Wong Han Benevolent Association

We stopped for a light snack at the Hang Ah Tea Room, which claimed to be the oldest place in Chinatown selling dim sum. Having much publicity from travel guide books and travel agents, the Hang Ah Tea Room has turned into a tourist attraction and a place where the Chinese brought business associates. This was probably a place where a local would never step in for a meal, and the crowd in the Tea Room was comprised of foreigners or Chinese with foreign business associates.


Outside the Hang Ah Tea Room

After a light dim sum, we returned to the Chinese Playground which Victor had brought us to last week for a quick visit of the place. I remembered that I didn’t have much of an impression of the playground, just that it was a place for recreation and where parents brought their children to play during the weekends. The official inscription pinned on the building where Hang Ah Alley was read:

Hang Ah Alley
The Chinese Playground is one of the few recreational facilities in Chinatown. In order to make use of as much open space as possible, the Committee for Better Parks and Recreation in Chinatown and the San Francisco Department of Parks and Recreation worked for 11 years on new plans for the playground. The old club house was torn down in June of 1977 and the new structures were installed 3 years later. Mr Oliver C. Chang was the first director of the Chinese playground as well as the first Chinese American director of the SF Department of Park and Recreation.

The Chinese Playground for me has taken on a different meaning after reading more into the Chinese street gangs and picking up the book ‘Chinese Playground: A Memoir’, written by a Chiense ex-gang member, Bill Lee. As a tourist, one would have never suspected that the Chinese Playground reflected both the wholesome and the underlying social ills of the Chinese community, especially during the 1960s and 1970s.


The Chinese Playground after the 1977 refurbishment, also known as the Willy 'Woo Woo' Wong Playground

“The city of San Francisco purchased the land in 1925 and completed construction in 1927. The playground was situated with Waverly Alley to the east, Hang Ah Alley to the west and Clay and Sacramento streets as its north and south borders, respectively. There were three levels within the grounds. A basketball court was on the lower level, and a tennis and volleyball court were in the upper section. Everything was out in the open. A small clubhouse with a pagoda design stood on the main level along with a slide, swings, merry-go-round, and ring apparatus.

I spent countless hours playing ping pong on a table that was bolted to the ground in front of the clubhouse. Every few years, they’d slap a new table-top on. Behind the building sat a mini-slide and concrete sandbox where we transported water for our muddy-duddy creations. There were three ways to enter and exit the park: from the two alleys and on Sacramento Street. The multiple accesses served us well as children playing hide-and-seek. The playground was our home base and we hid throughout Chinatown.

As a young boy, I was chased by the police in one entrance and out the other over illegal fireworks sales or other petty crimes.

The first gang of immigrant kids, the Wah Chings, originated out of this playground in 1964, complete with club jackets. They discreetly came in ad out through Waverly Alley and congregated in the basketball court that they used for soccer. Every Sunday afternoon, an organized volleyball game was played in which gang members participated with others from their homeland.

The gang wars from the late sixties to the late seventies turned the playground into a hot spot. It symbolized the ruling gang in Chinatown, and opposing sides ambushed one another at all entrances. Chinese Playground was a second home to me from the time I was a toddler. Just half a block from our house, it was reached by crossing one intersection to Hang Ah Alley. Kids gathered there early in the day on weekends, holidays, and during the summer. We also played in alley ways, jumped on and off moving cable cars and hung around department stores downtown. But at the end of each day, we regrouped at the playground.”

Having an understanding of how Tongs work in the Chinese American community is crucial. Chinese gangs (Tongs) are part and parcel of the Chinese American Community in San Francisco. Much of the newspaper cuttings which we read from the San Francisco Chronicle about the recent gang violence and shootings seem to suggest that the underside of the Chinese American Community living in San Francisco have to grapple with. Although gang activities are not as rampant as they were in the 1970s, much of the Chinese American community today speaks little of the topic for fear of retaliation by these gang members. In this book, street gangs do recruit members from the recreational areas, thus park directors cannot be caught off guard and it was part of their everyday job to have to interact with teenage gang youth. Thus, park directors were held in high regards and as Lee puts it, “most of the kids who hung out at the playground spent more time with Paul (the site director at that time) than with their own parents. He was firm, yet highly skilled in diplomacy, earning respect from fei jies (gangsters) who were fearless).”

In Lee’s opinion, the playground “wasn’t a conducive place for any child to be in. Adults who chaperoned their children there enjoyed the facility as it was intended. But it was, for the most part, comprised of kids from troubled homes thrown together unsupervised. Paul (the site director) was a good influence, but he was one person. Junior sociopaths outnumbered him twenty to one.

We didn’t develop the right social skills at Chinese Playground. The environment represented the dark side. We learned to cheat and lie. What you could get away with prevailed over fair play. It was ‘screw the other guy first’ and ‘you don’t let anyone fuck with you’.”


Nevertheless, street gangs are less prevalent in the playground after its refurbishment in 1977. When Janice and I were in the playground that morning, we came across a group of old Chinese men who were playing table tennis. We met with Mr Luo, 75. We introduced ourselves as Singaporeans, and he said that he and LKY were from the same province. He told us that he was a table tennis coach who coached in the Chinese Playground and that his whole family was here in the bay Area.


Inside the Chinese playground clubhouse, old men playing table tennis


Janice and Mr Luo



Mr Luo showed us some of his photos of his family. Being a table tennis coach, he told us that he wrote a sports anthem which he used for his team during competitions. The anthem:

人生什么 最难忘 骨肉情深 最难忘
人生什么 最重要 保养好身件 最重要
读书 为 的是什么 读书 为 事业 为前途
多 少数的守候 多少辛筋的关爱
人生什么 最快乐歌唱我们的新生活

海外的亲人常思念，唉咳喻。。。 终于回到自己的守园

强身健体要坚持，唉咳喻。。。身体强健才 有夺钱
筋学苦练为自己，唉咳喻。。。 前途光明才有出息
养育着你们步步的成长，唉咳喻。。。是爸 妈恩情忘不了
祝愿 早日完成祖国 一大业，唉咳喻。。。 祝庆我们全部欢聚在一堂



为献上我对会周年庆祝 而欢呼歌唱吧！

罗威


Hang Ah Alley, written by Steph