2021-22

As a Chinese American, I’ve grown up with both Chinese and American cultures. I speak Chinese with my parents and grandparents and use English for the words I don’t know but in a way, I feel more comfortable speaking in both languages than just one. Communicating with my grandparents can be difficult because of the language barrier and they also have Chinese dialects that can make some words difficult to understand. Because of the language barrier, it can feel like I’m missing out on a lot of experiences with my grandparents and Asian culture but I think it’s okay because Asian American culture is very distinct. Especially for 1st generation Asian Americans who grow up in America, it’s a very unique experience that a lot of us hold and share. So even though I may not have as much knowledge or experience with Asian culture, I don’t see it as a sacrifice because Asian American culture is also just a culture that is experienced in different ways and is not less or greater than other cultures. I don’t feel like I’m losing Asian culture because I experience Asian American culture which gives a unique experience and has made me who I am.

One of the reasons why I took a Chinese course in college was because of my grandfather. My step-grandfather is Taiwanese so I grew up with him and I felt a little disconnected because I didn’t know much about him or his culture. Because of this, I decided to take a Chinese 101 course and Chinese popular culture course freshman year. I wanted to be able to connect with him on a deeper level than just English. I absolutely fell in love with the courses. I would never see myself coming to college to study Chinese or APIA studies, especially because I didn’t know APIA was an option, but now I’m majoring in both.

I think a lot of what white people do with any outside culture is appropriate rather than appreciate. I think there needs to be a change in that. When I go into any APIA class or AASI event, I expect to see a little more than just me as the only white person. I feel really upset when I see the people that need to be in the class not there and I understand that Asian Americans also need to learn their history but it’s disappointing that so many of the white organizations on the campus are ignorant about anything outside of the white experience. I feel like many Asian Americans know about these things but the people that need to be educated are not in that class. If there is a way to make APIA classes a part of the COLL curriculum, it would make a huge impact on the community.

Throughout my time in high school, I have worked towards setting up multiple clubs and platforms to support the APIA community. In my sophomore year, I started the Multicultural Club at my high school. I saw a huge gap in clubs and opportunities for minority students to meet and make connections so I developed this club to support this and also spread advocacy and awareness for various social and societal issues and movements. During my senior year, I worked to create a stronger connection with the Young AAPI of Charlottesville and also worked with a team to create and facilitate Anti-Racism workshops. Currently, I have been working on creating Lesson Plans for Asian American History to support ethnic studies.

The main motivation for me to work on these projects and create or support these organizations is to ensure that there is a foundation and basis for younger Asian Americans, so they have the opportunities to go further than I did by the time they are in college or high school. I want to make sure that they have the agency and platform to speak their mind and make sure that they can create the change that they want to see in their communities because that’s really hard to do when you don’t have that platform. It’s also incredibly intimidating to do when you are unsure of the support system in the community. I want to make sure that these projects I’m working on will create that platform and space to do what Asian Americans deserve to do in advocacy and education, so that we can collectively, as a community, progress.

I remember that when I was little, I always got confused as to whose house I was supposed to take my shoes off in. The cultural differences between both sides of my family are really interesting. My dad’s side is white and my mom’s side is Japanese Hawaiian.

There are a lot of aspects of each family side that is different, like taking off shoes in the house and also addressing older family members. During graduation, I had to write thank you cards to my relatives and so I addressed one card and wrote Uncle __X__. My mom looked at it and asked why I called him Uncle because he was my second cousin on my dad’s side. She pointed out that in the Mainland, he’d be my cousin but I was thinking about it through the lens of Hawaiian culture because in Hawai’i, referring to someone as a cousin is only for someone your age and that relative was much older. So that was pretty mindblowing because it was one thing I just grew up with but never thought twice until then.

Growing up mixed, I always struggled with the “Which Race/ethnicity do you identify with" question. My dad’s side is white and my mom’s side is Japanese Hawaiian.

Some organizations let you choose multiple options but other times you can always choose one. I’ve seen cases where you can only choose one and “2 or more” isn’t even an option. So then I just fill in the “other” bubble. Normally if it’s just picking one, I just choose Pacific Islander but that’s not always an option. Situations like these are so frustrating and it really shows that these things like representation aren’t really accounted for and that even at higher levels, nobody is checking for it.

I feel like I spoke a lot more Chinese at home as a kid. Especially in high school when I’d speak more English than Chinese because of friends and school, I would tend to speak more English at home too. I think a lot of Asian Americans fall into this pattern where your parents speak to you in Chinese and you respond in English. For the most part, I always revert back to Chinese whenever I’m frustrated or want to ramble. In high school, that worked out because I had a lot of friends that understood Chinese but at William and Mary, most of my friends don’t understand Chinese so then if I rant in Chinese, nobody really understands. And I also talk in Chinese with my parents if there are other people there and I don’t want them to know what’s going on.

My relationship with the Chinese language has greatly changed over the years. Before, I saw it as more of an obstacle, especially in Chinese school and being lectured about how my Chinese was not good enough. Now, I really appreciate the language and it partially represents my relationship with my grandparents. Communicating with my grandparents has always been difficult with the language barrier because their English is not fluent and my Chinese vocabulary is limited. I’ve always wanted to understand more about their lives and tell them all the stories about mine as well but it’s sad because I don’t have all the vocabulary. I am able to talk with my grandparents but not at the deeper level that I wish I could. Ever since I was in middle school, I feel like I’ve internalized this guilt at not knowing enough Chinese to be a “good grandchild” to my grandparents but I think they’ve come to terms to understand that as an Asian American, I may not be fluent in Chinese but I still am trying to communicate with them. In high school, I took Chinese classes for 4 years to improve my Chinese and that really helped me communicate with my grandparents because I could talk with them more.

Overall, I am grateful that improving my Chinese has strengthened my connection with my grandparents but I also know that my relationship with my grandparents isn’t solely measured by my Chinese ability but by the way I respect and cherish our time together.

Both of my parents are post-Vietnam refugee immigrants who came to the United States. It was always extremely important for my parents to be Vietnamese before American in the title of Vietnamese-American. I grew up with a lot of Vietnamese traditions and a lot of that was through food as a transit of our culture, such as celebrating meals with our broader family. Growing up, Vietnamese was my native language but after going to school, grade school teachers and other students ridiculed me for my accent and for not knowing fluent English. This led me to speak less Vietnamese at home and therefore I, unfortunately, became less fluent.

A cultural introspective shock for me was when I went to Vietnam in my freshman year of high school. It was the first time I had ever traveled to Asia and I was able to interact with so many family members that I had never met before. It was such an enriching experience but it also felt like there was such a language barrier that prevented me from fluently interacting with the cab drivers, waiter, servers, or actual family members. It was the language barrier that inhibited me from having meaningful conversations with my family so, in so many ways, the education system in the US whitewashes and Americanizes so many children so that they “normalize” themselves to the general American public.

This summer, I will be going to Mongolia and Japan for an internship opportunity. I am also planning on going to Vietnam during the time that would be my senior year because I can graduate early. One thing I am hoping to do in life and while I’m abroad is to get back and acclimate to Vietnamese culture which has felt like a missing link in my life. I’m hoping to work in Vietnam in the educational system for the full year so I can be fluent again by fully immersing myself there.

Coming to a predominantly white institution, was a state of estrangement for me because my elementary, middle, and high school had a large Asian demographic, and William and Mary lacked that aspect. I remember initially, I did not want to join an Asian American group on campus because I was worried that my membership would be the definition of my identity. As much as I embrace my culture and my Vietnamese-American identity, I don’t want that to be the sole dictation of who I am. But after being propelled into AASI and being intertwined in its events and advocacy, I realized that there is no need to reject the fact that I am Asian-American because my identity should be a moment of pride and empowerment.