Chinese New Year was a holiday not only for children but for adults also. New clothes are worn on that day to signal a new beginning. When Yen Mah’s parents gave her and her older siblings traditional Chinese clothing, they are disappointed in their gifts because their stepmother’s favored children received western clothing. Yen Mah was included along with her older siblings in an act to rebel against their parents by writing an anonymous letter to their father complaining about their needs. Their older sister, the leader of the group, soon was pursued to join their stepmother’s side and the group’s plan doesn’t follow out. In school Yen Mah found a passion to write fictional stories and is accepted into the class but they suspected something was off in her family life. Though Yen Mah tries to act like she has a normal family, she hides the negative emotions in her. Wu Chun- mei was an athletic classmate that befriends Yen Mah when she saw her walking to and from school, even in dangerous weather. During this time, World War II had ended when America dropped the atomic bomb on Japan and American influences came in to their country since America was their hero. Wu Chun- mei let her borrow a book similar to Yen Mah’s life and she became attached to it since she could relate to the protagonist’s feelings. In the spring of 1946, her father, older sister, and step family went north, staying away for three months. During this time, everyone in the household had more freedon and her brothers rebel against the rules their parents set up. One heated summer day, Yen Mah was tricked in drinking contaminated orange juice by her 3 brothers. She cried, not because of their cruelty but because Third Brother’s, her kindest and youngest older brother, nicer side disappeared.
“They didn’t know that in front of them, I was desperate to keep up with the pretense that I came from a normal, loving family” (Yen Mah 54).
Yen Mah had put up a façade in school in order to try and fit in with her other classmates who don’t live under the same family conditions as her. Little do they know that she was distressed in finding a place where she could fit in and be treated as someone special, unlike the behavior her family gives her behind doors. Only a young child at around the age of 10, Yen Mah had this pressure of being unwanted and a child as young at her shouldn’t be harboring these kinds of feelings. In my opinion, I think children her age should be still acting like a child and free from such heavy burdens on them self.
how did Yen Mah manage the pretense of a normal family?
ReplyDeletenice that writing was her entry into acceptance