10 Years

(In Chinese culture, red is the lucky color and is emphasized especially a lot at Chinese New Year.)

People often ask, "Where do you see yourself in ten years?" There's perhaps no better time to contemplate this question when it's the New Year, and we're chock full of nostalgia for the past and hope for the future.

Last week I walked the halls of a nearby middle school, where our local Chinese Association hosts their annual Chinese New Year celebration, feeling surrounded by a community that was once familiar to me. I felt lost.

I thought about how so much had changed in my life in the seeming blink of an eye; that one moment we were in the throes of adolescence, trying desperately and confusedly to find some identity, and the next, all of that was suddenly gone. For the first time in my life, I spent Chinese New Year without my brother. He and my first best friend, who I met through this very Chinese community, were both now off at college. This question came to mind. Where would I be ten Chinese New Years from now, if already so much had changed? I know almost certainly I'll be in a different city, surrounded by different Chinese people. I thought about where I was ten years ago (well, technically nine, but shh), especially in terms of my Chinese-American identity.

Being Chinese has been an incredibly important part of who I am for as long as I can remember, and I know it always will be. Looking back now, I can see that my mother really tried quite hard to make sure that my friends at school knew about my culture, perhaps to ensure that I wouldn't feel left out for being nonwhite and - moreover - so that I would hopefully come to appreciate my own culture too. For my birthday, I brought sweet Chinese rice crackers and shrimp chips from Chinatown to share with the class. I remember feeling so awkward and mortified for bringing fried rice to lunch and always begged for something "American," like a ham sandwich.

But one of the most distinct memories I have of being Chinese in an almost all-white community comes from ten (nine) years ago. I was a second-grader then, and our class was having a cultural celebration day - I think around the same time as Chinese New Year. Lots of kids brought dishes to share from their respective cultures; I brought fried rice. My mom must have been a class mom or something, because she somehow got me to dress up in a qi pao (which is the word for a fancy Chinese dress, similar to a kimono). My socially-awkward seven-year-old self then proceeded to teach the class how to use chopsticks, as if I even knew myself, and everyone had a pair of those ones you get from the takeout restaurant with altogether confusing instructions written on them. Most memorable of all, I ended up in the local newspaper that week. Because Chinese culture was so much of a novelty that the brief flash of it in an elementary school classroom somehow became one of the top stories of the week. I mean, granted, I live in a small town where the eventful is defined by mundane everyday life. In any case, I certainly wasn't thinking this deeply about the implications as a second-grader. I remember feeling...special - proud, even.

For me that was the first time in my memory that I truly felt proud of my heritage - like it was important, and not simply something to be brushed over. That's not to say that every moment from there was an uphill climb to the wholehearted, unapologetic embrace of my Asian-ness. No, there were definitely other moments: feeling confused by the whole pinky finger thing, wondering why the Easter bunny never came to my house, looking in the mirror after reading Inside Out and Back Again and staring at my own pancake face. To be totally honest, I still struggle sometimes. And it's been ten years!

Or, well, it's only been ten years. Ultimately, I can now say without a doubt that I truly love and appreciate my Chinese heritage. (Thanks, Mom.) When it comes down to it, I am so unbelievably proud and grateful to come from two worlds: Mandarin and English, dumplings and burgers, no shoes and shoes, Chinese and American. In a year and a half, I'll probably move into a far more diverse community than mine now, and I do hope that in ten Chinese New Years I'll be celebrating with a group of people who have had more similar experiences to mine, and it will probably replace the local Chinese community here now. Though faded for me now, I don't mean for one second to diminish the role that the local Chinese association and its Chinese New Years has played in giving me a safe cultural space to grow over the years. And I don't wish that my childhood was in any way different. I've learned to love myself in spite of and because I am different, and I'll gladly take my pancake face any day if it means I get to eat dumplings and hot pot and photograph red lanterns and dragons while celebrating Chinese New Year.

And, fun fact: I still can't use chopsticks properly. Maybe in another ten years, I suppose.