ERASED

We had just landed in Beijing when police hastily boarded our plane and pointed thermometers at our foreheads. Beep. Expressionless faces demanded my name and left. The following day, Beijing health authorities came to our hotel to retake my temperature. An officer immediately escorted me into an awaiting ambulance, its destination the quarantine ward for China’s 2009 swine flu pandemic. I returned to America more ashamed of my heritage than enlightened. Under the hazmat suits and police uniforms were people just like me. Yet I was treated as an outsider, nothing but a contagious virus.

I wrote this segment two years ago for my college common app essay. I have been revisiting this time in my life relatively often as we sit at home on Zoom calls, learn how to make bread, and go out to protests, in the midst of this new pandemic. You’d think this would be the last thing I would reflect on, as life seems to constantly have breaking updates everyday. 

But with the fear of COVID-19 in America becoming rampant in March 2020, I began seeing many racist and xenophobic attacks against Asian people on my social media. People, including Donald Trump, called Asians the “Chinese Virus” and I heard several stories of Asian people, including my friends, getting harrassed. I started to doubt my own truths about my identity. This felt oddly familiar, not from something I had heard before, but something I felt in myself eleven years ago in that hospital room in Beijing. My stomach flipped at the thought of returning to the girl who hated being Chinese.

Luckily, a few things have changed since then. I joined dragon boat in high school, arguably the most Chinese sport in the Bay Area, found friends who made me curious about the Chinese culture, was given the opportunity to since travel back to China on multiple occasions, and even have been practicing cooking some traditional dishes. I learned how to write my Chinese name and have even used it as my signature on some of my artwork. I can say that I am proud of my growth and acceptance since that trip in 2009, however, there is one thing that I have been holding onto.

My Gung Gung. As much as I would love to say it’s because of the fond memories I shared with him and the life advice he gave me, I can’t. I am someone who is stubborn beyond belief when someone tells me I can’t achieve something. There was one moment where he told me he really wanted his grandsons to get a good education and become successful as doctors or lawyers–he mentioned nothing about his one granddaughter out of seven grandchildren. Growing up in the liberal city of San Francisco, with friends who were all feminists that made sure to be vocal about what they believed in, I was appalled and angry and didn’t stop to question why he said that. He passed away soon after in 2014, years before I could even think about asking him.

During one of our meetings for the Ekklesiae Stories of the Prophetic, Sarah Akutagawa’s presentation about San Francisco Chinatown opened my eyes up to how much of the history has been erased in order to make it more palatable for white people. As I earnestly searched on Google for photos of Stockton and Grant Street with roasted ducks in the windows, live fishes ready to take home, and crowded streets full of grocery carts and visors, I could only find images of the Dragon Gate and lanterns which made me realize that this erasure spread even into the digital realm. I was disappointed that I had more images of Chinatown in my memory than a worldwide search engine did.

I began thinking about how this erasure affected my ancestors, especially my maternal grandparents who resided in Chinatown since the 1960s. My grandpa immigrated to San Francisco from Taishan, Guangdong in middle school. He attended Francisco Middle School, Galileo High School, and San Jose State University for engineering. That engineering career was one of many. From my mom’s stories, I knew him as an engineer, salesman, property owner, businessman, and at one point, president of the Lee Association, yet I never questioned why he had so many different professions. I just assumed it was part of the hustle.

I learned that being a Chinese man trying to find work in the 1970s was quite similar to how I felt as an Asian woman entering the tech space. He did not receive promotions while working just as hard as his White colleagues, and job opportunities were very hard to come by. I had always believed that my family fell into the all too familiar trope of going into the medical field to make the most money, as it’s seen as one of the most studious and academic careers. I learned, however, that my Gung Gung chose this route for his children so they would be respected, regardless of their appearance–something he had not had in his own career. 

Hearing that shifted my perspective of him immediately. I suddenly felt guilt and shame for creating this negative persona of him in my head when in reality, he always wanted the best for his family. Growing up in the same city, sixty years apart, our environments were oddly different yet positions similar. 

It got me thinking a lot about reconciliation. I often avoid it because I fear that it’s too late to fix things or not worth the emotional labor. But learning more about my grandfather, I feel called to reconcile with him. Now you might think, how is that possible? And yes, I cannot turn back time to 2014, but I can continue to learn more about him and his life, and in turn hopefully rebuild the broken image of him I kept for so many years. It reminds me of another relationship I have–one with Christ. I come broken and on more days than I’d like to admit, I don’t give God the credit they deserve or even the time to hear what they have to say. And yet, Christ wants a relationship with me. Not one that is linear, but one with restoration. 

To be honest, I am only at the beginning of this new journey of familial and ancestral history that will undoubtedly take a lot of unlearning, unpacking, and relearning. It will still be painful and confusing, but all growth happens when we enter those uncomfortable spots and start healing from them. I am putting my hope into this journey of restoration, starting with my Gung Gung.