Chinese come to America with the illusion that there will be gold waiting for 'em but 'cuz of their race they're kept back from either going back to China or entering America, according to Maxine Hong Kingston's book China Men, which is about the male relatives of her life.
Because of the Chinese Exclusion Act, Chinese were kept at Angel Island for days, which turn into weeks which become months. Months into years. Even though they got good jobs back in China, where they speak
Chinese, here in America all they get was either work in the restaurants (my father) or the laundry (my grandfather and Maxine Hong Kingston's father). We were only allowed to do menial labor like helped built the transcontinental railroad. We lost people building that railroad. They had to change their names to an America name/ My father was given an American name, but Maxine Hong Kingston's father changed his name to an American name. The thngs we do to fit in to American culture. This is so not the 'land of opportunity.'
According to Maxine Hong Kingston, her grand-grandfather worked in the fields like a slave (although he and his fellow Chinese immigrants get paid, though they get short-changed sometimes. Yes, life as a Chinese who came here for a better life was hard here in America the land of the opportunity. Yea, right!) helped harvesting the sugar cane in Hawaii's Sandalwood Mountains. On the other hand, my great-grandfather (on my father's side) was a hardworking man (although Maxine Hong Kingston's great-grandfather was a hardworker; she goes, the ones who weren't able to survive, he won't acknowledge them as his own.) He started his own hand-washed laundry business in the Big Apple (New York) Yes he went back. To this day, we have connections there in the Big Apple. Even my dad lived there for a time.
My folks never ever told me Chinese stories. However, Maxine Hong Kingston's relatives did. Reading those old Chinse stories made me feel like I'm missing a part of my Chinese culture; I lost a part of my Chinese culture being born in America. Being born an American means I was taught American stories, not Chinese stories, which include tall tales-Paul Bunyan, Johnny Appleseed, remember those two characters? Being born in America also meant I also learned American history, not Chinese history-sure, I was taught world history but just the important parts; they didn't go into details. Through Maxine Hong Kingston's autobiography, I learned some Chinese history-parts I feel missing from my education as I was growing up in America.
But boy, am I glad I didn't grow up in China! The Communist Party did unspeakable things to their civilians. All of Maxine Hong Kingston's male relatives died at the hands of the Communists/ The Communist may have taken our material possessions, but not our dignity!
Through it all, my mother worked hard in school both in high school and college majoring in chemistry. She was athletic in many sports, most especially basketball and ping pong. She was popular in school.
Meanwhile my dad was in America working hard before and after school, he delivered newspapers. He went to Lowell (back then, anybody could get in-it wasn't just the smart kids) was enlisted in the Air Force-traveled a bit, got out to finished his college education at CCSF (it wasn't as big as it was now) majored in business at first, then got his RE degree there about the same time as Mom did.
Mom and Dad got married in 1973-opened their real estate agency at about the same time; Mom still worked part-time at an adveriising agency doing accounting.. When my older brother was born almost 36 years ago, my maternal grandparents came to take care of him. 2 yearss later I was born and both my grandparents had a hand in raising us kids while the parental units worked.
They always say, work hard and you will succeed.
I admit, sometimes I tend to be lazy, but I enjoy doing something like selling stuff (ie.: cards, calendars) so that I could get a coveted prize. I hate arithmetic but love English-I love composition. As all younger sibs do, I tended to look up to my older brother, tag along after him when he was with his friends.
During my schoolyears, I tended to be shy so I made few friends. My dad once teasingly called stuck-up, but me, I never like to be teased.
One so-called friend stabbed me in the back by laughing at me. I couldn't take it anymore so I got mad; I took matters into my own hands. They then rejected me. They told everyone about what happened; I got paranoid.
Fast forward to 21st century: my paranoid took a turn for the worst. I thought people were stalking me so that they could make mincemeat out of me.It took getting out of school for awhile to get my senses back.
i digress...
Old Gold Mountain: I got a theory about OGM-
there's no such thing! It's just another way to say Land of Opportunity but at a price (probably gold). It is the land of opportunity if you're a rich, white, male. If you don't fit those criteria, then there's no land of opportunity for you, whether you're Asian, black or any other ethnicity that isn't white. During WWII, if you're Jewish or Japanese, there ain't no opportunity for ya. In the here n' now, if you're Muslim, you will be ostracize, all because of your faith. Maybe it's WWII all over again... When they have they Chinese Exclusion Act, there wasn't any opportunity for Chinese except for menial labor, helping to build the transcontinental railroad. Also women didn't have much opportunity either until the suffragists did something about it! Power to the women!
The only people with opportunity in America so-called land of opportunity were male of Caucasian ancestry (ie.: Polish, Danish). This just wasn't right but it happened.
Why wasn't there ever some kind of an uprising among all minorities ? I don't mean among just blacks, I mean among all minorities to unite together to overthrow the system. Blacks may have started the civil rights movement, but we as minorities could continue the movement of overthrowing the white supremacists of the world. We shouldn't let anyone put us down cuz united we stand. I think the minority race outnumbers the majority race.
There is Asian race from every spectrum-Indian, Korean, Filipino, Japanese, Vietnamese, Chinese, Polynesian to name a few. African Americns, Spanish race has a lot of different cultures-Latin Americans, Chicanos, mixed races-don't forget women and children. Women & children need rights too-sometimes they need to be heard-sometims no one listens to them.
We can form forces with the women & children, which include the Caucasian ones of the world. They, like the minorities, have been pushed around. With the minorities (& women & kids) can cause an uprising among the rich, white, male and order will be overthrown. It will be total and complete chaos! Now
this is the land of opportunity! When order resumes, utopia will be in order. Ah tranquility.
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