Roots and Wings

The last time I returned to Taiwan was in 2019, when M and I went there to bring home the child we had adopted. I’ve always pondered the phrase 'returned to Taiwan,' a direct translation from Mandarin: '回台灣,' which seems to build a homecoming call into itself.

The concept of going back to a home country isn’t foreign to me; it’s one embedded into the foundation, so to speak. A significant tradition during Lunar New Year is to return to one’s hometown. But what does that mean for someone like me, who was born and raised in a country far from the one my ancestors lived?

I don’t recall struggling much with my Asian American identity. During my early school days, my shyness was so pronounced that teachers and classmates thought I was mute, until I laughed once and surprised a girl who exclaimed, “Wow, you do have a voice!” It only dawned on me much later that my classmates laughed at my clothes and food because I was considered “foreign.” Even in college, when another random man passed me a note as I studied in the library saying he wanted to try dating an Asian for a taste of exoticism, I still didn’t think anything of it.

No one had taught me about microaggressions or the racism in my state, which banned Asians from owning land until 19521—less than 50 years before my parents immigrated. I was ignorant of how unwelcome I was because of my race.

I didn’t attribute any personality differences or quirks to a difference in culture between my white friends and me.

I attributed them, instead, to myself.2

Even if these few encounters had raised alarm bells, I was hopelessly ill-equipped to spot them. A potent combination of woman-submissiveness (thanks, evangelistic Christianity), the unbendable rule of not-rocking-the-boat (thanks, Asian people-pleasing shame culture), and my natural reserve would have kept me silent.

I say I don’t recall struggling much with my ethnic or racial identity. What I mean is, I never felt so caught in between my two cultures that I didn’t know who I was.

I grew up speaking Mandarin, but my parents never spoke to me in Taiwanese, so I cannot speak or understand it. This is a loss, but I understand their reasoning; they thought learning English was hard enough, and it was.

In becoming Christians, my parents shed much of the external traditions of Taiwanese culture, believing anything that didn’t adhere to western evangelical Christianity must be demonic. I know more about Christian history than Taiwanese history. We retain only a few traditions, mostly those revolving around food for major holidays.

I’m ¼ Hakka, one of the oldest ethnic groups in Taiwan, a fact I did not learn until I was in college. I found out by accident, when I was studying Taiwanese history and mentioned the Hakka people to my parents. My dad said, “You know, your grandma is Hakka.” I didn’t know; no one ever told me. My father’s generation is the last in our family to speak the Hakka language. Another loss.

When I’m in Taiwan, locals comment that I seem native; despite limited vocabulary, my pronunciation is near-perfect. So, if they don’t try to hold any complex conversations, I appear to belong. Once, while waiting outside a 7-11, the smell of tea eggs wafting through the gap in the glass doors, a granny approached me for directions in Taiwanese; I replied in Taiwanese that I didn’t understand. She said she was so sure I was a local. I’m pretty proud of that.

In San Diego, it’s rare to meet someone who was born and bred here. People often express surprise when they learn that about me, especially since it is such a transient city. I can give stories of what changes I’ve seen in this city throughout my life, point out street corners and sidewalks I used to walk as a child. I’m pretty proud of that, too.

It was the search for a place to call home that led me to travel. M and I got married young enough that we enjoyed years of blissful couple-hood before entering parenthood.

In the early days of our marriage, we adventured to nearby cities and far-off cities, countries I’d never seen and lands at once familiar and unfamiliar. I searched for pieces of myself in each place, as though I could find the elusive location where I broke apart and bring it all back together if I just made it to enough destinations.

Colorado has part of me in its mountains and trees. Santa Barbara carries a piece of a past I never quite released. And of course, Taiwan’s ancient grounds are soaked with the dust and blood of my ancestry in an intricate tapestry of history making me, me.

But what I wanted, what I really wanted, was an indescribable place where history, safety, and understanding all collided in an unquestionable haven of belonging.

The thing is, though, those of us who feel we don’t belong anywhere (all of us?) won’t find that magical place somehow. What I found was a fragment here and there—echoes of what could be a larger puzzle to which I belonged, but I’m left with a lingering suspicion that the jagged edges making up my insides will always be so.

In truth, I fully belong neither in Taiwan nor in San Diego, but I feel at home enough in both. They are pieces of a puzzle, but only a few, and they cannot tell my complete story.

What I really want to say: while knowing my family history is important to me (I have bits of family stories collected through the years in hopes of writing an intergenerational family saga one day), it plays a smaller role in how I understand myself than one might think.

What I really want to say is, labels are a starting point only, but they can also be another cage.

My direct experiences have a greater impact on who I am, and my response is not influenced by cultural restraints or permissions.

I am a second-generation Taiwanese American woman. I am a mother of both living and dead children. I am a really good friend. I am a survivor of childhood abuse, sexual assault, and suicide. I am a Christian but somewhat reluctantly. I am reserved but also wild, and prone to word vomit. I am a lesbian married to a man I love. I am a mess of contradictions.

In the end, those jagged edges may never fit together into a perfect, cohesive whole. But really, who wants that anyway?