Remembering Suyuan Woo

 Suyuan Woo, mother to Jing mei Woo and a member of the Joy Luck Club, was born in China and migrated to The Unites States, specifically to Chinatown in San Francisco, California, to start a new life, creating a new family. Back in China, she had left all her memories and valuables behind, including her 2 infant daughters, as at the time of escape China was involved in an ongoing war with Japan. The journey was difficult, but in the end she was able to make it, just not with her 2 daughters. In her recent years, she played with her four other friends she met in San Francisco, An-Mei, Lindo, and Ying-ying, the mah jong most nights, winning mostly every time, as she had skill and strategics to successfully defeat the other players.  Unfortunately, a few years later, she passed away due to a cerebral aneurysm, leaving her daughter, Jing mei, to fill in her spot at the mah jong playing and her husband behind.




 

The Joy Luck Club As a Whole

Throughout the short stories of the young women in The Joy Luck Club, it describes the relationships between mothers and daughters and the thought of these relationships is upsetting because children have to suffer due to how “perfect” that child has to be in order to please their family. Furthermore, the short stories demonstrate the Chinese cultures and struggles that the person must go through to satisfy their parents. The Joy Luck Club caused me to reflect on the connection that I have with my mother. The short stories in the book made me believe even more that I should be appreciative for the belongings that I have and the things that people give me. I can relate to Waverly Jong in the beginning of her story because she says that her mom expects her to learn many things and my mom requires me to learn all types of activities due to the fact that she believes that it is the best for me and she always ends up being right. 

One of the best parts of the stories is when Lindo Jong leaves her marriage because she does not want to be married. So, she tells her mother-in-law that her marriage will turn out bad unless she lets her leave the marriage. Afterward, her mother-in-law lets her get out of the marriage, but it is kept a secret. A worst part of the stories is when the baby drowned and the family saw the baby drown, but they did not do anything about it. Also, when Huang Tai-Tai treated his daughter with disrespect. Such as, instead of treating her as a daughter, he treated her as a slave. 

The ending was outstanding due to the fact that Jing-Mei Woo had the chance to meet her two sisters which her mother had left behind in China. In total, I would rate The Joy Luck Club a 3.9 out of 5.

Lead Story: Lindo Jong's Escape

Last night, Lindo Jong had an exclusive one on one interview with “The Chinese Diaries” about her experiences in the Huang’s family household and how she was able to leave the arranged marriage set for her at age two by a village matchmaker. “An earth horse for an earth sheep.  This is the best marriage combination” claimed the village matchmaker believing that Lindo Jong and Tyan-Yu Huang were perfect for eachother but as told by Jong, it was horrible.

When Lindo Jong’s family home recently got destroyed by natural causes, the family became bankrupt. This caused the whole Jong family except for Lindo to go to Wushi. “I was told my mother why can’t I go with you guys, why do I have to stay with the Huangs?” She told me that, “Since I was 12 years old already I was old enough to go live with the Huangs.” The Huangs were to be Lindo’s second family since she was marrying Tyan-Yu Huang, because they were arranged by the village matchmaker at age 2 making a whole life commitment of being together . When Lindo was dropped off to the Huangs household she didn’t immediately expect to be treated like a servant, but she was. “Once I enter the house they immediately sent me to the kitchen where the servants were held at making me realize where my position was in this house,” said Lindo Jong. Throughout the 3 years before she officially got married with Tyan-Yu Huang, she stated, “Huang Taitai would always give me harsh criticism and orders that I had to follow making me be a good wife, she would make me clean, cook and sew all the time! So that I could be an obedient  wife to her son. I wanted to speak back  but I knew that if I would say a harsh word to Ms.Huang that would be a disgrace to my family so I just followed them”. When it was Lindo Jong’s and Tyan-yu Huang's wedding day , it wasn’t like every ordinary sunny, happy day in their wedding day it was rainy and very cloudy making people not come to the wedding since people believed that the rain were bombs, as the Japanese had previously invaded the region. But that didn’t stop their wedding day.

Lindo decided to end this marriage by to pretend to have a dream that was able to make Huang Taitai realize that the marriage was a horrible mistake not only to Lindo but to the whole Huang family. Jong came up with the idea to say to Taitai that, “They knew that you would not believe me, because they know I do not want to leave the comforts of my marriage. So our ancestors said they would plant the signs, to show our marriage is now rotting. At first Huang Taitai did not believe what Jong said as it was nonsense to her but she started believing Lindo when she pointed the signs of what the ancestors had said to her in her “dream”, like the spot on Tyan-yu back, which was supposedly killing him and Lindo’s teeth falling out due to her not “protesting leaving this marriage”, and about how Tyan had planted a seed on the servant girl.  All these signs Huang Taitai looked at began to worry her, so Huang Taitai decided to call the off marriage. It was basically like getting a divorce, but only if Lindo Jong was to keep the marriage a secret.

Meet the Child Prodigy: Waverly Jong

Waverly Jong, daughter of Lindo Jong, is smart, conceited, and very competitive towards others, especially with a long time childhood friend, June Woo. Throughout her life, she has had a strained relationship with her mother, who is very picky and is never satisfied with what Waverly does. But even with this, Waverly is able to obtain secrets from her that help her become the person she was when she was little- a child prodigy. She obtains the ability to conceal her thoughts and to win strategically when going on chess championships, called the "invisible strength". She admits to having this trait, when saying "I could see things on the chessboard that other people could not. I could create barriers to protect myself that were invisible to my opponents." (Tan 170)  As an adult, she has been very successful, landing at a well paid job of an attorney, and is to be married to a man she truly loves, Rich.

Q&A With Waverly Jong

1. Q- How did it feel to be featured on the Life Magazine, especially at a young age?

   A- Honestly, that was one of the greatest moments of my life, up to this point. I knew i was a national chess champion, but I never would have imagined to be on this important magazine. I remember the day of the magazine shoot I had dressed up really nice, in a clean white dress, which I would only wear on special occasions, and my hair neatly plaited with braids. Yea, it was an opportunity I was given that will always remember.

2. Q- Why the sudden interest in chess?

   A- (Laughs) I get what you mean. Uhm, I don't really know, it was just something I saw and i was out of nowhere intrigued. The first time I was opened to this was when my brother had received the set as a Christmas party from an old church we used to go to. Him and my other brother would play, and they wouldn't let me as I didn't know the rules. And so I would then go to the library and spend hours reading books on instructions on how to play. I the played with my brother, and ended up playing against others on tournaments.

Where the Mothers Came to Start a New Life: San Francisco, CA

This novel, The Joy Luck Club was set in a few places, and one among them was San Francisco, CA, specifically in the 1950s. The setting adds to the book's context, which was the relationship between American and Chinese cultures, through mothers and daughters. The mothers migrated to the United States to run away from the violence they were facing in China as the country was fighting in a war at that time, and embarked on a new lifestyle with their families. The immigrants all lived in San Francisco's Chinatown, in houses that were adorned with traditional Chinese furniture and on the walls they had paintings of their ancestors whom their mothers came to obey.

At this time in the America there were many laws passed that benefited incoming immigrants, such as the mothers in this novel. With these laws, they were able to live peacefully with their incoming generations.

Thoughts on the Joy Luck Club

The novel, Joy Luck Club, has had few criticism, but overall as a whole it is a good read, and would recommend it to people of all ages, as it teaches various topics that can be connected back to your own life experiences. With reading this book, I came to learn more about Chinese traditions, and how they come to vary with the ones here in America. Throughout the book Amy Tan has the characters, specifically the mothers, who originate from China, state that in their country they are more respectful, to their parents and their elders, and have moral codes and superstitions to follow that should never be broken or face devastating consequences in the futures. The daughters, which are open to American culture, decide that they have their own right to do as they please, and feel that they are free to do so, such as when Waverly Jong replies to her mother, "Don't be so old fashioned, Ma. I'm my own person" (Tan 254).

When reading this, I noticed that the author of this novel came to include the theme of maternal love within the stories of each mother and daughter, which caught my attention, as I was able to relate to it to some extent. In The Joy Luck Club, the mothers and daughters each appeared to have strained relationships with each other, as the daughters were adapting to the American cultures and traditions while their mothers dealt with them through Chinese customs and their superstitions. The mothers such as Ying-ying St. Clair would protect her daughter to having a better future, or a husband in this case, by putting fear in them with old superstitions, the idea that if she didn't finish all her food she would grow to have a bad husband.