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The life of Jing-mei Woo was not of a Disney story but a sad, difficult life. Her past are laced with hard lessons. She is burdened with her mothers past haunting her and her family. The life changed when Canning asked Jing-mei to take Suyuan's place in the Joy Luck Club. Ultimately discover a part of family that she never knew existed and found herself on a Journey to find them and be united for the first time. Jing-mei's mother had unattainable expectations of Jing-mei.
Suyuan expected her daughter to be a prodigy and tried to shape her into one. In the beginning, she was very excited and was looking forward to her future fame and popularly (p. 142). Every night her mother gave her tests after tests (p. 143) but Jing-mei fell short of her mothers expectations. Again and again Jing-mei saw Suyuan disappointed face that she began to give up (p. 144). She decided that the prodigy in her was the girl who would steadfastly refuse to be what she was not (p. 144). Jing-mei and her mother finally gave up on the concept of prodigy until seeing a nine-year-old Chinese girl perform on the piano on the Ed Sullivan Show, Suyuan made Jing-mei take lessons from their neighbor, Mr.
Chong (p. 146 - 148). Unfortunately, Mr. Chong was deaf and his eye was too slow to keep track of her performance on the piano, therefore Jing-mei learned how to make mistakes and not get caught (p. 148). She learned the hard lesson that if you slacked off then you would pay the price. Jing-mei's mother entered Jing-mei on a talent contest (p. 149). Jing-mei played pleading child, Jing-mei did not practice very hard, so she played poorly, she learned the lesson the hard way.
She felt devastated and felt that she let her mother down (p. 151). Suyuan did not realize how strongly her disappointment affected Jing-mei as a child. Jing-mei began to associate herself with the disappointment of Suyuan's expectations (p. 153 - 154). Jing-mei alludes to her belief that she disappointed Suyuan by not graduating from college (p. 154) A few months before Suyuan's death, she cooked a crab dinner for ten people to celebrate the Chinese New Year.
While Jing-mei and her mother shopped in Chinatown, on Stockton Street, at a fish store, they were looking for the liveliest crabs (p. 225). They got 10 crabs and one defective crab with one less leg due to a tug of war (p. 225). When the guests arrived for the New Year dinner, Suyuan had not counted Shoshana when buying the crabs. So at the dinner when Waverly chose the best crab for her daughter then chose the next best two for herself and Rich. Then Lindo chose the best of the remaining crabs for herself, Tin, Vincent, and Lisa. Suyuan gave good crabs to Mr.
Ching and Canning. Finally there were only two crabs left, one with the missing limb. Jing-mei was ready to chose the crab with the missing leg for herself but her mother insisted she take the better one (p. 227). Then after everyone was stuffed and started having conversations, Waverly complimented Jing-mei's haircut (p. 229). Jing-mei told Waverly David always does a great job. Then Waverly was shocked that Jing-mei still went to her gay hairstylist.
The intense conversation went on, Waverly suggested that Jing-mei go to her own hairstylist but also said that the prices might be too high, infuriating Jing-mei. She mentioned that Waverly's firm had not paid her for some work that she had done for Waverly. Then Waverly replied that her firm decided not to use her work because the quality was not good. It went on until Jing-mei gave up and cleared the table and retreated to the kitchen, defeated (p. 229 - 230). When the guests left, Suyuan went to the kitchen and explained that she did not eat the crab with the missing legs because it was not editable then teased Jing-mei for choosing the worst of the two remaining crabs whereas everyone else insisted on the best quality available. Then Suyuan explained to Jing-mei that she should not be satisfied with the leftovers; it is time to reach for the best, then she gave Jing-mei a Jade Pendant.
Jing-mei realized that her personalities are foundation ally different than Waverly and other and that she should go the direction that her heart desires not what other want (p. 235). Suyuan recognized Jing-mei's real strength. Two months after Suyuan died due to an aneurysm, Canning asked Jing-mei to take her mothers place in the Joy Luck Club (p. 5). Her mother created the Joy Luck Club in Kweilin to cope with the horror of the war.
Then she created the San Francisco version in 1949 (p. 6). Jing-mei felt inadequate to replace her mother because she never succeeded in becoming the prize daughter that Waverly is and never even finished college. When Jing-mei arrived at the Joy Luck Club party and she was not surprised that everyone at the party was dressed up really fancy. Jing-mei was ashamed of her heritage; people at the J. L. C.
were dressing in strange dressings and felt that it was a shameful Chinese custom (p. 16). When the party were over, Jing-mei were relieved and was trying to leave but her mothers friends told Jing-mei to stay but she still tried to leave but sat down when they informed Jing-mei that they have something to tell Jing-mei from her mother (p. 29). When her mothers friends informed her that Suyuan succeeded in locating her twin daughters after a life-long search. Suyuan died before she could contact then at the address she discovered, so they wrote a letter in her name and received a letter from Jing-mei's lost twin sisters (p. 29 - 30).
Then they offered Jing-mei 1, 200 to travel to China and tell her sisters about Jing-mei's mother, yet Jing-mei felt that she did not know her mother well enough to tell her sisters about her (p. 31 - 32). She also felt that she represents the failure of Suyuan's dreams. Jing-mei is on her way to Shanghai to embrace her destiny and complete the circle that her mother started. When she was a teenager, she refused to believe she was Chinese at all.
Suyuan disagreed. When she was on the train going toward the destiny that waits, she realized that she was part Chinese and American (p. 306 - 308). That would never change, no matter what Jing-mei does. Jing-mei was worried what to say to her sisters about her mother but all her fears and uncertainties evaporated away when she met her lost family and when she saw her two sisters, they did not resembled Suyuan but when she looked at a Polaroid picture of her and her lost sisters, for the first time they looked like her mother. The sorrows, the pains that Jing-mei experienced in her lifetime was long and difficult.
But Fears about cultural Identity were resolved. Jing-mei realized that she is inevitably Chinese as well American. When Jing-mei met her sisters for the first time made her realize that belonging to her family makes her Chinese by default. It is not matter of proving her claim to Chinese identity.
The missing piece of the family has ceased to be her sisters. The true object of Jing-mei's search was Suyuan all along. Having found her mother, Jing-mei ceased to voice doubts about her identity and her relationship to Suyuan. The cycle is now complete after a lifetime of sorrow. Bibliography:
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Research essay sample on Jing Mei Mother Joy Luck Club
