| My Secret |
| by Chris |
In writing these following pages, I know I am revealing a big secret, to my readers, of my life. It is a secret, which I have not even told my closest family members or friends. I used to just try and forget about my tragedies in my lifetime as they came along, but now I wish I had not. And instead, used them as inspiration rather than letting them bring me down.
Now, after I have grown up, I am in a sense trying to seek relief of the decisions I have made in the past. The decisions I have came upon have made me the person I am now and I have regretted it everyday for making those choices and not the others.
I was born in New York a few years after my parents had moved from China. My parents arrived in America hoping to allow me to have a better life than the one they had had in China. I do not remember much of where I was born, but my recollections of the apartment where we lived in were not pleasant ones. I remember having to play on a hard, cold floor, which always resulted in me having a small piece of wood being stuck in my leg. I would start crying and then my mother would try and take out the splinter with a small needle. I seldom played outside, but when I did, it was because of a new toy I had received. I would ride my tricycle happily down the sidewalk when I was outside with my mother watching, but then one day, a boy had pushed me off my tricycle and rode it away while my mother went inside to use the bathroom. I sat on the ground not knowing why the boy had pushed me off of my tricycle and said to me, “Go back to where you came from.” I had thought he just wanted to borrow it and I was always taught to share, so I just waited for him to return it. A few minutes after, my mother came back outside and asked why I was sitting on the ground and I told her the reason. Right after that, I was brought inside and never played outside again. I did not understand why the boy had said what he had said until looking back upon it a few years later. And soon after that day, we moved to a house in New Jersey.
My father worked in a bank in New York as a manager, and my mother was a pattern maker. She made wedding gowns and altered clothes for a nearby dry cleaners. I recall many times which my mother used to say to me, “Work hard, don’t play all day and watch too much television,” while I used to watch her make the beautiful dresses. My father used to always tell me not to worry about anyone else except myself because it will be all up to me to succeed in life. I’d hear him say, “Being Chinese American has benefit. Not everyone speak three language,” when I would ask why I couldn’t go play outside with the other white boys. My parents never answered the questions I’d ask, they’d just always tell me to work hard in school.
Soon, it was time for me to be enrolled into school. I remember playing by myself during playtime in preschool. I tried making friends with the other white kids, but they all did not want to play with me. The teacher tried to get the other kids to play with me, but they wouldn’t. A white boy told me one day that I was different, and started to make weird noises like “chin, choi, chang, waa” while making his eyes slanted with is fingers. Right after the boy said that, I started to cry. I knew what he was doing, and that was the first time I felt inferior to somebody else. I questioned myself why I was so different than everyone else, and why my classmates did not like me. From that day on, I wished to be like the other white boys. I wanted the shape of their eyes and noses, and the color of their hair and skin, I wanted to eat the same foods they brought to school, I wanted to have the same cool lunch boxes they brought the food in, I wanted to dress like them. I felt at such an early age that if I acted more like them, that they’d accept me more and like me.
The remarks did not stop, instead they got worse. I was now in first grade and I had developed my first crush on a girl. She was friendly, pretty and had blonde hair. I involved myself in games with the white boys and girls now instead of playing by myself or waiting for them to ask me to join them. During recess one mid-afternoon, we were playing tag and my crush was chasing after me, and when she caught up to me, I turned around and quickly gave her a kiss. The other kids around us saw, and it turned out to be the talk of the day. I quickly became harassed and heard other kids telling the girl, “Ewww!!! Now you have Chinese cooties! Your eyes are going to be like Ôthis’ now,” using their fingers to make their eyes slanted. I felt so horrible that my kiss to the girl has brought my misfortunes upon her and apologized for my action. The girl accepted my apology and we became friends from that day on, but the harassment by the other boys did not stop.
As I got older, the harassment was brought to new levels. I would get chased up to my front door, have rocks thrown at me, and get pushed around. This would happen almost everyday for about 3-4 weeks until I begged my mother to pick me up from school, and sometimes, if she could, come into the school and have me called down to the office so I can go home. My parents would call up the principal at the school and try to explain them the problems I was having with the other kids in the school, but with my parents’ broken English, it was difficult for them to explain the situation as well as for them to understand what they were being told.
Then one day in 6th grade, I made friends with a fellow classmate and the harassment stopped. There was this black boy who sat next to me in my class who was having difficulty understanding the math problems we were assigned. He kept on erasing his work and soon became frustrated over the problems. The teacher was busy helping out another student, and so he looked over to me since I was already finished with my work. I always had an easy time understanding my school work and I never thought it would benefit me in the way as I am about to explain. The boy, Travis, looked over to me and said, “I don’t get this.” I immediately asked him if he needed some help, and then proceeded on explaining the problem to him. He picked up on what I had said and that was what sparked our life long friendship. From what I saw and heard of him, he was a popular boy. He was a good football player and girls always liked him. Travis saw how I would always get picked on by our classmates and stood up for me one day after school. We were walking across the playground and a boy who was running by bumped into me on purpose and knocked me down. Travis knew the boy and immediately chased him down and made him apologize to me. I told Travis that he didn’t have to do that, and what he had just done would only bring upon me more problems later on. He explained, “You got my back, I got yours. Besides, I can’t let my tutor get hurt, cuz how else would I understand my work. You’re a cool kid,” and smiled. My friendship with Travis was well known the next day of school and the kids who usually picked on me backed off. And even some of my bullies asked me for help on their homework because of Travis boasting his high scores on his Math tests after my tutoring.
I don’t recall any more harassment from my classmates from then on, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t be harassed by people who I’d see that I didn’t know in the places I went.
I had always gone to the supermarket either with my parents because I wanted them to buy me the same foods, which the white kids, ate at school. I would separate away from either one of them to go and look for the things I wanted them to buy me. As I was walking down the cereal aisle, two white boys were making some remarks about me, so I proceeded to walk faster into the next aisle. I heard them say, “Let’s follow this chink,” and as I looked back behind me, they were about 5 feet away. They were bigger and older than me. “What are you looking at karate kid?” I did not answer and hoped I would find my parents in the next aisle or some adult which will make the harassment stop. As I turned around, I felt a stinging feeling on my hand and butt and quickly brought up my hand to see what had happened. It seemed like a whip mark and then I heard the two boys laughing behind me with one saying, “Do it again! Do it again!” Without even looking back, I started to run down the aisle, but I was caught before I got to the end. The boy who had the plastic whip grabbed my shirt and said, “Where are you going you little chink? We’re not done with you.” Luckily, a lady and an employee of the supermarket had walked into the aisle we were in, and one white boy said to the other, “Let’s just leave him alone. Let’s go.” After they left the aisle, I walked cautiously into the next aisle to make sure they were not in it. I see my parents in the middle and I go towards them. I did not say a word to them for the rest of the day. My father would ask, “What’s wrong?” I would not say a word and just kept pushing the cart, hoping they’d get the idea that I wanted to leave and go home.
Basketball was a game that I loved playing because it brought me closer to other boys and since I was good at it, the white boys wantedme on their teams. I would play at a nearby park for hours everyday after school until it got dark either by myself or with people who were already there. I would bring water with me just so I won’t have to go all the way home to quench my thirst. But going to the bathroom was a problem because none of the people who played basketball there lived close by. The closest house of a basketball player was a 10-minute walk away. Yet there was a VFW right across the street of the park that kids would sometime go into as a last resort. I never had to go in there as a last resort, but I’ve seen kids being allowed to use the bathrooms inside of there and afterwards, were offered sodas at the bar. Then one day, I had to go really bad, but didn’t want to use a tree to relieve my urge, so I ran across the street and went into the VFW and asked to use their restroom. The man at the bar said to me, “The restrooms are for customers only.” As I walked out, I thought it was strange that I couldn’t use the restroom but my friends could. I did not think of this incident much and just brushed it off. So then I walked back to the basketball court and had to turn to a tree. The next day, I met up with some of my friends at the park to play basketball. After a few games being played, Justin, a white boy around the same age as me, needed to use the bathroom and decided to go to the VFW across the street. I said to him, “You can’t use the bathrooms in there, they’re only for customers.” Justin responded, “I used their bathrooms before, they never said anything to me.” So he walked across the street and then came back to the basketball court about ten minutes later with a can of ice, cold soda in his hand. “See, I told you. They’re nice people,” Justin said to me. Right there, I felt odd about the situation, which happened to me the past day, and wondered why I wasn’t allowed to use the bathroom.
I had only been in that VFW once to use the bathroom after that day, and I only went in there after Justin had asked if his friend could come in and use the bathroom as well. I walked into the men’s room with him and walked up to a urinal. There seemed to be a bulls-eye target hanging in the urinal, but then as I got closer, I realized it was a bulls-eye with a picture of a Vietnamese woman on there named “Jane Hanoi.” I felt so offended even though I was not Vietnamese, but just because I realized the real reason why I was turned away to use the bathroom the first time. The hanging bulls-eye in the urinal upset me so much because I was Asian and it made me feel the veterans of that VFW thought that they had the right to urinate on Asians. As I walked out, I noticed more “Jane Hanoi” paraphernalia. I saw posters, dart boards, slogans and etc. hanging in the bar. To this day, I refuse to go into that VFW. Elections are held in that VFW and I am now of legal age to vote, however I choose not to because of my past experience in there.
As I went through high school, I dressed and acted more like the way white people had acted. Soon, my appearance seemed to be more and more accepted by strangers or classmates. I have learned it was only because many have believed I was half white that some have associated with me. I did not care as long as I was not being harassed or pushed around. I wanted so much to look like a white person that I dyed my hair on a regular basis, wore colored contacts, spoke differently, and soon, even my Chinese relatives thought I was half white even though they have known me for my whole life. I would dye my hair blonde or brown and wear blue or hazel contacts. Chinese people would speak Chinese in front of me as if I did not understand the language. It is not only after I respond to their remarks in Chinese do they know I am one hundred percent Chinese.
I started to do less of my schoolwork and studying to hang out with my new acquaintances. I realized they were not as intelligent as me when it comes to schoolwork so I started to do less so I can be more like them. I defied my parents’ orders to do better in school and instead, slacked off most of my high school years. My father would always say, “American dream is only to people who work hard in school.” I was happy though as long as I didn’t hear any racist remarks or get the harassment I used to get.
Now I realize that I should have been accepted for who I was and just be myself. I see many students at college now who are higher scholars than me, but deep down, I know I could’ve been just as successful as they are now only if I did not trade studies away for my acceptance by my fellow white friends. So I am trying to make up for lost time in a sense and working harder than the people above me to make their achievements and be all that I could be.
It was not an easy task to grow up in America as a Chinese-American boy. The looks and remarks I’d get from strangers walking down a white-dominated street or just people passing by gets to you when you see it almost everyday. Young boys were not the only ones being racist, even adults would utter a few remarks at times. The harassment made me feel so inferior and worthless at times. But the people are becoming less and less racist as new generations are born. People are starting to see we are a diverse country and see that just because we all don’t look alike, it doesn’t mean we all aren’t equal.