American Panda

Content Warning: This section discusses anti-Asian racism and cultural stereotypes, familial pressure and conflict, and identity struggles, including references to body shaming.

Because Mei is a second-generation Taiwanese American, she faces the challenge of reconciling both parts of her cultural identity. Her Taiwanese side is fraught with norms and traditions that seem outdated and restrictive to her when juxtaposed with the American culture she has grown up in. Mei’s childhood is filled with memories of being an outcast who looked and spoke differently than her peers. She was often bullied for the way she dressed, what she ate, the rituals her family practiced, and her lack of knowledge of American pop culture: “I was six years old again, wearing traditional Chinese garb […] trying to hold my shaky chin in the air as I was laughed out of the school picture line. Forever the outcast, even at this school of nerdy outcasts” (23). She sometimes resents her parents for forcing their traditions on her, making her even more of an outcast.

Furthermore, Mei knows that the geopolitical tensions between Taiwan and China are often carried over into America by immigrants and their descendants. However, she only confronts these tensions directly at MIT because college exposes her to a set of new, and often uncomfortable, experiences.