Part 1 of Essay
"Hey, Sabrina, are you Japanese or Chinese?" I asked. Her reply, as it seems to be for a lot of minority groups, is, "Neither, I'm Chinese-American." So, besides her American accent and a hyphenated ending on her answer to the SAT questionnaire about her ethnic background, what's the difference? In Amy Tan's enjoyable nove ....

Part 2 of Essay
.... Really, this was their only joy. The mothers grew up during perilous times in China. They all were taught "to desire nothing, to swallow other people's misery, to eat [their] own bitterness." (p. 241) Though not many of them grew up terribly poor, they all had a certain respect for their elders, and for life itself. These Chinese mothers were all taught to be honorable, to the point of sacrificing their own lives to keep any family members' promise. Instead of their daughters, who "can promise to come to dinner, ....