Project Planning #3, Week 13, The Joy Luck Club

For our third and final project, I will be using the free choice book, The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tran. I really enjoyed this book and the contents. Below are the three choices that I will use to select my topic for my project.

Choice One - Think about a theme you see running through your life. Choose a reading that you think also discusses this theme. Explore connections between how the theme plays out in your life, and how the theme gets played out in the reading.

Theme - Life is not always what it seems

In the book, The Joy Luck Club, there are four mothers born and raised in China, and later immigrated to San Francisco with their husbands and had daughters. The book has stories from the mothers and daughters grew up and then talks about their relationships once the daughters became adults. The daughters views of what their mothers wanted for and from them are different than what the mothers want for their daughters and at the end of the book the daughters finally see what their mothers have been trying to show and tell them for all of their lives.

Choice Two – Choose a reading selection. Explore the relationship between elements of the selection.

How does setting influence character development – China vs San Francisco, California, US.

The four mothers were born and grew up in China, their daughters were born and grew up in San Francisco. The mothers wanted a different life for their children, but still tried to instill their cultural values in them. The mothers realized that although they wanted a better life for their children in America, it was very different then what they expected.

Choice Three – What does this work reflect about its historical, social, political and/or economic context? You may focus in race, class, power, cultural values and beliefs, historical events, etc)

Focus – Cultural values and beliefs -  The cultural values and belief were very different for the mothers and daughters in the book, The Joy Luck Club. Lindo Jong was raised to keep her families promise to marry the man she was promised to by the town matchmaker, she could not dishonor her family. Waverly Jong was her daughter, she did not think her mother would approve of her new boyfriend, she felt like she needed to trick her mom into inviting him over for dinner, after she felt defeated because the dinner did not go well. She later came to realize that her mother loved her no matter what and tired to find a balance and build a stronger, trusting relationship with her mother.

Reading Notes B, Week 13, The Joy Luck Club

The Voice from the Wall: Lena St. Clair daughter of Ying-ying St. Clair

Because, even as a young child, I could sense the unspoken terrors that surrounded out house, the ones that chased my mother until she hid in a secret dark corner of her mind. And still they found her. I watched, over the years, as they devoured her, piece by piece, until she disappeared and became a ghost. (103)

Lena was a very aware of her surroundings as a young child, because her mother, Ying-ying would tell her dark stories, such has how her grandfather sentenced a beggar to die and then he came back and killed her great grandfather a week later, there was a bad man who lived in the basement of their home. Lena started to see the bad around her and did not tell anyone. Ying-ying did not speak good English and her husband who was not Chinese, would try to say what she was thinking and speak for her. Ying-ying arrived in SF through Angel Island Immigration Station, which she stayed there for 3weeks, she was claimed as a Displaced Person, since they did not have rules for a Chinese wide of a Caucasian citizen. When Ying-ying and Lena were alone her mother would speak Chinese, and say that everything was danegerous. Lena’s father was promoted and they moved to a better area, up a hill in North Beach. Ying-ying was still not happy, did not feel like her home was balanced and started to move many things around in the apartment, food, furniture.

“When something goes against your nature, you are not in balance. This house was built too steep, and a bad wind from the top blows all your strength back down the hill. So you can never get ahead. You are always rolling backwards.” (109)

Ying-ying was pregnant and was nesting, but she did not take care of herself, she would bump into things and did not seem happy about being pregnant.

Lena’s bed was moved once the baby’s crib was in the room and she could hear a woman shouting at girl, she would hear yelling, pushing and hitting sounds, this would happen all of the time. Lena seen the girl in the stairs of the apartment but she would not look at Lena.

One day she was picked up from school from a family friend, who took her to the hospital, her mother lost the baby and was blaming herself. After this her mother was lost and slowly fell apart, piece by piece.

One night the neighbor girl who Lena could hear through the window came to her door, she came into the house and then started to go through Lena’s window back up to her room. Even though, her mother beat her, and treated her badly, she went back home and said her mom would be happy she returned. Later that night she heard, “you stupida girl. You almost gave me a heart attack……. Then I heard them laughing and crying, shouting with love.” (115)

Reading Notes A, Week 13, The Joy Luck Club

Rules of the Game: Waverly Jong daughter of Lindo Jong

I was six when my mother taught me the art of invisible strength. It was a strategy for winning arguments, respect for others, and eventually, though neither of us knew it at the time, chess games.(89)

At home, she said, “Wise guy, he not go again wind. In Chinese we say, Come from South, blow with wind-poom!- North will follow. Strongest wind cannot be seen.” (89)

“Some boy in my class said Chinese people do Chinese torture.” “Chinese people do many tings, she said simply. “Chinese people do business, do medicine, do painting. Not lazy like American people. We do torture. Best torture.” (91)

During an annual Christmas party help at the First Chinese Baptist Church near their home, her older brother, Vincent was given a chess set, Waverly got a 12 pack of Life Savers. Her older brothers played chess and she watched them and begged them to let her play, she used her Life Savers as replacements for the missing pieces they allowed her to play. Waverly studied and learned the rules for the game.

I loved the secrets I found within the sixty-four black and white squares. I carefully drew a handmade chessboard and pinned it to the wall next to my bed, where at night I would stare for hours at imaginary battles. Soon I no longer lost any games or Life Savers, but I lost my adversaries. (95)

Waverly found a man at the park to play, Lau Po, she played, learned a lot from him, and became an even better chest player.

Waverly started playing in local tournaments, and won trophy’s .

By my ninth birthday, I was a national chess champion. I was still some 429 points away from grand-master status, but I was touted as the Great American Hope, child prodigy and a girl to boot. (97)

Lindo was very proud of her daughter, Waverly, and bragged about her often to people, and she did not like that. One day she told her mom that she wished she did not do that, her and her mother argued and Waverly ran off, she was in the alley by her house. When she went home she though she would be in a lot of trouble, her parents did not yell at her, which made her unsure of the situation. She went to her room and thought about her mom and chess.