• Blogger atlasien turns the mixed-race story upside down a few times: Joy Luck Hub Submission

He used to sing me to sleep with "God save the queen, iza fascist
regime," which he intoned in a bizarre but somewhat credible imitation
of a cockney accent.

• Michelle Phan on discovering her immigrant story for school: Grandmother's Story

When
I was in Jr. High, my social studies class was assigned a project, a
family timeline. I thought it was going to be easy, just from Laos to
America. But as I sat there pondering what events to include, I was
stumped; I didn’t know how my family got to America.

• Artist Jennifer Wofford on the complicated lines of migration: we be joy luck clubbin'

My mom, tito and tita spent their preteen and teen years on Guam,
attending a tiny missionary school there. It’s a little unclear
financially how, but somehow Lolo sent all 3 kids off to college in the
U.S. My mom and aunt were probably the only 2 Filipinas/Asians in
Walla Walla, Washington in the late 50’s: they quickly bonded with 2
Japanese-American sisters there as well.

• ennie18 on a sibling's romance: Brother's Story

My brother and his fiancé met in middle school and dated in high
school. After high school, they even went to college together. While
talking about their refugee camp experience, they found out they were
in the same refugee camp once.

• Blogger Ernie of little. yellow. different. blog on seeing the movie with his family: The Joy Luck Club

... sometimes I wonder if my parents were somehow fortold what would happen
— that their daughter would succumb to mental illness and their son
would become an overweight homosexual with a penchant for putting his
private life to share with the Internet — if they would perservere and
stay in the United States, or if they would turn around and go right
back to where they came from.

• Hana of Hana Logic blog on her first American crush: Joy Luck Hub Submission: A tiny anecdote circa 1998

I have never been in a class with boys before, having
been raised in a convent school in the Philippines since I was six. But
there he was, already tall for his age with fair skin and blonde hair.
The Hollywood ideal that I saw in American T.V. shows in Manila when I
was allowed to watch.

• Jane Voodikon on the confusions of family storytelling: forty years

I vividly recall in my mother’s version of the story, she escaped to Hong Kong. The verb was always the key part. My father, in his secondhand version of the same story, said that she smuggled out to Hong Kong, on the bottom of a boat. I
thought she got to the U.S. by plane. My sister, then an attorney fresh
out of law school, in her write-up of the account said she sailed.

• Kimberley of A Companion Piece blog on how alternative families are nothing new: queer luck club

My great-uncle was not a blood relative. His sister and my great-aunt
were life partners, in love with one another since their teens. My
great-aunt married her lover’s brother, who was then in the U.S.  The
two women joined my great-uncle in Stockton, and the three were a
family for more than half a century.

• Hyphen blogger Catherine Traywick in her Femmalia blog with more complicated back-and-forthing : My Mother's Migration Story

When I was born, my father decided that I should grow up in the
Philippines where I would be safe from the evils of Western society,
and so we moved back to Mom’s home town where she proudly paraded me as
the only half-white baby around for miles and miles.

• Lilledeshan Bose on incremental migration: Joy Luck Clubish? An Immigrant Story

I made the decision to move to the United States in increments. At
first I was going to stay a month, then three, then I found myself the
lead singer of a rock n roll band and decided to stay. Now I’ve been in
the country six years; the band doesn’t exist anymore but I’ve lived in
five cities (in two states) since opting to stay in Orange County.

• Artist Johanna Poethig (in Jenifer Wofford's blog) on growing up an American Asian: Joy Luck Club: Johanna Poethig

My first profanity was “putang ina mo”. My best friend in 3rd grade
got mad at me after she learned the Americans killed Aguinaldo. ... In 5th grade I finally
got to be in a school performance. The Ifugao ceremony where we all
moved together around a fire did not require pairing me off with a boy
half my size.

• Mo on the details the grand immigrant story gets wrong: the joy luck hub (and this comment seems to have disappeared from the call for subs post. Dunno how that happened.)

My parents ran away from Cambodia not because they didn’t
want to fight, but because my mom was pregnant with me (and pregnancy isn’t
convenient during war.) ... When I was 12, I was
called ‘chink’ for the first time.  It
bothered me more that someone had taught this other child a racial slur, than
the fact that he was calling me a name.  It didn’t occur to me that it should have felt
odd for me to be desensitized to the word.

• Melinda of Women's Work blog on transracial adoption and immigration: One Foot In, One Foot Out (In Honor of the 20th Anniversary of The Joy Luck Club)

Still, I am an unlikely first-generation immigrant of sorts. I’m a Korean adoptee of unknown origins...found, fostered and foisted onto
American soil, into the waiting arms of a caring, typically-Caucasian
middle-class family. That makes me a product of
a typically-Caucasian middle-class suburban upbringing, except –
somehow – I don’t feel typical at all.

• Angela at mommybytes blog on grad school immigration: Asian American Immigration - My Parents' Story

They found advertisements in science journals for the University of
North Dakota which offered full scholarships. They applied to the
Chemistry department and were accepted, but had no money for air
travel.  Linda's father decided to give money to John for airfare in
1962. After a year, Linda was given the airfare to go. They often
said that they picked North Dakota because they wanted to live
someplace cold because Taiwan was so hot.

• kim of c'est la vie blog on loss of language: one lucky day

honestly, i didn’t consciously try
to forget my first language. it just happened … through
overcompensation, or something. over the years i’ve been trying to
improve, but something else prevented me from succeeding: a lack of
self-confidence. a fear of sounding stupid, making mistakes and
consequently, a fool of myself. after overcoming so many barriers, i
can’t believe this is the one i still can’t defeat.

• Bernie at Prouder Never Always blog on representing his entire race: Eye-closing Experience

Right there and then, upon my shoulders was placed the entire reputation of the Chinese people.

• And last (and very definitely least) my own entry on the tangled trajectories of the overseas Chinese: Traditional Immigrant Story

Great-great-grandfather went to San Francisco to pluck duck feathers and carve candles. Great-grandfather didn't join him in the States. Why? It's possible that, returning to Zhong Shan, Great-great blew all the money he had saved on gifts and banquets and couldn't afford to bring his only son over.