Shanghai Girls

“As sisters, May and I share a particular kind of intimacy. May is the one person who’ll stand by me no matter what. I never wonder if we’re good friends or not. We just are.”

This is an early quote expressing Pearl’s special relationship with her sister. She is quick to make the distinction between liking someone and being a blood relative. Future statements express a hatred for May’s selfishness. In the statement above, Pearl places an existential value on their relationship. They simply “are” to each other.

“In Shanghai, life flows like an endlessly serene river for the wealthy, the lucky, the fortunate. For those with bad fates, the smell of desperation is as strong as a rotting corpse.”

The other Shanghai elites have become aware of the downturn in the Chin family’s fortunes. The reference to “bad fates” is an indication that one can’t do anything to help oneself under such circumstances. Pearl frequently refers to the action of fate and destiny in her life and her inability to resist it. This may simply be a rationalization for her fear of trying.

“People say you need to be strong, smart, and lucky to survive hard times, war, a natural disaster, or physical torture. But I say emotional abuse—anxiety, fear, guilt, and degradation—is far worse and much harder to survive.”

This is Pearl’s assessment of the relative pain of outer conditions as opposed to inner conflict. She has experienced both. While her ordeal during the flight from Shanghai is fraught with trauma, her failure to let go of those events keeps her trapped for a lifetime. She abuses herself emotionally on a daily basis.

“We don’t grasp that the trail of refugees crossing the Garden Bridge with us extends for ten miles into the countryside. There is so much we don’t know. We view the world very much as peasants in the countryside have for millennia. They’ve always said the mountains are high and the emperor is far away.”

In hindsight, Pearl describes the flight out of Shanghai as the Japanese approach. She regrets not paying attention to events surrounding her at the time. For the Chin sisters, life is one endless party because the Japanese invasion of Manchuria is far away. Once Pearl gets to America, she remains in a permanent state of hypervigilance lest another such catastrophe should catch her unawares.

“I despair over what’s happening to us. I want to be rescued. If not that, then I want to go back to bed, lie under the covers, and sob until I have no tears left. But I’m May’s older sister. I have to be braver than my emotions.”

Pearl makes this statement after her failed attempt to get steamship tickets out of Shanghai. Far worse is yet to come. Ironically, she assumes the role of brave older sister when it is May who often shows more grit in a crisis. Pearl is still relying on outer designations of rank (older sister, younger sister) to tell her who she is. Inner character is a better means of determining resiliency and resourcefulness.

“My mother always said, ‘Keep something for yourself,’ Mama explains. ‘I knew I might have to use these things one day. Now that day is here.’”

Mrs. Chin has hidden her dowry bag so that she can hold onto money independently of her husband. She received this advice from her own mother. Such a practice is a good indication of the survival skills than Chinese wives needed to develop. In a world where women are dependent on a potentially weak spouse, this is a failsafe. It’s also an indicator that despite her socialite ways and bound feet, Mrs. Chin is tougher than she looks.

“We don’t know what it means to get by on almost nothing. We don’t know what it takes to survive day to day. But the family that lives here and the woman who took us in last night do. When you don’t have much, having less isn’t so bad.”

Pearl makes this statement after observing the humble lifestyle of the peasants who shelter her family for one night. Leaving Shanghai and its wealthy lifestyle brings her into contact with the realities of the world. This seems to be a humbling experience and one from which she learns that it’s possible to live on next to nothing.

“Mama’s voice comes floating to me, reciting one of her favorite sayings, ‘There is no catastrophe except death; one cannot be poorer than a beggar.’ I want—need—to do something braver and finer than dying.”

Pearl is recovering in the hospital after her sexual assault. The trauma of the experience leaves her in a state of despair, and she thinks about suicide. Despite her bold words, Pearl does little that might be considered “brave” and “fine” in the years to come. Quite possibly, the sequel to the novel shows her fulfilling a higher destiny, but this isn’t apparent in her behavior in Shanghai Girls, no matter what she says to the contrary.

“How is it that these illiterate peasants know more about these things and are clearer about what has to be done to get into this country than we are? Because they’re the targeted class, while May and I shouldn’t be here. I sigh.”

Pearl has just received some useful information while being detained on Angel Island. As in the earlier quote about the peasant family, Pearl’s sense of high social status receives a rebuke here too. Simple peasant women know more about how to game the immigration system than a college-educated girl like Pearl does. Survival skills are an entirely different matter than book learning.

“You can be freed from one thing, but that only puts you in a tight spot somewhere else. Understand?”

Yen-yen is having a conversation with Pearl and May shortly after their arrival. Her words are unintentionally prophetic. The sisters have just escaped war in Shanghai and the interrogators on Angel Island. However, they are now trapped in arranged marriages in a strange country that is hostile to Chinese immigrants. While May finds a way to beat the system, Pearl’s fears keep her pinned in a tight spot for the next 20 years.

“China City isn’t like Shanghai. It isn’t like the Old Chinese City either. It isn’t even like a Chinese village. It looks a lot like the China May and I used to see in movies brought to Shanghai from Hollywood.”

This quote is an early indication of the cultural identity mash-up that will plague Pearl for years to come. She can easily see that Americans have no real notion of what China is like. Instead, Hollywood creates a stage set in China City for the benefit of American tourists. Over time, she will start to incorporate American behavior into her own life through a process of reverse osmosis.

“‘You’re like a bird that’s been freed from a cage,’ May says, ‘but doesn’t remember how to fly. You’re my sister, but I don’t know where you’ve gone in your mind. You’re so far away from me now.’”

Pearl has just accused May of going her own way in life. However, May rightly points out that America offers multiple opportunities, but Pearl is too frightened to take advantage of them. May is moving forward in her life while Pearl remains stuck in a traumatic past. She can escape Chinatown if she wishes, but she is too fearful to try.

“She’s grabbed on to old traditions—outdated traditions—in the same way I latch on to them now: as a means of soul survival, as a way to hang on to ghost memories.”

Pearl is talking about Yen-yen’s various folk remedies and superstitions. Rather than dismissing these old-fashioned notions, Pearl can appreciate their value as a psychological prop. At the same time, Pearl is unconsciously admitting her own tendency to cling to the past. She believes she will lose her soul if she doesn’t cling, yet nothing could be further from the truth.

“We’ll always fight, but we’ll always make up as well. That’s what sisters do: we argue, we point out each other’s frailties, mistakes, and bad judgment, we flash the insecurities we’ve had since childhood, and then we come back together. Until the next time.”

Pearl and May have just had another one of their volatile spats. While Pearl seems to take the hard feelings as a matter of course, she never expects to resolve the issues the sisters raise during each confrontation. In other words, they never resolve anything. The same grievances will remain with them throughout life.

“What the photo doesn’t show is my father-in-law, standing a few feet away, looking devastated and scared. My feelings about him have changed the past few years. He has almost nothing here in Los Angeles: he’s a third-class citizen, he faces the same discrimination we all do, and he will never break out of Chinatown.”

When Pearl first arrived in America, she was intimidated by her father-in-law. He seemed a wealthy and powerful figure to be reckoned with. When she has a chance to observe for herself, she recognizes that all Chinese immigrants are trapped. Old Man Louie may not have been forced into an arranged marriage, but he will never achieve his ambition of becoming a “big man” in America. He is just as restricted as the family he rules.

“When I first passed through the miniature Great Wall, I felt no connection to this place. Now it feels like home: familiar, comfortable, and much loved.”

Over the years, Pearl’s reaction to China City changes. Initially, she is dismissive of its inauthenticity. Decades later, it has become as familiar to her as her childhood home in Shanghai. Perhaps, she is also acknowledging the degree to which she has changed. America has influenced her tastes and her choices in raising her daughter. She has become inauthentic herself by now and is no longer simply Chinese. She is Chinese American.

“We’re told that men are strong and brave, but I think women know how to endure, accept defeat, and bear physical and mental agony much better than men.”

Pearl is pondering the behavior of the males in the family after Yen-yen’s death. This constitutes an awakening since she has always been conditioned to believe in female weakness and male strength. Life experience teaches her the opposite lesson, which runs contrary to everything she learned in China. Her comment shows a distinctly American perspective on gender relations.

“‘He never hurt anyone and has only been kind to us, and yet there was no way to change his destiny.’ He says these words about Vern, but he could be speaking about any of us. These twin tragedies bind us together as a family in ways none of us could have imagined.”

Sam is speaking about Vern’s health diagnosis. He receives this news right after his son is stillborn. Same chooses to interpret Vern’s misfortune as destiny. Bad fate has once again brought tragedy. Pearl seems to agree with the assumption that there is no way to escape what fate has decreed. Such a belief limits the possibility of constructive change of any kind.

“I tell myself that fate is inevitable and that the only provable fate is death, but I wonder why fate always has to be tragic.”

As in the preceding quote, Pearl focuses on the actions of fate in determining a person’s life. Her wry observation about the tragic nature of fate does beg the question of why this is so. Perhaps the answer is that people prefer to blame fate for catastrophes rather than examine the behavior that led up to them. Blaming fate absolves one of responsibility for taking meaningful action.

“When you lose your home country, what do you preserve and what do you abandon? We’ve saved only those things that are possible to save: Chinese food, Chinese language, and sneaking what money we can back to the Louie relatives in the home village. But what about an arranged marriage for my girl?”

Pearl’s comment once more raises the issue of a cultural identity crisis. If life in China was ideal, why would anyone want to leave? The implicit assumption is that life in America is better. However, immigrants come to America with the intention of clinging to the past instead of building a better future. Pearl isn’t ready to relinquish her exclusively Chinese identity quite yet.

“How could we leave May to care for her husband, run the Golden Prop and Extras Company and the curio shop, and manage the house? But it goes even past loyalty to the family and promises made. We continue to be deeply afraid.”

The FBI is investigating Sam and Pearl, and Pearl briefly considers fleeing. While it is true that doing so would place a heavy burden on May’s shoulders, Pearl is honest enough to admit the real reason. She and Sam have both lived their lives in fear of being discovered. They have frozen themselves in place when taking action might have provided a better alternative than they face now.

“Is she thinking about Shanghai and how in a sense we’ve been trapped in our final days there ever since we left, forever destined to relive the loss of our parents, our home, Z.G., and carry the consequences of my rape and May’s pregnancy?”

Pearl once again keys on entrapment in this quote. May isn’t trapped to the same extent that Pearl is. The latter has chosen to remain suspended in time, trying to reconstruct a lost past. Her sister has moved forward and taken the opportunities that come her way. By making this statement, Pearl finally admits that the trap was of her own making.

“In these moments, I regret the years of homesickness and loneliness I’ve felt for Shanghai: the way I turned it into so many golden-hued remembrances of people, places, and food that, as Betsy has written me so many times, no longer exist and will never again exist. I berate myself.”

This comment can be paired with the preceding one to better understand Pearl’s evolving thought process. She is consciously beginning to understand the role that her thinking has played in constructing the trap she built for herself. She was unwilling to let go of the past and finally admits it’s time to do so.