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The old woman remembered a swan she had bought...many years ago in
Shanghai
for a foolish sum.
"This bird," boasted the market vendor..."was once a duck that
stretched its neck...in hopes of becoming a goose.
And now look.
It is too beautiful to eat."
Then the woman and the swan sailed across an ocean...many thousands
of li wide...stretching their necks toward America.
On her journey she cooed to the swan...
"In America I will have a daughter just like me.
But over there, nobody will say her worth is measured...by the
loudness
of her husband's belch.
Over there, nobody will look down on her...because I will make her
speak
only perfect American English.
And over there, she will always be too full to swallow any sorrow.
She will know my meaning because I will give her this swan...a
creature that became more than what was hoped for."
But when she arrived in the new country...the immigration officials
pulled the swan away from her...leaving the woman fluttering her
arms...
and with only one swan feather for a memory.
For a long time now, the woman had wanted...to give her daughter
the single swan feather...and tell her, "This feather may look
worthless...but it comes from afar and carries with it...all my good
intentions."
- Hi!
- Oh, Jennifer! Oh, hi!
- Hi, June.
- Hi.
Yeah, I want-- That's it.
How are you, June?...the official line of scrimmage. No gain.
- Come on, do or die.
Right here. Come on, do or die!
- Come on!
- All right, all right, they're lining up for a pass!
- A pass, man!
- It's a pass! Here we go, baby!
- Fourth and seven.
- Here we go. Come on!
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- Oakland.
All right, all right, here we go! Here we go!
- Yes. Yes. Yes!
- Yeah!
Yes! I told you, man!
I told you!
Yeah, you owe me five bucks!
Every morning,
"Wave, Wave, Waverly-a!"
I do not sound like--She's saying I sound like my-I do not sound like my mother.
How could I be like my mother?
- And you started-- She said that too.
- She is right, you know.
This kind of vegetable...
- What?
- Don't put Chinese cabbage in the salad.
- has to be, has to be boiled.
- I always use Chinese cabbage-- It's bitter.
- Mmm, Dad, that smells good.
- Thanks.
- No! No!
- It will fall apart!
- Someone help me now.
- I can't believe they're still arguing.
- Come on, picture time!
- Picture time! Picture time!
All right, picture time now.
- Waverly, Waverly loves it!
- Aunt Rose! Rose!
- Rose! Rose! Rose!
- Come on, come on, come on.
- Picture, picture.
- We're ready.
- Come on.
- Oh! June.
-June. Come here.
- Come on, June!
- Get over here!
- Get over here!
-Get over here!
-Come on!
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For
years, these women feasted...forgot past wrongs, laughed and
played...lost and won and told the best stories.
Each week they hoped to be lucky...and that hope was their only joy.
Their connection with each other had more to do with hope...
than joy or luck.
- You win like your mother?
- Uh, I only played once...
- with some Jewish friends in college.
- Hmph! Jewish mah-jong.
Not the same thing.
Entirely different.
Now, Chinese mah-jong very tricky.
You have to watch what everybody throw out...and you keep all this
in your head.
And if nobody play well...then the game is just like Jewish mah-jong:
no strategy.
You American girls play Chinese, Jewish.
What's the difference?
Oh.
They were worried.
In me, they see their own daughters.
Just as ignorant of all the hopes and dreams...our mothers brought
to this country.
Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
No talking in Chinese.
- Huh?
- How do I know you're not cheating?
- We would not cheat.
- You don't know, but not we.
- Ah.
You don't know, but we are your auntie, and we are very honest
people.
- We will not cheat you.
- Maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe.
Hey, June, why you not take the piano home?
You only one who play.
When I was nine years old...my mother's version of believing in me...
was believing that I could be anything...anything she wanted; the
best piano prodigy this side of China.
I never practiced.
Lucky for me, old Mr. Chong couldn't tell the difference.
He'd gone stone-deaf over the years.
Me and Beethoven, we both hear it in our head!
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Okey-dokey.
Now, how many sharps...how many flats?
- What key are we in?
- Z major.
- What? Good.
- Z major!
Now, for the recital...more feeling...more gusto!
I'm a girl and by me that's only great
I am proud that my silhouette is curvy
When I was young, Auntie Lindo...was my mother's best friend and
archenemy.
Their weapons of choice were comparing their children.
Mom was sick of hearing Auntie Lindo brag...about her daughter
Waverly, who was Chinatown's chess champion.
That night Mom figured I'd redeem her...
- with my international piano debut.
- I ask my daughter...
"Help me carry grocery."
She think this too much ask.
All day long she play chess.
I dust off all her trophy.
Appreciate me? No.
You lucky you don't have the same problem.
My problem worser than yours.
If I tell June time to wash dish...she hear nothing but music.
It's like you can't stop this natural talent.
Being a girl
Until that night, I didn't believe I was a prodigy.
Twerp.
In fact, I used to go out of my way to prove my mother wrong...
that I wasn't cut out to be the best anything...
I could only be me.
It was incredible. It was like my hands were possessed by Mozart.
And everybody could see this, could hear this.
I was a genius.
I had been discovered.
And then I heard it.
Maybe they didn't notice.
Bravo! Bravo!
Encore! Well done!
Here we come
Walkin' down the street
- After the talent show fiasco...
- Get the funniest looks from
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You must come to China and meet them...and tell them all about their
mother.
What could I tell them?
I didn't know anything about her. She was-- She was my mother.
- What do you mean?
Tell them how smart she was...
- Your mother is your voice.
- how kind she was.
- Everyone love her.
- How sincere, how hard-working she was.
- And the excellent dishes she cooked.
- Even better than mine.
And how beautiful she sang.
Don't you remember?
How can a daughter not know her own mother?
You're right.
I will tell them.
I-I should.
I want to.
June? June.
What you thinking?
Oh, those babies, of course. The twins.
I can't believe I'm actually going to meet them.
How sad they must have been when you told them Mom died.
That must have been the hardest letter for you to write.
Oh, peanut bowl empty.
Oh! Oh, I'll get us some.
All this time never telling her the truth.
- Must tell her today.
- How can you not tell her?
How can I tell her what the letter really say?
Then she never go to China, never go to see her sister.
Am I right?
Yes, of course.
Lindo, I still think it's wrong.
It's so sad for those babies.
How could Suyuan give them up?
To lose a mother so young...to wonder why.
Even to this day I wonder...how my own mother could give me up.
That day...when I was only four years old...
I came upon a meeting...that would change my life forever.
Come here quick.
Come here.
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What's wrong?
Tell me quick!
It's so scary.
It's too terrible to say.
I had a bad dream.
Our ancestors came to me!
So angry!
They told me if Tyan-yu stays...in this marriage...he will die.
What's this bullshit?
What a stupid girl to have bad dreams!
The ancestors said...if the matter is not settled immediately...
they will begin...the cycle of destruction!
There are three signs, he said.
First, he has drawn a spot on Tyan-yu's back.
And this spot will eat away Tyan-yu's flesh.
Just as it ate away our ancestor's face.
The same mole I had seen
during all those nights...of sleeping just like brother and sister.
Next, our ancestor touched my mouth.
Our ancestor said...if I don't leave this marriage...all my teeth
will fall out.
But how could I leave this family I love so much?
I live and die for this family.
The open spot in my mouth...where a rotted tooth fell out four years
ago.
Our ancestor also said this girl here...is Tyan-yu's true spiritual
wife...already growing his son!
It's true!
To prove it our ancestor planted the seed in her womb.
Already ripe in one day.
Ah Ping!
Come over here!
Come over here!
If you don't believe me, ask the matchmaker.
I told them the matchmaker had made the wrong match...on purpose,
just for money.
Matchmaker, how could you?
How could you?
Well...mistakes happen in Heaven.
The hell with this!
Get out!
All of you!
Huang Tai Tai got her grandson.
The servant girl got her marriage.
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- Thank you.
- You not see Life magazine?
- No.
I told my daughter, "Use your horses to run over the enemy."
- One fine day
- She won very quickly this way.
- Oh, good.
- You'll look at me
- Bye-bye.
- Bye-bye.
- Say bye-bye.
- And you will know
- Our love was meant to be
- Bye.
- Bye.
- One fine day
- Hi.
- You're gonna want me for your girl
- Ah, Mrs. Chew!
Oh, you know my daughter, Waverly Jong, chess champion?
- The arms I long for will open wide
- Smart girl! Bye.
- Thank you. Bye-bye.
- And you'll be proud to have me
I wish you wouldn't do that, telling everyone I'm your daughter.
- What you mean? You so ashamed to be with your mother?
- One fine day
- You're gonna want me for your girl
- It's not that.
It's just that it's so...
- embarrassing, that's all.
- What? Embarrassed you be my daughter?
- I'll keep waiting and some day, darling
- That's not what I said.
- Then what you say? Look at me!
- You'll come to me
- When you want to settle down
- Look at me!
- Oh, one fine day
- Why do you have to use me to show off?
- We'll meet once more
- If you want to show off...
- And then you'll want the love
- then why don't you learn to play chess?
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Dog fart!
Ah, Lin Xiao-Lin Xiao.
After that, everything like this dream.
Our wedding...our son.
Honored guests!
Thank you for coming.
I have persuaded the famous diva, Miss Bai Yen...
- to sing in honor of my son.
- There he was...with his opera singer.
This was not his first conquest...only the first I permitted
myself to recognize.
By then I knew what kind of man I had married: happiest when he was
cruel.
Let me have him.
He became forgetful.
Don't touch it!
So forgetful he had not returned by the next morning.
Or the next evening.
Who's this?
This person is a whore.
Just like you.
My son!
My son!
Listen to that voice!
Strong...like his father!
Look at you!
Disgusting!
You make me sick!
Clean up this mess!
You hear me?
My whole life turned in this moment.
If I had left him or killed him...
I would not have lost the one thing that mattered.
My mind kept repeating a single thought.
He had taken from me my innocence...my youth, my heart,
everything.
So I took from him the only thing I could.
My baby was so light in my arms...because his little spirit
had flown away.
And with his, my spirit had also gone.
Years later, I moved to America.
But what I had done in China was always with me.
In time, I remarried...and I had a daughter.
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Well.
- Oh.
- I love you said that.
I didn't say it to impress you.
That's why it did.
His dad owned a publishing empire.
His mom's family had wineries.
I'd never been around people like this.
- Dad. Mom.
- Hi.
This is Rose Hsu,
my girlfriend.
The one word sent me into total shock...- from which, I'm afraid,
I've never quite recovered.
- How do you do?
- Hello. Hi.
- Hello.
Is this a private reverie or can an old lady join you?
Sure.
You and Ted haven't known each other long, have you?
- Actually, no.
- I've never heard him speak of you until this morning.
But it's always a thrill for a mother to hear that sort of
excitement...
Please.
- Yeah.
Oh, no.
- Oh, god.
- Thank you.
Well, take all of this love with you to China tonight.
- Oh.
- Speech, speech.
- Oh, no, no, no, no.
- Yeah, speech, speech.
- I'm not a speaker.
- Louder, louder.
- Louder, louder.
- Stop it.
- Hurry up.
Yeah.
Well, she spilled on my hair.
Not on me.
I've known all of you for so long-Rose, Lena, Waverly--since we were babies and kids fighting over
dolls.
It's amazing, isn't it?
Auntie Lindo,
Auntie Ying Ying...
Auntie An Mei...long-time friends of my mother...you are like
second mothers to me...in so many ways.
Truly.
I mean, you gave her back to me by finding my sisters.
You've given me something
I can still do for her.
Here, I thought it was too late.
Well, it isn't.
All right. Well, good night, TC.
Good night, Daisy.
- Thank you. Bye-bye.
- Uh-huh, okay. Good-bye.
Auntie Lindo?
I have something
I must tell you.
One little thing I forget tell you.
You know I write letter to your sisters...telling them how happy
you are to find them...how happy you are you go to China to see
them-Yes, Auntie Lindo, you've already told me this.
And then I signed it...from your mother.
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Mine too.
Oh, I love you, Daddy.
I will tell them this feather may look worthless...but it comes from
afar...and carries with it all my good intentions.
Hey, hey, hey, hey!
Hey._
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Mama's gone to heaven.
- Gone? Mama's dead?
- I'm sorry.
When?
Four months ago.
I'm so sorry.
She loved you very much.
I'm your sister. June.
Our little sister.
I've come to take our mother's place.
I've come to bring you her hopes.
Our sister.
Our family.
It was enough...for them and for me.
Because really she was there...and I'd finally done something for
her.
I'd found the best of myself...what she kept for all of us: her longcherished wish.
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