A Common Story

Albert Ai , 12th Grade
Santa Clara CA
Adrian C. Wilcox High School

In attempting to pinpoint the unifying source of poetry’s value, Perrine found that worth stemmed not from an imposition of the beautiful or distasteful, strange or common, joyful or poignant, but from the simple communication of human experience. Perhaps that is why my Asian American heritage can so powerfully color my outlook on life, but through no single identifiable path. Thinking about what my culture means to me conjures both the thrill of cultural celebration and the gravity of filial piety, both the bitterness of competition and the camaraderie of social harmony. Being a first generation Asian American raised at the center of Silicon Valley bridges me between the plenty of America’s most prosperous and the poverty of my parents’ rural origins.

But thinking about my heritage also brings forward the realization that my understanding of our family’s past is meager at best, simply because it was decided at some point that this story was too commonplace to be heard. I unavoidably pieced together a few details over the years: that my father had come to the United States without any assets or family to turn to, or even a strong grasp of English; that after earning two graduate degrees, he had first worked as a door to door salesman, selling copies of the Bible; that after his troupe had run out of gas, funds, and places to solicit, he had found work as an assistant chef making a dish called “cashew chicken” at a small restaurant in Missouri. How he had gotten there from Ohio, where he had earned his second degree, he never bothered to say. Only after moderate success at the restaurant was he able to save enough to come to California, buying an economical watch as a souvenir before he left.

After it was decided that this story, in completion, was too commonplace to be heard, I made the critical mistake of never protesting the decision until silence had become so firmly established that it became unlikely the complete story would ever be told. When I finally grew mature enough to understand why this was regrettable, I began to ask around, to hear the stories of others. To my surprise, their grasp of their own stories was as fragmented as mine: broken, vague, and distant. I listened as their voices dropped and they too admitted their meager knowledge about who and what preceded them. I then realized that my story, about the story that had never been told, was in fact an ordinary one. It was just one of thousands, belonging to thousands of other families respectively, whose unique stories had also been decided too commonplace to tell.

If I could change one thing to make the world a better place, I would have it that the stories of our past be heard. My father’s reticence has implicitly shown me that the wealth of unspoken meaning can only be discovered on our own, by our own desire. The necessity of such self-discovery may temporarily delay progress, but it is also by such discovery that whatever meaning we find becomes most deeply engrained into how we view the past, present, and future.

A few years ago, digging through an old drawer of odds and ends, I found that watch – the one my father had bought before leaving Missouri. It was missing its band, and had a crack over the third hour. Seeing this, he urged me to throw it away, but I didn’t. As a watch, I realized that it was worthless, and at best sentimental. But as a remnant of the past, it serves as a reminder of one struggle to overcome barriers of language and isolation, of poverty and opportunity; a relic of human experience, too valuable to be forgotten.

Save the Tamil (Children in Sri Lanka)

Omaelan Hariharan
Cupertino CA
Eaton Elementary School

My Pet

Darlene, portrayed by Bethel High School Senior Arielle Galleon, is bemoaning the loss of her beloved. A monologue from Roger Krashner performed in Vallejo CA.

Changing the Way We Think

Olivia Zhu, 10th Grade
Saratoga CA
The Harker School

There are so many aspects of the world that I wish were different, but I have the strongest personal interest in and connection to fixing the role of education in California and in other parts of the world. Improving the status quo will result in further gains, according to historian Henry Commager’s belief that “Education is essential to change, for education creates both new wants and the ability to satisfy them.” Unfortunately, scholastic spending is likely to continue decreasing due to the current financial crisis, and the Millennium Development Goals regarding worldwide schooling for the underprivileged will not be fulfilled. At a time where some students are denied classrooms, textbooks, and supplies, I feel lucky that my family prioritizes the benefits of education and that I live in a community where the Asian drive for knowledge meshes perfectly with the American appreciation of creativity. Ideally, I would change the mindset of the world to reflect these dual values, hopefully leading to greater rights and respect for everyone.

I first realized the importance of changing current education standards and spending when I began tutoring students from underperforming districts. As smart and as driven as they are, they are sometimes at a disadvantage. A boy named Gustavo told me that he stays at school until late at night to relearn material from his teacher simply because there are too many people in his class for him to receive individual attention. However, after only one hour of tutoring, he understood his lessons perfectly. Though teachers are working overtime without pay and students are doing as best they can, situations such as Gustavo’s persist. Against obstacles such as budget shortfalls, my tutoring does little to mitigate the problem, yet I am grateful for the few hours a week that allow me to help the middle school students and learn about society from them. They make much of their temporary classrooms, separated only by thin corkboard partitions, by covering those walls with cheerful art projects and eloquent essays about their dreams and desires. Gustavo, for example, wants to be a soccer player—but a smart one.

Tutoring is so different from what I experience at my own school, where parents urge their children to study harder, take advantage of all the extracurricular options, and prioritize academics. There, the dreaded Asian grading scale is well known and often cited: an A is just average and a D means disowned. Myths circulate in other schools that we swap “strict parent” stories among ourselves after classes and all of us are mindless, knowledge-absorbing robots. Such stereotypes are, of course, incorrect and exaggerated, but the importance of learning has always been stressed in Asian culture. While academic pressure might be present in some situations, I feel that respect and appreciation of education are what tie all the students of my school together, not whatever bonding we might achieve by telling fictional scary Asian parent stories.

Being Asian-American means I settle contentedly in the middle of two cultures; I am fortunate to experience the individuality and academic freedom that is a cornerstone of American liberty as well as the motivation to learn, understand, and analyze that my parents instilled in me. Having the best aspects of both worlds allowed me to comprehend exactly why education is and will be such a key topic in American and global affairs. The Chinese proverb that states “shí nián shù mù, bâi nián shù rén,” or, just as cryptically, “grow a tree for a ten years, but grow men for a hundred,” truly emphasizes the importance of education—if people are nurtured and taught when young, they will be content and prosperous always. It has been proven that countries with higher standards in schooling will be able to develop a stronger workforce, keep those trained individuals from leaving for other nations, and fortify their economies. There is nothing more worth investment than this cause.

Granted, it may be difficult to begin this switch in attitude toward education, but change has already begun. Officials like Margaret Rhee have reformed Washington D.C. schools, Japanese pediatricians have later office hours based on the schedules of students, and greater attention is being paid to the plight of the California scholastic spending in general. As Commager noted, such transformations of the status quo will only beget more change as individuals are inspired by education to do more. Furthermore, if we nurture these people and communities, they will become self-sufficient. Hopefully they will even grow for more than a hundred years! If everyone embraced the parallel ideals of dedication and distinctiveness, then this ideal future could occur. As a young generation of Asian-Americans who have benefitted from both Western and Eastern traditions, it is our duty to ensure that these very achievable goals are fulfilled.

Striving for a Greener Tomorrow

Catherine Chen, 10th Grade
San Jose CA
Notre Dame High School

Pieces of Hope

Minjie Yoo, 12th Grade
Palo Alto CA
Henry M. Gunn High School

Let The Child Learn

Naren S. Vutukuru , 8th Grade
San Jose CA
Miller Middle School

I am growing up Asian in America and I am very grateful to be a part of this great country, the land of abundant resources. In this country there are so many opportunities for everyone, starting with an education. Here, every child is allowed an education with no regard to status or heritage. However, being Asian, I do know that this is not true in some countries in Asia. Instead of being educated, children are put to work. Child labor is one of the main causes of illiteracy in Asian countries, and poverty causes child labor. Some people from these countries have not received any education since childhood and may not have even laid eyes on the pages of a book. This is illiteracy. The fact of anyone being illiterate in the United States is thought quite unusual for children are legally bound to attend school here; however, it’s nonconformity to think these things in some parts of Asia especially in countries like India. Based on my frequent visits to the country, I found out that, children whose parents live in poverty and cannot support their family alone are forced into labor to set food on the table thus living without an education. I strongly feel that this is unfair. My recent viewing of the Oscar winning movie” The Slum dog Millionaire” which depicted the reality in some parts of the country, also made me think about the children in poverty. I can proudly say that, if there was one thing I would change in the world, it’d be elimination of child labor and enforcement of child education.

Education, essentially, is the ticket to a successful life. However, it is not a privilege that only a gifted and lucky few may obtain. I believe every child has the born right to an adequate education. However, if a child is strenuously working for a coldhearted man in a sweatshop somewhere fifteen hours a day everyday, where is this child’s education? The parents of this child may not be able to afford it, but there are thousands of people in similar circumstances. As more families are thrown into poverty, more people are born into poverty, resulting in an endless chain. The government should not let this slip by. It should be funding organizations, it should be initiating relief funds, and it should be making great efforts to help educate children in their countries. The government should provide free schools with adequate facilities so that the children whose parents cannot pay for school can receive an education. This way, child labor won’t be present. True, there are laws against child labor, but they do not necessarily prevent it. I believe laws against child labor should be strongly enforced, more than it is right now.

So, the government has a part to play by strongly enforcing child labor laws, even if it is , sometimes it is very difficult for government to keep track of every nook and corner, especially in rural areas. So, citizens themselves have some responsibilities too. Whenever a person sees or witnesses an act of child labor which is blatantly illegal, it is that person’s duty to report it to the government so that the employer responsible is punished. You see, many people employ children because they work cheap and don’t have much of a sense of independence—meaning they can be censured and castigated. This is also wrong. You must not employ children or even force them into labor because of these reasons. Also, people should not purchase items manufactured through child labor just because they are cheap. Therefore, all of us must make our strongest efforts to discourage child labor and even end it.

I think the message that I am trying to convey is that we all should realize that child labor and illiteracy in any country can damage that country’s prosperity. The people of the government should believe in the importance of an education and make their best efforts to make it so that kids don’t have to work and can receive an education. Also, the people of the country, as in citizens, also have a responsibility to prevent child labor in the country by reporting it to the government, by not hiring children, and by not purchasing products made through child labor. We all need to be aware that children are backbone to a stronger world, no matter in which part of the world they are in. Need less to say that the success and prosperity of any country relies mainly up on the literacy rate in that country. If children are properly enlightened through education in their prime years of their life, without wasting them in work, they will, indeed be the most valuable asset to their countries. So we all have to keep this in our minds and try to do as much as we can to eliminate child labor completely and facilitate child literacy. What more do we need to make the world a better place? I strongly wish to see this awareness develop in people’s minds and everyone to make sincere efforts for this good cause and finally one day, we could be proud of what we did to make the world a better place.