“Traditional Chinese Women”

A mini-memoir of the complex, strong women who raised me

Growing up in a small town in China’s Guangxi Autonomous Region, I’d never felt I had anything in common with the women in my family.

As a child, I was defiant, ambitious, fiercely independent, and more than anything else, I prided myself to be different. I thought I was one-of-a-kind.

My mother and I, 2016