The Joy Luck Summaries

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 1, PROLOGUE SUMMARY BACK NEXT In Shanghai, a woman buys a swan with an incredible story. Though the swan began life as a duck who stretched its neck in the hopes of becoming a goose, it stretched its neck too far and became more than what it had hoped for. The woman sails to America with her swan. She hopes to have a girl in America who's value will not be judged based on her husband, and who will not have to ignore herself and \"swallow sorrow.\" The woman wants to keep the swan and one day give it to her American daughter (along with, we presume, a better life). Aw. When the woman arrives in America, immigration officials take the swan away, leaving only one feather in the woman's possession. She fills out immigration paperwork until she forgets why she came to the U.S. in the first place. Now the woman is old and she has an American daughter who speaks only English. The old woman is waiting for the day that she can give her daughter the feather, and tell her the story of the feather in perfect English.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 1, CHAPTER 2 SUMMARY BACK NEXT An-mei tells the story of her youth as a child in her uncle's house, where she lived with her uncle, auntie, grandmother (Popo), and little brother. Now we get a flashback to when An-mei is a little girl. Popo tells An-mei that her mother is a ghost, meaning that An-mei is forbidden to talk about her mother. Still in flashback mode, the story jumps to 1923, when An-mei is nine years old and her grandmother is very ill. Popo tells An-mei never to say her mother's name, because that would be a disgrace to An-mei's dead father. Clearly, An-mei's mom has done something bad. An-mei only knows her dad from a scary, stiff painting of him that she sees on the wall. One day when An-mei's short-tempered aunt is mad, she yells at An-mei about her mother's disgrace. This is how An-mei learns that her mother is now the concubine of a rich man (who already has a wife and two other concubines). An-mei's relatives look down on her mother, viewing her as a traitor to An-mei's dead father, a woman with no honor who brings shame to the family. An-mei begins to imagine her mother as a carefree woman who laughingly abandoned her family and her honor. This image of her mother disappoints her. One day a woman arrives to take care of Popo. An-mei immediately knows it is her mother. An-mei's mother brushes her daughter's hair, whispering, \"you know me.\" And then she rubs the scar on her daughter's neck, leading An-mei into a memory of when she was four years old and her mom tried to take her away from her grandmother. In the memory, her mother, uncle, aunt, and Popo are fighting. They are criticizing An-mei's mother, saying she has no honor and is only a lowly concubine. They won't let her have her children. In the scuffle, a large pot of boiling soup falls on four-year-old An-mei, burning her neck. Popo nurses An-mei back to health and the scar heals. End memory - but back to An-mei as a nine-year-old girl. Popo gets steadily sicker. An-mei's mother cooks up a soup and then cuts a piece of flesh from her own arm. PAINFUL! GROSS! She adds it to the soup, along with herbs and medicines. The soup is a last-ditch effort to save Popo. The ancient remedy fails to work, but An-mei learns to love her mother by seeing what a faithful daughter her mother is to Popo.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 1, CHAPTER 4 SUMMARY BACK NEXT Ying-ying begins by saying that she was so quiet for so long, keeping her true nature hidden, that her daughter no longer hears her. She wants to tell her daughter that both of them are lost, so lost that no one knows them. But as Ying-ying remembers a time that she ran and shouted, telling the Moon Lady a secret wish, we get a flashback. In the flashback, it's 1918 and Ying-ying is an inquisitive four-years-old. She wakes up to many preparations for the Moon Festival, i.e., she is dressed in pretty clothes and her hair is done nicely despite her fidgeting. Ying-ying's amah (nanny) tells her what the Moon Festival is all about: it's the day when you can see the Moon Lady and she will fulfill your \"secret wish.\" But your wish must remain unspoken, because if you speak it, then it's a \"selfish desire.\" Relatives from all over arrive to celebrate the Moon Festival. They have rented a boat on Tai Lake, and Ying-ying's nanny promises that the little girl will meet the Moon Lady. Throughout the morning, Ying-ying is very impatient to get to the boat. Obviously. She's four, for heaven's sake. She gets scolded for running around chasing a dragonfly because that's what boys do. Ying-ying should be acting like a girl, waiting quietly for the dragonfly to come up to her. Finally the family is brought to the lake by a team of rickshaws. Ying-ying has fun exploring the boat. She watches boys use a bird to catch fish. She watches an old woman gut and clean the fish. Ying-ying's new clothes are completely soiled. Her nanny finds her, scolds her, and removes all her clothes. Ying-ying continues standing in the back of the boat, waiting for her mother to come scold her. No one comes, and when the fireworks go off, Ying-ying falls into the lake. No one notices. She is caught by a fishing boat, and the nice fishermen joke about her being a fish. They ask her to point to her family's boat, and Ying-ying picks a boat, only to discover that the little girl on that boat is safe. The people in the fishing boat try to determine Ying-ying's identity. Briefly they wonder if she's a beggar, but they decide that she's from a wealthy family because her skin is pale and her feet are soft. Ying-ying feels lost forever without her family. Her rescuers drop her off on shore, assuming that her family will look for her there. But, what do they think they're doing, leaving a four-year-old alone? On shore, Ying-ying forgets her troubles when she watches a play about the Moon Lady. She is utterly entranced by the tragic tale of separation; the Mood Lady's husband lives on the sun while the Moon Lady is banished from the earth to the moon for stealing a magic peach. Ying-ying sobs at the end of the play, drawing a connection between her own loss and the Moon Lady's loss of the world and her husband. Ying-ying runs to tell the Moon Lady her secret wish (exactly what she's not supposed to do!), but as she runs closer and closer, the beautiful Moon Lady turns into an ugly figure. As Ying-ying declares her wish, she realizes that the Moon Lady is a man. Bummer. Drag is always confusing. End of flashback. In the present day, Ying-ying says she eventually forgot both her secret wish and her return to her family. However, as she ages, she remembers more of the beginning of her life and how she lost herself. Her secret wish to the Moon Lady was that she be found.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 2, CHAPTER 1 SUMMARY BACK NEXT We get a flashback to when Waverly was six-years-old and her mother teaches her about the art of invisible strength via a weekly trip to the supermarket. When Waverly throws a hissy fit because she can't have a treat - a bag of salted plums - her mom tells her the \"Strongest wind cannot be seen.\" So next time when they go shopping, Waverly doesn't make a fuss, and her mom quietly buys her the salted plums. Waverly's family lives in San Francisco's Chinatown, above a Chinese bakery. Waverly and the other neighborhood kids spend their time playing in the dark alleys and poking around the local shops: a medicinal herb shop, a fish market, a café, etc. Waverly is named for their address: Waverly Place. She is the youngest in the family, and the only daughter. Her name at home is \"Meimei,\" which means \"Little Sister.\" During the annual Christmas party at First Chinese Baptist Church, Waverly sits on Santa's lap. She knows he's not the real Santa, because Santa isn't Chinese. Still she says that she's a good girl, and strategically selects a present, already having observed that the biggest presents aren't always the best, and attempting to judge the gift by it's weight. Waverly ends up with a twelve pack of lifesavers, not bad. Her older brother, Vincent, receives an old chess set - one that's missing pieces. Waverly rapidly becomes obsessed with the game, watching her brothers, Vincent and Winston, play. Vincent allows her to play in exchange for some lifesavers. Waverly begins by questioning all of the rules, stuff like, why can't pawns move more than one step at a time. Waverly's mom compares the arbitrary rules of chess to \"American rules\" that immigrants have to deal with. Waverly researches all of the rules and studies the strategy involved in the game. She learns that chess \"is a game of secrets in which one must show and never tell.\" Sounds like her mom's invisible strength of the wind. Soon, her brothers get sick of losing to their little sister, and Waverly begins playing against an old man, Lau Po, in the park. She loses lots of lifesavers to him, but he becomes a great mentor. Waverly begins playing (and beating) a bunch of locals, until someone recommends she try a local tournament. In her first tournament, she beats a fifteen-year-old boy, the whole time she's thinking of wind analogies from her mom. Waverly becomes a neighborhood celebrity when she starts winning all sorts of tournaments. By the time she is nine, she is featured in Life magazine as a child prodigy, after beating a fifty-year-old man. During this particular competition, Waverly uses all kinds of strategic body language designed to make her opponent underestimate her as an indecisive, cute little girl. Waverly stops doing everything but going to school and practicing chess. There's a problem though: Waverly's annoying mom likes to hover when she practices. In return for all this chess success, Waverly gets a lot of perks. She no longer has to do the dishes, sleep in the room next to the street, or finish her food at meals. She cannot, however, avoid going with her mother to the market. On one such trip, Waverly gets fed up and yells at her mother, alleging that these shopping trips are just to show her off. Waverly runs away. When she comes home, she imagines a chess match against her mother.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 2, CHAPTER 3 SUMMARY BACK NEXT Rose's mother used to carry a white Bible, but it's been used for over twenty years to prop up one leg of their dining room table. We envisioned other ways in which religion can be useful, but we guess it's a \"to each his own\" type of deal. Rose knows that her mother still sees that Bible, because it is still immaculately clean. Fishy... Rose is watching her mother sweep the kitchen, waiting for the right moment to tell An-mei that she's divorcing her husband, Ted. Rose knows that her mother will want her to save the marriage. We get a flashback of how Rose met Ted. The two meet in college and Rose is initially attracted to him in part because he's not Chinese and therefore very different from the guys she's previously dated. Neither of their mothers approve. An-mei points out that he's American. Ted's mother pulls Rose aside and basically tells Rose that she better not marry Ted, because that would hurt her son's future career as a doctor, with the Vietnam War being unpopular and all. Clearly, to this woman, all Asian people are Vietnamese. Ted and Rose cling together against the world's prejudice. As their relationship progresses, Rose and Ted fall into roles: she plays the victim and he's the hero. They marry and buy a house. Ted becomes not only a dermatologist, but the proverbial decider, choosing everything from their furniture to their vacation spots. Rose never thinks of protesting. After a malpractice suit, Ted pushes Rose to make more decisions. Ted accuses Rose of not being able to do anything without him. Then he asks for a divorce. That's the end of Rose and Ted's romantic history. Rose has another flash back to the day her mother lost faith in God. Enter flashback: The entire family goes to the beach because Rose's father wants to catch ocean perch, despite not being a fisherman. Rose's parents believe in their nengkan, which is a person's ability to achieve anything she sets her mind on. Rose's dad thinks he can catch ocean perch because of his nengkan, and Rose's parents immigrated from China to America and had seven children on the same basis. At the beach, Rose's mother assigns her to watching her four younger brothers, in Chinese literally saying, \"Watch out for their bodies.\" Rose begins worrying about her youngest brother, Bing. But she feels like her worry is based on superstition from The Twenty-Six Malignant Gates, that Chinese book about all the ways children can get hurt. As the family is enveloped in chaos of different kinds - some of the boys get into a fight, Rose's father gets a tug on his line - Rose watches four-year-old Bing fall into the sea. The rescue people can't find Bing. Rose's mom jumps into the water, searching for Bing. She has so much faith in her nengkan that she's sure she'll find Bing even though she doesn't know how to swim. Rose knows that it's all her fault that her brother has been lost to the ocean. She was supposed to look after him. She's expecting all of her family to blame her. Instead, each family member blames him or herself. Rose and her mother go back to the beach the next morning. Her mother has the white Bible with her and prays to God, begging him to return her son. When Bing does not appear, she doesn't lose hope, but tries another tactic. Rose's mother begs the Coiling Dragon who lives in the sea, to return her son, throwing into the ocean an offering of sweet tea to cool his temper, and her ring of watery sapphire to distract him from Bing. Bing fails to appear after even a hour passes. Rose's mom now tosses out a life preserver tied to a fishing pole, sure it will float directly to Bing and pull him back to safety. Despite all of her nengkan, the life preserver is shredded and Bing doesn't appear. Finally, Rose's mother gives up, horrified and despairing. So the flashback is over and we're back in real time. Rose's mom wants Rose to keep trying to save her marriage, even if it doesn't work out. Rose draws a parallel between Bing's death and her own marriage; both times, she sees the danger coming but does nothing about it. Rose draws out the Bible from under the table and finds \"Bing Hsu\" written in erasable pencil, under a section titled \"Deaths.\"

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 3, PROLOGUE SUMMARY BACK NEXT This is an exchange between a mother and her grown daughter, taking place in the master bedroom of the daughter's new condo. The mother insists that mirrors cannot be placed at the foot of the bed, because they turn away marriage happiness. The daughter is dismissive, sick of her mom's superstition and all of the bad omens she sees. The mother corrects the imbalance by giving her daughter a second mirror to be placed at the head of the bed. The two mirrors are meant to help fertility; the mother says that she can see her future grandchild in the second mirror. When the daughter looks in the mirror, she finds that her mother is right: through her own reflection, she can see her future child.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 3, CHAPTER 2 SUMMARY BACK NEXT Waverly takes her mother out to lunch. Her mother complains the entire time: Waverly's haircut is ugly, the restaurant chopsticks are greasy, the soup isn't hot enough, etc. Waverly gives up on the idea of telling her mother an important bit of news: that she plans on marrying Rich Schields. Waverly's mom has never met Rich, and every time Waverly tries to talk to her mother about him, her mother changes the subject. After lunch, Waverly takes her mom to her apartment, where Waverly lives with her daughter, Shoshana. It's clear that Rich has moved in. She wants her mom to realize the relationship is serious. Waverly shows her mom a mink coat that Rich bought her for Christmas - a really extravagant gift that Waverly seems really proud of. Her mother points out the coat's flaws. Waverly is hurt, but at the same time she sees the truth in her mother's comments. Waverly's mom jabs her again. Waverly asks if her mom is going to say anything about the apartment (i.e., Rich living there), and her mom just comments on the apartment being a mess. We flash back to the first time Waverly was seriously hurt by her mother. Waverly is ten-years-old and sick of her mom boasting about her chess skills and taking all the credit for Waverly's clever chess strategies. In a crowd of people, Waverly yells at her mom to stop showing off and basically tells her that she knows nothing about chess. Waverly's mom is mad and gives her daughter the silent treatment for the next few days. Waverly decides not to respond with anger; she ignores her mom right back and quits playing chess for a few days in order to spite her mother. Basically, Waverly's trying to make her mom so mad that she has to talk to her. Waverly decides to skip a tournament, but even this elicits no response from her mother. After a week, she announces that she's ready to begin playing again, hoping she'll get a positive reaction out of her mom. But her mother tells her that it's not so easy, just because Waverly is smart and can pick things up quickly doesn't mean she should be so fickle. Waverly contracts chicken pox, and her mother looks after her, ending their silent battle. Waverly is convinced that her mother is back to her usual self, but when it comes to Waverly's chess playing, her mother no longer seems to care. She longer polishes her daughter's trophies, cuts out newspaper clips about Waverly, or hovers over Waverly as she practices. Waverly loses her next tournament, saying that she felt as though she had lost a magic armor, leaving her completely vulnerable to her opponents. Waverly's mom even seems to smile a bit when she loses the game. The game stops coming so easily to Waverly. She has to fight hard to win, and the losses are hard on her. After a spell of time, Waverly stops playing altogether. We return from the flashback to the present. Waverly is on the phone with her friend, Marlene, explaining the incident with her mom and the mink coat. Marlene wants to know why Waverly gets so hurt by her mom, why doesn't she just tell her mom to shut up and deal with the fact that she's with Rich? Waverly describes her mother as having all these little sneaky attacks. And, you just can't tell Chinese moms to shut up. Waverly's afraid that amidst all her mother's criticisms, some truth will stick and alter all of her perceptions of Rich, the man she currently adores. Waverly says that's what happened with her first husband, Marvin Chen. Marvin was like Mary Poppins, practically perfect in every way. He got a full scholarship to Stanford, played tennis, actually had chest hair, was funny, and was creative with sex. However, all of Waverly's mother's criticisms of Marvin rang true, and he turned out to be kind of a jerk with an eye for other ladies. Waverly's not sure if her mom actually did poison her marriage, but she ended up feeling mere apathy towards Marvin. Waverly found out she was pregnant just as her marriage turned sour. She considered aborting the baby, but ended up keeping her. Waverly's daughter, Shoshana, is now four-years-old, and Waverly adores her. Waverly compares Rich's love for her with her own love for Shoshana- unequivocal and without needing anything in return. Rich is super sweet, really romantic, and great in bed, but Waverly is still worried about how her mom will criticize him. Finally, Waverly engineers a way for Rich to meet her mother. Waverly and Rich eat dinner at Auntie Suyuan and Uncle Canning's house. In her thank-you card, Waverly writes that Rich thought it was the best Chinese food he had ever eaten. Shortly after, a dinner invitation comes from Waverly's mother. This was exactly what Waverly predicted because her mom is so competitive with Suyuan cooking skill. Waverly hangs out in the kitchen while her mother prepares the meal. Already her mom's pointing out how she's a better cook that Suyuan. Waverly builds up the courage to ask for her mom's first impression of Rich. Waverly's really nervous because Rich is an average-looking, kind of short, red-headed guy with freckles. Her mom says he has a lot of spots on his face and doesn't buy it when Waverly insists that freckles are good luck. By Waverly's standards, the dinner goes terribly. Let's call it White Boy in Chinese House. Rich brings a fancy French wine. Waverly's parents don't even own wine glasses. Rich then drinks two glasses when everyone else has three sips. Rich insists on using chopsticks, then drops almost everything he tries to eat in his lap, making Shoshana laugh hysterically. Rich helps himself to big portions - before anyone else gets a chance. Rich thinks he's being polite by refusing to eat seconds, even though Waverly's father sets the right example by taking four helpings, insisting the food is so delicious he can't resist. And the coup de grâce is when Waverly's mother criticizes the main dish (cue for everyone to pronounce it the best food they've ever tasted!), and Rich says it just needs a little soy sauce, and proceeds to drench his food. When Rich says goodnight, he uses butchered versions of her parents' first names: Linda and Tim (instead of Lindo and Tin). At the end of this debacle, Rich looks pathetic in Waverly's eyes. He doesn't even have any sense of how badly the whole dinner went. The next morning when Waverly wakes up mad and decides to go give her mother a piece of her mind. When she arrives at her parents' house, Waverly finds her mother sleeping on the sofa, and for a terrible moment is afraid she's died. As she wakes her mom up, Waverly instantly starts crying. She then tells her mother that she's marrying Rich. To her surprise, her mom says, that's old news. Just because Waverly didn't tell her doesn't mean she didn't know. Waverly says she knows her mom hates Rich. Her mom is becomes kind of angry-sad, realizing her daughter thinks \"I am this bad.\" Really she had just said things about his freckles and the mink coat because they were true, not because she wanted to be mean. Waverly just wants to go home because she says she doesn't know what she's feeling, what's \"inside of me right now.\" Her mom lets her know what's inside of her: half is from father - the Jongs - and half is from her mother - the Suns. The people from the Sun clan are \"smart people, very strong, tricky, and famous for winning wars.\" Waverly feels comforted by having a semblance of a normal conversation with her mother. Finally, instead of a crabby old woman hell-bent on ruining her daughter's life, Waverly sees her mother as an old woman who simply cares about her daughter. The chapter ends with the definite possibility that Rich, Waverly, and Waverly's mother will all visit China after the wedding. Waverly's mom says she doesn't want to go with them, but really she's dying for them to invite her. That's pretty cute.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 3, CHAPTER 4 SUMMARY BACK NEXT Jing-mei opens by talking about her \"life's importance,\" a jade pendant that her mother gave her on Chinese New Year. She has no idea what the pedant means. She wishes she could ask her mom, but Suyuan is dead. As a piece of jewelry, Jing-mei thinks the pendant isn't attractive, but she's been wearing it every day recently, wanting to find out what her mother intended it to mean. Jing-mei notices other Chinese people wearing the same kind of pendant. She asks one guy about his. His mom gave it to him, but he basically has no understanding of what his means either. We flash back to Chinese New Year, when Jing-mei's mom was alive. Jing-mei helps her mom prepare the holiday meal. They go to Chinatown and shop for crabs. Suyuan complains about the tenants in the building she owns, how they take multiple showers a day and run up the water bill, how they always have too many bags of garbage so she has to pay extra, etc. She also complains that her tenants think she poisoned this cat that was a pest, always glaring at her through the kitchen window. Jing-mei's pretty sure her mom did poison the cat. While shopping, Jing-mei has to select the most alive looking crabs, but they end up being forced to take one missing a leg, which is bad luck. Thankfully, there will only be ten people eating dinner, and the crab missing the leg makes eleven, so it's extra. Back at home, her mom starts preparing the crabs. Jing-mei can't handle watching them be boiled because once she made a pet out of a crab as a child, only to have her mom cook it. Suyuan invites Lindo and Tin Jong for dinner, which means the whole Jong family is invited, including Lindo's son, Vincent, and his girlfriend Lisa, Waverly, Rich, and Shoshana. Jing-mei's old piano teacher, Mr. Chong, is also invited. Eleven people in all for dinner - someone will have to take the legless crab. When the crabs are served, the Jong family takes all the best crabs. Jing-mei's father and Mr. Chong get the best out of what's left, leaving Jing-mei and her mother with really bad crabs. Jing-mei takes the worst crab (the one missing a leg), but her mother stops her and gives her the better of the two crabs. There's quite a bit of bickering over dinner. Lindo criticizes the way Rich eats crab. Waverly, Rich, Vincent, and Lisa all think that Lindo is gross for eating the crab's brain. Tin Jong makes jokes about how he told his daughter not to marry poor, she should marry Rich. Ha ha. Then Vincent asks when Waverly is getting married already. And she directs the same question right back at him, making Lisa uncomfortable (guess Vincent hasn't popped the question yet). Waverly compliments Jing-mei's haircut, but criticizes her choice of a stylist, David, who is gay. To Waverly, this means David probably has AIDS and has given the disease to Jing-mei through her hair. (Wow, that's a lot of assumptions to make.) To make it worse, Waverly recommends her own hair stylist, but says he might be too expensive for her. Now Jing-mei is mad and decides to make a jab back. Jing-mei did some freelance work for the firm Waverly works at and hasn't yet been paid. So she says that she could afford the haircut if Waverly's firm could get it together to pay their bills. Then Waverly says that the firm hasn't paid because they think Jing-mei's work is \"unacceptable.\" Then she mocks Jing-mei's work in front of everyone. Which the whole group seems to think is a great joke. Suyuan even admits that Jing-mei isn't as sophisticated as Waverly. Jing-mei is totally mortified. She starts to clean off the table and do the dishes. She realizes that she's just herself, nothing more, nothing less. Jing-mei notices that her mom didn't even touch the crab that was missing a leg. Suyuan says she didn't eat it because it died before it was even cooked, so it was bad. Jing-mei wants to know why her mom even cooked it then. Her mom responds that she knew no one but Jing-mei would ever pick it, because everyone else selects things that are top quality. Jing-mei can't tell if this is a criticism or a compliment. At this moment, Suyuan takes off her necklace and gives it to Jing-mei. She says that when Jing-mei wears it, she will know her mother's meaning. She tells her daughter that the pendant is Jing-mei's \"life importance.\" Jing-mei thinks her mom gave her the necklace to make her feel better after Waverly humiliated her. Suyuan insists that Waverly is like a crab, always waking sideways and crooked. The flashback ends. Jing-mei is in the kitchen of her parents' house, cooking dinner for her widowed father. She notices that the annoying cat has returned - her mom didn't poison it after all. The cat annoys her too, and just like her mom, Jing-mei starts pounding on the kitchen window to try to scare the cat away.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 4, CHAPTER 1 SUMMARY BACK NEXT An-mei begins by talking about her daughter, who, despite An-mei's best efforts, grew into a woman who can't take action to ensure her own happiness. An-mei sees her daughter crying over her broken marriage to a psychiatrist, but does nothing to prevent the divorce. Rose, her daughter, doesn't want to make any choices, but by saying nothing, is making a choice. An-mei sees the flaws in her daughter because they are An-mei's flaws as well. An-mei was raised in the traditional Chinese way, desiring nothing and ignoring her own suffering. She sees that somehow Rose turned out this way too. Then An-mei enters into a flashback. An-mei is nine-years-old and Popo (her grandmother) has died. Despite hearing from her aunt that her mother is a bad woman, An-mei only sees a respectful, sad, humble woman. An-mei cries when she realizes that her mother is going to be leaving again, returning to her second husband and all of his wives in Tientsin. Her mom tries to calm An-mei with a story about a turtle who swallowed An-mei's mother's tears and then turned them into magpies, birds of happiness. She says that your tears won't keep you from being sad, they only end up feeding someone else's happiness. The moral of the story is you should swallow your own tears. The only problem is, An-mei's mom is crying while telling the story. They both end up crying together. An-mei wakes up the next morning to the sounds of her uncle shouting at her mother. He doesn't want to let his sister take her children with her. An-mei runs to her mother, who gives An-mei the choice of coming to Tientsin. An-mei decides to go with her mom, despite her aunt and uncle shouting that she'll be disgraced like her mother if she goes. Her mother can't ask An-mei's brother to come too; she can't take a son to live at someone else's house. An-mei rides for seven days on a train with her mother, getting scared as she realizes how far away she is from the life she's known. But her mother tells her enticing stories about Tientsin, Near the end of the trip, An-mei's mother takes off her white clothes of mourning (mourning for An-mei's dead father) and puts on Western clothes. She gives An-mei a new, white dress and shoes. An-mei's mother tells her that she will be starting a new life, with a new father, sisters, and a brother. They reach Tientsin and no one is there to meet them so they take a rickshaw home. Her mom has become cross and exhausted. It is clear that her mother is not happy to be home. Her mother lives as the third concubine (Fourth Wife) of a wealthy merchant named Wu Tsing. An-mei is amazed by the richness of the house - a curving staircase, huge rooms, lots of Western furniture, and her mother's luxurious bed. Yan Chang, An-mei's mother's personal servant, explains the house to An-mei. For the first few days in her new home An-mei is really content. She now realizes that she was completely unhappy in her uncle's home. Two weeks after their arrival, more of the family returns. An-mei sees Wu Tsing be lifted out of a rickshaw. He's wearing Western clothes, he's pretty fat, and much older than An-mei's mother. Wu Tsing has returned with a fifth wife. Fifth Wife is very young, practically a girl, and reveling in her new status as one of Wu Tsing's wives. With Wu Tsing now home, An-mei's mom mostly keeps to her own rooms. An-mei has a feeling that something bad is going to happen. One night, An-mei is woken up by her mother, who asks her to go to Yan Chang's room for the night - Wu Tsing wants some private time with her mom. An-mei leaves, crying. The next morning, it's obvious that Fifth Wife has been crying too, her face is all puffy. Looks like she's found out that she's Fifth Wife not First Wife. But like a little girl, she throws a fit and is rude to everyone. Later in the day, Fifth Wife is happy again because she has gotten a new dress - probably a gift from Wu Tsing to shut her up. An-mei sees her mother's sadness for the first time. Her mother says that her life is shameful and that a fourth wife has no status at all, seemingly even less than the new Fifth Wife. She wants An-mei to remember that she was once a First Wife, and the wife of a scholar, An-mei's father There's another problem with being the fourth wife, the word for \"fourth\" and \"die\" are very similar and can come out of your mouth mixed up. Second and Third Wife return home with their children. Third wife is plain looking, but seems nice. Second Wife is pretty, but not young, and dressed very fancy. She's also obviously in charge; An-mei even has to call her \"Big Mother.\" Second Wife has a two-year-old son, despite her own old-ish age. An-mei is enchanted when Second Wife gives her a beautiful pearl necklace. Later that day, An-mei's mother warns her against Second Wife's tricks, her ways of buying and controlling people. When she sees that An-mei isn't listening, she snatches An-mei's new necklace and crushes one of the beads. The necklace is made of glass, not pearl. An-mei wears the necklace for a week as punishment. At the end of the week, her mother gives her a beautiful sapphire ring. First Wife comes home from her separate estate in Peking. To An-mei's surprise, First Wife is like a ghost and doesn't make Second Wife bow to her. Overall, First Wife ignores mostly everything around her, choosing to overlook things that might make her unhappy, like her marriage. An-mei's mother is excited at the prospect of having her own household estate, which Wu Tsing has promised her. During the coldest winter month, when it is too cold to go outside, An-mei sits with Yan Chang and hears stories about Second Wife. Second Wife used to be a famous singing girl, and while she wasn't pretty, she was seductive. Wu Tsing asked her to be his wife so he could own the object that so many other men desired. Second Wife quickly learned how to control Wu Tsing; when she wanted more money she would fake a suicide attempt, because no man wants the ghost of one of his wives haunting him. The only thing Second Wife was unable to get was children - she's barren. Yet obviously Wu Tsing would want a son. Second Wife went about finding Wu Tsing a third wife so she could claim the new wife's sons as her own. This is how Third Wife came about - a virgin, but clearly not a threat to Second Wife because she's so ugly. Third Wife bore no sons, so Second Wife needed to come up with a fourth wife - An-mei's mother. Yan Chang then tells An-mei about how Second Wife manipulated An-mei's mother into becoming a concubine. After An-mei's father had died, An-mei's mother went to the Six Harmonies Pagoda to pledge to observe the virtues of Buddhism in honor of her dead husband. Wu Tsing and Second Wife were also in the area, and Wu Tsing was immediately struck by An-mei's mother's beauty. Second Wife pretended to be nice to An-mei's mom, and invited her over for dinner, but kept her so late that she had to stay the night. During the night, Wu Tsing entered the room and raped An-mei's mother. No one believed that she was raped, they all preferred to think that she was a widow without honor. She had no choice but to submit to being Wu Tsing's concubine. An-mei's mother later bore Wu Tsing a son, which Second Wife claimed. Now An-mei sees through all of Second Wife's manipulations. An-mei's mother is denied her own household when Second Wife performs another pretend suicide, making An-mei's mother feel even more depressed and hopeless. Two days before the lunar new year, An-mei's mother commits suicide by taking poison. She dies slowly, and An-mei watches, unable to help. An-mei's mother strategically planned her suicide such that the third day after she died, the day when one's ghost comes back to get even, is the lunar new year. In order to prevent bad luck from following him all throughout the year, Wu Tsing has to appease the spirit of An-mei's mother. Wu Tsing promises to revere An-mei's mother as if she were First Wife, and to raise An-mei and her brother as his honored children. Second Wife loses her power. The flashback ends and An-mei says that her mother had no choice, no control over fate, and no ability to speak for herself. But nowadays, people can control their own destiny. That's why she wants her daughter to speak up and not swallow her tears. An-mei says that the people in China no longer have to watch the magpies taunt them. The peasants of China used to be plagued by magpies which would swarm the crops, eating the seeds and swallowing the peasants' tears. But eventually the peasants got sick of the magpies and decided to shout at them and make a lot of noise. The magpies became confused and didn't land to eat the seeds, but eventually died of starvation.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB PART 4, CHAPTER 3 SUMMARY BACK NEXT Lindo's daughter, Waverly, is anxious about blending in on her trip to China; she is both worried about fitting in too well, but also mad at her mom for saying that everyone will pick her out as a foreigner instantly. Apparently it's now fashionable to be Chinese, whereas when Waverly was a little girl she did everything she could to avoid seeming Chinese. Lindo rebukes herself for thinking that she could give her children \"American circumstances and Chinese character.\" She now realizes that the two are mutually exclusive options. Waverly learned American circumstances - that you don't have to accept the circumstances other people give you, and that you can have more than what you are born to. But Waverly never gained a Chinese character - respect, tact, knowledge of her own self-worth. Then the narrative shifts to a beauty parlor, where Waverly wants Lindo's hair to be cut in order to look decent for the wedding (Waverly and Rich's). Mr. Rory, the stylist, and Waverly talk around Lindo, acting like Lindo can't understand English, is deaf, and can't pick her own hairstyle. To Lindo's pleasure and Waverly's disgust, Mr. Rory mentions that Waverly and Lindo look very similar. Lindo and Waverly look in the mirror together. Lindo says that she can see Waverly's character and future in her face. In her mind, Lindo also says that their faces are so similar, and they have the same character strengths and flaws. Because their faces are so alike, Waverly will have a similar life fortune to her mother's. We enter into a flashback of when Lindo was ten-years-old. Lindo's mother looks at Lindo's face to deduce her character. She goes over all of Lindo's facial characteristics: Lindo has good, thick ears, which means her life will be full of blessings; a straight nose, which is a good sign; a broad forehead, so she'll be clever; etc. Lindo's face shows one flaw, her low hairline shows that she will have some troubles in her youth. Lindo's mother determines that Lindo will be \"a good wife, mother, and daughter-in-law.\" Lindo and her mother have similar faces, and out of her adoration of her mother, Lindo wants to look even more like her. Lindo's flashback ends. Lindo realizes that her face has changed, and her mother never saw the changes. Lindo's nose has become crooked (thanks to American public transportation), and the look in her eyes has changed to be more American. Basically, Lindo has lost her Chinese face. Lindo enters into a flashback about her preparation for immigrating to America and eventual arrival. Keep in mind that this flashback is all a narration to Waverly. Lindo pays an American-raised Chinese girl for advice on being in America. She gets advised to hide her true reasons for going to the U.S. and pretend to be a student of theology. She's also advised to find an American citizen for a husband. And if Lindo can't find an American citizen to marry, then she should have a baby in the U.S., even though she can't let on to the American authorities that this is her plan. The girl also gives Lindo some addresses of people she should meet in San Francisco, \"people with big connections.\" When she arrives in America, the officials don't hassle her. She decides to go to one of the addresses of the \"people with big connections.\" When she gets to this address, a grumpy lady gives her some more addresses - which eventually helps Lindo find a crappy apartment and an awful job - and expects a big tip. Lindo ends up working at a fortune cookie factory, folding the cookie dough into the right shape. Lindo burns her fingers repeatedly on the hot cookie dough, but she also meets An-mei. An-mei jokingly points out that they are very powerful women; they determine people's fortunes. Lindo doesn't get the joke, so An-mei explains that they are putting tacky sayings into cookies, and American people think that the cookies hold Chinese sayings that tell them their fortune. An-mei brings Lindo to church and sets her up with a man named Tin Jong. Although they speak separate dialects (Tin speaks Cantonese and Lindo speaks Mandarin), Lindo decides to try him out. After all, this isn't China so she can decide for herself if she wants to marry him. Lindo and Tin can't communicate with each other, but they attend English classes together. Lindo, with An-mei's help, sets out to assist Tin in realizing that he wants to marry her. Hey, a little manipulation never hurt anyone. At the cookie factory, An-mei and Lindo go through the fortunes, looking for one that will nudge Tin in the right direction. Lindo finds the perfect fortune: \"A house is not a home when a spouse is not at home.\" Then she folds a cookie around it. The next day, after English class, Lindo acts like she is surprised to find a cookie in her purse. She gives it to Tin and innocently ask him what the fortune says. But Tin doesn't know what the word \"spouse\" means, so he's planning on looking it up in the dictionary that night. The next day he asks Lindo, in English, \"Will you spouse me?\" They joke about his poor use of the word \"spouse,\" but obviously her answer is \"yes\" since she engineered the whole proposal. Nine months after the wedding, Lindo gives birth to a son, Winston (who dies 16 years later in a car accident). In another two years, they have a second son, Vincent. Both children are named to bring luck and wealth (\"wins ton\" and \"win cent\"). When Lindo gives birth to Waverly and child looks so much like her, Lindo realizes she is dissatisfied with her own circumstances and wants this little girl to have a better life. She names her Waverly after the street they live on, so the little girl will know she belongs, and always carry a piece of her mother with her after she leaves home. No longer in the flashback, we return to the beauty parlor scene. Waverly and Lindo look into the mirror side by side. Lindo's hair looks great. She looks at Waverly, as if for the first time, and realizes that Waverly's nose is crooked. Waverly says her nose was always like that, she has her mom's nose (but remember Lindo's nose became crooked when she busted it in a crowded San Francisco bus). The mother and daughter talk about their crooked noses, which Waverly thinks makes them look devious, which she translates to her mom as \"two-faced.\" Lindo thinks about having a double face - one American and one Chinese - and notes that when she went back to China the previous year, everyone knew that she wasn't 100% Chinese.

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