I've come a long way.

Today I got to hang out with Rachel and Jenna. We made Jenna skip school to go eat dim sum with us in Oakland haha. It was really good to go into Chinatown again. It's been a long time since I don't go to church there anymore. As I walk around those couple of blocks, I realize how many memories I have there. I mean, going to church in Oakland Chinatown for 18 years will do that to you. The most striking thing I realized today were the types of thoughts running through my head and how different they are now than they were four years ago.

Oakland is about a 25 minute drive away from my home in white suburbia. They're basically two completely different worlds. Church was in Oakland, school was in Danville. Life was very segmented. In fact, I never even had my friends over at my house, partially because Jenna was younger and would attack anyone who wasn't family, but I think a deeper issue I never admitted was that I was ashamed of how Chinese culture still dictated some of how my family conducted ourselves in our household. I would think about all the things I would have to explain to my friends, things that would be so intuitive to me, but would seem foreign, strange, maybe even repulsive. I barely related to my Chinese culture, so I did my best to not make things difficult for my friends or my family by trying to bridge the two and make it work. Life was segmented and I was comfortable with that.

Today I saw Chinatown through a different lens. Not only is it a place where I have a lot of memories, but it's a place where my culture thrives and I'm learning to appreciate its beauty. I wish I had time to browse the super smelly markets and do a little grocery shopping. I wish my friends were there so I could show them all the places I used to go in between service and sunday school. I'm learning to embrace my Chinese culture instead of being embarrassed or ashamed. My time in BCF has been even more healing and restorative than I realized before today. I keep saying that I want to grow in my ethnic identity and how I have no idea how to do that, but it seems though that I've gone miles on that journey without even realizing it.

I hope that someday soon, friends can come visit (again or for the first time). I'll take you to Chinatown and it'll be fun!