Amy Tan's "A pair of tickets" character analysis

Trevor Bryan
Professor Bisirri
ENC 1102
September 24, 2013
Character Analysis of Jing Mei In the short story “A Pair of Tickets” by Amy Tan, Tan portrays the story of an Americanized Chinese woman trying to reconnect with her culture. In the story, the character Jing Mei is conflicted over the loss of her mother and the feeling that they never fully connected with each other. For years she resented her heritage, but as part of her life passes, she feels the need to reconnect and learn who she truly is. Throughout the story, we see the struggle of Jing trying to find her place in family from believing she didn’t belong to finally feeling accepted. In the story, Jing Mei changes the way she views herself in her cultural family from being an outcast in the family to finding out her place and feeling accepted in it. Being immersed in the American culture her entire life, Jing Mei believes that her Chinese heritage was only through her blood. Since the early age of 15, Jing Mei had denied her heritage. Mei states“…and all my Caucasian friends agreed: I was about as Chinese as they were. But my mother had studied at a famous nursing school in Shanghai and she said she knew all about genetics. So there was no doubt in her mind, whether I agreed or not: Once you are born Chinese, you cannot help but feel and think Chinese” (Tan 147). This statement highlights the fact that Jing felt like she was Americanized. She lived in a cultural home but felt as though she was connected to any of it. She believed herself to be a normal American child with just the physical features of a Chinese woman. In a way she resented it, Jing Mei describes this feeling like seeing “myself transforming like a werewolf, a mutant tag of DNA suddenly triggered, replicating itself insidiously into a syndrome, a cluster of telltale Chinese behaviors,” (147). The slight chance of becoming Chinese was a fear of hers. She viewed it as becoming a monster. Jing Mei was accustomed to the American lifestyle, the thought of changed scared her as it would to most people. She saw how her mother acted and lived her life and that was something she did not want to be part of. She didn’t want to be a regular stereotypical Chinese woman; she wanted to be her own person. Jing Mei describes her mother’s characteristics as “haggling with store owners, pecking her mouth with a toothpick in public, being colorblind to the fact that lemon yellow and pale pink are not good combinations for the winter” (147). The way her mom acted was embarrassing to her, it put the image of all Chinese people being embarrassing inside her mind. However, it all changes with the loss of her mother.
After the loss of her mother, Jing Mei feels an obligation to her mom to learn more about her culture and family. With an incomplete feeling towards the relationship she had with her mother and that side of her family, Jing Mei and her father take a trip to China. This trip symbolizes the gap inside the relationship Jing Mei has with her Chinese heritage. There’s a void inside her, and it’s something she desperately wants to fill. However, Jing Mei resembles someone who is scared of something new. The entire experience is a freighting thought for her. She is going to a foreign place, to meet people she’s never met but are considered family. The author describes the meeting “as an awkward feeling” (151). Her father is described as “crying openly, laughing at the time...his eyes widen, his face opens up and he smiles like a pleased little boy.” (151). Whereas Jing Mei states “I’m afraid to feel their joy,” (151). This is evidence of how uncomfortable she was in this situation. She didn’t feel like she was able to be part of their happiness.
After arriving in china, Jing Mei has a desire to find out more about her family and learn more about herself. In the story, it’s very clear that Jing Mei feels isolated. The author makes this clear from this statement “…speak the Mandarin dialect from their childhood, but the rest of the family speaks only the Cantonese of their village. I understand only Mandarin but can’t speak it that well.” (151). The language barrier makes it very difficult for Jing Mei to further connect to her family. Jing describes it as “if I were in the United Nation and the translators had run amok.”(151). Jing Mei had made a colossal commitment to go visit her family in China, however by going overseas, she begins to feel even further from her Chinese background than when she left. This conflict is highlighted when she and her father arrive at their hotel. Jing Mei had prepaid for 35 dollar rooms, trying to prove that she can live without luxuries to the rest of her family, however when they arrive to the hotel, it’s a massive lavish skyscraper. The rooms stocked with American foods, leading Jing Mei to ask the question “Is this communist China?” (153).
From her trip in china, Jing Mei comes to the realization that the way to find herself is through her family and culture. After a feeling of disappointment from her time in China, Jing Mei confides in her father. Her father then tells her the story of her sisters. Having this desire to connect more with her heritage, Jing Mei states, “…tell me [the story] in Chinese” (155). This action allows the audience to realize that Jing Mei is beginning to connect and find her place within the family. Although it was previously stated that she didn’t understand the language that well, she felt confident enough in herself and her culture to here the story in Chinese. Here she realizes that she has been part of the family the entire time and that trying to fit in with the family doesn’t affect who she is. When she finally meets her sisters, she is ecstatic to meet them and wants a photo to commemorate the occasion. After observing it she realizes that just because they don’t look like her mother, it doesn’t make them excluded from the family. It’s here that she realizes that she can find herself just from whom her family is; she spent most of the trip trying to relate to them when in fact she was always with them through family.
Reflecting back onto the days of her childhood, Jing Mei finally realizes the message her mother tried to convey to her. Her mother made it clear, “[Your Chinese heritage]… is in your blood, waiting to be let go” (147). Jing Mei’s mother knew one day Jing would embrace her Chinese culture. Although for years she repressed her heritage and backed away from her mother, her journey made her recognize her family was all she needed to find herself. At the end of the story Jing Mei is able to see her mother in herself. Even though her mother has passed, Jing Mei feels closer to her than ever.
Jing Mei begins the trip with a feeling of sorrow for not knowing who she really was. She took the trip to try and connect with her mother even after her passing to find herself in her home country. Even through language barriers and considering herself an outcast, Jing Mei was able to realize that if she really wanted to find herself, she could do it through her family. The one she was once embarrassed of turned out to be the only thing she needed. She was finally able to overcome her conflict with herself and accept the person she was.

Works Cited
Tan, Amy. "A Pair of Tickets." Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and
Writing. Ed. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 12th ed. New York. Pearson, 2013. 146-159.
Print.

Cited: Tan, Amy. "A Pair of Tickets." Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. Ed. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 12th ed. New York. Pearson, 2013. 146-159. Print.