the joy luck club, like mother like daughter

People’s identities come from their backgrounds; from their connections with the past and their predecessors. They often resemble their parents, even in ways they criticize and disapprove. When trying to renounce this connection, they often realize that it takes more than just denying it, because it is a part of them and it can’t be taken away. In the novel, The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, three American-born Chinese girls; Waverly Jong, Rose Hsu and Jing-mei Woo constantly feel embarrassed or criticized by their Chinese mothers. Ultimately, they recognize that they have more similarities than differences to their mothers, and that these similarities alone can’t be removed because they are not just on the surface, they are formed in their bones, deep inside of them, in their characters and personalities.
Early in life, young people usually feel humiliated by their parents, ashamed of who their parents are and the way that they act. Growing up as a chess prodigy, Waverly Jong is highly praised by her mother, Lindo, who is always bragging about her. Lindo used to take her every Saturday to the market, until Waverly told her mother that she preferred if her mother didn’t go around “telling everybody that [she was her] daughter¨ and using her “to show off” (99). Waverly feels embarrassed by the way her mom tells everyone that she is her daughter, she doesn’t realize that her mom is only expressing how proud she is of her. Waverly misunderstands her mother. She thinks that she is competing with everyone else to see who has the best daughter and that she is only using her. But Children don’t just grow in the opposite direction of their parents, and then later as adults, grow up to be the same way as their parents. Instead, young people miss the similar traits and shared characteristics between them and their parents. They often deny them. But at some point, they can see that they are made of the same and have similar nature as them. In Waverly’s mother-daughter