A PAIR OF TICKET

by Amy Tan

Jing-mei is on a train to China, traveling with her seventy-

two-year-old father, Canning Woo. As the train enters
Shenzhen, China, Jing-mei begins to "feel Chinese." Their
first stop will be Guangzhou. Like her father, Jing-mei is
weeping for joy. After her mother's death, a letter arrived
from China from her mother's twin daughters from her
first marriage. These were the two children whom she
was forced to abandon on the side of the road in 1944.
Jing-mei's father asked Auntie Lindo to write back to the
girls and tell them that their mother was dead. Instead,
Auntie Lindo took the letter to the Joy Luck Club.
Together, the women answered the letter, signing
Suyuan Woo's name to it. Jing-mei agrees that she
should be the one to tell her half-sisters about their
mother's death. But after dreaming about the scene
many times, she begs Auntie Lindo to write a letter to the
sisters explaining that their mother is dead. Auntie Lindo
does so.
The train pulls into the station, and the visitors are met
by Canning's great-aunt. The reunion is emotional. Other
relatives join them. Jing-mei wins her young cousin Lili
over with instant photographs from her Polaroid camera.
They soon arrive at a magnificent hotel, much grander
than Jing-mei had expected. Jing-mei is anxious to have
her first real Chinese feast; however, the native-born
Chinese family decides that they want to eat American —
hamburgers, French fries, and apple pie à la mode in the
hotel room.
Late that night, Canning explains that his wife's name,
"Suyuan," has two different meanings, depending on
how it is written. Written one way, it means "Long-
Cherished Wish"; written another way, it means "Long-
Held Grudge." He further explains that Jing-mei's name
means that she is, first, a pure essence, and second, that
she is a younger sister. Her name makes her the essence
of her two sisters. He then tells her the story of how her
mother, Suyuan, abandoned Jing-mei's half-sisters.

Suyuan walked for three days, hoping to escape the

Japanese invasion. Her hands began to bleed from the
weight of her heavy possessions and that of her
daughters. She dropped her possessions one by one,
continuing to trudge on until she was delirious with pain
and fever. She finally fell by the side of the road. Despite
her entreaties, no one would take the babies.

Having no other choice, she stuffed jewelry under the

shirt of one baby, money under the shirt of the other.
Then she put in family pictures and a note and left her
daughters to see if she could find food. Soon she fainted
and awoke in the back of a truck filled with sick people
who were being tended by American missionaries. When
she arrived in Chungking, she learned that her husband
was dead. She met Canning Woo in the hospital.

The abandoned babies were found by a kindly peasant

couple, who raised the girls as their own. When the girls
were eight years old, their foster parents tried to find
their parents. They located the address of the children's
home, but now it was a factory. Meanwhile, Suyuan and
Canning had returned to try to find the girls, but their
attempts proved fruitless. In 1949, they left for America,
but Suyuan never abandoned hope. After she died, a
schoolmate saw the twins in a department store and
tried to contact Suyuan in America.
Jing-mei sees her sisters as she enters the terminal. At
first, they look just like her mother. Later, she sees no
trace of her mother — yet the women still look familiar.
She sees in them the part of her that is Chinese. Her
father takes a picture of the three girls; they look at the
Polaroid photograph, and they see that together, they all
look like their mother.