English Comp. II: Amy Tan, A Pair of Tickets

Amy Tan's "A Pair of Tickets" is a great story about the personal struggles of a young woman to find out who she truly is and fully embrace her heritage. Jing-Mei, the narrator and main character of the story, is a Chinese-American who is born in America. At the beginning of the story during part of a conversation between Jing-Mei and her mother, we see Jing-Mei fervently deny that she has any Chinese in her at all. At the end of this conversation, we see a bit of foreshadowing when Jing-Mei's mother tells her that her Chinese ancestry is "in her blood, waiting to be let go." After Jing-Mei's mother dies, her family receives a letter from her half-sisters in China asking about their mother. After responding to the letter, Jing-Mei's family decides to travel to China to visit family. To make a long story short, Jing-Mei eventually meeets her sisters for the first time and realizes and embraces the fact the she is Chinese.