A Quote by Amy Tan

I used to think that my mother got into arguments with people because they didn't understand her English, because she was Chinese. — © Amy Tan
I used to think that my mother got into arguments with people because they didn't understand her English, because she was Chinese.
I couldn't understand her [my mother's] wiring, all the time. I couldn't understand how she denied herself pleasure and enjoyment in life. As my career got successful and I wanted to do things for her, she wasn't able to allow them because she just didn't work that way. It was always that. It wasn't necessarily ugly, just complicated.
Sia's talent lies in her ability to really understand what pop is. And I think because she used to write for a lot of people, she understands different styles.
My father was English. He date-raped my mother so she's hated English men ever since. You know my boyfriend's English, and I'm, uh, I'm half-English, which she's never been real happy about. If she finds out I'm dating someone English, she'll ah, think I' turning my back on her and becoming a foreigner.' Cathy, that's the stupidest reason I've ever heard.
Yet some of my friends tell me they understand 50 percent of what my mother says. Some say they understand 80 to 90 percent. Some say they understand none of it, as if she were speaking pure Chinese. But to me, my mother's English is perfectly clear, perfectly natural. It's my mother tongue. Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery. That was the language that helped shape the way I saw things, expressed things, made sense of the world
Hillary Clinton does not have a connection with her voters like Donald Trump has with his. She's got people who like her, and she's got support because she's a woman, and she has support because she's Mrs. Clinton. She has support because she's a Democrat.
I was so glad that I was able to use my skills of speaking Chinese in a film where the character is Chinese, because sometimes you actually don't get to do that. Especially in Hollywood blockbusters today because they want everyone around the world to understand what is happening, so they usually want you to speak English.
The woman who fights against her father still has the possibility of leading an instinctive, feminine existence, because she rejects only what is alien to her. But when she fights against the mother she may, at the risk of injury to her instincts, attain to greater consciousness, because in repudiating the mother she repudiates all that is obscure, instinctive, ambiguous, and unconscious in her own nature.
My father was a dark-skinned brother, but my mother was a very fair-skinned lady. From what I understand, she was Creole; we think her people originally came from New Orleans. She looked almost like a white woman, which meant she could pass - as folks used to say back then. Her hair was jet-black. She was slim and very attractive.
When you're young your mother shields you from the world because she thinks you're too young to understand, and when she's old you shield her because she's too old to understand - or to have any more understanding inflicted upon her. The curve of life goes: want to know, know, don't want to know.
Having a mother who has had cancer and fought through it and at times used cannabis to you know fight off nausea and whatnot. I mean it's not really her thing, but there were times when she needed it and the idea that you can't have it because it's an illegal drug, but OxyContin is legal. That's you know that's just insane to a level that I think most people understand.
My mom was a house mom when we were growing up, and that's all I knew about her. I had a really big disconnect with her because she only spoke Chinese. Her English isn't good at all. Being a typical second-generation, you have the basic stuff, but I never had a deep conversation with her.
I certainly enjoyed having my sister, because when she came I felt a certain responsibility to help her fit in, and help her learn English. I wanted her to play with all my toys. I was actually, I think, really scary to her, because I had so much energy.
Jeremy used to hate it when she was younger because someone in her class told her redheads were freaks of nature.But our mother told her that redheads were genetically more courageous than other people and that she should always where her hair long,like a wariors badge of honor.
My mom and I were super tight. I think she really wanted me to be an artist, you know? She used to like to tell people she wanted to be Beethoven's mother. That was her thing. She wanted to be the mother of this person.
I always tell people, if a young girl read "Beloved" as her first novel, she'd have to kill either herself or her mother, because in "Beloved" you have a mother killing their children. This is not something a child would accept very easily. And would never understand.
My mother was a great typist. She said she loved to type because it gave her time to think. She was a secretary for an insurance company. She was a poor girl; she'd grown up in an orphanage, and she went to a business college - and then worked to put her brothers through school.
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