I was born in Hong Kong and immigrated to the United States with my family when I was 4. I spent most of my childhood in Chicago. My elementary school had no program in English as a second language, so I was placed in a class for students with speech impediments.
English is my second language, but in Hong Kong, they don't know that I'm from China. They think I'm from Hollywood because all the films they see are from here. China and Hong Kong are very different places, but they're starting to merge. Still the culture is very different.
I went to elementary school in L.A. I was born in L.A. My mother was from Redondo Beach. My father was French. He died six months before I was born, so my mother went home. I was born there. Not the childhood that most people think. Middle-class, raised by my mother. Single mom.
Hong Kong people say Hong Kong needs to preserve its uniqueness. I say Hong Kong's uniqueness is in its diversity, its tolerance of difference cultures... China does not want to see Hong Kong in decline. I have full confidence in its future.
I remember reading 'The Grapes of Wrath' in high school in 1983. My family had immigrated to the U.S. three years before, and I had spent the better part of the first two years learning English. John Steinbeck's book was the first book I read in English where I had an 'Aha!' moment, namely in the famed turtle chapter.
When I look at 'Fallen Angels,' I realize it is not a film that is truly about Hong Kong. It's more like my Hong Kong fantasy. I want Hong Kong to be quiet, with less people.
Hong Kong compatriots will surely display great love for the motherland and for Hong Kong and take it as their utmost honor to maintain long-term prosperity and stability in Hong Kong and safeguard the fundamental interests of the country.
Princeton has made an enormous difference in my life, and I am delighted to be able to express my gratitude in such a tangible way. The generosity of earlier generations of donors made it possible for me to attend Princeton as a young student from Hong Kong, and I have always wanted to do all I could to assure that students in the future.. from the United States and around the world.. will have the same kinds of opportunities I had to learn from faculty members who are leaders in their fields at a university that remains second to none in its commitment to teaching.
I hope Hong Kong isn't just named Hong Kong but it can still be the Hong Kong we desire.
My father describes himself as a Pole of Lithuanian descent. At Southampton University, he read aeronautical engineering and then the family moved to Hong Kong - this was before I was born - where he designed aeroplanes. Back in the U.K., he worked as a civil engineer, although every spare minute was spent researching his family's history.
I have had many opportunities to flee HK, but I would rather stay and fight the United States government in the courts, because I have faith in Hong Kong's rule of law.
I am home grown St. Lucian. Born in 1980 I have spent most of my life on this island. Apart from the few summers I spent in the United States I spent most of my time in my homeland.
When I lived in Hong Kong, I felt that Hong Kong is my family.
My father, a math professor in Hong Kong, worked as an electrical engineer here. My mother was an art teacher, but once we came to the United States, she went back to school and became certified as a special-education teacher.
The life expectancy in Hong Kong is among the highest in the world. You can come to only one conclusion: we have the most environmentally friendly place for people, for executives, for Hong Kong people to live.
There was the Cultural Revolution just over the border, and Hong Kong felt quite dodgy. My younger brother's wife actually swam from China to Hong Kong to escape. I realised in the '60s that I had to get out.
My mother was born in a refugee camp in Germany before the family immigrated to western Canada. They were able to get visas thanks to my grandfather's older sister, who had immigrated between the wars.