Growing Up Asian in Australia

Growing Up ... in Australia

by Alice Pung (Editor), Sunil Badami (Contributor), Amy Choi (Contributor)

Asian-Australians have often been written about by outsiders, as outsiders. In this collection, compiled by award-winning author Alice Pung, they tell their own stories with verve, courage and a large dose of humour. These are not predictable tales of food, festivals and traditional dress. The food is here in all its steaming glory - but listen more closely to the dinner-table chatter and you might be surprised by what you hear.

Here are tales of leaving home, falling in love, coming out and finding one's feet. A young Cindy Pan vows to win every single category of Nobel Prize. Tony Ayres blows a kiss to a skinhead and lives to tell the tale. Benjamin Law has a close encounter with some angry Australian fauna, and Kylie Kwong makes a moving pilgrimage to her great-grandfather's Chinese village.

Here are well-known authors and exciting new voices, spanning several generations and drawn from all over Australia. In sharing their stories, they show us what it is really like to grow up Asian, and Australian.

Contributors include: Shaun Tan, Jason Yat-Sen Li, John So, Annette Shun Wah, Quan Yeomans, Jenny Kee, Anh Do, Khoa Do, Caroline Tran and many more.

Genres: Nonfiction, Australia, Biography, Memoir, Short Stories, Contemporary, Anthologies

351 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2008

About the author

Alice was born in Footscray, Victoria, a month after her parents Kuan and Kien arrived in Australia. Alice’s father, Kuan - a survivor of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime - named her after Lewis Carroll’s character because after surviving the Killing Fields, he thought Australia was a Wonderland. Alice is the oldest of four - she has a brother, Alexander, and two sisters, Alison and Alina.

Alice grew up in Footscray and Braybrook, and changed high schools five times - almost once every year! These experiences have shaped her as a writer because they taught her how to pay attention to the quiet young adults that others might overlook or miss.

Alice Pung’s first book, Unpolished Gem, is an Australian bestseller which won the Australian Book Industry Newcomer of the Year Award and was shortlisted in the Victorian and NSW Premiers’ Literary awards. It was published in the UK and USA in separate editions and has been translated into several languages including Italian, German and Indonesian.

Alice’s next book, Her Father’s Daughter, won the Western Australia Premier’s Award for Non-Fiction and was shortlisted for the Victorian and NSW Premiers’ Literary awards and the Queensland Literary Awards.

Alice also edited the collection Growing Up Asian in Australia and her writing has appeared in the Monthly, the Age, and The Best Australian Stories and The Best Australian Essays.

Alice is a qualified lawyer and still works as a legal researcher in the area of minimum wages and pay equity. She lives with her husband Nick at Janet Clarke Hall, the University of Melbourne, where she is the Artist in Residence.

Reviews

[claud. · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

The flaws:

Let me start with the biggest one that I found. In the section called "The Folks," the last story is called Are You Different? by someone named Mia Francis, who is a WHITE WOMAN. No, I'm not saying the fact that they let or asked a white woman to contribute to an anthology about ASIAN PEOPLE growing up in Australia is the flaw that I'm referring to (but I'm not saying it's not a flaw either… ahem). How she told the story was the main problem. It's bad enough that she, a white woman, was the one telling HER adopted Filipino son's story, the way she told it was from a white western gaze. OH, and the fact that it was ridden with racial slurs like the N-word! I wanted to SCREAM! "Ricky has lots of good friends at school. They affectionately call each other 'n****r' and 'bro.'" DING DING DING DING! THIS is the warning sign that a white parent is most DEFINITELY racist. WHY would you let your son say racial slurs that are not for him to reclaim? Did you not teach him not to say racial slurs? Did he learn it from YOU? And also, why would you brag about it as if this is a stepping stone for your son in making friends at school? WHY ARE YOU TREATING IT LIKE IT'S A GOOD THING??? AARRRGGHH I was so mad when I read this story!! I don't know HOW or WHY they let a racist white Australian woman with a white saviourism complex contribute to an autobiographical anthology about ASIAN PEOPLE growing up in Australia!! It's not a book about white people adopting Asian kids!! Who is this Mia Francis person and WHAT IS SHE DOING IN A BOOK ABOUT ASIANS??? "Thank you for being our beautiful son" MY ASS. WHY CAN'T I READ ANYTHING WITHOUT A WHITE PERSON RUINING IT AND MAKING IT ABOUT THEM???

*deep breath*

I expected that there would be more stories in this book told by Filipinos. There was only one, and the story wasn't even about the author, who is half-Filipino. Filipinos don't get enough representation ANYWHERE, whether it be movies, TV shows, books. Sigh. It just makes me feel all the more ostracised. :/

Redemption:

I did like the stories, generally. Most of them were the typical "I was bullied in school for being different" "I don't know how to speak my native language" "My parents put too much pressure on me" type of stories, but I did like them, even though they were so similar that they blurred together. There were a good amount that stood out -- from dealing with sexuality to humorous everyday situations that doesn't necessarily have anything to do with them being Asian. Even though I couldn't relate to these stories in a degree of "oh my god, that is exactly what my family is like" "something similar has happened to me before", I still had one big thing in common with these people, and that is we are all Asian immigrants living in Australia. Even though I couldn't relate to their stories on a personal level, I still felt like there was at least some sort of connection between me and these stories, and the people who wrote them who were Asian immigrants like me.

[Kiran Bhat · Rating 4 out of 5]

An extremely unique compilation of 2nd generation Australian voices. My only concern is that the narratives in the collection tend to harp on a similar theme (eg lack of acceptance in a relatively homogenous society). I think a lot few voices could have been selected, and some of the stories or poems could have been more multi-dimensional. Nevertheless, absolutely worthwhile reading. A lot of the essays are very easy to relate to if you grew up in an immigrant context.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am a second generation Australian Chinese, born into a typical working class suburb in Melbourne, raised within a strict yet somewhat liberal (in comparison to my other counterparts) Chinese family environment, so it's no surprise at all that I could relate to so many of the stories in this anthology--the bewildering cultural displacement (the typical "banana" analogy): am I more Chinese than I am Australian? Why can I not be both? Then there are the odd moments when you realise that this is what defines you. How many of us are familiar with the breakdown of familial ties or confronting and overcoming discrimination? I was horrified by Tony Ayres' conflict with a skinhead, incredulous and moved by Jacqui Larkin's chance encounter with a childhood bully in the unlikeliest of places and amused by the "Strine" accounts--how often do we stop and remember those brave, hard-working pioneers who paved the way for us younger generations so that we could have a chance at life and to succeed?

It would have been better to read more about other Asian ethnicities, like people from the Middle East, but this is a comprehensive outlook from people from all walks of life. A good read indeed for Australians of all ethnicities.

[Joyce · Rating 2 out of 5]

Perhaps due to their brevity (only several pages each), the stories in this book present oversimplified analyses of Asian Australian life (terms like "banana", "east meets west" used). I can see the its significance when it was published in 2008, but eleven years on it feels outdated, with many of the narratives perpetuating antiblack sentiment that's rampant in (particularly east) Asian communities.

[Rich Gamble · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve never gave an Australian book 5 stars on Goodreads before so I’m not exaggerating when I gush about how much I love this book. This is a bunch of largely non fiction pieces collected together by Alice Pung who I hadn’t read at the time but is now one of my favourite writers. I usually find multi-author collections to lack flow but this is seamless – Alice has done an excellent job as editor and delivers a great introduction to start things off. My favourite story was ‘Wei Lei & Me’ – touching to the point of tears, the pieces by Benjamin Law are laugh out loud funny and the ‘tall poppies’ section of famous Asian-Australians is a great touch. Seriously, there are so many great new voices here competing for attention it’s enough in itself to justify abandoning our government’s embarrassingly inhumane treatment of refugees and migrants for the wealth they have brought to our country. As an ‘Anglo’ Australian I feel I can identify with these stories both as the close-minded kid at school giving grief to those he doesn’t understand for no good reason and as a young Australian finding his feet growing up in a great country.

[Lauren]

tbr note: Considering that I'm writing my next novel about a biracial Japanese Australian character, I bought this with no questions asked, purely for research purposes. I can see that this was published over ten years ago, though. Because of that, I'm curious to see which pieces of writing, if any, speak to currently-developing topics like BIPOC erasure and multiracial identity. On the other hand, I'm looking forward to reading more about Asian experiences in Australia, as that's something I want to learn more about as a whole.

[Amber · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found many of the stories far too brief ! One was only 2 pages .......I didn't feel that the stories were linked in a cohesive way

[Richa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

[C.X. Blake · Rating 2 out of 5]

wym i relate to this book . wym i grew up asian in australia. thats cringe. anyways, good parallels with Gattaca bc the essays i wrote on these guys slayed so hard

[Initially NO · Rating 2 out of 5]

Most of the life-stories are aimed at Secondary School students, so, it's not a great read if you're looking for something more substantial than teen angst, fart jokes, identity issues, of (for the most part) privileged 1st generation or 2nd generation families that have migrated to Melbourne from overseas.

Some of the short memoirs are well worth reading employing symbolism and maturity that adult readers are looking for (ie The Water Buffalo), and, I'd argue that Secondary School students are looking for as well (helps in that essay). There is also some brilliant cartoon strips. Love them. Actually, a whole book of these cartoon strips would great!

The book comes across as teacher's curriculum style, with attempt to interest 'youth'. Way too many typical school kid issues that are not even unique to migrants, yet it is portrayed as though they are, which makes the authors look ignorant of what is going on in their midst. The interviews section doesn't quite do much more than a bland short biography does. No doubt this book replaces 'The Strength of Tradition' (Holt) that was the 1980s-90s curriculum, which was also somewhat disappointing, because of the editing style that dumbs it down for students.

Time for a new book, as this one is, as a whole, is really, really out-of-date. I'm surprised it has been reprinted so much. But it has a 'market' for curriculum (I'm not in favour of forced markets). I cannot hope the next one will be better, if the market is 'curriculum style.'

There are some cultural insensitivities as well, things that should never be said in Australia, and a sprinkling of psychiatrisms that are horribly discrediting to the authors (and re-traumatising to Australians that have suffered that). Publishers and teachers really need to think about what they condone.

[Nina {ᴡᴏʀᴅs ᴀɴᴅ ᴡᴀᴛᴇʀ} · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this. SO much that I now have a crick in my neck for leaning sideways just to read the pages (I could have just flattened the book out in front of me and read it, but for some reason, it was easier to read it sideways--so bad for the neck!)

Alice Pung did a wonderful job collecting and editing this anthology of short stories about asians growing up in Australia. It is very insightful, and being one of those asians, I can definitely relate to the majority of the stories contained.

[Bee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Being second generation Australian myself, there's a bit of a disconnect with this book - not as much of the embarrassment, not as much of the isolation - but what it really captured was that feeling of not quite belonging and that lack of connection with my cultural heritage.

If someone asks me where I'm from, do I say Australia, because I am, or do I say Singapore because that's where one generation of my family is from? And does insisting on Australian make me a brave struggler against racism or does it just mean I'm denying my history?

I'm still not sure.

[Sarah Y · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this volume, almost for the first time, I am greeted by a babble, a symphony, a loosely knitted collage of voices, memories, experiences which so closely recall my own. I have never laughed and cried or smiled so much from reading a single collection before, it is like I am reading fragments of my own story - dreams, guilt, shame, excitement, the bizarre sense of being between two worlds and yet belonging to neither. A really wonderful read.

[Jessie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great anthology from this series. As an Asian who migrated to Australia myself, it feels nice to be seen and heard, and to share the same stories as many others. Some laughs, some tears, and some triggers. Thank you for sharing so generously.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

All the feels.

[Tony · Rating 4 out of 5]

Important stories of intersectionality and for representation. Although some were a bit bland and oversimplistic in peddling a fatalistic pessimism, perhaps as a result of being collated in 2008

[Calum · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had so much fun reading this book.
And i learnt a lot.
I feel like I am more aware of the difficulties experienced when multiple cultures demand your allegiance. I also thought about identity and how it is influenced by culture:
What exactly defines us?
Our actions?
Our heritage?
Or ourselves?

All brilliant questions which this book left me with.

I swear I felt all emotions while reading this.
There were literal laugh out loud moments many times. There were also moments when I shut the book and just had to take time out to process the horror I witnessed.

I look forward to revisiting this book.

A glorious anthology. Nothing less.

[Ruby Soho · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great collection of thoughtfully written memoirs. Unputdownable.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was one of the books I studied in Year 12 English. Its the only school book I've reread parts of since I finished studying it. Its relatable, and whilst some ideas seem farfetched or hard to believe (harsh expectations, consequences), the reality is that many people in today's society do face those hardships. Its great to see these kinds of experiences are replicated in these short stories, demonstrating not only how these events affected the individuals, but also how they have learnt and grown from them.

This is also one of the very few books (both fiction and non-fiction) where I quite like the prologue. Yes, these stories capture the "model minority" at the core, and the adversity they face as a result. Yes, its a book I'm glad I've read growing up. One that I will pass on to my friends who would also be able to relate to it.

"I hope that these loose themes will help bring to the forefront questions of identity, place and perspective. Because the stories deal so insightfully with the challenges of coming to terms with multiple identities, they move beyond crude labels such as "bananas" and "coconuts". We are not fruit (or power sockets) we are people. These are not sociological essays, but deeply personal stories told with great literary skill. These stories show us not only what it is like to grow up Asian in Australia, but also what it means to be Asian-Australian. And this is exactly the sort of book I wish I had read when I was growing up."

Thanks Alice.

[Nisma · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't think I can fairly rate this book as a whole. I'll admit, guiltily, that when I first randomly read a few stories out of it a few years ago, I must have have somehow picked out the angsty-est of the angsty-est stories out of the whole lot. This is what gave me negative preconceived notions, so I was kinda against the book from the start.

THAT BEING SAID, I admit now not all the stories are that bad. I mean, none of them are that fantastic, but I think quite a few of them had a certain, relatable charm. Admittedly, with all of them stuck together like this, a lot of them started to blur together - too many kids working in shops, being embarassed of their heritage... blah di blah. That's mean of me, though, 'cause they're only writing from experience and such...

... agh. Okay, on a personal level, I don't think it's fair to judge the stories at all. Entertainment value, a little less. Perhaps if I was reading this over an extended period of time, I could have enjoyed some stories a bit better.

* I swear I hate reading two books at once Dx *

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Whilst I absolutely adore Alice's "Unpolished Gem", as an Asian-Australian myself, I suffer a little from what I call the "ethnic cringe", so I was a little worried when this came out. However, Asian-Australian writing seems to be emerging as a distinct voice in recent years, and the publication of this anthology is an important one.

And at the heart of this anthology is the sheer diversity of stories, perhaps indicating that the Asian commonality is perhaps a tenuous one, constructed more by the society that we grow up in, rather than in our own identity and voice.

Of course, as an anthology, there is a wide range of storytelling, and some are stronger than others. But be they funny, sad, political, poignant or hopeful, these are all very real stories, and deserve to be read.

[Oanh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have a piece of my writing in this collection, so I am not objective.

As with all collections, there are good and less-good, but overall, the collection is great and it's mere existence is A Very Good Thing.

[Erika · Rating 4 out of 5]

A sprawling collection of experiences in bite-sized pieces. Funny, insightful, and valuable.

[Merideth Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of these stories were very amusing, some sad and many were insightful. However this collection couls have done with some severe editing. Sometimes a point is better made with less information.

[Ash ♡ · Rating 1 out of 5]

worst book ever... read it for school and it has been completely ruined because of that

[Helen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some terrific anecdotes. The themes of growing up Asian are universal. Everyone just wants their parents to be proud of them.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE FEELS!

I always come back to this story..my mind can't help but wander and remember when I come across other similiar stories, especially of Asian Australians like me

[Hayley McManus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great collection of australian stories. Some were gut-wrenchingly sad, while others were very funny and insightful.

[Alex Rankine · Rating 4 out of 5]

a lot of these were a bit too short in form to be as fully effective as they could be, but overall really interesting!!

[Susan Austin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this collection of diverse stories. It wasn’t a page turner by any means but they were all different enough to shed new light on life experiences and cultural intersections.