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The Joy Luck Club

by Amy Tan

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In The Joy Luck Club, how do Suyuan's expectations of Kweilin compare to her actual experience?

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Suyuan's time in Kweilin is pivotal to the book since her experiences there inspire the very first Joy Luck Club, and her hasty departure from the city greatly affects not only her own life's journey, but Jing-Mei's as well. In the Kweilin stories she frequently tells while Jing-Mei is growing up, Suyan reveals that everyone in China once dreamed of Kweilin's beauty, which she herself imagined as beautiful and green with shockingly tall peaks topped by white mists. What she instead found upon arrival were peaks akin to "giant fried fish heads trying to jump out of a vat of oil," flanked by "shadows of another fish, and then another and another." When the clouds moved, "the hills would suddenly become monstruous elephants marching slowly," and although Kweilin looks nothing like she pictured, Suyuan nonetheless describes it as an elusive place containing "things so strange and beautiful you can't ever imagine them."

Although Kweilin's ethereal beauty both differs from and exceeds her expectations, the family's relocation is inspired by the safety and security it promises to Suyuan and the babies while her husband is stationed in Chungking. Overcrowding, poor sanitary conditions, and the imminent threat of war greatly dampen Suyuan's spirit, and she creates the Joy Luck club with a group of like-minded acquaintances to intentionally celebrate life and fight despair. Suyuan reveals the following to Jing-Mei, demonstrating how resilient the human spirit can be amidst depressing circumstances:

We feasted, we laughed, we played games, lost and won, we told the best stories. And each week, we could hope to be lucky. That hope was our only joy. And that's how we came to call our little parties Joy Luck Club.

Suyuan's initial optimism regarding Kweilin is tempered by the daily reality of life there, and the illusion of security is fully shattered when she is warned to flee Kweilin immediately due to imminent Japanese invasion. The grueling journey on foot with valuables in hand and twin babies wrapped and carried in scarves ultimately robs Suyuan of her health, forcing her to leave the babies on the side of the road in hopes they will be cared for by benevolent strangers. This event tragically colors the remainder of Suyuan's life, and upon her death, Jing-Mei undertakes an outstanding responsibility to reunite with her lost sisters in order to honor their mother's wishes and memory.

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Suyuan had always thought that Kweilin would be a beautiful place, with "jagged peaks lining a carving river, with magic moss greening the banks".  What she found was a city whose shabby surrounding peaks "looked like giant fried fish heads trying to jump out of a vat of oil".  But the reality of the ugly city was not the worst letdown for Suyuan.  Her husband had brought Suyuan and their children to Kweilin because he thought they would be safe from the war there.  They did not anticipate that the city would be crowded with refugees, "a city of leftovers  mixed together".  The city was dirty, and the people, who had come from all over, did not get along.  Kweilin, with its squalid living conditions, was not beautiful in any way at all.

The worst thing about Kweilin, though, was that it wasn't even the safe haven they had believed it to be.  The Japanese had penetrated the hills surrounding the city, and the citizens had to take shelter regularly from the bombs which rained from above.

(Chapter 1 - "The Joy Luck Club")

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