The Blue Bucket

I was 11—just a little girl playing on the swing set. I saw the picnic table, a white mother and her daughter were walking toward me. They were getting closer and closer as their baritone steps bared down on the rough pavement. In the blink of an eye, the pair was standing directly above me, a maddening expression crossing their faces. I was scared to speak, to move, to do anything under the gaze of their terrifying expressions. And then she spoke, quietly at first but her voice increased in volume as it continued. I didn’t understand what was happening. What had I done to stir up the unbearable emotion this mother held? As she went on, my ears eventually blocked out her empty accusations and pointed glare that was thrown at me. A pounding began in my ears, increasing my heartbeat as tears streamed down my face. Who was this lady with the pale face and blue eyes that contained an indescribable desire to hurt me with her words? To knock me down until I had nothing left but the thick stream of tears threatening to pour down my face. I don’t recall much about the conversation, only that I had said nothing in return. A few phrases like go back and you’re not welcome here stood out from the rest.

It was no surprise that the cause of the woman’s hate was due to my Asian background. In a place like Forest, Virginia, I inexplicitly stood out from the rest. I don’t and never will blame the white woman for lashing out at me. She didn’t know any better. I was just the girl with the Asian face that was conveniently there to consume her anger. The years went on and Winter turned into Spring, Spring into Summer. Hate was everywhere, in every crevice and hidden nook, waiting for me to cross its path. As everyone went about their day, I began to lose track of all the hate that I had experienced. All those times I noticed the way cashiers glared at my parents when they opened their mouths. The way teachers and classmates would make backhand comments about my Asian heritage and culture. All those memories were stored in the back of my head in a wastebin I called the “The Blue Bucket.” My parents only turned a blind eye to all the times I attempted to start a conversation based on the subject. They said, “You should be thankful for even living here, to begin with, everything we’ve sacrificed for you.” I wasn’t so sure.

In March 2020, everything took a turn for the worse. I still remember the shock as I sat online at my desk, reading the morning newspaper. Thousands of hate incidents directed toward East Asians due to the pandemic were increasing in a matter of days. Inside, it felt like flames erupting into a wildfire that had no intention of being contained. Incidents that the police ignored and which my parents ceased to mention at the dinner table. All the pent-up fury that I contained from the past threatened to explode. I took to the internet, attempting to find a way to extinguish the wildfire spreading freely within me. On that fateful day, I discovered the organization that was the hope I had been searching for all these years. I let out a sigh of relief as the vision of Stop AAPI Hate appeared on the screen. The nonprofit organization was founded on March 19th, 2020, just as the pandemic had come into full swing. It was dedicated to tracking incidents of hate or discrimination toward Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the United States. I couldn’t believe it! All those years of suffering in the shadows and holding back my tears were coming to an end! With my newly found support and community, I set out to address the racism that was flowing through my life every second of the day. My discovery of the organization welcomed not only a sense of belonging but also a relief after failing to address the racism eating up all aspects of my life for so many years. That very day, I decided that the only way to address this hate was to step out of the shadows and take a stand for my birth country. I was no longer ashamed of who I am.