Anne Huang and Nancy Mackay

[00:07] NANCY MCKAY: My name is Nancy McKay. I am 63 years old. Today is April 2, 2009, and we're here in the StoryCorps booth at the Jewish Contemporary Museum in San Francisco, and I'm going to be interviewing Ann Huang, my friend and colleague from way back.

[00:26] ANN HUANG: My name is Ann Huang. I am 44 years old. Today is April 2, 2009. We're in San Francisco, and I'm here having a conversation with my good friend Nancy McKay.

[00:43] NANCY MCKAY: So, Ann after all this time, we're finally together for this second interview. I'm excited and I'm really glad that the StoryCorps people are taking care of the recording technology so I don't have to worry about that, although it is a little intimidating. Do you think? I.

[00:58] ANN HUANG: Well, as I said in the beginning of interview, even though I've done StoryCorps interview before, I always forget how big the microphone actually looks. But it's great to be with you, and I've been looking forward to our conversation for quite a long time.

[01:16] NANCY MCKAY: Yes, it has been a long time. So I'm glad. I'm so glad. We had an interview almost exactly two years ago, and we talked over lunch. How poignant that date was, too, because so much else has happened in your life. And today I want to talk a lot about, I guess the story behind the story is what brought us together through oral history. Why oral history is important to you and important to me, which is why I think that we became so close so quickly. But to find out more about your life, but to put the whole thing in context, start with the beginning of your life, even though we're really going to talk about your more recent journey, if you could talk about when and where you were born and a little bit of the stage where growing up in Taiwan.

[02:09] ANN HUANG: I was born in 1964 in Jayi, Taiwan. And let's see.

[02:20] NANCY MCKAY: For example, I'd like to hear something about your family makeup and your household, extended family, big family, daily life when you were a little, small child.

[02:32] ANN HUANG: Yeah, I was born into a small immediate family, mom, dad, me, and my brother two years younger. However, I grew up with a very large extended family. So I really felt my siblings, I had more than one sibling. It felt like I had more than one sibling because I grew up with four cousins. So five of us, we were just the best, best friends. I had other cousins as well, which I saw semi regularly. So really it was a very large family. Both of my parents have five siblings, so we saw all of those relatives fairly regularly, as well as grandparents and distant relatives. So it was a very close knit community that had been in the same geographic location for a long time. And on top of that, the environment that I was born into, Washington, Taiwan, was under martial law from 1948 to 1985. I was born in 1964. So Taiwan was under the thick of martial law. So since our last interview in 2006, I have come to realize the political environment of the country quite oppressively affected my family almost on daily basis. But as a child, when I was living in Taiwan, I didn't realize. So that was the environment that I grew up in, which eventually really helped my parents make the decision to move to this country, to leave that politically oppressive environment.

[04:20] NANCY MCKAY: Do you think it was mostly a political decision for them to move to the US?

[04:25] ANN HUANG: Not mostly.

[04:26] NANCY MCKAY: Particularly since your family was so close knit, your extended family was so close knit.

[04:31] ANN HUANG: Yeah, I think we're living in the Bay Area, where we see so many immigrant families. And I think for most human beings to leave their homeland, the incentive has to be very, very strong. So there's the push and pull. The push environment is that you have to have a very strong reason to leave your environment. And the pole is the country that you move to has to have a very strong draw. So for our family, it was, you know, on my mom's side, both of the grandparents were political prisoners, and having come from that background, they. Oh, and my uncle had just left for Japan because he was. There was sort of rumor in the community was going to be put in jail. And then one of our distant cousins was already put in jail for writing a letter to the president. So my parents were just worried that about our future. So there's that. As well as my mom, I didn't find this out. A few years ago. My mom felt really stifled as an independently minded woman in Taiwan. So she came from a family where she was really encouraged to be herself. Her mother was the first female dentist in Taiwan, after all. But she was in this cultural environment, and she also married into this family that was really traditional. And to give you a small example, how traditional my father's family was, all of my father's male, his brothers all became doctors and went to. Were very highly educated for their generation, but none of his sisters were allowed to have education beyond high school. So my mom wanted to escape from a culturally oppressive environment. And I think they were rightfully or wrongfully seduced by the allure of USA.

[06:49] NANCY MCKAY: Were there in your family? Was it tv or magazines or what kinds of influences from the United States were there that possibly could have drawn them? Or would you have known that as a child or maybe just talk.

[07:02] ANN HUANG: Maybe people mainly talk again. Living under martial law, there was not a whole lot of outside influence. At that time. People from Taiwan did not really travel for tourism. It was not allowed, and people did not have economic means to do so. My brother reminded me two weeks ago that back in the 1960s, per capita income of Taiwan equal per capita income at that time of Tanzania. Wow. Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. Anyway, so a lot of talk and some tv. And if you can imagine american tv life, how it mustn't appear to folks living in, quote, unquote, third world country. How appealing.

[07:55] NANCY MCKAY: Do you remember any examples of tv programs that we might know?

[07:59] ANN HUANG: Yes, I do. I remember my brother and I watched Donnie and Marie every week. Captain and Tenille. And you know what was also really popular in Taiwan right after we left the love boat? Starsky and Hutch. Oh, and Dallas. So imagine watching Dallas.

[08:19] NANCY MCKAY: So that was your impression of the United States, was the love boat in Dallas?

[08:24] ANN HUANG: Yeah. And after coming to this country, so many people I met who were from other countries said, oh, yeah, that's why we came here, because we thought America was that. And even now, comparing a typical middle class family home here, comparing that living environment to many other households in other countries, we still have so much wealth. Really? In this country?

[08:53] NANCY MCKAY: Yes.

[08:53] ANN HUANG: Yes, for sure.

[08:56] NANCY MCKAY: Great. How old were you when you immigrated?

[09:00] ANN HUANG: I came when I was twelve.

[09:01] NANCY MCKAY: And you were twelve. That's a hard time for, even if you stay home.

[09:05] ANN HUANG: Yes, yes. I was a very difficult age. From age twelve to 14, I went to four different junior high schools. One in Taiwan and three here.

[09:18] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness.

[09:19] ANN HUANG: Yes, yes. So, first one was. My experience of the first junior high school was complete safety. I belonged to. I represented the racial majority. And I went to school with everybody I grew up with. And our parents even knew each other, and the teachers knew the parents. So coming over here, my first school was in San Francisco, urban, right next to a housing project. Very difficult. Then after that, we were in El Cerrito for six months. A lot of racial riots going on with the kids in El Cerrito and the kids who were busting from Richmond. And again, my first time experiencing racial diversity was truly shocking, as well as not knowing a word of English.

[10:12] NANCY MCKAY: And you were being a minority too?

[10:13] ANN HUANG: Being a minority, exactly. Not only seeing people who were of non asian descent, but for the first time in my life, I saw chinese people who spoke different languages, English, Cantonese. And that was truly shocking to me.

[10:33] NANCY MCKAY: Another kind of diversity.

[10:35] ANN HUANG: Another kind of diversity. Then after six months in El Cerrito, we went to Walnut Creek, whole nother culture. Wow. Yeah. Yeah.

[10:47] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness. Well, that actually sets the stage for a lot of what happens, because adolescence kind of does that to us. Great. I want to jump forward too, because I want to make sure that we cover everything too. And I know you well enough to know that between five years or three years ago when we did the last interview and the time you were 14, you have a whole broad thing of so many accomplishments, and really you've lived many lives. But so kind of give us a list so we can, you know, the Afro Cuba, the dentist.

[11:19] ANN HUANG: Wow. Okay. So just very briefly, the end of high school, I wanted to become a concert pianist, but I went towards the route of dentistry instead to follow a family path in medicine. So with the encouragement of your parents. With a very strong encouragement. Anyway, so I majored in, double majored in chemistry and biology in college in University of Pacific. Then I got my dental degree when I was 25 years old from University of California, San Francisco. Worked as a dentist for ten years. Meanwhile, was always involved in the arts. I was in a professional afro cuban dance company, one of the founding members. I sang with the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir for five years and also studied brazilian dance, indian dance, and did some classical singing. Played piano, studied piano fairly seriously for quite a few years and volunteered for quite a few arts organizations.

[12:35] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, wow.

[12:35] ANN HUANG: Yeah. And then in year 2000, made a big career switch, left dentistry, went to work for Oakland Asian Cultural center, took a year sabbatical, then went to work for Oakland Asian Cultural center, which was a life changing experience, and that experience helped, allowed me to meet you.

[12:54] NANCY MCKAY: That's right. That was so wonderful. I think it's just such a great organization and so glad it brought us together too. And that's really what brought us to oral history too. We met when you came to a workshop at Mills College. Right. On oral history. Is that correct?

[13:12] ANN HUANG: Yes, yes.

[13:14] NANCY MCKAY: And then we just took it from there. I got involved in the oral history project and so forth.

[13:20] ANN HUANG: Yeah.

[13:21] NANCY MCKAY: You were telling me at lunch that we, I interviewed you in March 2006, which was just about, almost exactly three years ago, and then that was a really meaningful point. In fact, without even knowing about that was really a turning point. Right. The structures of your personal life and your professional and spiritual. Really, the whole thing.

[13:44] ANN HUANG: Yeah. Being involved in oral history work really has been. I was used the word miraculous because what I've learned in the different community and oral history projects in the last few years has helped me so much personally. So because of leaving dentistry, my parents and I, we had a very painful estrangement period lasting five and a half years. Then in March, you interviewed me for the Mills College oral history program. A month later, my parents and I reconnected after not seeing each other for five and a half years. So I felt.

[14:28] NANCY MCKAY: And your parents were in California or Taiwan?

[14:30] ANN HUANG: In Taiwan at that time. So I think that last interview we did in March 2006 was a perfect and much needed opportunity for me to reflect on my life from the beginning, to prepare for this momentous reunion with the folks who gave me life and for them to meet my daughter. So I just realized that today was really special.

[15:09] NANCY MCKAY: Can you describe the meeting? Was it a visit?

[15:12] ANN HUANG: Yeah, it was. I was filled with trepidation.

[15:17] NANCY MCKAY: Before you went to Taiwan or they came here?

[15:19] ANN HUANG: They came here. And there have been some phone contacts before then, obviously. So I was, I would say this. Throughout most of my life, since coming to this country, I felt this strong yearning to run away from my family and my native culture. I felt it was stifling. There was too much conformity, and I did not have room to breathe. So for so many years, my identity tide was tied to that. And I felt in 2000, I left a profession. But symbolically, I was leaving my roots, so to speak. And yet along the way, my roots kept tugging at me, and I felt something missing. So in coming back to my roots, in meeting up with my parents again, I was afraid that the branches and the roots of our family have been away for so long, separated for so long that we could not be together to behold again. So I was really nervous. I was already married to an algerian man, had a baby together. Were they going to be accepting of our interracial marriage, our mixed heritage, child, all of that. And so when we connected again, it was. It was kind of miraculous. The minute they saw Mimia, my daughter, it was love at first sight for them, first granddaughter, first grand, and the only grandchild. So I think Mimiya's gift to our family has been that she been the glue or the renewed sprout or branch to bring back all the tentacles of our family. She's inspired me to find out more about my ancestors, my current family members, and she's brought all of us back together. At the same time, I also realized that during the estrangement period, I changed quite a bit. My heart grew a lot bigger. I had matured, and so did my parents, unbeknownst to me. So at this juncture of my life, I am closer to my parents than ever before, to the degree that I had never, ever dared to imagine.

[19:07] NANCY MCKAY: My goodness.

[19:08] ANN HUANG: Before. So my mom and I, we were actually working on our family history project together. Right now we're in the United States. My mom is visiting here. And on April 30 with the. Returning to Taiwan again.

[19:22] NANCY MCKAY: So your mom is here now?

[19:24] ANN HUANG: My mom's here now. And you'll be going back together with Mimiya? Yeah. So in this past year and a half, working on our family history.

[19:33] NANCY MCKAY: So tell me more about that. How, like, the process, the things you talk about. Tell me everything. That's wonderful.

[19:39] ANN HUANG: Yeah.

[19:40] NANCY MCKAY: How did it get started? What did she think about it?

[19:44] ANN HUANG: Well, it was really amazing. So much. So much easier than I had ever imagined, because I don't know what kind of process they went through as far as changing their attitudes and opening up their hearts. I know that I had worked quite a bit to be forgiving, to have compassion. And again, unbeknownst to me, I had a calling to work at Oakland Asian Cultural center to experience, deeply experience conflict and reconciliation within the asian american community. So when I started the Oakland Asian Cultural Center, OACC was in the middle of multiple, deep conflicts in Chinatown and asian american community. And so a lot of my work was to heal those divisions. And in doing that, I felt the fragments and the divisions within my heart healing as well as I gained skills to deal with conflicts with my family. So it. It seems like in 2006, when I reconnected with my parents again, they had kind of gone through the same process.

[21:21] NANCY MCKAY: Amazing. It must have been as difficult.

[21:25] ANN HUANG: Yes, yes, yes. So I think the shocking event, when I say shocking event was me leaving dentistry. It shocked us out of the state we were in. So due to a voluntary action on my part and something involuntarily they experienced, obviously. Right. So for whatever reason, we all grew from that experience. And I think as painful as that experience was, it was. It was so healthy for our family.

[22:07] NANCY MCKAY: To have gone through that, and there was a reconciliation. And now you're moving forward, I guess, with your mother on this.

[22:14] ANN HUANG: Real important. It's so great. I'm connecting with, you know, all of my family members now. Obviously, we met through a cultural institution. And so through my tenure, through my work at Oakland Asian Cultural center, I've been really interested in different cultures, in looking at my family and truth and reconciliation process. And I look at the state of the world, and I think about truth and reconciliation. South Africa, Cambodia, I know that the only way for reconciliation is to face the truth, however painful it is. So this is something I want to share with you. Last year, I discovered a letter that my family wrote to the taiwanese government. One thing that's been really inspirational, very touching to me, is to witness and to learn about the truth and reconciliation my native land has gone through. Taiwan has gone through. So, as I stated, Taiwan was under martial law for almost 40 years until the 1980s. Taiwan did not have its first presidential election until 1996. And so since 1996, Taiwan, the taiwanese government gradually recognized, publicly acknowledged to its citizens, the mistakes of its past. And what pushed Taiwan into martial law was an incident on February 28 in 1947. It was, you know, if you can imagine, Rosa Parks, Rodney King, these incidents that pushed the society to a certain state. So basically, it was just kind of small incident of an old lady that did not want to sell cigarettes to some soldiers or some soldiers that was trying to. That were kind of being abusive to this one lady. Anyway, that small incident catapulted the country into civil war and then clamping down of the government using martial law, killing and imprisonment of almost every educated person in Taiwan, including execution and beheading of some high school students.

[24:58] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness.

[24:59] ANN HUANG: Yes. So taiwanese government in the recent years, part of the recognition and truth and reconciliation process is to set aside funds for reparation so that victims of this martial law period, they call it the victims of 228, could receive financial compensation from the government. So a few years ago, my family wrote a letter to the government as part of this process in documenting the suffering of my family, my mother's side of the family, and then my family received fairly significant financial compensation from the government. I did not discover this letter until a year ago. And part of the effort of my mother and myself for this family history project is to translate this letter. This letter. We're about halfway done. And.

[26:01] NANCY MCKAY: The letters from your parents or from the larger family?

[26:04] ANN HUANG: Letters from my mom and her siblings to the federal government. And it was because of this letter that they received financial reparations. So, again, I did not discover this letter until a year ago. And I.

[26:19] NANCY MCKAY: She showed it to you or you?

[26:21] ANN HUANG: Yes. And she told me about a letter. I asked her to show it to me, and we're working together to translate the letter. This letter. As I talked to my aunts and uncles and my mom about this letter, this letter alone, financial compensation aside, really, really healed the family. It really healed really me, because oftentimes during their childhood, both of their parents were missing.

[26:54] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness.

[26:55] ANN HUANG: In prison. And my grandfather was in and out of prison for about ten years and greatly tortured.

[27:02] NANCY MCKAY: Did you know this grandfather?

[27:04] ANN HUANG: No. He died when I was one year old. So I didn't really know him and, and he didn't really talk about his experience. He didn't want to, didn't have means to do so and was afraid.

[27:20] NANCY MCKAY: Is there anything, I know you're working on the translation. Is there anything that you can say so far about what was in the letter that surprised you or would be significant?

[27:32] ANN HUANG: Would be. I'm not sure what would be significant.

[27:34] NANCY MCKAY: It would be in the ways that. Listing reasons that the family would be deemed to get these reparations, too. So these were wrongs done against the family.

[27:44] ANN HUANG: Right. Well, the fact that you have to document the fact that your family members were put in prison.

[27:50] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, I see that.

[27:51] ANN HUANG: Yeah, it was. And that government officials came by for years to basically terrorize the family. Oftentimes soldiers, policemen would just show up at the family.

[28:08] NANCY MCKAY: So your mother and her siblings were subjected to this as they were young children.

[28:12] ANN HUANG: Yes.

[28:13] NANCY MCKAY: To this kind of police officer?

[28:14] ANN HUANG: Yes. I'll give you one very small example. And again, many, many, many taiwanese citizens experienced this because martial law obviously impacted the entire island. So I'll give you really a small example. When my mother was twelve years old, she was lucky enough to get into a good junior high school, which meant she had to go out of town to attend school. So she left home and lived with two older siblings who were in high school. They were, the three of them were living on their own to attend school, and one day their mother came to visit them. At that time, the law of the land was this. If somebody wanted to visit somebody else in another town and stay overnight, that person had to first go to the police station and make a report. So let's say, you know, you're living Oakland. I live in San Francisco. For me to visit you overnight, I had to go to the Oakland police station and state to the Oakland police. I am visiting Nancy McKay tonight. This is my relationship with her, and I'm going to stay one night.

[29:23] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness.

[29:24] ANN HUANG: That was the rule of the land. Okay. That night, my grandmother came to visit. Her own children did not have an opportunity to go to the police station first at night. My mom remembers police knocking on the door. She was the person that answered the door. They, I guess maybe saw to the window that there were policemen by the door. Her mother hid underneath pretty thick blankets in the bed, pretend. So they needed to make the house appear that their mother was not there.

[30:03] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness. And was this police visit a routine thing? How would the police have known?

[30:11] ANN HUANG: Well, there was a lot of neighborhood spies. I'm sure that's everybody tattletale. And everybody and the government really, really encouraged that. So my mother remembers being the youngest person in the room, opening the door, police saying to her, is there anyone from out of town visiting you tonight? My mother looked at the policeman in the eye and said, no. My mom's recollection is this, a person, a kid so young will not be able to lie to such an I imposing authority figure. And the policeman left, or else her mother would have been put in jail that night.

[30:53] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness.

[30:54] ANN HUANG: So can you imagine my parents growing up in these conditions?

[31:00] NANCY MCKAY: Can you imagine?

[31:01] ANN HUANG: Yeah.

[31:02] NANCY MCKAY: Wow.

[31:03] ANN HUANG: I can't imagine myself. So no wonder they wanted to come to this country.

[31:09] NANCY MCKAY: Sure, sure, sure. And no wonder they wanted the best for you, for their own children.

[31:17] ANN HUANG: Yeah.

[31:18] NANCY MCKAY: You've also gone back further in your roots, right, to see grandparents and grandparents and grandparents and so forth. Right. Have you been exploring your roots with your mother?

[31:30] ANN HUANG: Yes. So both factually, genealogically. Last year, I discovered this family tree I never knew, dating back to 1666. I found out that I'm part Dutch. On my mom's side, I found out that my mom's surname, I always thought our family name was Shang, but a few generations back, my great grandfather was born into the Lin family. But because his family was so poor, when he was nine years old, he was sold as a child to the Shang family.

[32:06] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness.

[32:07] ANN HUANG: So that's how my mom's family became Shang instead of Lin.

[32:12] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, my goodness. That's amazing.

[32:14] ANN HUANG: Yeah, yeah. So in the 1970s, my grand. My. Sorry. Under the japanese occupation, you had to choose to either have a japanese surname or keep your chinese surname.

[32:31] NANCY MCKAY: So some Taiwanese assumed japanese surname.

[32:36] ANN HUANG: Taiwan was under japanese occupation for the first half of the 20th century. So under japanese occupation, you could choose to have a japanese surrogate to change your name.

[32:50] NANCY MCKAY: Really?

[32:50] ANN HUANG: Yeah. So the japanese government really encouraged that to show for the folks, to show their loyalty and that you could be better treated in society. The surname, the japanese surname they chose for themselves was Kambayashi, which means respectful Lin. So the family, this I found out last year, the family always felt connected to their actual biological roots, Lin instead of Shang.

[33:22] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, that's fascinating.

[33:23] ANN HUANG: Yeah.

[33:25] NANCY MCKAY: So tell me more about it. Must be wonderful working with your mother together on these.

[33:31] ANN HUANG: Sometimes frustrating.

[33:33] NANCY MCKAY: We've got just a few more minutes, but I love to hear, you know, how this is all kind of panning out in your relationship with your mother in this wonderful path that you can take together. You know, it must be bringing you together to explore and maybe pick up some things that weren't there before. In terms of your relationship, I would.

[33:54] ANN HUANG: Have to say, overall, it's been really wonderful to discover and rediscover family history together. Yet I realize we have so many remaining challenges in our relationship and that even though she's the older, between the two of us, I'm the one who has a lot more motivation to find out about the past. So I feel this family history project is bringing us together is our gift to the family, and is our family's gift to us, like, our family's past, family's history gift to us. And I can't wait until Mimiya is old enough that she can understand the information. So all the things that we're documenting now, I wish I had this information. The beginning of my family history journey.

[34:58] NANCY MCKAY: Oh, yes, yes, yes. But now you've got it. And your mother and your daughter. That's it. That's great.

[35:08] ANN HUANG: Yeah, yeah. So, and I'm. I hope someday we could develop something digitally that different family members can enter their family stories and histories.

[35:27] NANCY MCKAY: That would be wonderful.

[35:28] ANN HUANG: Yeah, that would be wonderful.

[35:30] NANCY MCKAY: So our cousins and your brother, are they all interested, too, or is it mostly a project with you and your mom?

[35:37] ANN HUANG: Right now, it's mainly me and my mom. As I explain the nature of the project with family, different family members, they don't understand it quite well, so they're like, oh, we're happy to have conversations with you as long as you do it. But slowly and slowly, they're getting engaged. So when we go back to Taiwan in April and May, 1 thing I want to do is revisit our old home, which is the, what we call the old home. That's the home that my grandfather grew up in, compound that used to have 40 people living in, and it still has really old photos. So that house is about 100 years old.

[36:18] NANCY MCKAY: And the fact your family still lives in it.

[36:20] ANN HUANG: No, no, it's not livable. It's not livable condition, but it's. Boy, if somebody really renovated, it could be a great cultural museum.

[36:28] NANCY MCKAY: That's wonderful.

[36:29] ANN HUANG: Yeah.

[36:30] NANCY MCKAY: Well, I wish we had more and more time to talk, but we should do it again in another four years.

[36:34] ANN HUANG: Yeah, yeah, next time. Yeah, next time. I really want to talk to you, interview you about your family history journey and what brought you to oral history board, because I know it's had a deeply personal meaning.

[36:46] NANCY MCKAY: Okay, great.

[36:47] ANN HUANG: Yeah. And I really want to thank you, Nancy, for being active participant of my roots journey.

[36:55] NANCY MCKAY: Yes, I love it. Thank you for sharing. Thank you. So I guess we should line up.