My family immigrated from Asia to the US decades ago. Why I’m leaving the US for Asia.
By: Grace Yeung, Co-Founder of From Roots to Bridges
Hi, my name is Grace and I am an American Born Chinese daughter of immigrant parents from Fuzhou, Fujian, China. My grandpa came to the US 50 years ago and my parents came here 35+ years ago. After nearly 4 years of working in big tech, I quit my job as a Product Marketer at Google, vacated my apartment, sold most of my belongings, and left the San Francisco Bay Area for good with my partner, Yongjian.
College Years: No Pain, No Gain!
Why would I do such a thing? Let’s rewind a bit to my college days. In college, I was the typical overachiever who only cared about my grades, my GPA, my co-ops (internships), and the brand name of the company that I was going to work at after graduation. I don’t blame myself for being this way because everyone around me was like that. I went to Northeastern University, where you literally could not graduate if you did not have at least 2 co-ops (or equivalent experiences) under your belt so every student was a professional overachiever.
It’s not just the Northeastern environment that influenced me deeply. Ever since I was a child, my Chinese immigrant family instilled in me that the more money you make, the more successful and happy you will be. And I ingrained that into my head like a tattoo. In college, I regularly stayed in the library or my dorm’s study rooms from late afternoon to 1–3AM after a full day of classes. If my parents worked 12 hours a day at their Chinese take-out restaurant to raise my brother and I, the least I could do is study until I reached my breaking point.
Post College Years: What Am I Doing?
After I graduated college, I started working at Salesforce and soon after, Google. For the first time, my dad told me that he was proud of me. He would brag to all his friends about how his daughter works at these top companies and while it was flattering at first, I felt like I could never complain about my job to him or my mom because they were so happy for me. They would be crushed and wouldn’t really understand why if I told them that I wasn’t truly fulfilled in my job, that I was working as hard as I could to be a star employee but deep down, I knew I wasn’t contributing to projects that really fulfilled and stimulated me, especially the creative side of my brain. I remember what that feeling of being fulfilled and stimulated was like because in college, I was involved in student organizations, class projects, and even building my own community of aspiring PMs called Product Buds. The thrill of building something 0 to 1 was missing from my life.
The Quarter Life Crisis: What Do I Do Next?
Throughout 2023, I was having serious doubts about my career choices and questioning everything about my life. Maybe I should go to grad school to pivot to another industry? Maybe I should take a gap year to travel and figure out what I actually like? Maybe I should start my own company…but what would it be? I couldn’t put my finger on it but I knew in my heart that something had to change. I can’t just sit here and complain about my life while not trying to change my circumstances.
The Trip That Changed It All!
So in December 2023, I saved up my PTO (paid time off) at work and took a month long trip to Taiwan, northern and southern China, Hong Kong, and Macau. That trip changed everything for me. For almost my entire life, I had been led to believe by media and my own family that my family’s home country was horribly polluted, unsanitary, unsafe, and unpleasant to visit. Prior to visiting China, I believed that people in China would view me unfavorably because I don’t speak much Mandarin, I do not meet Chinese beauty standards, and I have very Westernized values (like pursuing one’s passions, as Eleanor Young once said in the movie “Crazy Rich Asians”). But my perspectives and my world view changed.
China is a country that is diverse in culture, history, culinary diversity, landscapes, technology, perspectives, and people. We saw more EVs on the roads in Hangzhou than in Silicon Valley. We went to beaches in Xiamen that rivaled San Diego beaches. We had lamb burgers in Jinan that are way better than the ones you find at the famous NYC restaurant, Xi’an Famous Foods. In Fuzhou, a seafood feast would cost less than half of what it costs in the US and double the freshness because the sea is right there. The bullet trains in China were just as, if not more affordable, clean, and fast as the ones you find in Japan.
And in my family’s village of Chang Bing in the Mawei District of Fuzhou, Fujian, I was taken aback, in a different way. This village had been so well preserved, it looked like it came straight out of a history book. We visited my mom and dad’s old village homes, the ceremonial hall that my grandparents got married in, my family’s ancestral temple, my dad’s old school, and the homes of many of our grandparents’ siblings and cousins. We shared stories of the past, like how my grandma’s oldest brother, who just passed away at 95 years old, then had to take care of all his siblings, even declining early opportunities to get married because he knew he had an obligation to care for his siblings. From learning this, I started to realize why my grandma has a scarcity mindset, why she is always anxious and scared, why she hates wasting food, and why she married my grandpa. At the time, my grandpa was from a relatively more financially stable family because of my great-grandpa sending money back from his sailor job.
Returning Back to the US
When I came back to the US in late December, I had a really hard time transitioning back to the 9–5 corporate life. I had what I label as “post-trip depression”. I could barely get up from bed to go to work, let alone be that productive worker bee that I was expected to be. A series of unfortunate events happened at work, causing me some severe anxiety. To help with the anxiety, I would go through the old footage of our China trip and create travel vlogs. To my surprise, our Fuzhou Village vlog got thousands of views within a week and the comments came flooding in with other overseas Chinese who were touched by “homecoming” journey and shared their stories as well. It felt like a sign from the universe.
The Pain Point & Opportunity for the Asian Diaspora
From those YouTube comments and conversations with our personal networks, we realized that it is so common for overseas Asians/the Asian diaspora, especially those who are Chinese Americans, to feel disconnected from their heritage culture because living in a country that doesn’t politically align with China and still doesn’t see us as “true Americans”, we fight to assimilate with our westernized classmates, friends, and coworkers. We don’t want to speak our mother tongue unless it’s behind closed doors at home and we have complicated relationships with our families because they came from a different generation of hardship in China. Feeling “yellow on the outside, white on the inside” is the lived experience of so many first generation and 1.5 generation Asian Americans.
But yet, there is still a growing curiosity about Asia amongst this demographic, with Facebook groups like Subtle Asian Travel boasting over 100,000 members. While many posts are about Japan and South Korea, there are more posts popping up about China. For example, an anonymous poster shared the following:
This is a very common experience. We, as Chinese Americans, feel that visiting China is something we want to do but it is intimidating to visit China on your own or every with family members who haven’t returned to China since the mass adoption of mobile payments, Chinese social media apps, and new modes of transportation and booking hotels. Even for our Dec 2023 trip to China, my partner and I had to carry out extensive research, pouring hours of our time into finding out how to book train tickets, what hotels accept foreigners, and which apps we needed to have on our phones. For the first time, our parents, who can speak and read Mandarin, still had to follow our lead because they are not as tech savvy as we are. This level of complexity is common in many other countries in Asia as well so this is not a problem unique to China.
What We are Building for the Asian Diaspora
From Roots to Bridges provides immersive heritage-seeking trips to Asia for the Asian diaspora and those with a strong interest in Asia, allowing them to connect with their ancestral roots and experience the rich culture of Asia. We believe in creating meaningful connections and unforgettable experiences that bring pride back to the Asian diaspora. Our first trip is December 14–24, 2024 to Hong Kong and the Guangdong and Fujian provinces of China, where millions of overseas Chinese trace their roots to. We will visit sites such as Overseas Chinese Museums (like Quanzhou Maritime Museum, China Museum of Fujian-Taiwan Kinship, Guangdong Overseas Chinese Museum), Bruce Lee’s Ancestral Home, ancestral temples and villages, and major urban city centers. We are creating a truly immersive cultural, historical, and educational experience for small groups of roughly 8-10 people so that everyone can enter the experience as strangers but leave as close friends. We want to empower every one of our travelers with the information they need to travel China and then whenever they decide they are ready, they can bring their own families, either their parents and/or their own kids, to China too!
If you are interested in learning more about our upcoming trip to China, check out our website at fromrootstobridges.com. We hope to expand to other countries in Asia in the future so even if you can’t attend our China trip, we encourage you to apply and indicate which countries you are interested in visiting.
Wait, You’re Living in Asia Now?
Yes! Starting August 2024, Yongjian (my co-founder/significant other) and I will be living full time in Asia. We don’t know when we are coming back to the US but we do know that we are living in East Asia, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia while working on From Roots to Bridges. This is the biggest decision we have ever made in our lives. While Yongjian lived in Asia (Kazakhstan) for two years as a Princeton in Asia fellow before the pandemic, I have never lived in Asia, for longer than a brief half of a summer in Hong Kong when I studied abroad at Chinese University of Hong Kong. But that was sheltered; I was in a dorm with classmates my age, professors who I could go to when I needed help, and a definite end to my time there. I don’t know how long this next chapter of my life in Asia will last but I know I’m going to work hard every day to make it worth the journey.
Why Did You Decide to Live in Asia?
There are many reasons why we decided to live in Asia. Firstly, it is much more affordable to live in Asia (with our savings from being paid US salaries) than the major cities in the US that have close proximity to an international airport. Considering that we are building From Roots to Bridges with no funding from investors (we want to keep it that way for now), living in Asia will allow us to have our savings last longer. Secondly, we want to become Asia experts, specifically in the destinations where we hope to host more group trips with From Roots to Bridges. We want to deeply understand the cultural nuances, the tourism infrastructure, the culinary scene, the local people, and the opportunities for cultural exchange. We hope to build close friendships and business relationships in Asia so that we can scale our group trips to other countries. This makes sense for our personal finances and for our business.
What Does Your Family Think?
My Chinese immigrant family still doesn’t understand my decision to do this. They want to be supportive but the tone of their voice and their repetitive questioning indicates heavy skepticism and doubt. If I look at it from their perspective, it makes sense why they feel that way. They left China in search of opportunities to create a better life, one where they don’t have to worry about not having enough food, housing, medicine, education, or career opportunities. They came to the US with nothing and lived the “American Dream” for their kids. Why would their daughter and granddaughter abandon this country? Well, the way we see it is that we are not abandoning this country. We are bridging the gap between the US and Asia in ways that we believe are meaningful for the next generation of overseas Asians.
