Growing Up With Asian-American Hair

“Oh wow. She looks like one of those Japanese dolls.”

That’s one of my first memories, gazing up at my mother’s friends who ooh-ed and ahhh-ed over my perfect, silky black hair. They were all white.

“Say thank you,” my mother instructed, and I immediately obliged, even though we were Taiwanese. I was only a kid, but I knew this was weird. They were giving me compliments, but they were all based solely on my looks. And they were saying I was different. And I didn’t want to be different.

I showed my mother a photo of what I wanted to look like. We were one of very few non-white families living in a small, New Jersey suburb, and I wanted to be like the blonde girls I saw in Bon Jovi videos.

I couldn’t understand why, no matter how many pumps of hair spray I put in my bangs, they wouldn’t stay up. My mom squinted at the photo I cut out of Tiger Beat, then at me, and confidently informed me (having zero hair expertise) that I needed a perm.

Two towns over, on the outskirts of the Paramus Park Mall, we visited a woman I had never met before, but was required to call “Ayi” (Chinese for “Auntie”).

Ayi’s kitchen smelled like rotten eggs gone chemical, and her sink had a short, attached garden hose amongst the dirty dishes. I sat…