By Aldrich Tan/Staff writer

Editor's note: This is the final installment of a two-part series on what some believe is a fading appreciation for Chinese-American culture in the Central Valley.

September 3, 2005

Karmay Kwong-Robbins wants her daughter to learn Chinese. She intends to make it happen by launching a Chinese-language class through the Asian Cultural Society, an organization she founded three years ago.

A greater challenge, however, may be keeping her soon-to-be bilingual daughter in Visalia.

Nicole Kwong-Robbins, 17, will leave for college in a year. In doing so, she'll join the more than 1,000 Asian-Americans who have left the city since 2003, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.

"The later generations of Asian-Americans are starting to leave Visalia," said Sidney Chang, a professor emeritus in history at California State University, Fresno.

The outward migration is an alarming trend in a Chinese community that is struggling to preserve its culture in the Valley.

A generation's exodus

Peter Hsu, 21, has left for good. The son of Shu-Dean Hsu, 62, a Taiwanese medical professional living in Visalia, he went to Redwood High School and currently attends Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash.

Hsu said he didn't want a small-town lifestyle anymore.

"You start to realize what is missing in this community when you leave Visalia," he said. "There is nothing to do here if you are a young adult growing up in the Valley."

Young Asian-Americans often are able to go away to college because their families can pay for their educations, said Isao Fujimoto, a professor emeritus in Asian American Studies at the University of California, Davis.

At some point, however, they must decide whether or not to return.

Wade Chun Wong, 38, is the son of Raymond Chun Wong, director of the Central Valley Chinese Cultural Center. He went to Exeter Union High School, left to attend the University of California, Irvine, and returned to the Valley to manage his father’s store, R-N Market in Exeter.

“My decision to return didn’t have anything to do with family values or my cultural heritage,” he said. “I came back to the Central Valley because there was an opportunity for me to work here.”

While heritage had nothing to do with Wong’s return, Joel Eubank, curator for the Central California Chinese Cultural Center, believes a thriving Chinese American culture could attract other recent graduates.

“They’re busy having families right now,” he said. “But they will eventually be interested in the culture as they get older.”

It wasn’t until her mother died two years ago that Karmay Kwong-Robbins, 44, became interested in her heritage. Before that, Kwong-Robbins, a holistic doctor in Visalia, haven’t even told her children her immigration story.

“It had never dawned on me to tell them about my history,” she said. “It didn’t matter to me when I was younger. But I want to leave something behind for them.”

She has plenty to leave behind.

Kwong-Robbins came from Hong Kong to San Francisco in 1966 as part of the last group of Asian immigrants migrating to the U.S. by boat.

“It tool two and a half weeks by ship to get to America,” she said.

After her mother’s death, she took a train back to San Francisco. The pier that greeted her in America? Today it’s SBC Park, home of the San Francisco Giants baseball team.

“I didn’t recognize the place,” she said. “I felt sad because I realized that it was gone.”

Energized by her newfound appreciation for the past, Kwong-Robbins founded the Asian Cultural Society. The organization’s objective is to educate and preserve Asian heritage in Central California, and members meet once a month.

The society has hosted Chinese, Japanese, Laotian and Tahitian speakers.

“We want to promote Asian business, Asian art, literature and education in the community,” she said.

The Chinese-language class will be the society’s next project. A Chinese teacher is available and there are several interested students, Kwong-Robbins said. She’s looking for a permanent home for the society, and for volunteers.

“I’m happy to do the work, but I wish that there were more people to help me organize,” she said. “Then we can have more events.”

Sing Lai Kong, 48, just taught her son Dustin, 6, how to write his Chinese name – Tien Zuo.

“It means understanding,” she said.

Kong came from Hong King to the U.S. in 1997. Separated from a large Chinese community, Kong said she has been teaching Dustin about his heritage herself.

“We try to keep Chinese cultural traditions and family values alive at the home, such as how to respect the elderly,” she said. “I’m teaching my son Cantonese, so he can interact with more people who live in the Valley.”

Kong met Kwong-Robbins at her clinic last year. She said she is interested in teaching others, in part to help her son.

“I hope that my son will some day be able to read and write Mandarin,” Kong said.

Wade Chun Wong hopes that his children – Ciara, 12, and Christopher, 9 – also will learn Chinese. He hopes to take them to China one day and show them a school – So Chun elementary school – that’s named for their grandfather.

“I want them to see what it was like to live in China back then,” he said, “and to value what they have here in America.”

Get involved

Central California Chinese Cultural Center

Event: Board meeting

When: 6:30 p.m. Wednesday

Where: 500 S. Akers St.

Information: 625-2525. Event is open to the public

Asian Cultural Society

Event: "Oriental Medicine as Career" workshop

When: 7 p.m. Sept. 10

Where: RSVP for location

Information: 625-4246. Event is open to the public.

© 2005 Visalia Times-Delta. Reproduced with the permission of Gannett Co., Inc. by NewsBank, Inc.