I Spent Lunar New Year in North America's Most Asian City — and It Taught Me to Embrace My Cross-cultural Heritage

Growing up in California's Bay Area in the '80s, I was one of two Asian Americans in my grade. Although I went to Chinese School on Saturday mornings and the country’s oldest Chinatown was about an hour north in San Francisco, those felt like novelties. I felt like I was on the sidelines of both Asian and American cultures, having to hide my bilingual home language and the fact my family was more comfortable with chopsticks instead of forks. Yet when I visited Taiwan, my parents' home country, I was told people immediately knew I was American from how I walked. My ethnic identity was a constant push and pull, always feeling shunted by both sides.

Ironically, it was during a trip to Vancouver for Expo ‘86 when we drove out to eat in adjacent Richmond, British Columbia, where I got my first glimpse of how my Eastern heritage and Western upbringing could exist harmoniously. Here, it wasn’t about the one Asian restaurant down the street or that singular kiosk that sold the Chinese newspaper. Richmond was an entire North American neighborhood that hopscotched between English and Asian dialects — elements of both communities existing together equally.

The brief visit left a profound mark on the early years of my search for cultural identity. While southern California communities in the San Gabriel Valley (like Rowland Heights, where I lived for summer in the '90s) also had that essence, it felt like two different worlds as soon as I drove back to my job in Burbank.

So more than 35 years later, in 2024, I finally went back to the Canadian city where I had felt so accepted, during the most festive time of year for the diaspora: the Lunar New Year.

With roughly 74 percent of the population identifying as Asian — including more than 54 percent Chinese, as well as major Filipino, Japanese, Korean, and Taiwanese populations — Richmond isn’t just a place with Asian enclaves here and there. Instead, it's a city that developed encapsulating both worlds that I still struggle to bridge in the U.S.

Asian culture is deeply centered around food. So much so that “How are you?” is often replaced with “Have you eaten yet?” So it's no surprise that the moment I touched down at Vancouver International Airport I started searching for my favorite Asian dish, stinky tofu — a fermented bean curd with an infamous scent that I find crave-worthy. (To my delight, a restaurant was serving the fragrant dish within walking distance from my hotel.)

When I entered Uno Beef Noodle, the staff somehow knew to speak to me in a Mandarin-English hybrid, exactly like I do with my parents, so I knew this was the real deal. I’d been taught that the quality gauge of a Taiwanese restaurant lies in its beef noodle soup, so I ordered the trademark dish, which impressed upon my first slurp.

Back at home, an old friend was shocked I didn’t wake up thinking I was Asian every morning. But the truth is that whenever I was in Asia, I was called an outsider. Yet here in Canada — a country that I had no ties to — I finally felt seen. Here, everyday life felt like a slice of those two sides of my identity. (And, of course, that extra dose of Canadian kindness was just an extra cherry on top.)

With that newfound acceptance, I leaned in even deeper. One moment I was in a historic district’s trendy coffee shop and the next I was waiting for rice rolls and congee at Hei Hei Rice Roll inside Richmond Public Market’s Asian food court. Then I was touring the Gulf of Georgia Cannery National Historic Site to learn about Canada’s fishery past in the seaside village of Steveston. A couple of blocks away, I was taking a bite of fried stinky tofu (yes, more!) at CHJ Bistro, so reminiscent of my favorite ones in Taipei’s Raohe Street Night Market. Later, I was on a run in Vancouver’s Stanley Park, and not long after, I was back in Richmond at Memory Corner, where its entire interior felt like Taipei’s oldest street, Dihua Street, where my grandpa owned a fabric shop.

On top of that, Vancouver was right next door, and there was no imaginary border that made Richmond feel like an enclave. After all, in British Columbia’s largest city, 13 percent of the population speak Chinese at home.

I was taken by the number of major landmarks in its Chinatown alone, including the Chinese Canadian Museum, Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, and Chinatown Storytelling Centre. I even went on a private tour with Robert Sung who runs A Wok Around Chinatown tours to understand the context of the community. Each experience enlightened me to the Canadian take on Asian immigrants and culture, in a way that felt simple and accepting. My visit even lined up with the city’s Lunar New Year parade, as dragon and lion dancers took to the rainy streets with a fearless spirit that enveloped me.

Returning home to the U.S. after that 2024 Lunar New Year Richmond trip, I felt a sense of whole-hearted pride being Asian American, slightly ironic having learned that lesson in Canada. But for the first time in 20 years of living in the New York City area, I threw myself into its Asian culture more than ever, going to Manhattan's Chinatown Lunar New Year Parade, as well as making my first visit to the Museum of Chinese in America, and capping it off with a dinner with my cousins over the nostalgic Asian decor and food at Potluck Club.

I never thought that it would take going to a country where I have no roots to finally see how the dueling sides of my cultural heritage could exist together, and teach me the true meaning of being Asian American. 

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