Girl in Translation: Two Summary & Analysis

Kim begins school in the third week in November. She attends a school that's very far away from the apartment, in a cleaner neighborhood. Aunt Paula set it up so that that Kim will use an address in that neighborhood as her official one, as it'll allow her to go to the nicer school. Ma and Kim struggle to find the school and finally get there late. A black security guard curtly greets them and gives Kim nearly unintelligible directions to her classroom. Kim walks away and feels horrible for not saying goodbye to Ma, but she turns to her task of finding her classroom.

Kim knocks on her classroom door and enters when the muffled voice tells her to come in. Her teacher, Mr. Bogart, is extremely tall, thin, and unnaturally pale. Kim struggles to understand what he's asking as he asks for her excuse as to why she's late, but finally, she manages to haltingly explain she couldn't find the school. He points her to a desk next to a chubby white girl (Annette) and Kim promptly spills the contents of her pencil case in her nervousness. Annette helps her pick things up.

As Mr. Bogart resumes his lecture, Kim places her hand behind her back to listen, as is customary and respectful in Hong Kong. When he calls her out for sitting strangely, she notices that her classmates are sprawled in their desks. At lunch, Kim is shocked: her classmates are wild, and because there's no rice with her lunch, she feels as though she hasn't eaten. When she returns to class, Mr. Bogart passes out a piece of paper with a map. Kim can't understand his intent (a pop quiz on capital cities), so she looks at Annette's sheet for a clue. Mr. Bogart snatches Kim's paper away, calls her a cheater, and corrects her grammar when she apologizes. Kim hopes to impress Mr. Bogart when they clean the classroom in the afternoon, but the students race out when the bell rings. Kim follows.

Kim holds back tears as she meets Ma outside of the school. She doesn't tell Ma the truth and settles for saying that everything is different. Ma sighs and turns her attention to showing Kim how to take the subway to the factory. Kim is terrified when she notices that the two black boys sitting across from them have a big knife. When they exit the subway station, Kim is surprised that Chinatown looks like Hong Kong.

Ma leads Kim to a freight elevator and then onto the factory floor. The air is hot and thick, and the sound of the sewing machines is a roar. The seamstresses are coated in sweat, and young boys push racks around. A layer of fabric dust coats everything. Ma points out Aunt Paula, who is handing out work to seamstresses. The ones who get larger piles seem grateful. Ma asks Aunt Paula if they can talk for a moment, and Paula leads them to the office. As soon as they're in the office with Uncle Bob, Paula declares that they can't talk for long or it'll look like favoritism. Ma quickly explains that their apartment is dirty and unsafe. Paula warmly assures her that as soon as a better apartment opens up that they can afford, she'll help them move there. Kim and Ma both believe her.

Aunt Paula leads Ma and Kim through the factory. They pass a large table with old ladies and young children gathered around it, trimming threads. Paula proudly explains that employees begin at that table as children, and end their tenure there as grandmothers. Finally they reach the finishing station, where she explains that Ma and Kim will hang, sort, and bag finished garments in time for the next shipment. Ma quickly gets to work, and Kim begins sorting pants by size. Neither of them wears their face mask, as the air is too stifling. Kim surreptitiously reads from a Chinese paper as she works.

After an hour, Kim smells a pork bun in addition to the fabric stench. She notices a boy about her age eating a bun. The boy comments that Kim can still read Chinese and offers her a bite of his bun. He tells her she can't tell anyone about it, as he swiped it from "Dog Flea Mama's" station. When Kim looks confused, the boy mimics Aunt Paula's habit of scratching her neck. Kim gasps and says that Paula is her aunt, and the two begin to laugh. The boy introduces himself as Matt.

When Kim takes a break, she finds Matt at the thread cutters' table. He's sitting with his mother, Mrs. Wu. Mrs. Wu notices Kim's flat chest and cropped hair and asks Kim if she's a boy or a girl, embarrassing Kim. Kim greets the little boy next to Mrs. Wu. He doesn't look at her and ignores Matt as well. Matt explains that Park is shy and doesn't hear well, and then declares he's taking a break. Other kids join Matt and Kim near the soda machine. Kim understands the other kids are like her: not real employees, just there to help their families, as employees are secretly paid by the piece. Kim later learns that piecework is illegal in the U.S., but says “those rules were for white people, not for us.” After ten minutes, the children return to their stations. Later, Ma and Kim have dinner at their station and don't leave until nine. Kim later learns that this was an early night.

The next morning, Kim feigns illness and insists she needs to stay home from school. Ma knows that Kim is lying. Through tears, Kim tells Ma about how mean Mr. Bogart had been to her the day before. Ma offers to speak to Mr. Bogart, but Kim realizes this won't help. She promises to try harder but decides secretly to skip school instead. Kim spends her day huddled in the living room, watching television. She's too afraid to make herself lunch; she knows everything must be cooked fully and fears the water will give her diarrhea. She fantasizes that Pa is still alive and thinks about Ma at work at the factory.

Kim decides to go through Ma's things. She finds an old record of an Italian opera with a photo inside, and remembers hearing this record once before in Hong Kong. The music had made Ma cry, and Kim had learned then why Ma relied on music. Ma's parents had been killed during the Cultural Revolution after getting Ma and Paula into Hong Kong, and then Pa died in his early forties. Music is how Ma processes her grief. Kim studies the photograph of her with both of her parents. She doesn't recognize the handwriting on the back and reasons that it must be Pa's. Kim understands that as much as she misses Pa, Ma's grief must be far worse. Kim carefully puts the record back and then leaves for the factory.