In 2008, during the last month of summer before high school begins, an impressionable 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy learns what his family can't teach him: how to skate, how to flirt, and how to love your mom.
A 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy named Chris as he navigates the summer before high school. He grapples with his cultural identity, experiences the joys and awkwardness of first love, and strengthens his bonds with friends while navigating the complexities of his relationship with his hardworking, single mother. Through skateboarding, online interactions, and everyday experiences, Chris begins to understand himself and his place in the world better. This coming-of-age story explores themes of family, identity, and self-discovery.—Adrian Serpa
The summer of 2008 finds 13-year-old Chris Wang (often referred to as Dì Di) living in a middle-class area of Fremont, California, with his older sister Vivian, his Taiwanese immigrant mother Chungsing, and Chungsing's strict mother-in-law Nai Nai. Chris does not see his father very often because he moved back to Taiwan for work and sends money home to support the family in America. Chris is always arguing with Vivian, who is going to UC San Diego. He is not a popular student at the school. Together with his best friends Fahad and Soup, he creates goofy YouTube videos that are heavily loaded with juvenile humor.
Chris's relationships start to suffer as a result of his actions and feelings of inadequacy. In order to establish a friendship with his crush, the half-Asian Madi, Chris uses Facebook and AIM. She displays internalized racism when they go on a date, telling Chris that he is attractive "for an Asian." When she attempts to start a sexual encounter, Chris is too apprehensive to proceed. After the incident, Madi makes an effort to get in touch, but he blocks her on AIM because he feels too ashamed to talk to her. Chris offends Fahad's African-American crush during a group hangout with him by making a casually sexist joke and graphically recounting how he and Fahad once played with a dead squirrel. Fahad chooses to keep his distance from Chris in case his crush discovers that Fahad has a similarly crude sense of humor. Chris is devastated to be demoted from his "top eight friends" list on MySpace by Fahad.
Chris starts to see how stressed out his mother is. A second Taiwanese mother and her son, Max, join Chungsing and Chris for dinner. Chungsing feels embarrassed by the mother's admission that Vivian was not accepted to UCLA or Berkeley. In an attempt to embarrass Chris and inspire him to work harder in his studies, Chungsing critiques Chris' academic performance in front of Max. Chungsing sends Chris to a cram school at the mother's suggestion, where Max is mercilessly bullied by his friend Josh. Furthermore, Nai Nai harshly criticizes Chungsing's parenting and disparagingly compares her to her absent son, despite her warmth and grandmotherly demeanor toward Chris. Chris hears Chungsing become irate and threaten to punish Nai Nai by sending her back to Taiwan. Ultimately, Chungsing is upset when her entry in a local painting competition is turned down.
Chris sees a chance to gain popularity when he is asked to film highlight reels for three senior skateboarders. He informs the white and African-American skateboarders that he is half Asian, still snarky about Madi's remark that he is cute for an Asian. Vivian fills in for him when he becomes ill after they take him to a party where he experiments with marijuana and alcohol. Before Vivian departs for college, he makes amends with her. When the skateboarders get to Chris' house, they discover that his footage is useless. Unaware of Chris' deceit, Chungsing introduces himself to the skateboarders and discloses that Chris is not half-Asian. In an attempt to get his mother to leave, Chris scolds her. When the other boys witness Chris mistreating his mother, they are appalled and depart.
Chris hits Josh at cram school after Josh makes fun of him for his failed date with Madi and almost gets kicked out. Chris screams at Chungsing in the car on the way home, accusing her of being a failed artist who does not support the family. In response, Chungsing vehemently says that Chris is a disgrace to the family and that she could have succeeded as a painter if Vivian and Chris had never been born. Chris spends the night away from his house. Chris is reassured by Chungsing when he gets home by telling him that, despite her love of painting, her children are her real ambition and that Vivian also ran away from home when she was 14.
After ignoring Madi for months, Chris makes an effort to make amends on the first day of high school. To save face, she rejects him, but it is clear that she still has feelings for him. Fahad nods when Chris welcomes him to the visual arts club he joins. Chris tells her about his day when Chungsing picks him up from school.
