I’ve never thought much about whether I was happy or if I had fun as a child. I was a so-so girl who lived with a so-so family in a so-so village. I didn’t know that there might be another way to live, and I didn’t worry about it either.

Dreaming, dreaming, dreaming -- weren't our dreams what gave us strength, hope, and desire?

But there are certain books I would never put on a Kindle because you want to be able to look at graphs and photos or the footnotes and maps. You can't see that.

I am old enough to know only too well my good and bad qualities, which were often one in the same.

And one of the interesting things about bound feet is that they never age.

I am an eighth Chinese, and I come from a large Chinese-American family in Los Angeles.

Don't ever feel that you have to hide who you are. Nothing good ever comes from keeping secrets like that.