Jean Kwok Quotes

What a relationship looks like on the outside isn't the same as what it's like on the inside. You can be more in love with someone in your mind than with the person you see every day.

Sometimes our fate is different from the one we imagined for ourselves.

Nobody can change who you are, except for you.

I never want to love someone like that,not even him,so much that there would be no room left for myself,so much that I wouldn't be able to survive if he left me.

Brains are beautiful.

I was a fool. I should have grabbed him when I could have had him all to myself, snatched him up like a ripe mango at the market. But how was I to know that this was what love felt like?

You may need to change your dreams.

I have not been so much pushed by winds as pulled forward by the force of my decisions.

We would be allowed to work and not cause any trouble for her, but she didn't want us to be any more successful than she was

No matter how flawed someone else may be, that doesn't give us the right to be less than we are, does it? We are decent people and we repay our debts.

In love and life, we never know when we are telling ourselves stories. We are the ultimate unreliable narrators.

When I’m with you, I could drink water and be full.

But I learned that if you do not speak, no one will ever hear you.

It may not seem like much - a few kisses in the dark - but it was enough to burn a hole like an ulcer in my heart.

if you do not speak, no one will ever hear you.

There's a Chinese saying that the fates are winds that blow through our lives from every angle, urging us along the paths of time. Those who are strong-willed may fight the storm and possibly choose their own road, while the weak must go where they are blown. I say I have not been so much pushed by winds as pulled forward by the force of my decisions.

When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.

I began to see beauty as something that could be unleashed from within a person rather than a set of physical features like a perfect nose or big eyes.

Dice un proverbio chino que el destino es como un temporal de vientos que, provenientes de todos los rincones, azotan nuestras vidas y nos empujan por las sendas del tiempo; quienes posean fuerza de voluntad, lucharán contra la tormenta y podrán escoger su propio camino, mientras que los débiles acabarán allá adonde los lleve la tempestad.

I was beginning to realize that I had kept myself so busy to avoid examining my life, and now that I had the chance, I did not like it at all.

I would have chosen statistical probabilities over luck any day.

Ma told me that while nothing can replace that which is lost, emptiness creates room for new growth.

Now, many years later, I was note sure if we had truly loved each other or merely the versions of ourselves we had seen reflected in the other's eyes-as if we had acted out a play together, both of us audience and player alike.

Once, Nina had pretended to be Dominic teaching a dance session. “I don’t like your feet, your legs, your shoulders and your head. Just cut them all off!

The core power of tai chi begins with awareness. Our stance is the posture of infinity: not tense but relaxed and upright, expectant. From this nothingness, all things begin.

sneaked another glance at myself in the mirror. For the first time, I did not see a dishwasher.

It felt as if the rest of the world knew something I didn't...

So quickly did we shed the wisdom and kindness of accumulated years, how easily we reverted to our former selves in the company of those who have known us before.

I am in love with imperfection. Some of my mistakes wind up being the most interesting work I have ever done.

No matter how flawed someone else may be, that doesn't give us the right to be less than we are.

Once you loved him, everything in your life fell into a before and after. Nothing would ever be the same.

No one knew better than I, that while your mind might disappear, the body must endure.

They say that once you see the ocean, no other water can compare. My love story started so many years ago. Pa and I began our marriage with the strength of a tiger’s head but it slowly transformed into the weak tail of the snake. How could it be that I placed the green hat upon his head?

but it’s hard to celebrate with all your heart when your festivity isn’t reflected by the society around you—no films on television, no displays in department stores, no friends with gifts, and no propaganda about peace and love whatsoever. Sylvie and I always had to go to school on Chinese New Year.

Any time I had a teacher in elementary or high school who’d taught Sylvie, they’d say, “Ah, you’re Sylvie Lee’s little sister,” rife with anticipation. I would then watch as their high hopes turned to bewilderment at my stuttering slowness. This was followed by their disappointment and, finally, their indifference.

Avevo perso gran parte del mio interesse per i cosmetici. Non che avessi smesso di preoccuparmi del mio aspetto, anzi, ma non riuscivo a comprendere sino in fondo come si potesse risultare simpatica o bella. Non capivo come funzionavano queste cose.

Me sentía como un espantapájaros ante una tempestad. En cualquier momento, el viento podría derribarme y esparcir todas las piezas que formaban mi cuerpo. Me despertaría para darme cuenta de que no quedaba nada de mí, ni rastro de la persona que quería ser.

nadie puede cambiar lo que eres, excepto tú misma.

I only had the morning to get my work done. I had to be really efficient. I'd let the others take the easy questions in class and wait to answer the hardest ones. I'm Asian and a woman, which shouldn't matter but did anyway. It was clear sometimes that no matter how hard I worked, I didn't qualify to be a member of the in club.

It is strange because I am naturally afraid of water but I love it too.'... '...why are you scared of water?' ... 'Because I can drown in two meters of it, idiot.'... 'Why do you love it, then?' 'It feels like freedom

Ma had said to me, “In the west, they believe in separation of body and soul. They think that the soul separated from the body will find enlightenment, but for the Chinese, we strive for unity. If you look at a child, you can see they are still struggling in their bodies, trying to master them. It is when you become one with your body and

I never want to love someone like that, not even Matt, so much that there would be no room left for myself, so much that I wouldn’t be able to survive if he left me.

In those days, I wanted to believe our love was something tangible and permanent, like a good luck charm I could always wear around my neck. Now I know that it was more like the wisp of smoke trailing off a stick of incense: most of what I could hold on to was the memory of the burning, the aftermath of its scent.

He who sits on his butt must also sit on his blisters.

Hunger makes raw beans sweet,

While nothing can replace that which is lost, emptiness creates room for new growth.

All of this made Tyrone a complete outcast with the other kids. I wanted to tell him that I had been like him in Hong Kong, that I knew what it was to be admired and hated at the same time, that I knew it simply amounted to being alone. I wanted to tell him I thought he had beautiful eyes. Like so many things I wanted to say, I never did.

What Annette couldn't understand was that silence could be a great protector. I couldn't afford to cry when there was no escape. Talking about my problems would only illuminate the lines of my unhappiness in the cold light of day, showing me, as well as her, the things I had been able to bear only because they had been half hidden in the shadows. I couldn't expose myself like that, not even for her.

She thinks about Lucy, this woman, who was invisible to her then appeared to be her enemy. Rebecca has never truly seen her because she didn’t bother to look. Plus, there were so many things she also chose not to notice in her own daughter whom she sometimes used to impress others.

It's the effect of the uncanny Valley " Brandon replied. "You know, the unsettling place inhabited by dolls and robots. It's been proven that humans react positively to humanoid figures until said figures become too human. At that point, the little differences - like the inability to make appropriate eye contact of unusual speech patterns - create feelings of discomfort and disgust, sometimes even leading to terror.

It's the effect of the uncanny valley " Brandon replied. "You know, the unsettling place inhabited by dolls and robots. It's been proven that humans react positively to humanoid figures until said figures become too human. At that point, the little differences - like the inability to make appropriate eye contact of unusual speech patterns - create feelings of discomfort and disgust, sometimes even leading to terror.

After work, we both caught our breath in front of that fan, sitting on the mattresses on the floor, our backs resting against the wall. Slowly, two yellowish human-shaped stains developed against the cracked paint: a small one for me and a larger one for Ma. Those stains are probably still there in that apartment, and I’ve dreamed about them, about our skin cells, our droplets of oil and sweat, sunk into that porous wall, bits of us that will never escape.

Helena's eyes glittered with naked intensity. I could not tell if they were filled with greed or a desperate need to be loved. I was not even sure if it made a difference: it came down to hunger. Perhaps those desires all stemmed from the same place in our broken, burdened hearts.

I felt surrounded by the warmth of Annette’s friendship, by her confidence in me. I wondered if that had been her plan all along.

Fortunately, it was easy to be invisible around Rebecca. She never truly looked at me anyway. She was smart enough to be aware of her privilege, in theory at least, but in practice, she was as blind as anyone else. I wasn’t one of them, even if I wanted to be. In English, I was a different person, stuttering, slow, and clumsy. Inarticulate, seemingly unintelligent. Rebecca, for whom appearances meant so much, wasn’t able to see past any of that to the woman I was in Chinese. She didn’t realize that I could understand so much more than I could express in her language. My features were as impenetrable as a mirror, reflecting back only what she expected to see with her white gaze.

In China, I’d seen posters warning girls of the danger of becoming leftover women, women that no one wanted. Leftover like scraps on a table, uneaten food, both a sacrilege and wasteful, something that should have nourished our country squandered and turned into rubbish: unwanted, purposeless, of no use to anyone. I was a leftover woman, I realized. After everyone else had carved away what they wanted to see in me and taken what they desired, I was all that was left.