Early in the story, at the start of the shortlived mother-daughter conspiracy to sculpt Jingmei's identity, Jing-mei looks in the mirror and at first sees a "sad, ugly girl." This enrages her. She proceeds to rage against the image, trying to "scratch out the face in the mirror." But after a moment something better shines through. Recognizing the power of a daughter's anger, Tan allows Jing-mei a moment of clarity that foreshadows the story's calming end. "This girl and I are the same," she thinks calmly. Here, Jing-mei expresses a nascent sense of identity, one full of power and rage, which separates her from her mother.
Two Kinds