America Against China Against America - by Jasmine Sun

In 1953, my late grandmother left home and embarked on a solo boat voyage to a country she had never been to. Back in Indonesia were her parents and six younger siblings. On the other side was her new high school in Fujian Province, which was established expressly to educate overseas Chinese. The PRC had been founded only four years prior, and they’d started an enthusiastic recruitment campaign to get a generation of patriotic young scientists to help build the new China. After high school, my grandmother headed to Fudan University in Shanghai to study math. The next decade would be tumultuous. Her mother would pass away, Suharto’s regime would escalate violence against Chinese-Indonesians, and Mao would begin the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution. As a university professor with international ties, her possessions were seized, and she was sent to the countryside for “reeducation.” And when mail lines between Indonesia and China were cut, she lost contact with her siblings and

In 1953, my late grandmother left home and embarked on a solo boat voyage to a country she had never been to. Back in Indonesia were her parents and six younger siblings. On the other side was her new high school in Fujian Province, which was established expressly to educate overseas Chinese. The PRC had been founded only four years prior, and they’d started an enthusiastic recruitment campaign to get a generation of patriotic young scientists to help build the new China. After high school, my grandmother headed to Fudan University in Shanghai to study math. The next decade would be tumultuous