W (Owner of the Wind from China bookstore): Our bookstore opened in 1994—it's been 31 years now. Before coming to New York, I worked as an editor at a publishing house in Shanghai. Back then, on the entire street lined with publishing houses, ours was the only one with a cafeteria. So everyone would bring their chopsticks and bowls and come eat at our place.

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Y (Me): What made you decide to come to the U.S. back then?

 

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W:To be frank, it had a lot to do with the Tiananmen Square incident in China. After June 4th, the political climate in China changed quite a bit. I believe that before 1989, especially during the 1980s, mainland China had a remarkably open and free cultural atmosphere. But after the crackdown, the leadership began to enforce stricter cultural policies. As someone working in the cultural field, I started to feel that there was little meaning in staying any longer. On top of that, back then, many young people had a deep admiration for the United States—we saw it as a place where everything was modern and ahead of the times.

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Y: What was your first job after coming to the U.S.?

 

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W: My very first job here was doing miscellaneous work at a restaurant. I earned about $1,000 a month back then. At the time, one U.S. dollar could be exchanged for 8 RMB on the black market. Before I left China, my monthly salary at the publishing house was only around 100 RMB.

 

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Y: Were there many Chinese immigrants from Shanghai in the U.S. back then?

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W: At the time, we had this saying: “Beijing people love the country, Shanghai people leave the country, and Cantonese people sell the country.” To us, Beijing was a place constantly caught up in political movements—like the May Fourth Movement, for instance. Meanwhile, it was common for people from Shanghai to study overseas. The top choice was the U.S., then Japan if you couldn't make it to the States, and if not Japan, then Australia. As for the Cantonese "selling the country," that referred to the smuggling and illegal immigration activities happening in Guangdong. A lot of foreign goods—like cigarettes, sunglasses, flared pants, radios, CDs—were smuggled into China through Guangdong. So yes, all in all, a lot of Shanghainese were going abroad in those days, and there were quite a few who ended up immigrating to the U.S.

 

 

Y: I’ve noticed that too—lots of people here in Flushing speak Shanghainese.

 

 

W: That’s right. These days, the descendants of Shanghainese immigrants in the U.S. often speak the dialect more accurately than many young people born and raised in Shanghai. Back in China, there was a big push to promote Mandarin, so a lot of younger generations grew up speaking only Mandarin at school—with their teachers and classmates—rather than the local dialect.

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Y: Are there a lot of Shanghainese restaurants in Flushing?

 

 

W: Not too many, but there are a couple of decent ones near our bookstore—one’s called Lao Ke Le, and the other is Shanghai Yu Garden. But actually, when we talk about Shanghainese cuisine, we’re really referring to home-style cooking. The tradition of Shanghainese food isn’t preserved through how many restaurants there are—it’s kept alive by Shanghainese people cooking at home. These days, though, a lot of younger people from Shanghai don’t know how to cook anymore. If things keep going like this, not only will the Shanghainese dialect fade away, but the food might disappear too.

 

 

Y: Do you still go back to China these days? Have you noticed anything special when you return to Shanghai?

 

 

W: I went back last year and met up with some old classmates and friends. When we compared our lives, I realized most of them now have a higher net worth than I do. Times really have changed—back then, no one could have imagined that housing prices in Shanghai would skyrocket the way they did over the past thirty years. Before I moved abroad, I sold my apartment in Shanghai to buy a place in the U.S. But many of my classmates who stayed ended up owning, on average, two apartments each. Back then, home ownership among Shanghainese was incredibly high.

 

 

Y: Looking back now, what do you think you’ve gained from immigrating to the U.S.?

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W: I still believe cultural freedom is something deeply important to me. And after all, New York is one of the cultural capitals of the world.

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Y: Was it hard to immigrate back then?

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W: Actually, it was much easier for Chinese students to immigrate at that time compared to now. Most of us had already finished our undergraduate studies in China and came to the U.S. to do a master’s degree. After graduating, we were usually able to find jobs pretty quickly, and our employers would sponsor us for a green card. The salary we earned was enough to live a stable, middle-class life. Back then, coming to the U.S. really felt like living the “American Dream”—getting a degree, finding a job, buying a car and a home. It felt like a clear, upward path into the middle class.

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​Y: During your time working in the cultural field in China, had you encountered or engaged with American cultural field prior to immigrating to the United States?

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W: Back when I was working at the publishing house, I became friends with a writer whose surname was Wang. He was the translator of the mainland Chinese edition of Roland Barthes’ A Lover’s Discourse—a book that my colleagues and I helped publish in 1989. A few years later, Wang applied to a comparative literature program in the U.S. But the university didn’t believe he was actually the translator of the book, so they asked for an official letter from the Chinese publisher to verify it. They even promised him the highest scholarship if he could prove his authorship. To help him, my colleagues and I sent out a letter of confirmation using the fastest mailing option available at the time. It cost a lot in postage, but we wanted to make sure it got there quickly. That was the first time I ever had any connection with the United States.

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Y: After running your bookstore in the U.S. for so many years, what are your reflections on both the shop itself and the industry as a whole?

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W: My wife and I have been running this bookstore for thirty-one years now, and we've truly been very, very happy here. To be honest, in today’s climate—whether in the U.S. or in China—it’s not easy for bookstores to survive, and it’s only getting harder. Even publishers are facing increasing difficulties. One of my former colleagues back in China told me that last year, for the first time in history, the initial print run numbers at their publishing house dropped across the board. In today’s world, bookstores are becoming rare for your generation—not just in Shanghai, but even here in Flushing, many have already closed.

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​Y: How do you go about selecting books for your bookstore? What kind of feedback have you received from your customers?

 

 

W: I like to say that our bookstore is “just a bit less professional than the professional ones, and a bit more professional than the unprofessional ones.” When we first started out, we didn’t even have a proper storefront. We were tucked away in a Chinese shopping mall in Flushing called “Golden Mall.” It was a tiny little shop back then. I still remember, at that time, a Chinese professor once came by and told us, “This is the best-curated Chinese bookstore in the Americas.”