You’d think that as a Chinese-American and a New Yorker I would know my way around the city pretty well. Nope. I spent an entire HOUR wandering the fishy streets of Chinatown trying to find The Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA). I Googled the museum address in the morning and jotted down the map location: 70 Mulberry Street. Twenty minutes later, I arrived at the corner of the block and realized that this didn’t look anything like the museum I visited before.
I called my sister and asked her to double check the location. She gave me the correct address, 215 Centre Street, and I spent another 40 minutes trying to find the place. I later learned that 70 Mulberry Street was the old location of the museum. Thanks a lot Google. If you’re planning to visit The MOCA in the future, don’t make the same mistake I did. After all the walking, I was glad to hear that the museum offered Target Free Thursdays. I didn’t have to pay admission!
Although The MOCA features their display on one floor, this small museum is filled with fascinating stories of the travels, tribulations, history and culture of the Chinese diaspora in America. You can find them on almost every inch of the walls.
Below is a collection of my favorite photos from the museum. Click here to see the rest of the album.
What do the foreigners want? Our ten thousand goods, our inventions. What do we want? To trade work for dollars. On their land, seized and conquered, We try our luck with sweat and blood.
"Chinese Must Go" - When the toy pistol's trigger is pulled, the man kicks the "Chinaman" in the rear, exploding the cap.
The Fairness Cup - When the pot is filled half way, the contents do not leak out from the hole in the bottom of the pot. However, if you take more than your share all the liquid will drain out. It illustrates the classical Chinese saying that modesty brings gains and arrogance results in loss.
Poem expressing Chinese immigrants' outraged of American treatment carved on the walls of Angel Island in California.
This 8lb iron represents the weight of a day's work - 6 days a week, 20 hours a day.
A pocket guide prepared by the US Army to distinguish the Chinese from the Japanese
The Civil Rights Movement is often remembered as political movement for African American equality but the Chinese diaspora had their own civil rights movement as well. The Chinese people were the only race of people in the history of the United States that were ever banned from entering the Land of the Free in the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.
