It is a very sweet, coming-of-age story about a girl who grows up in the New York suburb of Scarshill. This novel does the best job of talking about multiculturalism. It is kind of humorous take on serious questions. Mona was born in America. This book rises a question about how much flexibility do we have to define our own identity. Mona's parents are Chinese, therefore Mona is Chinese. But it is not that simple. She was born in America, she identifies herself as American. At the same time, she demonstrates to her friends in school that she knows karate and Chinese language. In reality she doesn't know any of it, but she wants to be popular and distinct. However, this is not an authentic expression of her true self. She doesn't really know how to speak Mandarin and she has no idea about the karate, she just saw it on TV the same time as her friend Barbara did. Mona lives in Jewish community and she does the same things as the Jewish kids do. She decides to become Jewish. It is kind of strange decision. For example, I love Jewish music. It has such a sweet melodic structure. However, it doesn't mean that because of that I can change and become Jewish. Even though I don't like a lot of things that are related to my own culture, it doesn't mean that I can change my nationality or religion. It is in my blood. I won't be better person if I start telling people that I became Jewish or French, or Native American. My nationality is a part of who I am. It doesn't matter if I like it or not. For me it sounds the same as if somebody says: "I don't like how my aunt (mother, father, sister, brother) talks to me, she has such an unpleasant manner to talk. I want to change her for this nice lady who lives next door. She is so nice and she makes the best pies in the world." Does it sound ridiculous? Oh yes, it does.
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I totally agree with you. However, I think that it is not that easy to became Jewish. The way how it was written in Jen's novel it was not a real way in which you can convert to Jew. Just try to do it now. Go to any rabbi as Mona did, and tell him, I want to be Jewish. Trust me they would not listen to you, not even look at you. I wrote all that just to bring the idea that Jen did not mean the conversion of Mona as the main idea. I think she decide to choose this conversion just to show the readers how easy it is in America to loose your identity when you have so many different cultures around.
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