In “10. Light,” the nar­ra­tive revolves around Wong Kim Ark, who was detained aboard the steamship Cop­tic in San Fran­cis­co Bay for five months in 1895 after return­ing from Hong Kong. He was born in the U.S. but faced depor­ta­tion due to pre­vail­ing nativist sen­ti­ments amidst the Chi­nese Exclu­sion Act. Despite pre­sent­ing his birth doc­u­men­ta­tion, he remained strand­ed until his lawyer ini­ti­at­ed legal pro­ceed­ings. Ulti­mate­ly, the Supreme Court ruled in his favor in 1898, estab­lish­ing that chil­dren of immi­grants, like Wong, are U.S. cit­i­zens.

Wong’s sto­ry is often sim­pli­fied in media por­tray­als, typ­i­cal­ly sug­gest­ing he “dis­ap­peared” post-vic­to­ry. In real­i­ty, he returned to Chi­na fre­quent­ly, main­tain­ing a com­plex life divid­ed between fam­i­lies in Guang­dong and San Fran­cis­co. His strug­gle reflects broad­er immi­grant expe­ri­ences, shaped by the tur­moil in Chi­na dur­ing his par­ents’ migra­tion in the mid-1800s due to war and polit­i­cal insta­bil­i­ty. This nar­ra­tive empha­sizes the quest for cit­i­zen­ship, famil­ial con­nec­tions, and the desire to reunite with loved ones amid harsh immi­gra­tion laws.

The author draws par­al­lels to con­tem­po­rary immi­grant expe­ri­ences, par­tic­u­lar­ly about fam­i­ly divi­sions and the long­ing to tra­verse bor­ders. Through per­son­al anec­dotes, the author reflects on famil­ial ties, migra­tion, and cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty, under­scor­ing the emo­tion­al weight such nar­ra­tives car­ry across gen­er­a­tions. As the author shares mem­o­ries of return­ing to Guatemala, he express­es a sense of belong­ing and nos­tal­gia, empha­siz­ing the sig­nif­i­cance of fam­i­ly and shared his­to­ries.

The chap­ter con­cludes with reflec­tions on the endur­ing spir­it of immi­grant fam­i­lies, reveal­ing their resilience and strength in the face of adver­si­ty. Such sto­ries illu­mi­nate the com­plex­i­ties of iden­ti­ty amid migra­tion, cap­tur­ing the per­sis­tent search for con­nec­tion and belong­ing across bor­ders. Ulti­mate­ly, this chap­ter insight­ful­ly threads togeth­er Wong’s expe­ri­ences and the author’s own famil­ial his­to­ry, pre­sent­ing a poignant explo­ration of iden­ti­ty, the immi­grant expe­ri­ence, and the relent­less pur­suit of famil­ial con­nec­tion.