Thirty-eight years. That is how long it had been since I was last in my home country. It felt like a lifetime.

This past winter school break, I had the opportunity to take my teenage son back to the country where I was born. Eighteen hours on a plane packed with screaming children later, I arrived in Taipei, Taiwan, to find myself a stranger in my own land.

As soon as I arrived, I realized that I had become the clichéd bad American — or even worse, a laowai, an outsider. Maybe I have grown too accustomed to the brusque style of a New Yorker, the swagger of America. I didn’t queue. I didn’t even understand that the white marking on the subway platform was where people lined up for the train. I expected natives to speak English. I practiced what my mother would call “Chinglish” — half English and half very Americanized Chinese. Ordering dinner was a disaster, since I can’t read Chinese, so both my son and I ended up ordering niu-lo-mien (beef with noodles) every night. It was the only thing I recognized on the menu.

I came to the United States as an 11-year-old. That was old enough to have a grasp on spoken Mandarin and written Chinese, and certainly old enough to have my culture and background firmly affixed to my heart and memory. But as a pre-teen newly arrived in California, I wanted to be an American. I grew my hair beyond the standard Taiwanese student cut of just below my ears, and styled it into a Farrah Fawcett flip. I devoured the dictionary to commit my twenty English words a day to memory. I tried hard to enunciate the various sounds that did not exist in Putonghua. And I imitated the American attitudes I saw around me, copping a style that would make any valley girl proud. I assimilated successfully, but something had to give. So I gave up being Chinese.

The return to my country was long time coming. “Where have you been?” people asked me in Taiwan. I wanted to know the same. “Why so long?” they asked. I didn’t have answer.

Taiwan was breathtaking in so many ways. The lush green everywhere I looked; the skyscrapers that loom just below the clouds; the civilized manner with which people treated each other; the drive and motivation of the young; the public school system where teachers teach and students actually learn; the social system where health care is free and good; subways that are clean, fast, efficient, free of rats… All of it took my breath away. Life in Taiwan seemed so much simpler, and yet more advanced than in the West. The sense of pride I felt was deep and multi-layered.

I looked at my half-Italian and half-Chinese son, and saw his Asian eyes looking back. At 14, he was at ease in Taiwan, where I was awkward. While I struggled to find my footing on both lands, I saw him connecting with his heritage with pride. He wanted to know his mother’s ancestors and have a link to my ethnicity. He even practiced his fledgling Chinese on the hotel concierge: “Xiao Jie, Wo ku-ee jie ni de jiang-dao, ma?” He squealed with pleasure when she responded by giving him a pair of scissors, as he had asked her to. He wants to go back to Taiwan, to live and to work, to experience life as a Taiwanese/Chinese man.

Ultimately, assimilation into life in the United States served me well. It allowed me to be part of my adopted country and to be successful. But the success came at a price.

This short trip to my homeland helped gave my son an identity. I am still looking for mine. In my middle years, I crave the connection that I lost with my culture. At almost 50, I am still searching for my roots. During our trip, a taxi-driver turned in his seat to give me some advice:

“To forget one’s ancestors is to be a brook without a source, a tree without roots.”

How true. Thirty-eight years ago, my parents changed my name from Yee-nien to Nancy. From now on, I will use my Chinese name.