From the movie, The Joy Luck Club (1993):
Jing-Mei “June” Woo: [opening narration] The old woman remembered a swan she had bought many years ago in Shanghai for a foolish sum. “This bird,” boasted the market vendor, “was once a duck that stretched its neck in hopes of becoming a goose. And now look, it is too beautiful to eat!” Then the woman and the swan sailed across an ocean many thousands of lei wide, stretching their necks toward America. On her journey, she cooed to the swan, “In America, I will have a daughter just like me. But over there, nobody will say her worth is measured by the loudness of her husband’s belch. Over there, nobody will look down on her because I will make her speak only perfect American English. And over there, she will always be too full to swallow any sorrow. She will know my meaning because I will give her this swan, a creature that became more than what was hoped for.”
But when she arrived in the new country the immigration officials pulled the swan away from her, leaving the woman fluttering her arms and with only one swan feather for a memory. For a long time now, the woman had wanted to give her daughter the single swan feather and tell her, “This feather may look worthless, but it comes from afar and carries with it all my good intentions.”
…
They arrived. I met them last week. Thirty-five master’s students from India, China, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Ecuador, Taiwan, and of course the United States; I spent the first day of HCI/design orientation with them. In addition there are the 16 undergraduates; I know many of them — they were students in my I300 class last spring; they know something of what is going to happen, but not quite. And then there are the other graduate students from a variety of areas, including computer science, education, journalism, telecommunications, and so on; each has their reasons for signing up for the course.
Everyone — 66 in all — seems excited and filled with anticipation. I’m certain their views of HCI/design [what I'll just refer to as "design"] differ from mine and my colleagues. And I know that the way many of them solve problems is not the way they will solve problems in this course. Design is not algebra; there is no algorithm for great design. Many will fight this, they will want to know the steps, the process, the formula. I’ll talk about this extensively throughout the semester, but for now everyone is happy and excited.
They come with hopes and dreams… from their parents, their family, and, of course, with their own ambitions. They carry with them many good intentions.
