My parents and I immigrated to the United States sometime in 1997, two years after I was born. For most of their life, they've been in the restaurant business, hopping from one family business to another before finally starting their own this summer. My dad is a cook and my mom works the front of the house and my brother and I often tagged along with them to work when we were younger.

We were a Chinese-American family, and I lived and breathed General Tso's chicken. I grew up as a restaurant kid. As a restaurant kid, I would always be at the family restaurant on weekends or breaks, playing a game of "lava" with my cousins in the break room or watching "Friends"on the small television set up there.

I remember watching my dad cook through the small, foggy window on the door that led to the kitchen. I watched, in awe of the flames that would sometimes rise and engulf the wok, amazed at how my dad skillfully tamed them. My mom came behind me later and ushered me away, asking me to play elsewhere, before hurrying into the kitchen with an ink-filled notepad in hand. She shouted orders seconds later. People often said that they sounded angry in the kitchen.

I spent the rest of that afternoon playing with the old Game Boy that my brother and I shared. When we would finally leave the restaurant, it would always be late, almost midnight, but the ride home would be quiet and I would stare at the bright blurred lights as we passed the lampposts on the highway.

My mom, no matter what, still woke up at 7 a.m. to help us get ready for school before going to work later that day. We would talk quietly while she braided my hair in the bathroom. She would hold our hands as we walked to school and, as we grew older, she let go.

Sometimes my parents would have days off; sometimes they'd be working the entire week. Sometimes my brother and I wouldn't see them much until later that night. Family dinners became sacred to me, since that was really the only time we were all together. During the week, if none of my parents had a day off, my brother and I would be picked up by our aunts that lived close by. We would come home late, and we would be shuttled off to bed for school the next day.

Growing up, it was hard for me to see the reasons why they did all of this. When I was little, I felt like my parents had abandoned my brother and I. The language barrier that we did have grew during this time, I think, because neither of them ever had the time to teach us or to have someone else teach us. A lot of division occurred during the time I was growing up.

When we both began to work side by side with my parents in the restaurant business, I never felt like I was truly my parents' child -- I was just a mere extension, an inconvenience. It was rare for them to express in words that they loved me. Vocal affirmation was not their modus operandi.

I remember folding menus with my brother and my cousins and feeling bitter. I often expressed my anger and frustration through tantrums and tears, unable to find the words to express how I felt to them.

However, I can also recall the eye-bags under my parents' eyes, the way that they smiled when they saw my brother and I, and the times they've tried to spend time with us by trying to be engaged in our games or stories. I remember Dad patiently teaching me how to play Chinese chess while he was on break and Mom kissing my forehead and tucking me in during bedtime. My parents are self-conscious of their English and their background, but every day, even now, my parents step outside of their comfort zone in order to provide for the family.

There are other little things that they did, too, that remind me that much of what they're doing is for our future. While some things became divided, it didn't stay that way permanently.

There was a time when I told my parents I wanted to open my own restaurant, and they immediately shot the idea down, telling me that I could do better and that I wouldn't be happy.

"I want you to live a better life," my mom told me, pushing strands of hair behind my ear. "To do better than this."

I look back on my childhood with fondness and a new perspective instead of bitterness. Their tired smiles have motivated me to push the limits and to do better, for both my sake and theirs.

When I see restaurant kids in Chinese restaurants, when I hear the high-pitched chitter chatter in the kitchen, a part of me hopes that one day they'll understand what their parents are doing for them.