porqueuepine:

Let’s talk about it. So before we even saw the short, we knew the story featured an Asian woman whose children had left the nest. And as you watch the short, you pick up that this woman is likely to be a first generation immigrant.
When we meet Bao, we hear baby gurgles and giggles, so the audience knows that we basically just witnessed a birth. And as we see Bao grow more and more, we witness the immense care and affection the woman puts into caring for Bao, establishing that it is her “child”. However, with the care and affection, also comes an extreme protection, in which she attempts to keep it by her side at all times, away from soccer – and most importantly– away from non-Asians. As an Asian-American who was brought over at a young age, this is incredibly familiar behavior. Our first generation parents love us AND their home, and they try to instill that same dedication to our native culture, despite what our individual interests may be. This can cause a rift between the two figures, the Asian parent and the Asian-American child. One wants to keep the other close and safe, away from the unfamiliar, while the other, unaware of the dangers of unfamiliarity, wants to learn and explore. This rift grows as the two continue to pursue their goals.
Eventually, it comes to the climax. Bao comes home with a non-Asian fiancé and it’s leaving home. Unequipped to cope, the woman eats Bao. This scene hit me the hardest. Instantly after eating Bao, the woman regrets it. My interpretation? She realizes that in trying to protect Bao by keeping him home against his will, she destroys it. Kills it, really. But wait!
A new character appears: Bao, but human and grown. We can connect the dots that THIS is the child who left the nest, and what we witnessed was this man’s youth leading up to his departure from home. So we can start piecing things together. Bao from the start, has always represented this guy. And the woman had wondered “how could I have kept him with me?” And through reliving her motherhood with Bao, she realizes she couldn’t. Her child wasn’t going to live life the same way she does, in her ethnic enclave, and she forcing him to do so would have destroyed him. She realizes she has to meet him halfway, thanks to him taking the first step of coming home. So the sharing of the bao making process with her son and his wife is the Asian parent reconciling her son’s Asian-American identity with her own Asian identity.

TL;DR As an Asian-American, seeing the struggles of cultural reproduction vs. cultural assimilation and its relationship with immigrant parenthood on the big screen induced tears, and I’m not ashamed.