In "Two Kinds," Suyuan gives her daughter, Jing-Mei, a piano. This gift comes about one year after Jing-Mei has started taking piano lessons from her neighbor, Mr. Chong. Jing-Mei had no real interest in learning to play the piano; it was, in fact, an ambition of her mother's who was determined to turn her daughter into a "child prodigy."
We should view the gift of the piano, then, as symbolic of Suyuan's aspirations for her daughter. She hopes that Jing-Mei will win an upcoming talent contest but, in fact, she pressures her daughter so much that the pair argue and she never plays the piano in her childhood again. It is not until her adult years, after the death of her mother, that Jing-Mei returns to the piano. Clearly, then, this gift was bittersweet: her mother meant well by encouraging Jing-Mei to master the piano, but the manner of her expression caused serious conflict between the two women.
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