Quote 1
My father, who spoke only a few canned Chinese expressions, insisted my mother learn English. So with him, she spoke in moods and gestures, looks and silences, and sometimes a combination of English punctuated by hesitations and Chinese frustration: "Shwo buchulai" – Words cannot come out. So my father would put words in her mouth. "I think Mom is trying to say she’s tired," he would whisper when my mother became moody. (II.2.21)
Clifford St. Clair and Ying-ying don’t exactly have the most understanding marriage. He doesn’t know what she’s really trying to communicate so makes assumptions.
Quote 2
I often lied when I had to translate for her, the endless forms, instructions, notices from school, telephone calls. "Shemma yisz?" – What meaning? – she asked me when a man at a grocery store yelled at her for opening up jars to smell the insides. I was so embarrassed I told her that Chinese people were not allowed to shop there. When the school sent a notice home about a polio vaccination, I told her the time and place, and added that all students were now required to use metal lunch boxes, since they had discovered old paper bags can carry polio germs. (II.2.32)
Lena doesn’t deliver perfect translations because she often has her own agenda or feelings about the issue.
Quote 3
I could not tell my father what she had said. He was so sad already with this empty crib in his mind. How could I tell him she was crazy?
So this is what I translated for him: "She says we must all think very hard about having another baby. She says she hopes this baby is very happy on the other side. And she thinks we should leave now and go have dinner." (II.2.76)
Ying-ying’s English must be really bad if she can’t tell that her daughter is lying. In any case, Lena functions as an interpreter/mediator between her parents, placing her in an uncomfortable position in which she is somewhat dishonest to both parents in order to preserve family harmony.