Charleston, South Carolina

Last year we decided on a winter trip before the craziness of the holidays. The boys treated me to an early birthday trip to Charleston, South Carolina. I was torn when it came to writing about it. On the one hand, I love visiting the South. The South is beautiful and easy to fall in love with, and I really wanted to put a guide together for families seeking to visit Charleston. My family and I had a wonderful trip, and I wanted to be able to share that experience with my Hello Rascal Kids community. On the other hand, however, the South is more than a cute, touristy location. It’s easy to be fooled by the cobblestone paths and charm, but, beneath it all, there is a sordid history of enslavement that still impacts the lives of Black Americans today. Charleston was built on the labor of enslaved people, and flourished at the height of Jim Crow laws and KKK violence. It was actually the first place that started the slave trade, and was the slave trade capital when enslavement was legal. Because of this history, I struggled with my family visiting there at all, because I know what it represents. The recognition that we were somewhere different than our diverse SoCal life was almost tangible. We were one of the few Asian families in the city, and I can’t think of a time that has ever happened at home. The history is impossible to ignore, even – no, especially – today.

However, the way that I valued our visit was by educating myself and my children, and by not shying away from the history as I now share the experience of our visit with my Hello Rascal Kids family. I struggled with this decision, too, because it’s difficult to talk about these things. However, failing to dive into its history and tiptoeing around it is unrealistic, and erases the real experiences of all the people who were immeasurably harmed.

When having these conversations with your children, it can be extremely difficult to know where to start. The truth is, our kids often know more than we give them credit for. I started by simplifying the history lessons that I already knew in my head. I started to talk to them about what the Civil War was, why the Civil War started, and what it means today. To my surprise, AJ had already read things in history books about Charleston, and had talked about these things in class. AJ even had places he wanted to see because of what he read or learned in class. There were so many things I had no idea they knew, and so much more they wanted to know. My boys had questions, and I let them ask those questions. We chose not to visit plantations because that is an aspect that I personally did not want to glamorize for my own family, but, of course, it is up to each family how they decide to take on their visit.

How you choose to educate your children, yourself, and your family is fully up to you. At the end of the day, we enjoyed our visit to the South, and I’m glad that it served as an outlet to talk with my kids about important and difficult topics in history.

Our family time in Charleston: