A waitress-dancer remembers her loving brother and their bittersweet childhood in Hong Kong.

Four college freshmen from vastly different worlds navigate identity, ambition, and growing pains in their first chaotic quarter of university life. San, a Chinese-American student torn between cultures; Tonisha, a gifted but struggling pre-med balancing school and family survival; Rick, a conservative freshman lost in a diverse campus; and Judy, a carefree party girl spinning out of control—all find their lives intersecting in a single history class.