Dear Juliet,
About a week ago, I found your book, "War Child," on a shelf of
a bookstore in the Hong Kong International Airport. I finished
reading it in about four hours. I was coming back home to
Canada from a month-long trip in Vietnam, where I was visiting
my family (mostly in Ho Chi Minh and Dong Thap).
Your book appealed to me for a lot of reasons; but the main
reason I wanted to read it was to better understand the pasts
and histories of my own mother and father, and of course, of
the many other Vietnamese people who have had to endure similar
experiences as yourself.
The older I get, the more curious I am about my parent’s past.
The problem is, however, that for some reason, they never want
to answer any of my questions! They always end the conversation
telling me that they don’t want to talk about it. It always
frustrated me. I never understood why my parents didn’t want to
share their pasts with me; I thought that they would have felt
happy about the fact that their children wanted to know about
their pasts. I'm 24 years old and before reading your book, I
knew barely anything about my parent's past...all I knew was
that they both left Vietnam on a boat, landed in Malaysia, and
stayed in a refugee camp before coming to Canada. I knew
nothing about the details in between.
I was born and raised in Canada. My mother had me when she was
only 18 years old, within a year of being in Canada. When I
read about your plans to go to school, to make a career for
yourself, etc. I felt sad because I was thinking that my
parents probably wanted to do the same thing...but then I came
into the picture. I know that my parents loved me, but I cannot
imagine how difficult it must have been trying to raise a child
with no money, no family, etc.
Being raised in Canada and having two traditional Vietnamese
parents has been a bit difficult for me, especially being the
oldest girl. I was always so angry at my parents when I was
younger for not allowing me to do simple things that my friends
were doing all the time, like sleepovers, dances, dating, etc.
And they were always so hard on me, always expecting so much,
always putting so much pressure on me... In the past couple of
years, though, I have tried really hard to understand why they
think the way they do, why they act the way they do, why they
are so hard on me sometimes, etc. Your story made me
understand. Asian parents are not always so good at showing
their children that they love them!
Reading your book was an emotional process for me. It brought
out so many different emotions in me - shock, sadness, anger,
regret, happiness, gratefulness, pride. I always had a great
deal of respect and admiration for people like my parents and
yourself, but now, the feelings have become even more profound.
Not only do I understand my parents better, but I have also
come to understand myself better by learning more about my
roots. For this, I could never thank you enough.
You are an incredible woman. You are intelligent, you are courageous, you are strong.
Thank you for sharing your story. Thank you for making me
understand. Thank you for making me feel proud about being Vietnamese.
Chinh Luu
February 2009
