IIn a state of panic, I packed my bags for a trip to Ho Chi Minh City. I received news that my grandmother was not well and her doctor warned her of her impending death. While anxious about my grandmother’s rapidly deteriorating condition, rising COVID-19 cases in Vietnam, and travel, I was acutely aware of a more practical problem: I didn’t have enough time to buy any American goods to give to my relatives. Whenever my uncle visits Vietnam from Texas, he fills his suitcase with dollar tree merchandise to appease friends and family, not to mention that many of these items are made in Vietnam. The thought of leaving empty-handed makes me blush.
Because America is better. My family has always felt that way for as long as I have known the concept of America.
Twenty years ago, my mother and I immigrated to the US, while my sister continued her education in the UK, where she moved as a teenager. Many Vietnamese families with parents in one country and children in another are familiar with this transnational dynamic. Unlike Vietnamese refugees, my family and I were part of a new wave of post-war Vietnamese immigrants who came to America not out of necessity but by choice, looking for the American dream, never asking if it fit our Vietnamese soul. For a long time, I also mistook this long-standing myth for an absolute. Once I left, I never thought I’d come back – for what? After all, we shouldn’t look back as we head higher.
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My grandmother’s house in District 2, when I was a kid, where the roads were wet and muddy and where mopeds would sink into the soft red dirt, is now considered a prime location for easy access to the bustling heart of the city. My aunt was there with her 2 year old daughter when I arrived. I’ll be there for a month or so, so we’ll overlap for a few weeks.
“Your Uncle Hanh will arrive about five days after you leave,” she told me. Her permanent resident card in the US allows her to be away for only six months at a time, so she and her husband are weighing.
I nod. Since my grandmother was diagnosed with stage IV cancer, my uncles and aunts have taken turns caring for her from wherever they are – Oklahoma, California, Texas. The unspoken truth is that after being separated by almost half a year, my auntie will only be with her husband for about five days before leaving Vietnam. I smiled at my niece, who greeted me in an invented language that I realized a few days later was her own Vietnamese, English, and toddler language.
Unlike when I moved abroad when I was young and perhaps found it easier to integrate into American society, my aunts and uncles who immigrated to the United States never fully settled in their adoptive country. They come from across the Pacific trying to manage their own business (their main source of income), schedule doctor appointments for their parents, and keep in touch with their partners while still working in the US, promising to help them secure their permanent residency. So did my aunt, who got hers after quitting her job as a banker in Vietnam to work at a chicken factory in Oklahoma – the hard-earned prize of her years of physical labor was semi-freedom to and fro, Always on the go, and half-heartedly chatting with husband via FaceTime.
In my grandmother’s bed, where she now spends most of her time, I was reluctant to share that my husband and I were planning to move to Vietnam in the summer.Part of this decision was the fact that we were pregnant, and part of it was the fact that we knew Now It was my last chance to be with my grandparents.
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“Why are you here?” Grandma frowned. “You need to have kids there so your kids can become U.S. citizens.”
My grandmother wasn’t the only one who expressed disapproval of my reverse immigration plan. “She says that now, but she won’t stick to it,” my mother told a relative. It seems to me that the older generation is stuck in the imagination of Vietnam of the past, despite the fact that, according to the World Bank, Vietnam has “went from one of the poorest countries to a middle-income country in a generation. Economy” . An East Asia Forum article called Vietnam the “economic star of 2020” because it has grown its GDP faster than most countries while containing the outbreak. It doesn’t take an economist to see this Dramatic development of the country. When I was a child, most of my extended family lived in houses with woven roofs from dried banana leaves. Now many are in full service high-rise condominiums developed by Singaporean and Korean investors owner.
I explained to those who were skeptical of my decision that in addition to a desire to rediscover my homeland, my children needed to learn about Vietnam in the way I once had, in their spirit and soul – this is not me One can teach.
“But your husband would here? Doubt that anyone born in the United States would ever want to move to this country, said my grandmother, who raised all four of her children into accomplished adults.
“He likes it here.” I gave the most reassuring smile, and she seemed to be temporarily reassured.
Fortunately, I encountered more than just resistance. I met my 26 year old cousin at a Hong Kong fusion restaurant in District 1. My cousin who has lived in America for many years is well aware of the disadvantages of being a minority, the recent boom in Asian violence in America, and the “bamboo ceiling” that prevents Asian Americans from holding top management positions.
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“Working in the corporate world in Vietnam is not as easy as it is in America,” she told me. “Infrastructure is not set in stone, so you have more flexibility to create your own rules and have more impact — essentially, you can build your own new things. But if you want to climb the corporate ladder with existing conditions, U.S. will be better.”
I can say my cousin is thriving here. She is young, talented, capable, and lucky that Vietnam places great emphasis on American education, and those with American university degrees can earn four times or more as their peers, perhaps an effort to encourage young Vietnamese to return home part. foreign.
“Life is good.” My cousin leaned back with a lychee cocktail.
As a mother-to-be, I was also drawn to Vietnam’s preferential treatment of foreigners, affordable childcare, high quality of life, and emphasis on family values. In America, the arrival of a baby is like a debilitating condition that needs to be overcome quickly— when will you return to work It’s a problem that plagues mothers. In Vietnam, mothers are entitled to six months of paid leave after the birth of their child. One of my cousins spent three months working from home without asking any questions because she had a miscarriage. At times, overwhelming respect for a family-oriented life can put undue pressure on women, but in many cases it’s also more humane because it acknowledges the daunting task of motherhood.
While in New York, I envisioned two options: living upstate in favor of a safer life to avoid anti-Asian-motivated attacks at the cost of a complete lack of diversity, or living in the city for the richness of culture and fear of being attacked Pushed in front of a moving subway car. I quickly got tired of imagining. Somehow, moving across borders with four pets and a baby feels like an easier option than in the US. For the first time in over 20 years, I no longer have to explain where I come from – no one will ask.
Vietnam is not without its shortcomings. When it comes to freedom of speech, there are still many gaps. I’m writing this in Ho Chi Minh City and I can’t seem to access the Human Rights Watch website. As a writer, I will have to live with the tension of never being able to adequately express myself in my native language. But it is also a Vietnamese fantasy to attribute all the right and the good to the United States. The American Dream is not without its full consequences and sacrifices. For my loved ones, its quest means children separated from their parents, partners separated from each other, and teens growing up without a clear grasp of either language. Maybe it’s time for Vietnamese at home and abroad to stop admiring America and consider the long-neglected Vietnam dream.
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