Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam

This final chapter about Chi explains what happens after she ran away from home. She went to San Francisco’s Chinatown and returned to living as a man. Chi adopted the male name Minh and was paid under the table at Chinese restaurants. Minh then traveled through various states working odd jobs, spent a couple of years working at an automobile factory in Detroit, and finally returned to California, where he became a welder at an aerospace company. He fell in love with a Vietnamese-American woman and underwent gender reassignment surgery. The two married despite the protestations of her family, but when Minh lost his job in a recession and could not find another, they separated.

Minh later reconnected with his family after 14 years. His homecoming was a joyous event, though Pham describes how they all danced around the real issues and the difficult topics. Pham explains this as his biggest regret now, writing, “While he was with us, we left his personal history dormant, boxed in this new shell, this new being we didn’t comprehend” (297). Minh enrolled in cosmetology classes, but soon stopped going; he was lonely and depressed without his wife, who had asked for a divorce. Once in a while, he would attempt to reconcile with her by traveling to Southern California, where she was staying with her parents, but her family shielded her from him. Just after the New Year’s holiday following his return home, Minh hung himself from the rafters in a bedroom at Grandma Le’s house. He was 32 years old. 

Chapter 39 continues the story of Pham’s bike trip as he rides south to the city of Quang Ngai. There he meets two young men on bikes who ride alongside him, chatting for miles. They invite him to stay the night with their family. He knows the lengths Vietnamese go to in welcoming guests, and he doesn’t want to impose upon their family, but they assure him it would be fine. They ride seven miles outside the city to reach the boys’ home. Their father is an official with the Tax Bureau, and after some tea and pleasantries, he says that Pham would be more comfortable in a hotel. Pham understands this to mean the father is wary of hosting a Viet-kieu given his position in the government, so Pham ends up at a run-down hotel back in the city.

Throughout much of the trip, his stomach has been bothering him, and he passes the night feeling sick. The next morning he’s back on the road, and makes it to the next city, where he feels even worse. Though he’s had trouble keeping food down, he knows he has to eat something to keep up his strength. He seeks out a vegetarian meal at a Buddhist restaurant. He passes the night at a dirty, cockroach-infested hotel, and the next morning is concerned when there is blood in his stool. He seeks out a pharmacy to get some medicine, and en route a cyclo driver shadows him, trying to sell him a ride. The driver even follows him into the shop, though Pham tells him he doesn’t need help. Finally, the pharmacist dispatches the driver by telling him to wait outside. Pham gets some medicine but continues with his ride: “Because I am angry, angry at the weakness of my body, angry at everything, I get on my bike and leave town. To hell with dysentery and fever. I am a survivor” (307).

Pham describes another memory he has from his childhood. Four-year-old An (Pham) was with his mother, in what he describes as a “chain-link cage” (308). He had been getting in trouble, such as the previous week when a “new girl” (308) found him under the table in her room. Women came to the cage window to give his mother money, which they referred to as rent. Great stacks of money sat on the desk as his mother counted it. He asked her whose money it was, and when she replied it was theirs, he wanted to know what she would do with it. She answered, “My son, this money will take you abroad to study. In America you will become a great engineer” (309). 

In this chapter, Pham describes his habit of drinking Coca-Cola on his cycling trip. He drinks two or three cans a day for the caffeine and sugar, which give him energy, and for the carbonation, which washes the dust from his throat. Coke is everywhere in Vietnam, though at 60 cents a can it’s not cheap: it costs almost a third of the daily wages of a common laborer. One hot day, he pulls over at a hut on the road for a Coke. The only customers are three soldiers in the middle of a full meal. The air is thick with the smell of liquor and cigarettes, and the three men glare at Pham as he enters. He nods toward them as a sign of respect.

When he orders his Coke, the waitress asks if he wants ice. Given his digestive trouble, he doesn’t want to risk any germs found in ice made from tap water, so he asks her to set the can on the ice for a few minutes. Then he goes to wait outside. He can hear the men grumbling, one complaining about the Viet-kieu, another angry that their ice was “too dirty” (311) for him. He has a sense of foreboding and wonders if he should leave. Just then, the men call out to the waitress to bring three Cokes—with ice. She replies that they can’t afford it, that they already owe her much of their next paychecks. This only angers them, and they swear at her before stomping out.

Outside, they surround Pham, taunting him about being a Viet-kieu and thinking he is better than they are. He replies that he wants no trouble, but he prepares for a fight. One man lurches at him but falls to the ground and vomits. A soldier watching from across the road laughs, and the other two near Pham yell at him to be quiet. Other soldiers appear to back up the laughing soldier, as the two groups trade insults. Soon a brawl breaks out in the middle of the road, and Pham sees an opportunity; he jumps on his bike and pedals away as fast as he can.