Vietnamerica: A Family's Journey

A second-generation Vietnamese American, GB was born in North Carolina in 1976. As a young man, GB knows very little about his family’s history, and his ignorance comes from a combination of his father’s refusal to discuss the past and his own disinterest in his Vietnamese heritage. GB represents the experience of assimilation and the ways that adopting new cultural practices risks erasing traditions. GB depicts himself as a stranger in his parents’ homeland, and his Americanized upbringing doesn’t prepare him for Vietnam’s customs when he visits the country as an adult. He’s often portrayed as a tourist in Vietnam and complains about the humidity and traffic. His father, Tri Huu, twice tells him to “show some respect” (9, 59) at places of worship. In addition, GB depicts his youth as one disconnected from and insensitive to his parents’ hardships, as he includes episodes where he laughs at his mother’s English and criticizes his father for being too strict and not supporting his art career.

GB gradually awakens to his heritage after several encounters during which he listens to his family members’ stories. In one flashback, his grandmother, Le Nhi, encourages him to ask his parents about their past and informs him, “There’s a lot about your parents you don’t know” (115). The memoir functions as a record of what GB learns about his parents through a collection of their memories and a framework of multiple storytellers. By becoming an active listener, GB sees his parents as individuals who pursued their goals in Vietnam and had to make traumatic sacrifices in leaving their homeland. The memoir begins and ends with the inscription that Tri Huu left for his son in a book about the Vietnam War. Attributed to Confucius, the quote reads, “A man without history is a tree without roots” (8, 278). In mapping the dangerous exodus of his parents from their origins, the disrespectful GB at the beginning of the memoir undergoes his own journey of maturity and self-discovery.