Thursday, November 17, 2011
Friday, September 9, 2011
Mom.
I don't write about you a lot. In fact, never.
It is not because you're any less important than Father or because you're not worth it. And it is not because I don't love you. No, it is because your story is one that needs time to breathe, time to forgive itself. And I'm not sure I forgive you for it yet, nor am I sure I can forgive myself for being too young and weak at the time to save you from the despair you've eternally etched across your soul.
But I have not forgotten.
And one day, the words will unravel themselves onto this screen or perhaps a crisp sheet of lined paper, whether pixelated or inked, more inconsequential and paltry than the story they're meant to tell.
It is not because you're any less important than Father or because you're not worth it. And it is not because I don't love you. No, it is because your story is one that needs time to breathe, time to forgive itself. And I'm not sure I forgive you for it yet, nor am I sure I can forgive myself for being too young and weak at the time to save you from the despair you've eternally etched across your soul.
But I have not forgotten.
And one day, the words will unravel themselves onto this screen or perhaps a crisp sheet of lined paper, whether pixelated or inked, more inconsequential and paltry than the story they're meant to tell.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Monday, March 28, 2011
Within the Prison Gates
He couldn't remember how long he had been there. How many full moons had passed, how many prayers he had quietly whispered to the moon goddess, how many monsoons had flooded the prison gates. It had been years now, but he could remember the details of the first day so clearly, as though it were yesterday. The fear lingered perpetually in his memories and haunted him in his nightmares. Life was fragile that first day, as he watched some of his closest friends die with a single shot from the M1 Carbine, a bullet weighing a little over seven grams.
Somewhere in the blackness, a cicada chirped mockingly in the hot night air, free. He closed his eyes. He felt the worms slithering around his bright red pus-filled ankles, rotten from the heavy ironclad chains that held them in place. The blood had dried and crusted over the wound, but the maggots fed on the flow underneath the scabs. Every shift of his legs opened up the flesh, towards which more maggots and insects crawled.
They didn't hurt him. What did they know of compassion and sympathy? They had been there for years, immutable companions coming for a good meal, and sometimes serving as meals during his toughest nights when the darkness encroached threateningly, and when sweat and death slithered down his forehead in bouts of famine and fever.
He opened his eyes, startled by a noise in the distance. A cry of anguish, long and painful, filled the valley hauntingly. It was a cry he was familiar with, guttural, almost animal-like, as he watched each of his friends deliver it during their last seconds of life. Now, there was only silence. He craned his neck and looked hard into the darkness to see if the guards were coming for him too. He wanted to look his murderers in the eye and let them know that they failed in taking away his dignity. He looked hard into the darkness, but saw nothing and heard nothing.
He closed his eyes again. That night was no different from any other night. And yet, from the depths of his soul, something shook violently. It started slowly. From the fungus that had infected all ten of his toenails, turning them a deep purplish black, from the wounded ankles filled with maggots and dried crusted blood, from the numbness in his legs and butt, frozen forever in their position, from his once-powerful arms, now beaten, bruised and cut from the daily whippings, his back burned by the sun's rays, his ribs threatening to tear through the skin entirely as famine took its toll. From the bottom of his lungs, something hurt really badly. It shook him, and he felt goosebumps all over his body. Finally, it traveled all the way to his worn face, filled with a forgotten pride and eyes that were once kind. Yes, the feeling traveled all the way to his eyes, and he felt something warm flow down the side of his face. Something that reminded him of home. Something that he had lost. It was a soft flow, like the ripples of the Mekong Delta on a hot summer day. Then, it became a torrential rain, mixed with the thunder of a voice he thought he had lost.
His body shook violently, and he heard a strange sound echoing through the jungle that night. For the first time in years, Ty Tran sat there in the black heat, body shaking, pools of water gathering at the tip of his chin, lonely.
And he cried and cried.
Somewhere in the blackness, a cicada chirped mockingly in the hot night air, free. He closed his eyes. He felt the worms slithering around his bright red pus-filled ankles, rotten from the heavy ironclad chains that held them in place. The blood had dried and crusted over the wound, but the maggots fed on the flow underneath the scabs. Every shift of his legs opened up the flesh, towards which more maggots and insects crawled.
They didn't hurt him. What did they know of compassion and sympathy? They had been there for years, immutable companions coming for a good meal, and sometimes serving as meals during his toughest nights when the darkness encroached threateningly, and when sweat and death slithered down his forehead in bouts of famine and fever.
He opened his eyes, startled by a noise in the distance. A cry of anguish, long and painful, filled the valley hauntingly. It was a cry he was familiar with, guttural, almost animal-like, as he watched each of his friends deliver it during their last seconds of life. Now, there was only silence. He craned his neck and looked hard into the darkness to see if the guards were coming for him too. He wanted to look his murderers in the eye and let them know that they failed in taking away his dignity. He looked hard into the darkness, but saw nothing and heard nothing.
He closed his eyes again. That night was no different from any other night. And yet, from the depths of his soul, something shook violently. It started slowly. From the fungus that had infected all ten of his toenails, turning them a deep purplish black, from the wounded ankles filled with maggots and dried crusted blood, from the numbness in his legs and butt, frozen forever in their position, from his once-powerful arms, now beaten, bruised and cut from the daily whippings, his back burned by the sun's rays, his ribs threatening to tear through the skin entirely as famine took its toll. From the bottom of his lungs, something hurt really badly. It shook him, and he felt goosebumps all over his body. Finally, it traveled all the way to his worn face, filled with a forgotten pride and eyes that were once kind. Yes, the feeling traveled all the way to his eyes, and he felt something warm flow down the side of his face. Something that reminded him of home. Something that he had lost. It was a soft flow, like the ripples of the Mekong Delta on a hot summer day. Then, it became a torrential rain, mixed with the thunder of a voice he thought he had lost.
His body shook violently, and he heard a strange sound echoing through the jungle that night. For the first time in years, Ty Tran sat there in the black heat, body shaking, pools of water gathering at the tip of his chin, lonely.
And he cried and cried.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Moonlight in New York City
Moonlight in New York City, the city that never sleeps, drunk on neon, night life frenzy, and light pollution, makes me sad. It makes me sad, because it is alone in the night sky, bejeweled with marvelous shadows of asteroid wars, beautifully lit, and forgotten in the cacophony of blinding lights. I was shocked to find that the moon is not so important in America, when I first arrived here. In Vietnam, it is all about the moon, an island in the sky, the light in the dark, and Nha Tra, the beautiful goddess that lives there.
I was young when I left my country, only four years old, but I held on tight to the few memories that toddlerhood could afford. Memories of the obnoxiously sweet taste of moon cake during the moon harvest festival; memories of my mother’s loving embrace as the children released their colorful hand-made lanterns onto the river and into the tropical night air; memories of all the villagers in the small village of Tra On, huddled together by the bank of the Mekong Delta. The children said quick prayers under their small breaths, that the light would eventually make its way to Nha Tra, and that she would be delighted enough to grant their wishes of toys, new clothing, luck, and prosperity. O goddess of the ocean tides, moonlight, and beauty, we said, please grant our wishes. Little fantastic dots of light afloat on the river, occasionally bumping into each other and permeating the night air with the scent of candle wax and hopeless innocence, hopeless because there were only rags for clothing the next day, hand-me-downs, rice with salt for food, and straw huts to return to. I am so glad I left before I could understand the immense destitution of my condition, an understanding that can only come with age and repetition, an understanding with which my parents were well acquainted.
When I was four years old, a U.S. government program known as the Humanitarian Operation (HO) made an offer to my father. The program’s purpose was to provide immigration services to former South Vietnamese soldiers that fought alongside the United States during the Vietnam War, and were captured as POWs by the North Vietnamese after the war ended in 1975. Persecuted for ten years as a POW, my father gladly accepted the offer to come to America, the Land of Opportunity. I will never forget the tears in his eyes when he told my mother. It seemed as though our lanterns had finally reached the moon goddess. Six months later, after all paperwork had been filed and documented, after all the goodbyes were said and all the tears were shed, promises of letter-writing, and eventual return, the six of us, my parents, my three older brothers, and I boarded a plane, excited and scared. On the plane ride, we dreamt only of streets paved with gold, mansions, Ford automobiles, education, a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow, a better life.
It was the winter of 1994 when we arrived in New York City, a representative from HO bringing us to a little apartment in Ridgewood, Queens, and we called it home. No more sticks to live in; monsoons couldn’t hurt us here. We stayed up that whole night, shivering, because we possessed no warm clothing, still with only rice and salt for food. But we were strong, courageous, filled with a sense of liberation. We were finally here.
Mommy and Daddy got right to work, enrolling me and my three brothers in school; my father enrolled himself in a free English and basic data entry class, and my mother took care of household chores. Winter shrieked and howled all around us, unbearable for people of the equator and hot sun. We had never even seen snow, or felt its powdery cold. White, we called it, because we did not know what other name to give it. Indeed, what a beautiful white it was, a snow white, a powder white, white like the moon, white like innocence, white like hope. And yet, hope we quickly lost, as we instead felt a creeping sense of desperation. We could not learn the language quickly enough, our tongues unable to wrap around F, J, X, W, Z, Th like in thought, phonemes nonexistent in Vietnamese, R’s at the middle and end of words – we only begin our words with R’s.
Our resources were quickly dwindling. Unfortunately for us, the Vietnamese community here in New York City was sparse and unwelcoming. School was worse for the children. Unfit for big slanted eyes, flat nose, high cheekbones, black teeth, frail emaciated bodies, weird names like Thinh, Phu, Long, or Ly. Childhood was cruel. Eventually, my parents found a Vietnamese friend who helped us find a temporary job to tide us over while my father worked hard to learn English and obtain his degree in data entry. The job was simple. We borrowed money to purchase a sewing machine, and had materials delivered to our homes. We would assemble the materials and make neckties, bowties, hair ties, cummerbunds, brooches, and flight attendant scarves. The nights were long and cold, as we each found ourselves having to work hard to prevent homelessness. We children did not dare mention homework. Any homework assigned I endeavored to do as quickly as possible within the classroom. With twenty four ties and twelve cummerbunds earning us a single dollar, our dreams were shattered as education was secondary to survival and we were faced with challenges of a lifetime. I was only four years old then, and for the next nine years of my life, I would spend all my time outside of school working with my family to make ends meet. We didn’t know it then, but it was child labor and sweatshop labor at its finest. And for this, we were grateful.
I was young when I left my country, only four years old, but I held on tight to the few memories that toddlerhood could afford. Memories of the obnoxiously sweet taste of moon cake during the moon harvest festival; memories of my mother’s loving embrace as the children released their colorful hand-made lanterns onto the river and into the tropical night air; memories of all the villagers in the small village of Tra On, huddled together by the bank of the Mekong Delta. The children said quick prayers under their small breaths, that the light would eventually make its way to Nha Tra, and that she would be delighted enough to grant their wishes of toys, new clothing, luck, and prosperity. O goddess of the ocean tides, moonlight, and beauty, we said, please grant our wishes. Little fantastic dots of light afloat on the river, occasionally bumping into each other and permeating the night air with the scent of candle wax and hopeless innocence, hopeless because there were only rags for clothing the next day, hand-me-downs, rice with salt for food, and straw huts to return to. I am so glad I left before I could understand the immense destitution of my condition, an understanding that can only come with age and repetition, an understanding with which my parents were well acquainted.
When I was four years old, a U.S. government program known as the Humanitarian Operation (HO) made an offer to my father. The program’s purpose was to provide immigration services to former South Vietnamese soldiers that fought alongside the United States during the Vietnam War, and were captured as POWs by the North Vietnamese after the war ended in 1975. Persecuted for ten years as a POW, my father gladly accepted the offer to come to America, the Land of Opportunity. I will never forget the tears in his eyes when he told my mother. It seemed as though our lanterns had finally reached the moon goddess. Six months later, after all paperwork had been filed and documented, after all the goodbyes were said and all the tears were shed, promises of letter-writing, and eventual return, the six of us, my parents, my three older brothers, and I boarded a plane, excited and scared. On the plane ride, we dreamt only of streets paved with gold, mansions, Ford automobiles, education, a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow, a better life.
It was the winter of 1994 when we arrived in New York City, a representative from HO bringing us to a little apartment in Ridgewood, Queens, and we called it home. No more sticks to live in; monsoons couldn’t hurt us here. We stayed up that whole night, shivering, because we possessed no warm clothing, still with only rice and salt for food. But we were strong, courageous, filled with a sense of liberation. We were finally here.
Mommy and Daddy got right to work, enrolling me and my three brothers in school; my father enrolled himself in a free English and basic data entry class, and my mother took care of household chores. Winter shrieked and howled all around us, unbearable for people of the equator and hot sun. We had never even seen snow, or felt its powdery cold. White, we called it, because we did not know what other name to give it. Indeed, what a beautiful white it was, a snow white, a powder white, white like the moon, white like innocence, white like hope. And yet, hope we quickly lost, as we instead felt a creeping sense of desperation. We could not learn the language quickly enough, our tongues unable to wrap around F, J, X, W, Z, Th like in thought, phonemes nonexistent in Vietnamese, R’s at the middle and end of words – we only begin our words with R’s.
Our resources were quickly dwindling. Unfortunately for us, the Vietnamese community here in New York City was sparse and unwelcoming. School was worse for the children. Unfit for big slanted eyes, flat nose, high cheekbones, black teeth, frail emaciated bodies, weird names like Thinh, Phu, Long, or Ly. Childhood was cruel. Eventually, my parents found a Vietnamese friend who helped us find a temporary job to tide us over while my father worked hard to learn English and obtain his degree in data entry. The job was simple. We borrowed money to purchase a sewing machine, and had materials delivered to our homes. We would assemble the materials and make neckties, bowties, hair ties, cummerbunds, brooches, and flight attendant scarves. The nights were long and cold, as we each found ourselves having to work hard to prevent homelessness. We children did not dare mention homework. Any homework assigned I endeavored to do as quickly as possible within the classroom. With twenty four ties and twelve cummerbunds earning us a single dollar, our dreams were shattered as education was secondary to survival and we were faced with challenges of a lifetime. I was only four years old then, and for the next nine years of my life, I would spend all my time outside of school working with my family to make ends meet. We didn’t know it then, but it was child labor and sweatshop labor at its finest. And for this, we were grateful.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Preface.
I wanted to start at the end -- or the end as I know it. You see, every passing second contributes to a new end. Because this is about my life. And I am still living.
But by the time you reach the end of this book, I will have been a completely different person from who I am at this very moment, and all the moments thereafter. After all, who are we really, but an amalgam of moments, seconds, days, years. Reincarnation does not transcend lifetimes, it transcends moments. We are reborn every step we take and every breath we inhale, sometimes finding ourselves and sometimes losing ourselves. Completely.
And I suppose that's okay. I suppose that's life. The French say "c'est la vie" -- the Vietnamese say "fuck it, enjoy".
But by the time you reach the end of this book, I will have been a completely different person from who I am at this very moment, and all the moments thereafter. After all, who are we really, but an amalgam of moments, seconds, days, years. Reincarnation does not transcend lifetimes, it transcends moments. We are reborn every step we take and every breath we inhale, sometimes finding ourselves and sometimes losing ourselves. Completely.
And I suppose that's okay. I suppose that's life. The French say "c'est la vie" -- the Vietnamese say "fuck it, enjoy".
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Vincent by Don Mclean
Starry, starry night.
Paint your palette blue and grey,
Look out on a summer's day,
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul.
Shadows on the hills,
Sketch the trees and the daffodils,
Catch the breeze and the winter chills,
In colors on the snowy linen land.
Now I understand what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they did not know how.
Perhaps they'll listen now.
Starry, starry night.
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze,
Swirling clouds in violet haze,
Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue.
Colors changing hue, morning field of amber grain,
Weathered faces lined in pain,
Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand.
Now I understand what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they did not know how.
Perhaps they'll listen now.
For they could not love you,
But still your love was true.
And when no hope was left in sight
On that starry, starry night,
You took your life, as lovers often do.
But I could have told you, Vincent,
This world was never meant for one
As beautiful as you.
Starry, starry night.
Portraits hung in empty halls,
Frameless head on nameless walls,
With eyes that watch the world and can't forget.
Like the strangers that you've met,
The ragged men in the ragged clothes,
The silver thorn of bloody rose,
Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.
Now I think I know what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they're not listening still.
Perhaps they never will...
Paint your palette blue and grey,
Look out on a summer's day,
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul.
Shadows on the hills,
Sketch the trees and the daffodils,
Catch the breeze and the winter chills,
In colors on the snowy linen land.
Now I understand what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they did not know how.
Perhaps they'll listen now.
Starry, starry night.
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze,
Swirling clouds in violet haze,
Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue.
Colors changing hue, morning field of amber grain,
Weathered faces lined in pain,
Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand.
Now I understand what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they did not know how.
Perhaps they'll listen now.
For they could not love you,
But still your love was true.
And when no hope was left in sight
On that starry, starry night,
You took your life, as lovers often do.
But I could have told you, Vincent,
This world was never meant for one
As beautiful as you.
Starry, starry night.
Portraits hung in empty halls,
Frameless head on nameless walls,
With eyes that watch the world and can't forget.
Like the strangers that you've met,
The ragged men in the ragged clothes,
The silver thorn of bloody rose,
Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.
Now I think I know what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they're not listening still.
Perhaps they never will...
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
