fathomless

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when i think about asian american heritage as a vietnamese person i think about the viet war survivors from the previous generation. i think about what they became. because to the asians i went to college with, they aren't even human

TW: vietnamese diaspora trauma, including brief nondescriptive mentions of sexual assault, war atrocities, the vietnamese war, drugs, heroin, cigarettes, child soldiers, domestic violence, vietnamese war veterans of the vietnam war (as opposed to the white ones who are most vocal in the usa about how They suffered the most)

do you believe it when i tell you a story of the ghosts i knew and loved? was it me, or an invention of my mind? how close am i to the viet auntie i speak about, who was lost in dreaming most of the time? or her husband, who grew up in the jungle of a warground.

were these real people? how do you know they aren't?

when i speak of myself through a character, how do you know how much is falsified, and how much is my heart?

the truth is what you believe it to be.

i think these people existed. but do i know? i know my compulsion to speak about them exists, especially in the context of asian american history. the vietnamese war veterans  of the vietnam war should be spoken about. what happened to them after?

i feel sorrow for the crooked-teeth immigrants with the heavy accents that their children shun in order to assimilate as americans.

in order to be american, you must accept that capital is king.

there must be no such thing as filial piety.

(isn't that feudal thinking?)