my latest submission is a way for me to work out some of the general frustration ive found before.
see, im half vietnamese, but i guess im oliveyyellow enough to not really pass for white. but i found out from an early age like, kindergarten or so i learned that i wasn’t allowed to speak my other language in public places. i was bilingual early on.

ok, as much as a yr old can be, but defaulted to Vietnamese, ’cause, well, that was what was spoken at home alongside english. i could read and count pretty high and do basic math, which may or may not be good for a 5 yr old.

so 1st day of big girl school ever I said, “hello” in Vietnamese to my teacher, not thinking that this would freak her out. for whatever shitbrain reason she immediately assumed that I was swearing at her in my crazy moonman language, twisted my ear, had a note sent to my parents, and I ended up in special education classes for the year. punishment? didnt wanna havve to teach with me in the class? fuck if i know. i was too young. all i know is that it hurt and was wrong of me and it seemed like my fault.

i know my dad was pissed. never fuck with ex-army, lol. but it didn't get get me back into the normal classes any sooner.

so my parents decided it was best to never speak Vietnamese in front of me again, so that I wouldn’t pick up the habit and unknowingly cause myself grief in school again. or rather, more grief.

this was in a diverse mixed city in nj. and that was the 80’s. tv and pop cultre and the attitudes of kids around me taught me that asians were weird, japanese and chinese were smart and vietnamese were ugly and dumb and did laundry and sold vegetables, and that there would never be, for instance, an asian president. asians are not heroes except in kung-fu flicks on saturday afternoons after soul train on wpix 11, and are at best sidekicks. the movies told me, tv told me, magazines and comics and lots of places with no one that looked like me told me was much, much better to be white.

for the longest time, i wished i was.