![]() ![]() Dedicating all her energy to daily tasks allows her to put her trauma behind her both emotionally and concretely: work and home life distract her from the past and allow her to build a future for her family. On top of all this, she cares for the children whenever she is home, which means she is occupied during every waking moment of her life. ![]() Once the family reaches the United States, Má copes better: she starts working when Bố refuses and makes sure they both take classes. He is unable to relate to his children because he is so used to living in survival mode: when his life is no longer under threat, he has no idea what to do with himself. Of course, he isn’t: he spends his days chain-smoking, drinking, obsessing about the supernatural, and stressing about invisible threats, like “that PERVERT across the street” whom he tells young Thi Bui is “watching” her. Bố recognizes that, given his childhood, he “wouldn’t be normal” as an adult. When they escape Việt Nam, Má is eight months pregnant-she gives birth as a refugee in Malaysia.īui’s parents’ trauma marks them for life, no matter how much they try to move beyond it. ![]() Má’s brother Hải disappears, and Má and Bố realize they are in danger of being killed, arrested, or forced to do hard labor in New Economic Zones. When South Việt Nam loses the war, this only gets worse: the Northern-led government fires Bố from his teaching position, labels him “ ngụy” (or “deceitful”), and begins surveilling the entire family. Then, war and inflation disrupt their brief “honeymoon period” in the Mekong Delta, and they return to Sài Gòn to find themselves living in a “police state” and subjected to constant suspicion. ![]() First, Má and Bố are devastated when their daughter Quyên dies as an infant. While Má’s childhood is comparatively comfortable, after her marriage to Bố her life is defined by constant fear and danger for 13 years. After listening to this story, Bui realizes that her father is still that “terrified boy” on the inside. Bố, age seven, hides underground the whole time. Then his father joins the Việt Minh, leaving Bố with his grandfather, who takes him back to their native village-which is then massacred by the French, and then by the Việt Minh. His father cheats on, badly abuses, and kicks out his mother, who leaves Việt Nam with an occupying Chinese soldier. His parents and grandparents fight endlessly, he falls deathly ill, and a famine strikes. As she looks to the future and wonders whether her son will inherit her “Refugee Reflex,” Bui learns that her and her family’s trauma is like a form of bodily memory that leaves an intergenerational imprint on each individual’s identity and emotional life.Īs her parents tell her about their pasts, Bui learns about the trauma they have experienced. When Thi Bui first realizes that her parents are reluctant to talk about their past in Việt Nam, she already knows that her family’s “gray stillness” has something to do with “a darkness did not understand but could always FEEL.” But as Má and Bố begin to recount their childhoods, Bui quickly sees that she is asking them to unwrap their “wounds beneath wounds.” Not only has trauma marked her parents forever, but it also shapes the next generation, deeply affecting the way Bui and her siblings navigate their relatively trauma-free lives in the United States. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |