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Vietnam and I.
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Alot of people from other countries here on this board have said things that would lead us to believe that they were under the impression that us Americans were taught patriotism as some sort of brainwashing thing that happened as soon as we entered into public schools. I don’t know if any of you other Americans were “victims” of such actions, but that’s not how I became a fan of the “American dream”. My time in Guatemala aside, my first foster family...
One day we came home from school, my 11 (eleven) foster brothers and sisters and me, to find two new additions to our household.
They were two brothers, from Vietnam...
in our home because their parents were still being held and questioned as political refugees. All and all I think they spent two weeks with us. They were very quiet, and for the first two days never left each others side. Eventually they started to enjoy their surroundings, and even managed to laugh with us...mostly by the light of the commodore 64.
I enjoyed their laughter because their silence was heavy and sucked all the light in from around them, and us. More than their laughter, I remember their scars. Cigarette burns, from their wrists to their elbows. This is what the police did to them for their father’s political indiscretions. I knew the type of scars well, I had them, not from my government or police though...and my scars may have been due to my father’s sins, I dunno, but on my knuckles and thighs I wore the wrath of one woman. Anyway..still it didnt touch what happened to them. Their backs were ..just, man.
It was the first time I appreciated my country, while meeting kim and tong that is.
Today, while talking to my client, also Vietnamese, I was reminded. She spoke of her family, and they are a close family. She spoke of “the three free countries” (her words not mine, and im not saying it is meritorious, just what she said) The US Canada, and Australia. And how her family members that made it in to the Us were doing better than other members of her family in the other “two free countries. But they appreciated everything, the ones in canada and austrailia, and they work half as hard on a daily basis as they did in Vietnam and my clients can buy up to 1, 000, 000 in property here, but could have barely managed to feed themselves there...for the same effort physically and mentally, though admitably they never would have owned their own company in their mother country. Another Vietnamese Client is moving next door to me at my new house, I hope their children and mine can be great friends and some of the appreciation for effort and pay off of it gets rubbed off in a way that I cant teach, or from another perspective than I can offer.
Anyway, Vietnam, my first lesson in patriotism.
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