The short story by Nam Le about his father and his origins in Vietnam was one that really resonated with me. Having been raised with two parents who share a similar past, I can understand a lot of the morals and values that Nam experiences/shares with his father. My parents immigrated to the United States as a result of the fall of Saigon. They were forced to leave their native country due to a lot of war, violence, and political turmoil. Throughout Le's story, I catch glimpses of emotional expressions in his writing. In Asian cultures, people value honor and pride, which can be expressed as love and sacrifice. From my own experiences, the sacrifices that parents make are usually for the sake of love and protection for their children. Any child of immigrant parents can vouch for their parents.
This brings up another point as to how Le doesn't share the sense of familial duty to his parents. He and his father were estranged, having not talked to each other for a period of time. This is interested as I'm sure a lot of American-born children have a sense of duty and repayment to their parents. In many ways, Le expresses nonconventional traits of the Asian child. He pursues writing, that in which itself is crucial in preserving Asian American history, but isn't the traditional career path. Other more conventional jobs include becoming a doctor or a lawyer, which he could have been. He also lives in Iowa, which isn't known for its large community or population of Asians. More concentrated areas of living could be those in the East or West Coast. Le also has a girlfriend who is White. This is unlike the typical same-ethnic partner that is expected of him. In the ways that he does follow the stereotypical Vietnamese portrayal is that he consumes a lot of alcohol, this is something lesser known to the public.
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