Week 6 Notes
(Not as many notes as usual due to the schedule this week but..)
- The Beautiful Country (2005, dir. Hans Petter Moland)
- Bui doi – “less than dust” (referring to Vietnamese children with American fathers left behind after the war)
- The Amerasian Homecoming Act (1987)
- Scene where Binh is working at Chinese restaurant after getting to America – dumps out a full plate of food, contrast to the ridiculously small amount of food given to the passengers on the ship over
- Binh finds out that GI’s children fly for free after getting to America (misleading of Vietnamese people by Americans during the war, not making information well known, seen also in We Should Never Meet)
- Ken Burns – Vietnam
- April 21st, 1975 – bombs on Saigon
- 60,000 refugees were picked up
- Kissinger misinformation about attack on Saigon
- April 29th – North Vietnam bombs an airport
- White Christmas playing after report of 105 degree weather in Vietnam (not the Bing Crosby version)
- 10 to 12,000 people surrounding the US embassy trying to evacuate
- “Let’s hope we don’t have another Vietnam experience.” – Kissinger (also how US wanted to sweep the war under the rug as soon as possible due to defeat) – “Put Vietnam behind us” – Kissinger
- Active misleading by US radio messages to South Vietnamese people about being able to leave
- A common theme in all of the works this week was gross miscommunication on the part of the US to the South Vietnamese people. How much of this was due to the shame of defeat in an already largely unpopular war? How much of it was not seeing the South Vietnamese as human beings?
Some annotations on We Should Never Meet:
- Kim posting out that there isn’t a difference between Vietnamese orphans who finish and don’t finish high school as far as their futures go (pg. 44) – “For her eighteenth birthday, her foster mother gave her a fifty-dollar bill and an old suitcase. You’re an adult now, she said. Don’t do anything stupid. (pg. 44-45) – this seems like a contrast to when Lien was leaving her family for the city to work and they reiterated to her not to bring shame to them
- Kim’s wanting to assure herself that she is tough and in control due to her upbringing, much like Lien’s want to be powerful (pg. 51) – same with the motivations behind Vinh and his gang (pg. 51) – “For years they had been denies so much from their new country and government-issued families. They robbed these buses and stores to break even, to survive. They believed they had no other choice.” (pg. 52) – being a gang the inevitable manifestation of the social workers/teachers/foster parents telling them they would be nothing (pg. 53)
- “That’s why Vietnamese gangs robbed their own people. Gangs knew their people wouldn’t trust the police to protect them. Police in Vietnam were a step below street merchants, they were so corrupt. They had no reason to believe the Americans, who couldn’t understand their accents anyway, would be any better.” (pg. 107)
- Vinh’s gang members ending up having more of a conscience about Vinh beating Bac than he has (pg. 111) – the relationship between Vinh and Bac not only parallels Bac and his son’s relationship, but also shows a generational gap between young and old Vietnamese in America
- Steven’s initial eagerness about getting to work a sign of his blind patriotism — believing that the States is doing the right thing? – “At first she found their chat dispositions intrusive, but eventually understood that their curiosity indicated a genuine concern. She tried to remember this with Steven, because of all the Americans entering her country, his intentions, like those of many of the center volunteers, were unselfish.” (pg. 119)
- Desensitization to death for Vietnamese workers, especially in the orphanages, contrasted with Stephen’s (and Americans like him) sensitivity to death due to their eagerness to help: “He was grieving. He was in shock. It was not the time for Hoa to tell him that the place he regarded as death was what she still considered home.” (pg. 127)
- Sophie and the staff marrying the Vietnamese staff to get them over to America, Sophia insisting that Hoa marry Steven even though she is already married (pg. 138) – goes back to this idea of thinking you’re doing the right thing – preferential treatment for Vietnamese working with Americans, not the average Vietnamese citizen
- Hoa’s decision to stay after learning that her son and husband were alive, albeit in prison. The decision to stay in a place in turmoil, after being promised a way out, showing the dedication to family over politics that Bac mentioned in the previous chapter.
- “Colleges liked essays on triumphing over adversity and learning important values from a life lesson.” (pg. 146) – does this capitalize on adversity, rather than celebrate overcoming it? – her life ended up being “too good” for her college essay due to her moving in with a stable family (pg. 147) – Mai embellishing the rest
- “He didn’t understand how lucky he was already to have a set of adoptive parents waiting for him in America. There were still unassigned children at the center who would leave for America unsure of their future homes.” (pg. 181) – this concept of the children being lucky also came up when Mai was reading her speech and someone referred to her as lucky for earning her scholarship
- The final part of 208-209 shows that Bridget is insecure about her trip overall, and wants to use Huan to ensure that what she did was valid, and that once they see him they will instinctually know that this was the right move and that all the time was worth it, instead of feeling more alienated by Bridget.