Amiee Phan, takes the reader through a series of intertwined stories of orphans from Vietnam sent to to America for a chance to live a “better life”. And few from women who tried to help these orphans before they left their home land.
The communist regime and the American military left chaos and horror in their wake as they fought in southern Vietnam during the Vietnam War. Thousands of children were abandoned at orphanages or were forced into them due to their families being destroyed by the war. Some women choosing to leave their children at these orphanages through out the country in hope of giving their children a chance, as they saw no other options in front of them.
After the war ended in 1973, America still occupied many of the cities trying to help the Vietnamese fend off the Communist power which was moving through the country and taking over the people in Southern Vietnam. Between 73 and 75, many Vietnamese continued to try and leave the country to make a better life for themselves and their families.
In April of 1975, President Ford instated Operation Babylift, which gave “safe” passage to thousands of the Vietnamese babies in the struggling orphanages to the United States. A very controversial last ditch effort of the United States to clean up some of the wreckage of the war, and a chance to give the children who were displaced by the war the opportunity to be adopted by American families.
The short stories in Phan’s book, gives us a front row seat through the lives of a few of these orphans and the lives they lead growing up in America. Showing the battles they went through in american foster homes and the challenges between they faced between themselves as not all of them got a guaranteed adoption. Some of them growing up alone as outsiders forced to live in a country that they didn’t feel welcome in.
The book starts with a graphic scene of a young girl, Miss Lien giving birth to a baby her family couldn’t and didn’t want to take care of. The vivid birth was tied to the destruction the country had gone through during the war. The girl is in a hospital full of other women in similar shoes of her, giving birth to a child in the midst of a graphic war. Another patient in the hospital tells Miss Lien about the adoption options for her child saying the child would get a better chance with these people and the young lady is faced with a brutal choice to make.
We follow along with a young couple in Vietnam whose relationship becomes the lively hood of the two families. Their neighboring farms supplying the financial needs for both families, and the young couple love soon becomes the wedge that drives the families apart. Much like the countries people, they must choose a side and the girls choice to live her own life helping the nuns. Her choice destroys both of the families stable lives and leaves them at odds. Much of the village has to make a choice and choose to back one of the families. Some of them feel the girls choice may have been influenced by witches and end up asking Buddhas too have her curse lifted from them as someone in their right mind wouldn’t have made this brash choice.
We then travel to America and follow along with three orphans and the troubles they have in each of their lives. Two of them Kim and Vinh who don’t get adopted , and living their lives out in various foster homes. And the third Mai, also not getting adopted but has great a set of foster parents that allow her to reach for her dreams but still leave he with a feeling of not belonging.
Kim finds companionship through an unlucky source, a women store owner who catches her stealing a pager from her. As she catches Kim she leaves her with a feeling of compassion that leaves Kim wanting more. Kim repeatedly walks home past the shop, even though it is out of the way just to see the women through the window and to catch a glimpse of her. She finally stops by one day, and ends up working for the women. Kim came to America as part of Operation Babylift, and being with this women has been one of the best times in her life. It also allows her a place to go away from her roommates.
Vinh is one of the boys Mai and Kim were shuffled around the foster homes with. He is a knucklehead and becomes a member of a smaller Vietnamese gangs which gives him the sense of family that he is lacking. He loves Kim, but she thinks he is a looser like the other boys they live with and that they are followers.
Vinh ends up helping an older man Bac Nyguen, take his groceries home one day after they spill all over the street. Bac is new to America and is happy to be here living with his daughter and her husband. Although he happy to be here, he is lonely and he finds himself inviting Hinh in for tea for conversation. They have a deep talk about American and the communists, and it ends with love and putting family first. Bac shows Vinh some of the things he has left of his wife, and tells Vinh he needs to put this girl he loves first and not to take her for granted because she could be gone at any minute. He ends up giving Vinh a piece of jewelry for Kim, and they part ways.
The next part really pissed me off, and I was literally yelling at the book and wanted to retaliate on Vinh for the old man. You find out that Vinh and his punk gang buddies in the 354. Were searching for someone to rob, and Vinh takes them back to rob the old timer and his family. Ugh fuck you Vinh, you have no back bone. The robbery was going “smooth” until on the way out the old man hears Vinh’s name and calls out to him. Caught and upset with himself, Vinh smacks Bac in the mouth and ends up stomping on the old man. Bac hit a cord with Vinh, but in no way was it justified to possibly kill this old timer because your self actions back fired on him. Kim’s not gonna accept the “gift” from you anyway.
Mai and Kim end up having a falling out on Mai’s birthday and the day of her emancipation from the foster parents and the state of California. Kim get drunk at a party she throws for Mai, or at least she says it’s for her. Mai wants to leave but get stuck there, just in time for Vinh to show up. Mai hates Vinh more than I do, but can’t understand why Kim would still be hanging around him after the hell he put her through when they lived together. Kim tries to get Mai to drink and loosen up a bit, but Mai just wants to leave and go back to her foster parents house to celebrate with them.
The girls get into a quick argument about growing up and Kim ends up kicking Mai out after being told she didn’t know anything about growing up. Mai is right, Kim is pretty childish and doesn’t have the same outlook about life as Mai does. Mai wants to grow as a person and Kim is going along with the life as it comes.
The book ends with Mai in Vietnam with another orphan, her friend Huan. Who was adopted by a white family, and has had a pretty blessed life with a family who cared for him and provided the opportunities for him to excel in life. But Huan isn’t happy with his life, he is still holding on to the fact his parents gave him away to be adopted in America. We also find out that Huan is one of the orphan’s from a story earlier in the book, with Bridget. An American volunteer that worked in the orphanages for three years and chose to stay in Vietnam to help the orphans, rather than returning after her first term of volunteering was up so she could do her part in making the world a better place. Bridget also tried to adopt Huan back then, but it didn’t work out and he was adopted by Gwen and her husband.
Huan returns to Vietnam with Mai and his adoptive mother, to try and gain some knowledge about his culture and to appease his foster mom who just wants him to be happy. The entire trip Huan is upset and you can feel the tension in his actions. He doesn’t feel welcome as an Ameriasian back in Vietnam and his mixed African American and Vietnamese complexion make him a target for the Vietnamese. Huan has always felt like he has never fit in, back home in the states and over in the country he was taken from he still feels unwelcome. He doesn’t understand why his adoptive mom is pushing him so hard to be here and visit all these places.
In the end he ends up visiting the orphanage where he was left in the Delta. Mai and him make to the trip out there alone to see if there is any answers from him. Seeing if he find out why his mother gave him up, or see if they can tell him anything about himself that he doesn’t know. Him and Mai get into a deep conversation waiting for their ride back to the group. She shares with him her feelings of living as an orphan, and that she also doesn’t feel welcome here. But she also shares with him her opinion of why his family is trying so hard to give him this chance to find out more about himself. She says, they are doing it because they love him no matter what and just want him to be happy.
At first I didn’t enjoy this book, the lack of quotation marks made it hard for me to follow for the first couple stories but eventually it became easy to follow the characters. Themes of family, home, personal battles, motherhood, fitting in, and the hatred for the war are littered all through this book and made it pretty hard to put down once I got into the story.
I have already looked up her other novel and am looking forward to reading more of her work.