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For our lunch today, I was determined to make pho ga (Vietnamese chicken noodle soup). Since I had never made it before, I decided to go to my mom first to ask for advice and maybe a recipe.

When I got to LA last weekend and asked her about it, she raved about these seasoning packets that just needed water, chicken, and maybe some onions and ginger. "It tastes really good and is convenient!" she exclaimed. I wasn't impressed, and I missed it when she made everything from scratch instead of from seasoning packets. I get that time is money and that she's got a large family to feed, but I missed the love in her food.

So instead of using her pho seasoning packets, I used this recipe. It was pretty straightforward, just time-consuming... it took me about 2 hours altogether to make. But it was so worth it.  Towards the end, I kept tasting the broth and noticed that something was missing.  I worried that I had put too much ginger and/or fish sauce and that I completely missed an ingredient.  I added some cinnamon.  Nope, that wasn't it.  It needed  a sweeter flavor.  I added a small piece of rock sugar to see if that would help.  Nope, that wasn't it, either.

Albert came over to help me taste test.  It was then that I realized I forgot to add the whole cloves.  So we added that, let it simmer for 10-15 minutes... the taste was closer, but still wasn't quite right and lacked the sweetness that wasn't from sugar.

"Did you add garlic?"

LIGHTBULB.

Garlic wasn't even in the recipe, but it desperately needed to be.  I added whole cloves of garlic to the broth while Albert chopped up some garlic, sauteed them in a little sesame oil (OMG SO FRAGRANT), and added that to the broth.  It was JUST what the soup needed!

Anyway, the whole point of the story is this: don't use seasoning packets when you've got the time and resources to do better.  Seasoning packets don't give you control over how you want to flavor your dishes, and they don't give you insight on the complexity and art of cooking.  I came away with 3 days' worth of delicious pho and a greater appreciation for well-made pho.

When you cooked for loved ones, it's worth the extra time and effort anyway. :)

Will introduced me to this site, TED.com, that features "talks by the world's leading thinkers and doers." I loved two of the videos I saw and wanted to share them with you.

The one he told me about is the first video featured below in which Jennifer 8. Lee--yes, that's the number 8 as her middle name--talks about the development of Chinese American food and the cultural significance of Chinese food on an international scale.



This second one was the result of a very short link-surf from the first video. I'm fairly new to the general concept of foie gras, so listening to Dan Barber's story about ethical foie gras was both educational and inspiring.

From an email I wrote to a friend the other day:

Everyone's got their reasons for their candidate/party, and his reason's probably not the worst I've heard. :P I've been tired lately of the political animosity between the constituents lately, and I'm especially embarrassed when the liberals say or do something stupid... just doesn't make us look good. Like when they talk about the Republicans being complete morons. They're not morons--they just have different needs and priorities.

MF and I were looking at a map of the red/blue states the other day*, and we were talking about guns for some reason. I mused that maybe gun ownership was more important in the central states and rural areas because by the time the trespasser/serial killer/etc. gets to your place, it'd take too long for law enforcement to arrive because facilities are so spaced out in those areas. I'd want a way to protect myself, too, if I were in that situation. In the big cities, one can argue that law enforcement could get there faster, and civilian-owned guns end up being more of a liability than an asset. Same with business regulation: concentration of big businesses is greater in big cities, and as an average consumer, how could you really protect yourself from Big Corporation XYZ? A consumer has greater power in the rural areas where businesses, particularly small ones, have greater sensitivity to the market.

Looking at issues by need makes a lot of sense that way and takes a lot of the "good party vs. bad party" out of it. Your friend's voting reasons fall along the same lines: he's just looking at what he'd need. :P

I had a conversation with my mom recently about the upcoming election, too. She usually doesn't care much for politics, but this year she's been much more interested and involved with it. Because my parents are Republican, I asked my mom out of curiosity what she thought of McCain and Palin. She was happy with the Republican ticket, and I was really surprised to hear her cite the war as being a strong reason for supporting McCain. "I don't think the US should pull out yet," she said.

Before those of you holding an olive branch get testy with my mom, keep in mind that she's a Vietnamese-American immigrant who was a refugee from the Vietnam War. In her mind--and many Vietnamese-Americans in Southern California--the American military departure from Vietnam was premature and left the country in a lot of pain and hurt with the Viet Cong. She sees pulling out of Iraq in much the same light and wants to spare Iraq the same pain Vietnam went through post-war. I see this reason as a kind of "need" for Vietnamese-Americans like my mom, too. For her, it's a different way to heal from the experience of war: to see the US make a different choice this time and help "save" another country when hers couldn't be "saved."

In response to her explanation, I related an analogy about resources. "Say you have a certain amount of money available to loan out to people. You have a lot of family and friends who need a loan from you, but you just don't have enough to loan out to all of them. Do you first loan it out to your friends or family?" She processed this thoughtfully, too. I continued, "Maybe after years of war, Americans just needed their government to focus on issues back home instead of abroad. Maybe it was terrible for Vietnam but good for the American family." "Maybe," she responded. "Maybe we should both look into whether America as a whole was better off from pulling out of the war." (Vague suggestion, I know, but I'm sure there are ways to examine the issue more concretely.)

All in all, I just wish people could be more respectful in their discussions of politics. Mom was so used to having polarized political discussions that having me just listen and trying to understand her perspective actually made her think that I was going to vote Republican, too. (I quickly corrected her, and she was respectful about my choice, too.)

We may not all know the details about the histories of each candidate/party/etc., but everyone's just working with what they can handle. If political education is an issue, then I'd hope such educators keep it respectful instead of name-calling. Every party's got their skeletons and scandals, and every constituent's got their need that they need addressed.


* I was thinking about how liberals commonly use the map to say that more educated areas tended to vote Democrat. I think that it just tends to be bigger cities vs. smaller towns, which of course are going to have different needs and vote accordingly.

I was playing Texas HoldEm Poker on Facebook just now, and I went into a room for 5 players. There were 3 white guys present.

As soon as I sat in, one of the players said in the chat window, "Hong Phuon Tran... good ol' american name." They raised.
"LOL... deal with that hong!" another player said.
"i almost couldn't," responded the first player.

"WTF?" I thought. I couldn't tolerate that. I left after that first hand, and I just couldn't play poker anymore. It was such a brief exchange, and I said nothing, but damn, I was so pissed.

What's the world coming to when a person can't feel safe playing online poker? >:(

P.S. I think there's some bizarre kind of comfort in the idea that these people are ignorant. Because if they knew what they were actually saying/doing and still said/did it anyway, I would not only feel hurt, but I'd be scared, too.

I know I'm about a week late on this, but it's my first public post of the year, so it ought to count.

Anyway, after some time mulling over my main goal to work on this year, I decided that what I really want to work on at this point is (re)building my relationship with Vietnamese culture, starting with language. People who have been long-time readers of my journal sometimes see the cultural angst come out [1] [2] [3]. Truthfully, I have been long terrified of reintegrating my Vietnamese identity back into my current one, even as I desire it out of some mysterious guilt.

I'm not sure that improving my Vietnamese fluency will get me to a comfortable point with Vietnamese culture, but it could certainly help. I've made small attempts in the past, e.g. writing emails in simple Vietnamese to my parents, but those faded quickly. I have more incentives to learn it now: I'm preparing to meet MF's parents, and I could also use Vietnamese to help advance me career-wise. I've started making small attempts in the last few days with my mom and MF's nephew and niece.

The factor that got me to this point was therapy. Blogging about my angst was one thing, but talking about it openly with someone else was another. My therapist has also been very good about asking the right questions and giving me useful visualization exercises that have really helped me to talk about it in the first place.

Anyway, so my short-term goal is to meet with a Vietnamese tutor by the end of January. I could do self-study for free, yes, but I'll need a tutor to keep me consistent with my studies.

I'm reading a chapter from my Cultures textbook that goes into mistrust between The White Man and The Minority. (Capitalizations and emphasis mine.) I just finished reading the section about monoculturalism and how unintentional racism is hidden behind colorblindness. Well, there's more to it than that.

I read the section about beliefs in superiority and inferiority as being major components of racism, and admittingly, I thought, "Bullshit. Nobody *really* believes that their race is better than others, do they?" And I caught myself. It's not only that there are people out there who DO think their race is better than others, but I could be one of those people.

I thought back to a conversation I had about a year and a half ago with MF about culture. I felt that being American could easily dilute and overpower one's culture, but he felt that being American just added another dimension to one's cultural richness. I guess I didn't see at the time that we embodied our own beliefs; I'm the Vietnamese American, and he's the Vietnamese-American.

Yes, I'm aware that it seems like I typed the same descriptor for the both of us, but that hyphen makes a huge difference.

"Vietnamese American" acts as an adjective and a noun. The "Vietnamese" is the adjective describing the operative noun, "American." Ultimately, I'm an American who happens to have Vietnamese characteristics.

"Vietnamese-American" acts as two connected nouns. MF is a Vietnamese. He is also an American. He has managed to successfully balance elements of Vietnamese and American culture without diluting the richness of either.

So what does this have to do with unintentional racism?

As a Vietnamese American without the hyphen, I've rejected a large part of my ethnic culture, and it's not because I wanted to fit in with the white kids; I just felt for a long time that I didn't have a place with the Vietnamese kids. And oftentimes I still feel that way. I think this is related somehow to the superior/inferior cultures belief, that perhaps I had defaulted to American values because it seemed like a better choice. In reality, did I really have to choose? Why couldn't I just keep both? Is it really because I think American values are "better" or easier to adopt?

And where does all this cultural guilt come from? Wow!

I don't really feel like American values are superior to Vietnamese ones, but I do think I ought to be aware of my attitude about biculturalism. "Counselor, know thyself," they say in my classes. So maybe deep down, I'm a bit racist. (Maybe? Probably?)


P.S. Teeheehee, when he finishes law school and I finish grad school, we'll both be working towards people calling us "counselor"! </nerdiness>

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Edit: Lecture in class today glossed over this issue a little bit. It could be internalized racism. Hmm.

"Would you please order this time?" he asked me.

I raised my eyebrow and asked why, even though I knew the answer.

This was significant in two respects.  First, he was almost always the one to make the order when we went out to eat, even if it was take-out.  If we both ordered, I would order my own dish, and he would order his and the sides we would both share.  He would not ordinarily have made this request for me to order.  Second, and this was what motivated the first point, we were eating at a Vietnamese restaurant.  He wanted me to order in Vietnamese.

"I hardly ever get to hear you speak Vietnamese," he responded.  "And when you speak it, it's like your voice changes so that it's low and quiet."

This was true.  I was always embarrassed of my "western accent" and hated broadcasting it to the world whenever possible, even if the listener wasn't Vietnamese.

"Also, it's good practice," he continued.  "It's always good to speak your language.  And you can read it, too."

"Yeah, but it doesn't mean I understand what I'm reading."

"But at least you can read it!  I can't read my language."

"That's because it's Chinese, silly." 

The waitress walked up and asked in her broken English, "What would you like to order?"  In my equally broken Vietnamese, I ordered a bowl of pho for him and a bowl of buon bo hue for myself, as well as some thai iced tea, soybean milk, and egg rolls.

"Good job," he said to me after she left.  "See?  That wasn't so bad."  I sat there, trying to steady my nerves. 

It's an embarassment to me when I encounter Vietnamese speakers and have them find that I can't speak the language.  But my broken Vietnamese is somehow even more of an embarassment, and I end up preferring to have people think I speak only English than only fragmented, mispronounced parts of a language.  Vietnamese was worst because I was working negatively against expectations.  Had it been any other language (Spanish, Chinese, Yiddish), people would be impressed, even if it was in a broken accent with funny grammar.

I don't really know how to deal with my unresolved issues with "Vietnameseness," but I would imagine it would have to do with reaching out to a different set of Vietnamese people, or a different part of Vietnamese culture I haven't witnessed yet. 

There will be ample opportunity for that.  After all, Tet will come soon, and I may be visiting Vietnam for the first time to see my uncle get married...

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* If people were required to order different ethnic foods in the native tongue, I would make sure to have friends for as many languages as possible. And over time, I would learn the "languages of ordering" from each friend. That would be cool, wouldn't it? To order Mexican food in Spanish (with the proper accent), or Indian food in Indian? And Ethiopian food in... Ethiopian? We'd reserve ordering in English for Denny's (and places like it) and fast food joints.

"So what's this new guy's name?"
"Jack."
"Doesn't sound like an Asian guy."
"No. He's part white, part Latino."
"Figures he'd be white."
"What do you mean?"
"You're too Americanized."

I was almost taken aback by Yu-Hung's comment. That, combined with the content from Slaying the Dragon, I started feeling self-conscious, even a little defensive, for a couple of reasons.

One, I hate using the term "American" to describe myself as I dislike what patriotism seems to mean in this country. I am most definitely "westernized," but not "Americanized." Most Americans, of course, can't tell the difference because they're brought up to think the U.S. is the hegemonic powerhouse of the world. And contrary to popular belief, it's not and hasn't been since post-WW2. That, and Canada and Mexico are also American countries, so for the U.S. to lay claim to the title "American" is silly. 'Course, I wouldn't know what else to call U.S. residents. But I digress. I just hate calling myself "American."

Nor do I like calling myself "Vietnamese" so much. I don't have anything against the country the way I do with the United States. I'm just way too disconnected from Vietnam. It's almost like calling me Chinese, except that I'm much more fascinated with Chinese culture. Perhaps calling me Russian would be a better parallel.

I just can't help but wince at all the labels that could possibly be attributed to my ethnicity/race/nationality: "American," "Vietnamese," "Vietnamese-American," "Asian," "Asian American." The last one is a more comfortable fit as a label, but generally not much better.

On the one hand, I could say labels are stupid and don't really matter, but that'd be a total lie. If the U.S. (or other countries, for that matter) don't put so much emphasis on racial labels, it wouldn't matter so much to me. Identities are built when groups are formed... but where is my group? And if I have none, what "outsider" label am I to use?

I had a conversation with this man on the BART on Halloween, but more later.

You know, times like this make me wish I had a laptop with wireless internet. Then I wouldn't have to run back upstairs to update, then back downstairs to finish my bowl of delicious pho.

Despite all the Asian food around the house and the whole eating-with-chopsticks thing, I sometimes forget that I'm Vietnamese. I wrote a post about it some months ago about my frustration of not being more "into" Vietnamese culture. I was born here, in Los Angeles, CA, USA. And yet I still don't feel quite "American." Should I still fret about not feeling a cultural identity? I don't think so... I have no desire to belong completely to any cultural group. I am probably much more concerned about my transition into adulthood, which I will get into next.

Instead of staying in America, maybe I should move to Canada. My liberal mindset would probably feel much more at home there, and from what I've seen, the country's beautiful. Yes. I can be Vietnamese-Canadian.

Do any other countries have ethnic subgroups like America? I don't see this "ethnicity-nationality" title anywhere else.