By Anh Thu Truong
Just like the stories of many other immigrant families, my mother was born in a small city in Vietnam amidst the turmoil following the Vietnam War. Unlike the comfort and privilege that shape my daily life today, my mother was the child of a soldier and a teacher—both of whom struggled to make ends meet for their three children.
Her hands, calloused from carrying water from the well to her small apartment, melded into warm sticky rice she carefully molded into round balls. Her fingers, wrinkled from constantly dipping into the water, gently caressed her siblings as she bathed them in a cramped bathroom.
When she followed my father to America, with her soft-spoken “hello” and shaky “nice to meet you,” her world gradually shrank, and everything she knew became a stepping stone to American life.
It would be years before she would visit her family in Vietnam again, but in the meantime, she clung to the things she knew best—cooking Vietnamese dishes that reminded her of home, speaking her native dialect and quietly lulling her children to sleep with old Vietnamese folklore songs.
Every Vietnamese Lunar New Year, or Tết, she would fill the house with the scent of freshly fried egg rolls, yellow rice shaped into neat domes, umami beef stew with roasted potatoes and carrots and so much more. My dad would brighten the house with vibrant lanterns and pale yellow cherry blossoms, handing out red envelopes while wearing our traditional dress, the áo dài.
Vietnamese altars are the pillars of our gatherings, along with family, of course. A slow dance of smoke would drift from the incense placed in front of countless portraits of our past loved ones, filling our small house with prayers and a woody aroma. My parents worked hard to maintain our altar, replacing fruits, old tea and vodka offerings every week. I watched my mom fervently plate traditional dishes every Tết—a welcoming meal for our ancestors to join us for the New Year. Closing her eyes, hands clasped together, she quietly whispered her prayers for luck, health and prosperity for our family.
Just like millions of other Asian Americans today, our generation stands at a crossroads. Many of us identify as first-generation immigrants whose parents came to America in hopes of greater opportunities and a better future for their families. While the majority of us were fortunately granted that dream—to pursue higher education, to live in a place where democracy is placed on a pedestal— it’s become so easy to lose touch with the side of our identity that has shaped our family for generations.
Growing up, I found it easier to speak to my parents in English, a habit my grandpa used to scold me for. With an annoyed expression plastered on my face, I would think that everyone spoke English—at school, at the grocery store, everywhere— why would home be any different? Yet he’d lecture me that our language is like a muscle, one that needs to be stretched, practiced and preserved. Looking back, I wish I could tell him I know what he meant now, that I’ll continue to practice Vietnamese so future generations will understand—and that I wouldn’t get annoyed if he reminded me again.
I sat in my friend’s kitchen the other week, receiving a lesson on how to shape and fill dumplings from his mother. Though it’s been a staple in Chinese cuisine for generations, there was something special about learning how the dough was prepared, kneaded and roughly flattened into a circular plain. From there, the filling—composed of chopped carrots, mushrooms, spices, fragrant ginger, minced shrimp and meat—was neatly tucked into the floured dough, pinched together and sealed through the tips of my fingers.
I could smell the filling of chả giò, Vietnamese fried egg rolls, that had a similar consistency and ingredients to the dumplings. Minced shrimp, eggs to bind the filling, grated carrots and daikon, wood ear mushrooms—these were just some of the ingredients in the mix as I mirrored my mom’s actions of neatly folding the edges of the rice paper, making sure not to wrap the filling too tight—but not too loose either.
Back in my friend’s kitchen, we laughed at our awkwardly shaped dumplings, yet stood mesmerized at how his mom’s hands easily sculpted the dumpling wrapper into any design she wanted. I could picture my mother, smoothing the rice paper out with beer to ensure crispness, tucking the filling like a burrito, firm yet delicate.
My mother took all she knew and passed it down to me—she showed me the right techniques to wrap and package bánh chưng, a Vietnamese rice cake. She explained how to maintain an altar in my future home, buying fruits and offerings to place for our ancestors. When I look into my future, with all the unknowns and uncertainties, I know my parents won’t always be around to nag me to speak Vietnamese in the house or explain to me the stories that molded our family into who we are today.
Yet, not everyone has the privilege of having parents or family actively engaged in exchanging language or culture. This creates difficulties and barriers when one wants to gain experience practicing a native language or custom—but there are so many resources and community spaces out there that can help bridge this gap.
Life is all about the pursuit of adapting, adjusting and finding your footing to shape your identity and who you really are. It’s challenging to navigate this identity as an Asian American, yet just by learning how to make a cultural dish or taking baby steps when learning your language—starting with “Hi, how are you?” or “What’s your name?”—you come so much closer to your roots.
Attend those cultural events within your community, participate in cultural clubs or even open a language app. Start small and end up big—you don’t have to have complete mastery over your native tongue (I certainly do not), but language is one of the simplest gateways to becoming more culturally immersed.
I find that holding onto these traditions, customs and language provides us with a powerful outlet to honor our parents’ and grandparents’ legacy. I know that being raised in America is tempting—tempting to forget the values, stories and tales that carried and shaped our ancestors—but we can prevent that. It’s a shared responsibility for all of us to ensure that our cultural customs today do not become a past tense, a relic of what once was, so our children and grandchildren will remember them, learn from them and continue to honor them for generations to come.
