We were in the U.S. Capital, well, then, when we were going through immigration, but really our home was in Baltimore. Some place downtown. A townhouse, one typical of colonial Maryland. That is, red brick houses and with a towering triangular roof. Cookie cutter homes stacked next to each utilizing as much land as possible. At least that’s what they looked like in photos. Our old 70′s washed out Polaroids. I barely remember the place. The only memory I have is the living room and kitchen area. And for some reason, it’s always dark there. The living room was sunken in. There were couches and a TV. I think I watched plenty of Sesame Street on that thing. The kitchen was open, no wall or separation. The place was small, and that was coming from a kid. The biggest thing was the window. It was a bright portal that whenever I looked through it, the room would darken.
It was a strange place. I wonder if I cross images of my nightmares with my memories or vice versa. If one word could describe that time, I’d say “chills.” Thankfully we didn’t stay there too long. Yet, I don’t remember how long it was.
My family stuck together in the area here. This townhouse was for everyone except for my older aunt. She stayed with her husband in another house outside the city.
We called her, Aunt Hoa. And no, it’s not translated, it was literally, “Aunt Hoa” like how country folk would say. You may wonder if this makes any sense, because she was the one married to an American, Uncle Chuck, yeah, that’s what we called him too. Maybe because we were learning English and didn’t know any better. But this never changed. Even stranger, we called my mom’s younger brother, Uncle Diep. There were no ties to an American there. Not yet at least. Then there’s the youngest sister, who we call ouc, which isn’t her name, it’s a Vietnamese word for the youngest in a family. Grandmother was Ngoại, Vietnamese for our maternal grandmother. And my mom, everyone else calls her No, and that’s Vietnamese, where you’d say phonetically “nuh” in tone 3 for those of you who study Asian languages. We just called her Mẹ, or mom. So dad was Bà. And if you haven’t figured it out, “we” are my brothers and I, and “they” were everyone else in the family. Tuan’s the oldest, Phong’s the middle, and I pull in last. My name’s Khanh, but everyone in the family calls me chu tư, which I translate, with my awful Vietnamese, to “Mr. Fourth.” Odd, I know. A revelation a decade later informed me that, my mom had a miscarriage with her first child. So out of tradition, we kept our nicknames. In our culture, addressing people properly and respectfully was huge. Everyone had a particular name depending on your relation to them, mom-side, dad-side, younger, older, it was very confusing if you weren’t constantly practicing it. That might as well sum up why our names weren’t consistent. Some were salutations, others were pronouns, and the lucky ones get to keep their names, or nicknames. My brothers and I were at a culture clash. Somehow the names stuck.
For the sake of clarity, I’ll continue forward with our English versions.
Uncle Chuck and Aunt Hoa were quite a couple. Chuck was this big brawny guy. Put a picture of a lumberjack in your head, minus the red cap and axe, that would be him. Full of energy and the center of every conversation. He could go on about his opinions on how the world worked, what was wrong the system, what we needed to do to fix it, and so on. Didn’t help me the slightest since loud things made me cry. And he made me cry plenty. Mom loved his helpfulness. He got things done for my family in the fashion only Uncle Chuck can do. Messy, but quick. Hell, that’s how we got here ahead of all the madness. Makes you wonder how he got along with Aunt Hoa. She was this dark piercing eye individual who’s eyes can cast a judgmental stare even in her sleep. This may be a bit harsh to characterize her as such, but I think everyone has someone in the family that isn’t scared to call things out and draw that line which you didn’t know you crossed. Everyone has someone like this around. She just happens to be my aunt and I love her for it. Sometimes.
The other thing was, she wasn’t the oldest. My grandfather had eight kids total, three with his first wife and five with Grandmother. When we left, the oldest was left behind. I never got the full story why. She eventually came with her family many years later. At this time though, we were without her, Chi Năm, um, “Older Sister Five.” I know, I’ll figure this out one day.
In any case, the lot of us stayed in this townhouse. That was until my dad found a job in the oil business. It paid well. Enough for us to pack our bags and head on south. Oh Texas, I never knew the draw of money came at such a risk.
