I Am Who I Say I Am
I Am Who I Say I Am
Uncomfortability
I’m curious about how we can look at these hate crimes and acts of violence as a learning experience. How can we dismantle systemic racism without restructuring those systems that allow it to perpetuate? I urge you to: think about how you use language and how you have done so in the past? How can previous experiences teach you to unlearn and relearn new rhetoric so as not to offend or trigger or retrigger someone’s old pain that they might have covered for years?
Cà Phê 179 (I have never been to Vietnam)
In the spring of quarantine, I brought up the dust-filled books and photo albums from our family basement. Printed films of my parents’ wedding and The History of Vietnam took over my bedside table. Thus began a well-awaited search for identity, history, any semblance of home that was not the refurbished house I spent my days in.
Mirror Mirror
A life spent hating my body because of social constructs like the “ideal body type,” which can’t seem to make up their mind, is a life I don’t want to live. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and when I look in the mirror, I see beauty, but I also see more than just external, physical beauty. When I look in the mirror, I see a person who has the bravery to keep moving forward every day, the bravery to be unapologetically herself, the bravery to dare to love herself for what’s inside as well as on the outside of her body.