It’s odd cause as I was growing up, I was never really affected by it.
Was it because I was too young to grasp what was going on? Or was it cause I was too innocent and naive to care?
But as I approached adulthood, it just seemed to bother me more and more. Especially this year.
I just feel like idk……I know how I feel but I feel like I don’t want to write it down cause I don’t know how to exactly express how I feel through words.
You say I’ll never understand until I’m married and yes, I totally agree. I don’t understand and who knows, maybe I won’t even understand why you guys do the things you guys do when I’m married myself.
But how can you guys blame us? How can you guys shut us down every single damn time we try to talk to you guys about something? How can you guys tell us you don’t want to hear it when we try to tell you guys about our boyfriends? How can you guys tell us you wish that we don’t engage in premarital sex when you know that you guys were pregnant with Michelle before you two were married and while Mom was only 20 or 21? It’s like asking us not to be whores when you use to be a Vegas stripper. It’s unreasonable and hyproctrical.
How can you tell me that everyone in college dorms study like crazy and “thats why they live on campus…to focus better on their studies.” Uhm, sorry to break your little bubble but I lived on campus and I have a very well understanding of what occurs on in these dorms and yes, there indeed is studying going on but there’s a whole of a lot more as well.
So yes, I don’t understand. I don’t understand at all. I try so so so so hard to but I don’t understand.
You tell us to exert patience when we speak to one another but what the fucking hell don’t even pull that bullshit when you two are always playing the blame game.
Don’t you find it pretty sad when I text Michelle “Hey we’re going to San Diego” and she says “Uhh noo I’m not going on a road trip with you Mom and Dad together in the same car ever again.” Then when SD trip gets ruined, we all decide to go to the beach when one again, Michelle says “Okay well i’ll agree to go but I’m taking my own car so when they start fighting ill just leave.” That’s pretty fucking sad to me that we all can’t even sit in the same car together for more than one hour without someone bringing up a heated topic.
I feel like I am living in this little suffocating bubble and throughout my whole life, I have been okay with it. Not necessarily okay, but I accepted it.
But since last year, I just seriously cannot take it anymore. And I am not blaming anyone. I am not blaming you, I am not blaming him, I am not blaming my weak mentality, I am not blaming anything or anyone.
I am saying that my main focus right now is to grow as an individual and I cannot do that as long as I live in this environment.
That’s one thing that I do not like about the Vietnamese culture: the philosophy that school is the main focus. That everything revolves around school. That you cannot do anything with your life until you’re finished with school. That if you don’t excel in school you are a bad kid and you are a piece of shit.
Don’t get me wrong, I respect the Vietnamese culture. I have mad respect for my culture. I believe Vietnamese people go through things that no other culture has ever gone through. I sure as hell bet that no American child has ever gotten beaten by a belt because they were not on the honor roll (not saying that I got beaten by a belt but I’m retelling incidents I have heard of from my friends). Vietnamese people are obedient and have so much self discipline and I admire that so much.
However, that is the downfall of this culture because no, I don’t believe everything should revolve around school. Do I think school is important? Heck yes. If I didn’t think it was important I wouldn’t have gotten into honor classes would I? I wouldn’t have busted my ass off in high school and felt so ashamed of myself when I only ended up with a 3.33 and at CSUF. Of course, school is so so important to me.
But looking back, what do I remember most about high school? I sure as heck don’t want to relive those memories of annotating in Mirsch’s class or studying for Mrs. Crosby’s History Honors tests. But you know what the memories I sincerely miss? I miss those memories of cheering at football games. I miss those memories of being on that dance floor during competition season. I miss stressing out about being President of MAW. I miss the Vietnamese Cultural Night Practices. I miss those memories. Being apart of the cheer team taught me so so much. Being apart of MAW taught me so so much. Being a coordinator for Vietnamese Cultural Night taught me so so much. Overall, I’m just trying to make a point that yes, maybe if I weren’t apart of these activities I would have been able to achieve higher than a 3.33 and ended up somewhere else besides CSUF. But you know what? I wouldn’t do that if I had the chance to go back to high school.
I believe that we, as individuals, have to experience certain things in life in order to grow as individuals. We have to experience that committment of being on a sports team in high school and we have to experience that first puppy love and we have to experience that “OMG I can’t believe I just did that…….that is soo unlike me!!! But it was so much fun but I’ll never do it again! I learned my lesson after tonight!” moments.
We have to experience things to discover ourselves and to discover people and to discover our world. Ask yourself this: would you learn more by one semester of college or would you learn more by spending one semester hitch hiking through Europe?
Education is not solely given through a school curriculum but it’s also given by experiencing this so called thing called life.
