On Returning Home

In year 2001, my family and I embarked on our first journey to China.  It was my Grandmother's dream to see the motherland, so my Mom, Uncle Vincent and I went with her on a 2-week holiday.  We met up with my Uncle Tran and his wife in Beijing, and continued onwards to Xi'an, Guilin and Hong Kong.  As ethnic Chinese people, my family had always dreamt of visiting the Mainland, to reunite with the Chinese, one of the largest and most established diaspora in the world.  However, in the course of our journey, my family came to a striking realization.  Having never set foot in the Mainland before, we felt like foreigners in the motherland.  I know I certainly did (and still do!), but what surprised me back then was that my family felt the same way.  Although everybody around us spoke Chinese, and it comforted my family, this was not home, and it didn't feel any closer to home than the US or the UK.

My family grew up in District 5 of Saigon, otherwise known as Cholon (堤岸), the Chinatown of Saigon.  My grandmother from my mom's side of the family (Pau Pau) immigrated to Saigon when she was a teenager, and met my grandfather (Ung Gong) there.  My grandmother from my Dad's side of the family (Ma Ma) also immigrated there from Hong Kong.  Hence, all of my aunts, uncles, and both of my parents were born and raised in Cholon.

 

Picture of my Ung Gong, one of the most well respected men in our family and in the Cholon community

I grew up listening to a lot of stories about my family's life in Cholon.  My Pau Pau always told hers with an air of nostalgia, and whenever my family congregated, my cousins and I would listen quietly while the older generation exchanged stories excitedly.  I was always fascinated by the tales, because they were so full of life, history and color, and they were so unique.  Compared to my Cantonese friends whose families came from Hong Kong or Guangdong, we didn't speak the dialect exactly the same way they did.  Our family's dialect was interwoven with a mixture of Cantonese, Fukinese and Vietnamese.  While confusing (there are some words I still can't figure out which dialect they're from!), our dialect was one of the many things that defined our family culture.

Pau Pau in 2002

I came to Saigon to trace my roots.  War and communism tore my family apart back in the 1970s, and our family, within a short period of time, fell from being one of the most established families in Cholon to nothing more than refugees.  About 75% of my family became boat people, forced to flee the new regime and persecution.  I didn't know this, but apparently, most of the Vietnamese boat people who fled in the late 1970s were ethnic Chinese.  Their wealth and business acumen made them an obvious target for the revolution, and sadly, my family wasn't spared.  Today, my relatives are located all over the world - US, UK, Australia, Switzerland, and Vietnam.  While this sounds cool to the outsider, I know my family misses the day when everybody lived under one roof in Cholon.

I came home two days ago and showed my photos to my mom.  When she saw them, she started to recite a poem in Chinese, written by 賀知章, a poet from the Tang Dynasty.  He's known for writing On Returning Home -

回 鄉 偶 書

少 小 離 家 老 大 回 ，	鄉 音 無 改 鬢 毛 催 。
兒 童 相 見 不 相 識 ，	笑 問 客 從 何 處 來 。

 Photo couresty of Wikipedia

The poem describes the author's journey as he returns to his hometown after decades of being away.  He said he left home as a kid and returned as an old man, speaking the same accent and dialect, but also sporting grey hair along both sides of his face.  He sees a group of children playing in the field, and upon seeing him, they ask, "Stranger, where are you coming from?"

My mom said she felt the same way when she saw my pictures.