Growing up, my parents would regularly take my siblings and I to our local library in the Fruitvale area. I remember running to the back, straight to the kids' corner, where I’d obsess over books like Harry Potter  or Charlie Bone . I would dream endlessly about those magical worlds, secretly hoping my own abilities might one day manifest. But as school introduced heavier material, I drifted toward video games as my escape, and those worlds quietly faded into the background.

(Here is a music playlist  I created as an accompaniment to this piece. Enjoy while reading or listen to it separately!) I have a purple monster that lives in my chest. It isn’t monstrous and doesn’t have sharp teeth in the traditional sense. It’s soft, formless—an amoeba that shifts and swells whenever I start questioning who I am or what I’m worth. It creeps up my throat, sticky and slow, until it coats my vocal cords and makes it harder for my voice to pass through. Growin

Reflections on the VBP Story Slam 2025 When I stepped onto the stage for the Vietnamese Boat People Story Slam 2025, I knew I wasn’t just telling a story. I was carrying a home with me. This year’s theme was My Journey , and while many journeys begin with movement, mine began somewhere quieter: memory, lineage, and the places that raised me. This piece didn’t start on a stage. It started in my class. Originally, I wrote this for a class assignment exploring the “Where I’m Fro

As a family of six, everyone had a seat at the dinner table. My three older sisters filled the right side, while my parents and I sat on the left. I always took the end seat, and to my left, my Bố  (dad). He was my left-hand man — the one who scooped rice from the cooker into everyone’s bowls, who fed me bits of history between bites, and who relished in teaching me about whatever he had just learned: world affairs, Vietnamese idioms, or stock market patterns. Over time, his

This month we celebrated the three year death anniversary of our father, Bố. Vietnamese rituals have offered a therapeutic effect for us...