My house was becoming too dysfunctional. Affairs in the house, unhappy fighting parents, gangs and poverty in the neighborhood, racism at school. It just wasn’t the best environment for a growing child.
Maybe in writing this, I’ll be able to pinpoint the exact moment that I changed from being “perfect kid” to the “crazy kid”.
3rd grade (age 8) – still a good boy
My final year as a “good boy”.
I actually can’t remember much from this year. There were things that definitely happened when I was 7 and things that happened when I was 9. But that 8-year old spot…I can’t remember so clearly. I struggle to place them in my memory and am still confused if they happened that year, or the one before or one after.
This year was one of the final years when my parents thought I was an angel and my brothers were troublemakers. In reality, they weren’t just troublemakers, they were simply younger. Younger kids eat more candy, get more cavities, don’t finish their dinners, break rules, break stuff, pee the bed.
3rd grade with Miss. Armitage.
She was such a lovely teacher. The kind of teacher where no kid could do any wrong. Any mistakes or faults you had was sweetly talked out of. If she didn’t like what you were doing, she’d come over and say, “Do you wanna play with something else? Let’s keep you over here instead.” And that was it. So positive. So forgiving.
Now imagine if you were being well-behaved. Well…she’d celebrate you like you were the second coming of Jesus Christ, and the most perfect angel ever. She was really a joy to please. A teacher who truly loved kids and the kids loved her.
Doing hair for the girls
I remember not always playing with the boys sometimes, that I sometimes liked to play with the girls. I would play handball with them. Or during story time in class, when all the girls would sit in a row braiding each other’s hair…I sat behind the last girl and braided her hair (since no other girls were available). It fit my little hobby of making those bracelets and other handcraft items at home.
Bad little brothers…Brian & Harry
The older and more independent Brian & Harry got, the more of a trouble-maker they were.
- Brian peed the bed.
- Brian & Harry ate candy (instead of turning them in like I did) and got cavities.
- Brian & Harry always made noise, broke things around the house, and also got into fights with each other in public (causing a scene in public places).
- Brian & Harry once saw a porno movie somewhere, and then acted out the moves that night in the living room when my parents had guests over. Hahahah…EVERYBODY knew exactly what they were mimicking. My mom screamed in horror for them to stop.
- Basically…both of them were poorly behaved, whereas I was always well-behaved. So they easily made me look like the agreeable “good son”.
Brian & Harry would also take forever to eat their dinners. Whereas I finished in 10-15mins so I could go outside to play. Sometimes they would throw their food away and my parents would catch them and beat them. They threw food in the trash, when caught they put it in the neighbor’s trash, then tried to flush. There was a whole year when they threw food over the fence into the neighbor’s yard and one day the neighbor came over to my dad saying, “Hey…why do I keep finding food in my backyard…sandwiches, noodles, fruits, vegetables..etc.” My dad was so pissed.
But to be fair, my parents were always criticizing us for being so skinny. We weren’t “thick and strong” like my parents friends. So they kept trying to overfeed us and of course, kids can’t eat as much as you hope. I remember overhearing my doctor telling my mom once, “Don’t worry about them being skinny. It’s much better than them being thicker now but fat once they grow up.”
Nightmares of Harry
My youngest brother, now 3 years old, was the most terrifying little monster you ever met. For whatever reason, the was the most mischievous. I think a great part of it had to do with how cute he was. He was so cute and treated so nicely by everyone that nothing bad could ever be his fault. Of course, everybody in the family KNEW it was him. But he still got away with murder.
- Lipstick on the walls – one time my mother flew out of the bedroom door, screaming WHERE’S Harry? When we followed her onto the room…we saw a child’s terrible handwriting on the wall that said “Harry”.
- Harry was also the kid who would deny eating the chocolate cake when it was all over his face.
- Another time…he took a marker and drew on our neighbor’s infant son’s face.
- He also set our living room couch on fire. Luckily my dad was there to put out the flames before it set the whole house on fire.
Mai’s daughter (Megan)
Mai (my dad’s mistress) brought her daughter Megan around a lot. And we liked her and played with her a bit. There’s a cute photo of her along with us at the cherry farm when we were all kids. Megan was kinda chubby and her mom was doing all she could to keep her skinny. But it didn’t work. Her body wanted to be what it wanted to be.
4th grade (age 9) – now a bad boy
My parents continuing unhappy marriage
The more busy my mom was with school and the more grown up the kids were, the more freedom my dad had to keep going around doing whatever he wanted to do. Him and Mai never stopped seeing each other.
My mom’s schoolwork was also getting harder. And it seemed she now even more responsibilities as a student and also as a mother. She really was supermom. She cooked, cleaned, did everything. We never did chores as kids. The best thing we could do for her was not break stuff or make each other cry and distract her from her studies. But usually we were the opposite…we were 3 really rowdy boys and drove her crazy.
I remember she was having such a hard time…she had the dictionary out for everything, even for her math homework. That’s how lacking her English was. And after all the taking care of the house and studying, my dad would come home late at night and want sex…so she had to give it up even when she wasn’t in the mood for it. I now look back thinking about how pinched she was from every end.
Despite my father getting to have his way with my mother as well as with any girl he wanted, he too was not so happy with my mom. Always criticizing her that the dog poop in the house wasn’t picked up fast enough. Or that she didn’t cook a perfect meal or set the table nice enough when guests were over. Anything that went wrong around the house, he blamed her for not being on top of it…even though I feel it’s partly his fault too for hardly being around the house.
My parents attack on the kids
My father’s attacks were physical and emotional. Very abusive and explosive. If we kids ever acted up, making noise, making each other cry, fighting with each other…he got really angry. Now when I look back, what he hated the most was being interrupted. He valued his sleep time and play time with his friends. So anytime one of the sons when to go tell on the others…it annoyed my dad so much.
What he REEEEEALLLY hated was when my mom was mad. Because my mom has a really annoying shrieking bitchy scream. That bothers my dad’s ears. If he was asleep and was woken up, he would literally storm out into the kitchen and beat all the kids…even if only 2 were involved, he’d still find a reason to hit the 3rd one. You can think of it like a raging alcoholic. We called him King Kong…and you BETTER NOT WAKE KING KONG.
I remember my mom threatening us, “I’m gonna scream and your dad is gonna come out and beat you all!” I felt she was so evil for threaten us with that.
And in fact, that’s how my mom operated. She was very evil. While my dad would attack us physically and emotionally, my mother not only did those 2…she also withdrew love. I could literally feel her not loving me as a kid. I didn’t understand at the time…but it’s a common psychological issue. Unhappy parents in the marriage will often take it out on their kids, and it’s usually the first kid that’s the punching bag…and for that reason, the oldest child in dysfunctional households are usually the most rebellious and most messed up.
I was slowly becoming messed up.
Mina the Chihuahua
We get a new dog and she barks all the damn time. So annoying but one day she really helped us. It was during the hot summer when we used to sleep with all our bedroom doors open for maximum airflow. One morning, she was barking non-stop like crazy. My dad woke up to go check it out and as he looked through the doorway of his bedroom, he saw a big white guy trying to steal our microwave. We had a HUGE microwave at the time, like an old school one that looked like a pizza oven.
Luckily, my parents’ bedroom door was already open so they didn’t have to open it and make sound to see the robber. My dad crept out of the bedroom and went into the hallway where he kept his work tools. With the hammer in his hand, he ran up the guy and surprised him while he was trying to lift the microwave. My dad hit him super hard in the shoulder and the guy screamed and jump out the window that Brian fell out of 2 years ago.
My dad then called police and they came over and then drove him around the neighborhood to see if he could identify the guy. They never saw him. It was crazy since this guy dared to enter a house that had people in it. Our cars were in the backyard and this was a big house that obviously had many people living in it. A few years later…another guy would try to enter the house while my grandmother was home. He broke the window of the kids bedroom and she screamed and he ran. Probably only crackheads would do this.
The beginning of my “fuck-it” attitude in life.
I haven’t yet been able to pinpoint the exact moment, what or why or how. But it happened. I was very slowly falling out of my “perfect child” persona. My parents were not happy with me, nobody was happy with me.
- And I wasn’t happy with my home environment. I started saying things like…I want to grow up to be a jet pilot so I can blow up this house!”
- I wasn’t happy with my parents. I felt something was unfair. I remember my parents always comparing me to their friend’s kids and say I didn’t match up well. But I would also compare my parents to my friend’s parents and feeling unfair as well.
- They wanted me to start doing chores and reading more advanced books on my free time. But I was a 9 year old, I wanted to play games and be a kid. They wanted more from me yet when I asked to have the latest games or to play football or other team sports…the answer was always “NO”. They kept wanting more but offered me nothing.
- I was getting bullied at school too. Being shorter and made fun of.
Looking back, our family just had no more love and stability. Love was conditional. I didn’t feel loved and safe. I felt attacked for everything I did (and thought). Also…I did feel myself to be a special kid, more free-spirited. And for traditional parents who needed to box me in, they felt I was a nightmare. And the more they called me names, the more I even ran with it…now wholeheartedly deciding to be every bit as bad as they said I was.
Suicidal threats
I wanted attention. And I learned one of the best ways to get sympathy as a kid was to say, “I want to die.” or “I want to kill myself.” Everybody at school stops and treats you like a victim if you say that. It’s the best way to get quick love.
- I started drawing dead bodies, with knives and severed heads and body parts. Clearly you can see it was the 5 members of the family. One the page, the most tortured bodies were mine and my parents.
I kind of laugh at it now because I realized I just didn’t know how to ask for help. I didn’t know how to say, “Please help me. I’m not happy at home. It’s not a loving environment and I don’t feel loved.”
But my artistic pleas for help worked. My teacher sent me to the school counselor where she talked to me a couple times each week. She asked me about my family and my life and how I thought about things in the world. I thought it was cool. Like just talk about whatever you want to talk about. And I loved that I got to skip out on class time while this was going on.
She even called in some of the kids in my class that were teasing or bullying me and told them to stop. To be fair, they were actually nice kids and I never felt they were mean. But my counselor was really trying to get to the bottom of things.
5th (age 10) – now a crazy boy
Getting sent to the child psychologist and psychiatric ward
I guess my counselor felt I needed more help. My parents were called in and now I was going to a psychiatric center. Today as an adult, I look back on this with anger. How dare my parents throw me in the psych ward?! I wasn’t the problem. They were! They should have been in there, not me.
I remember the first time I walked through there. It looked exactly like a psychiatric ward for crazy people, like an asylum that you see in movies. But I was a kid so I didn’t know that. I went through and saw different kids in different rooms, some were alone and some were with others. All acting kind of weird. I remember in one room, all the kids were wearing helmets on their heads and like these restrictive socks on their hands and the entire room was padded in cushion all around the walls and surfaces, so that they couldn’t hurt themselves.
Then they took me to my office where I met my psychiatrist. I think I spoke with her every week. It was fun. She had lots of toys and games and she was fun to talk to. I could say anything or everything I wanted. I felt safe and nothing I ever said or did was wrong. There were also times when my parents would come in and she’d have me wait outside.
Little did I know, my parents were putting on quite the show like they were perfect loving parents, and we were a loving family, and they just had no idea how I could be so crazy. And about 6 months or so, I was discharged. My parents told me the psychiatrist told them I was the crazy one. It stung.
Word of my psychiatric care got back to my school counselor and also my teacher somehow. I could tell Mr. Mark was no longer correcting me. He let me do whatever I wanted all day long. If I didn’t do my homework or classwork, he didn’t care. Sometimes for an hour straight I would just say, “I hate you Mr. Mark.” and he would reply with “write it down!” I guess they all felt I was such a problem child that I should just be abandoned and left alone. I was too broken to be fixed.
Dying for roller blades
One day I came home and demanded to play with my rollerblades but my mom said “no”. I said “give me my rollerblades or I’ll kill myself”. She called my bluff…so then I went to the kitchen crying and grabbed a knife and started pressing it into my arm (not enough to draw blood though). She saw what I was doing and finally gave in and said “ok ok ok…I’ll give them to you”.
When my dad came home, my mother told him what happened and he took me outside. 1 on 1. He didn’t know what to say to me. I guess since my mom told him to be cautious with his words.
- He told me, “You know you’re crazy, right?”
- He was just saying it to be mean. He was calm and you can tell he really believed it. That he had given up on me as a normal child.
And that made it official. Such a strong imprint in my head that for 20 years after in my life….I not only believed I was crazy or that something was wrong with me, I also owned it and perhaps even became proud of it. I can tell my parents probably spoke to my brothers on the side as well…telling them that I was crazy, that I need psychiatric help, that nobody knows what’s wrong with me. And I was often referred to in whispers (or side chats) around the house as “the crazy one”.
That day, both Brian and Harry demanded to have their rollerblades as well because “Why does Johnny get to play with his rollerblades but we can’t have ours?” And my parents gave in to them as well.
Unfortunately for me, Brian and Harry were racing and since Brian was losing at the end…he decided to push Harry at the end. Harry falls and bangs his head hard on the concrete, crying loudly. He was bleeding so heavily from his forehead…my parents had to take him to the hospital to get stitches. When they returned…they looked at me with so much disappointment. I too felt bad…like I was the cause of everything wrong in our family.
Ghetto friends around the neighborhood.
Being that I was older and trusted to go around the neighborhood. And also I had to take my brothers with me so that my parents didn’t have to look after them all the time at home.
William, the Mexican neighborhood kid. Around this age I start playing with ghetto friends from the neighborhood. One of them being this Mexican kid named William who cussed like a sailor. Looking back he had really trashy parents. They never stopped to correct him. Also, I think his grandmother or somebody who couldn’t speak English watched over, and didn’t know when he was using bad words or not. It was so embarrassing being around him in public because I could feel adults looking down on us when they heard him speak. He had a foul mouth all the time.
William’s neighbors were also terrible trashy kids. Foul language, constantly breaking the laws and just being mischievous all the time. Also listening to foul-mouth music and being anti-police and anti-school. They also idolized gangs, gang clothing and gang culture.
Mina dies while heartless Johnny laughs
I’ll always remember the day Mina died. A few days before, she was already acting weird. Her muscles were strangely cramped and she couldn’t move in the morning. And I remember my mom mouthing to my dad (like a verbal whisper) that Mina might die soon. She was trying to mouth the words behind my back but I looked up just in time and caught her.
At this point in my life, I had already lost a bit of my humanity. No longer wanting to be sensitive, no longer wanting to be vulnerable. I had turned cruel (without knowing). A few days later from the morning she first cramped…Mina refused to come out of her doghouse (in the kitchen). We would crouch down and look in there; she was laying in there alive and awake (head lifting every now and then) but she didn’t want to come out.
That night around 7pm or so…my dad came home and into the kitchen as we all said, “Hey! Mina won’t come out of her house.” As my dad stepped up to her doghouse…we all saw her drag herself out using her front legs and then lay her head on my dad’s feet. And she passed away right there. She loved him the most. And she waited for him to come home to say bye.
It was a really touching moment and my mom and dad’s friend both wept for her. I resisted the tears with an expression like….”YAYYYY! SHE’S DEAD!” And gleefully jumped on the chair. I would be out of touch with my ability to grief and express sadness for many years after. Looking bad…I think that I just didn’t want to be sorry or sad for myself.
Berry, Cherry, Nikor…1 dog
It wasn’t long after until we found a new dog. A cute stray black/brown German shepard puppy. Me and my brothers kept arguing on what his name should be and we never compromised. We each called him what we wanted and the poor thing literally responded to all three of his names. And then when our friends or dad’s friends would come over and ask what his name was…we’d fight again telling them the name we wanted.
Right after Berry, we found another dog. A girl basset hound we called Leica. My dad loves cameras so that’s where this name came from. Leica was nice but really really stupid. And her big floppy ears made a mess as she ate (always dipping into her food & water bowls).
Berry actually grew to be very big, very fast. And he was so strong he could break chains. We also didn’t know how to train dogs and he was quite aggressive. He once bit Miguel, one of our tenants right on the elbow as he walked by. And Miguel threatened to sue my dad. I don’t know how my dad talked him out of it. I was there during the bite and it seemed Miguel purposely hovered close enough to the dog to get bit. That guy was a shady tenant. He was someone who would break his own window or clog his toilet, or damaged his door lock and then use that as an excuse to not pay rent. (California law protects tenants and lets them not pay rent if “essential items” are not functioning.)
Because Berry would bark at everyone who walked through the alleyway past our backyard, people learned to hate him. Sometimes kids would throw rocks at him, and Berry in return would learn to hate people as well. One day a little kid (about 3-4 years old) kept throwing rocks at Berry. And I screamed out from behind our screen door, “Hey stop! He’s going to bite you!” The kid didn’t listen he kept throwing rocks…and Berry, broke like the 6th chain we bought for him. He went running right as the kid. And the little kid ran while screaming, “Help! He’s gonna bite meeeee!” And Berry did bite him right on the hip and maybe took out a tiny piece of meat.
By the time I was able to regain control of Berry, it was too late. The damage was already done. I took himself inside and told my dad what happened. And the whole family immediately got worried. Because we all knew this kid was related to gang members. Sure enough, some gang members came into our back yard. One with a stick, another with a bottle. Also a crying woman.
They yelled out, “Heyyyy! Your dog bit our nephew!” They were really angry and it looked like the y wanted a very violent revenge. All our family was quite terrified except for my father. Mai and her daughter Megan were over, and Megan was crying so hard (she thought something really terrible was going to happen). But my dad was really calm and confident and knew what to do. He opened the door and said, “It’s ok!” But as he did that…..Leica squeezed right passed him and ran straight out at the gangsters. The guy with the bottle raised it into the air and threw it straight down right at her as she was about to bite him. Incredibly, he missed! She instinctively side-shifted to the side and the bottle smashed into the concrete. She then kept her distance but still kept barking. Berry was barking loudly inside the house as well.
My dad came out anyway and calmly said, “It’s ok, it’s ok, it’s ok.” He somehow managed to stun them with his calmness and they actually calmed down. They were still combative in their tones when replying but becoming decreasingly violent with each passing second. Finally…one yelled, “You better get yourself a lawyer!” as they walked away. My dad called the cops and the cops talked to them as well. A truce was made. We’ll keep the dog on leash, they keep better watch of their kid. No lawsuits filed. We gave Berry away after that incident, to one of my dad’s friends who knew how to train dogs. And soon after, we gave Leica away as well. One day while walking through the neighborhood…I saw that somebody just a block away adopted her. They had a nice front yard for her and she seemed to be treated well. She greeted me at the gate and I never visited her again.
Dr. Ban (my uncle) meets Nhum (his future wife), and becomes the “Gambler”.
At one of my dad’s parties, my uncle meets a girl (Nhoung) who was somewhat in his situation. Both of them had broken up of a long relationship and both were still sad about their ex. Even if only a rebound, they seemed a good fit. But also…they were both “getting old” by Asian standards at the time. My uncle was 35 already and Nhoung was 30 (I think). Both families approved and encouraged a fast-tracked marriage. They married a year after meeting, and their first kid (Nolan) came out 4 months after that. I really liked Nhoung. She was like that cool aunt that you could talk to her about anything…life, school, girls. She knew how to be a cool big sister and not like a 3rd parent.
Nhoung moved in and lived with my uncle relatively quick at the Rosemont house. And one day while she was backing out, she saw an old Mexican lady in the rearview mirror about to cross behind her car. So she waited without backing up the car. After some minutes, she still didn’t see the old lady pass…so she got out of the car to make sure. The old lady was now sitting on the curb and saying that she didn’t feel well or couldn’t breathe (something like that). Nhoung being the sweetheart that she is, takes this lady to the hospital and makes sure she’s ok before leaving.
Some days or weeks later…my uncle receives a lawsuit. The old lady was claiming a “hit-and-run” accident. That supposedly, Nhoung hit her with the car and now she’s got all these medical costs. But it was absolute bullshit. We all knew it wasn’t the truth. Nhoung never backed out the car and on top of it, she never ran…she took the lady to the hospital. But the other party even said they had witnesses. My uncle didn’t know what to do…settle and just pay the costs or go to court and risk losing more.
My uncle was terrified of being sued for everything he had. My dad said, “Give me all your money so that you’ll have nothing in the bank when they sue you. Even if they win, you won’t be able to pay it.” It was a great idea and my uncle agreed. The shocker though…was when my uncle gave him $30,000.
My dad was basically…WHAT THE FUCK?! Because we all knew the gambler had been working over 10 years and saved at least $100,000. He’s most cheap/stingy guy in the universe. He keeps everything brand new and clean. Wearing super old clothes, driving a super old car, he absolutely does not buy anything unless he needs it. My dad asked him where the rest of it was and how he spent it. My uncle, “Oh I spent it. I’ve been going on dates.” Or something like that.
But my dad already knew the truth. Many months back, his good friend Liem said, “Hey I saw your brother at Commerce Casino the other night.” And my dad thought nothing of it, because he didn’t think his hardworking brother would do that. But now he knew for sure. When questioned further, “My uncle admitted that he gambles sometimes but it’s his money and his right. And that he did get lucky sometimes.” In reality…my uncle got lucky only the first night. He won $5,000 one night and then $2,000 another night. And felt….it was so much easier that way than to go to work. Looking back…I think the dealer swindled him to get him hooked. Dealing him good hands and making friendly conversation to keep him coming back. He had now lost $70,000 in less than 2 years, possibly only 1.
When they went to court months later for the false hit-and-run claim, the judge already knew the claim was bullshit. And she knew exactly what to ask. She asked the so-called “witness” what shirt Nhoung was wearing during the the hit-and-run and the witness lady freaked out and said “black”. But Nhoung was wearing a yellow shirt, and so the judge passed the verdict “CASE DISMISSED, WITNESS IRRELEVANT”.
A joyous celebration for the family. But now when my uncle asked for his money back, my dad was hesitant. My dad questioned him, “What are you going to do with the money? Are you going to gamble? I’m not going to let you throw your money away. You have to think of your son!” My uncle replied, “GIVE ME MY MONEY! IT’S MINE!” At some point, they exchanged cuss words…I think my uncle called him a fool and said something really personal. My dad was so angry, he grabbed a knife from the drawer and chased my uncle in the living room. My uncle ran into the living room and shut door just as my dad was trying to stab at him with the knife. Instead of penetrating the door, the knife point stuck solid into the door and my dad’s hand slipped down the blade…slicing his palm. He screamed and pushed Harry out of the way.
His hand was dripping blood. And somehow, Harry was standing there again crying (like the sad background music of our family drama). My dad ran off to drive himself to the hospital as I looked at my mom in eerie silence. She lied to me, “They are just playing! Nothing serious, ok?” But I knew better. When my dad came back home that night, his hand was stitched up and he told us boys how he cried as they stitched. I can’t imagine anything more painful that something that can make my monster father cry. For many years, I thought it was just my father’s boiling blood family being angry for no reason that day. It wasn’t until many years later that I understood what they were fighting about. Not long after…that knife would be coming for me.
Harry’s psychopathic tendencies, and his teddy bear knife.
Innocent-looking baby Harry was kind of sadistic in how tortured or enjoyed watching animals suffer. I remember reading crime journals of serial killers and psychopaths and I can say Harry fit the mold perfectly. I’m so grateful that he didn’t turn out that way. He grew up to be just fine. I can say a really good person.
But as a child, he was a menace. I think Harry (our youngest brother) soon learned how to get back at his brothers. He knew parents would always believe his innocent face and he used it against us (me and Brian).
- He would say…”give me your candy”. And we’d say no.
- And he’d say “give me your candy or I’ll hurt myself and say you did it”. We say no.
- And then he literally did it. He’d hit himself or claw at his skin with his finger nails until he bled.
- And then while crying through his own self-induced tears, my mom would run out screaming “what happened?”
- Of course, me and Brian would deny. “MOM! HARRY DID THAT TO HIMSELF!”
- But she didn’t believe us. “Why would he hurt himself?!”
- She’d punish us. Not only would we have to give him all our candy but now we were in trouble.
- It really put us in such a bad place. We were terrified of our own little baby brother. And also feeling so disconnected and unheard because we didn’t have our parent’s trust.
I guess from watching our father, Harry also learned we were scared of knives and so he used it against us. I remember one day me and Brian kept teasing him and calling him names. This was happening while we were playing video games and not paying direct attention to him. And he’d say…”you better stop” in a creepy voice. But we continued. And then he said, “that’s it” and reached for his teddy bear (a black & white stuffed panda bear). We laughed and said, hahahah your teddy bear. But then he reached inside it. He had made a slit in the bear’s throat, and from that slit he pulled out a knife! We screamed, “MOOMMMMM!” and ran from him as he chased us into the kitchen where we held up chairs to keep him at a distance. He would take some mock swings at the air with the knife until my mom came over and took it away from him. But now we knew to be afraid of his teddy bear.
Harry’s school fights
Harry’s violent tendencies carried over into school as well. He was notoriously getting into fights. He’d even get into fights on behalf of his friends. But there’d be times when either lost or needed help because the other kid was bringing his bigger brothers, so Harry would come call me and Brian. And well…me and Brian simply weren’t as big as the bigger Mexican or black brothers that were on the other kids side. Even worse was when the other kids were sons of gangsters.
We usually avoided these fights as there was no way of winning. We not only didn’t have the size, we also didn’t have the numbers. And we were a minority Asian race. They would very easily find us the next day. But if they made Harry cry, we’d try to take revenge by running up and kicking or punching the kid really fast and then running for our lives while them and their friends chased us through school (or the neighborhood).
You can call me a bad son, but I was a good brother. I did the best to fight for my brothers. If anybody made them cry, I was especially mad and took revenge as much as I could. Looking back…it was kind of like taking revenge for my crying mother as well. I already had a very strong revenge instinct…which is something that comes with protective (or over-protective) people.
My mother starts university (bachelors)
My mother got her GED (equivalent of high school diploma) and now gets accepted and starts her Bachelor’s Degree at California State University of Los Angeles (aka “Cal State LA” or “CSULA”). She’s now embarking to match the highest degree of anybody in my father’s family…which is the Gambler, who also has a bachelor’s degree.
But as the family had a big dinner with all my dad’s brothers & sister and parents, and other elderly folks…one asshole old-fashioned man stood up with something mean to say. He was my paternal grandfather’s brother.
- And he stood up to say…“Who do you think you are? You may have your little GED, but you need to remember you’re a woman. Nobody gets a bachelor’s degree at this age, and with 3 kids, and a woman?! It will never happen in my lifetime!”
And everybody just kept quiet since he was an elderly. And so far…it’s not like he’s totally wrong or offbase. My mom was indeed 35 year old woman with 3 rowdy kids, a refugee immigrant in a foreign country and doesn’t even speak the language well. But it is sad that nobody backed her up. Not even my father. Not even the wives of my uncles. It was like they all cheered her failure.
My mom stayed quiet. But it hurt her. She did in fact work very hard the first 2 years of community college just to get to this point and now embarking further into her studies at a real university seemed so much more difficult. The school itself was farther away and would require more driving as well. She was only used to streets at the time…now she’d have to start driving on freeways. It all seemed so scary.
But my grand uncle lit a fire under her belly. She swore she would prove him wrong and would study that much harder to shut him up.
She didn’t know it at the time…but she wouldn’t be alone. She would have my help. I was only 10 years old but already with much better native English than her, and also 3 years of self-taught computer experience. For the next couple years…I would be the one proofreading her essays and correcting her grammar, and showing her how to save her work and print. I also helped Mai as well.
Grandma has a stroke
My paternal grandmother had a stroke one day. I never knew what it was. My senses and child-logic told me….a stroke is when grandma loses consciousness, body freezes, falls down, and shits her pants all in one motion. Because that’s exactly what happened. I came home from school one day to a really foul smelling kitchen. The smell was her feces and I laughed because it was funny to me. But to the grownups, it was very serious. My dad and uncles were all so very concerned. They took grandma to the hospital and were giving us the play-by-play updates of her medical status.
I realized here that I hated my grandmother. I just hated her so much. She was such a bitch. Also mean and criticizing everything and everybody. And I remember her being sooooooo mean to my mom. Accusing my mom of being a bad mother…not knowing how to cook or bathe her kids properly. Not being a good-enough wife for my father, etc, etc. Exactly the kind of wretched mother-in-law that children’s fairy tales are made of. Now looking back…I wonder if she was extra mean because of my mom’s 1-time affair with Minh.
But anyway…I didn’t care that she was at risk of dying. I cared more about my dog Mina that died than I did for my grandmother. And my brothers all felt the same. We all absolutely hated her.