Today, as I drop our son at school, a fellow stressed-out dad thrusts a party invite my way.
“Look at this,” I beseech the boy, waving it in his face as he stands in front of his locker trying to remember which of his school-bag contents go where.
“Your friend is having a birthday party. He’s turning six. AND it’s on a Sunday. You’ll miss Vietnamese school. Result!”
He reels around and jabs me in the ribs with a pencil case.
“Sssssh, dad,” he implores, “don’t say Vietnamese. I don’t want the other kids to know I’m Vietnamese.”
“What’s wrong with being Vietnamese?”
“Being Vietnamese is stupid.”
Now this isn’t good.
“What are you talking about? Being Vietnamese is tremendous. You know what’s cool? You’re twothings. Vietnamese and English.”
I lean in close for an ear-mutter. “Most of the kids round here are plain old Aussie.”
He looks unconvinced. There’s no time to discuss this further, as the class-teacher is opening the day’s proceedings, and I don’t want to get mistaken for one of those parents who hang around to help.
Back at home, I spend the morning mulling.
This isn’t the first time one of our Anglo-Asian Aussie children has expressed a troubling antipathy towards the Asian end of their identity. Just the other week my daughter, aged eight, clambered on to my lap as I was enjoying a rare moment on the sofa, held her wrist against mine and demanded to know why she couldn’t be as white as me.
Why are our children rejecting their own Asian-ness?
This isn’t the first time one of our Anglo-Asian Aussie children has expressed a troubling antipathy towards the Asian end of their identity.
Making sure we were in a diverse neighbourhood wasn’t really a factor when we chose a place to live and bring up our family. The hills on the edge of Melbourne were pretty and cheap, and once we’d established there was decent coffee and baked goods, we didn’t fuss over demographics. We knew hippies flourished, that much we were braced for, but hadn’t realised it was going to be quite this white.
The school’s great, but not what you’d call multicultural, by any stretch of the imagination, which is not ideal. Narrow ethnic scope notwithstanding, we love it round here, so moving’s not an option (hey, have you seen the cost of stamp duty?)
All the banging on I do about merry old England probably doesn’t help matters. My homesickness (nine years in and counting) has had me gushing on to the kids about the old place all their lives. BBC radio shows streamed, shelves filled with British books, British music and photographs of people back in Britain. Asia cops a low profile round here, and that must be my fault.
It’s time I started doing my bit. Start spelling out to my Eurasian offspring what’s so tremendous about being Vietnamese.
Maybe I shouldn’t be quite so quick to conspiratorially celebrate with the kids whenever they get to skip Vietnamese school, either. I feel guilty about their having to spend Sunday afternoons there (hey, my own childhood was free from such character-building obligation, go figure), but it’s important they go, and not just to keep their grandmother happy.
It’s time I started doing my bit. Start spelling out to my Eurasian offspring what’s so tremendous about being Vietnamese.
The origin myths for a start. A dragon and fairy get it on, have 100 sons, then decide to split, fairy mum taking half the kids to the highlands, dragon dad the other half to the coast, forming two kingdoms - it’s like a Game Of Thrones plot - what’s not to like?
And then there’s the history - all that resistance and valour. Those badass Trung sisters who raised an army to revolt against occupying Chinese forces back in AD40 - let’s not dwell on their throwing themselves into Hat Giang River when their campaign failed, but dig that ballsy, proto-feminist defiance.
And once I’ve told them these and more reasons why being Vietnamese is righteous, I’ll remind them that it’s not where a person is from, but what they do and how they treat others that counts.
Vietnam’s struggle towards nationhood was immense - their David not only seeing off China’s Goliath again and again (an army tried invading as recently as 1979, but were sent packing after only 17 days), but also the French, then the Americans. That Viet blood these kids have flowing in their veins is some full-bodied drop, right enough.
Don’t even get me started on the food. Vietnamese or English? Hardly a match-up. Plus the place is stunning.
And once I’ve told them these and more reasons why being Vietnamese is righteous, I’ll remind them that it’s not where a person is from, but what they do and how they treat others that counts.
A slam-dunk on the parenting court. Might treat myself to 10 minutes on the sofa, on the back of that.
