Fortunate in Many Ways

By Anonymous / Summer 2021

When I was four years old, my family was sponsored over to America by my Grandparents. During that time, I didn’t see what the big deal about America was and thought that home in Vietnam was better. It wasn’t until I grew up that I began to understand why my parents gave everything up just to come here. The promise that is generally associated with America from my perspective is that your success is related to how hard you work. We weren’t necessarily poor in Vietnam. My dad was a college graduate. Therefore, our family was able to afford a house: a luxury that many did not have. Despite this, my parents did not hesitate to give everything up just to start over in America. For the most part though, the dream that America promised my parents was mostly fulfilled.

From my own personal experience, I believe that our life here has been better than what it could have been in Vietnam. My parents were able to find work and provide my sister and me with a great childhood. My mom was able to go to beauty school with government financial support; additionally, my dad was able to attend college and get his technical license in accounting with the help of financial aid. From this, one of the promises where they were able to receive an education without having to worry about financial drawbacks was fulfilled. This was something that wouldn’t have been possible in Vietnam. After a few years, my family was able to assimilate more into American culture by becoming citizens. Through this, we were able to apply for housing; a government assistant program that helps low income families pay rent. Although it wasn’t smooth sailing the whole way through, we soon reached a very stable point in our lives where we didn’t have to worry about basic necessities. For the most part, my parents came here so that my sister and I would have an opportunity to work towards a better life for ourselves through schooling. The economy in Vietnam isn’t as developed as America; as a result, it is very difficult to attend college and even if one were to have the luxury too, the market doesn’t have many openings for jobs that pay well. Even though nothing is guaranteed anywhere, America provides a much higher chance of being successful relative to how hard you can work. Despite the promises being fulfilled for my family and me, I wouldn’t say that everyone has the same experience. I believe that my family was fortunate in many ways.

Although my experiences have been positive, the one thing that I did notice was that some of these American promises worked out well, because my family was low income. We had various government assistants that made life manageable. This however was not the case for some middle class families when it comes to college. My ex girlfriend’s uncle’s son was not able to receive enough financial aid and was put into massive debt due to the father making just at middle class wage. Despite the father working hard during college to earn his income, he will not be able to put his son through college comfortably while my family, who came here late, would receive the luxury of putting both my sister and I through college. This was one of the experiences in my life where I saw a contradiction.

Overall, my parents came here so that my sister and I would have a better chance at leading a successful and happy life. I can confidently say that their investment into our future is going to pay off: I am soon to be an engineering graduate working in a field that I love and a few years down the line, my sister will finish vet school. Despite this, I know that America has a lot of contradictions that undermine many people’s lifestyle. Even though it worked out for my family, I am aware that there are a lot of issues in our society that need to be fixed today.