Say my name say my name

On a lighter note from the last blog, and still in the personal range. I used to hate my name. I hated it hated it hated it. Yen is great. Nuh-gock is not. Nor is Dwong. But then I came here.



Everytime I say my full name to someone, they say it's a beautiful name. Duong Ngoc Yen. (Yu-ung Nghup Ee-en is the best I can to write it phonetically) The director of the national math institute told me that it's the name of a beautiful woman very skilled at martial arts and poetry in Chinese folklore. After seeing my grandfather's grave with Duong An engraved on the headstone and thinking about my dad, who was an only child, I realize that I haven't given Duong enough credit, because I'm so close to my mother's side of the family, the Hos. But I love and am proud of my name, and of being a Viet Kieu and having different ways of pronouncing it. I prefer the Vietnamese sound for my middle and last names.



Speaking of being a Viet Kieu, more on that. I have a definite advantage now because I know more Vietnamese, but even if you don't you're still welcomed back to the home country. People are generally very excited to meet me and talk with a Viet Kieu My (American overseas Vietnamese). We get the Vietnamese, not the tourist, pricing, and extra friendliness and real conversations because we're Viet Kieu. That also means that some tourists think we're Vietnamese from VN and treat us as such, which is... interesting. Especially when people speak louder and slower in hopes that I'll understand more e.g. "do you know LAKE? Hon Kim LAKE?" "Well actually it's called Hoan Kiem lake, named after the restored sword in the legend, and it's down this street and hang a left. Bye."



Then there are many other tourists who love talking with me because I've got an inner look at Vietnamese culture; I've been to houses and chatted with shopkeepers etc. And there are many Vietnamese who aren't as friendly to Viet Kieu too. We're in between: Vietnamese know we aren't Vietnamese from VN, and foreigners think we are. It is a home but not my home, it is a unique experience which is great, but then makes it harder because we relate with neither group but with ourselves alone.



Hungary in a week! I was definitely not expecting myself to keep blogging.