I Am An Immigrant – Voices

I’m Vietnamese, my parents were both born in Vietnam, and they had me about 20 years after immigrating to America. The hardest part for them about coming to America, I think was adjusting and learning English. Their English is way better than it was when they were in Vietnam. My dad was a carpenter and my mom was an engineer. When they immigrated here, they were put into a host family that helped them adjust to American life and ever since then, people get that they’re not from here so they’re super helpful and super nice. I speak a little bit of Vietnamese. My parents sometimes speak Vietnamese to me and I understand it. I can speak it back to them, but if not, I’ll just answer in English and they can still understand me. My whole dad’s side is back in Vietnam. I’ve been to Vietnam when I was 9 years old to visit them and I remember there being no WIFI and no internet so it was very different. I wasn’t really adventurous when I was a kid so when we would go sightseeing, I wouldn’t appreciate it fully and now if I could do it again, I would appreciate it more. I love going home and eating Vietnamese food because I don’t get a lot of it here at school. I love my mom’s home cooking and celebrating Vietnamese holidays. I feel like Trump is making immigration a way bigger issue than it actually is. People come to America to be free and he wants to take away their freedom, so what’s the whole point?