Listen, Slowly

Twelve-year-old girls want nothing more than to be like everyone else. Vietnamese American Mai even goes by a different name outside her home, answering to “Mia” when with her friends. Mai tries not to identify with her heritage and instead sees herself as a Laguna Beach girl. As most teenagers do, Mai has searched for what it means to be her, and she is confident it has nothing to do with Vietnam. Mai feels disconnected from her parents’ heritage and identity and what they are trying to build for themselves and their progeny. In their efforts to rebuild a life apart from the trauma of post-war Vietnam, they hid parts of themselves and their story, thinking they were protecting Mai. When Mai’s parents force her to spend the summer with her grandmother in Vietnam instead of with her friends on the beach in California, she is launched into a true exploration of herself as she is fully immersed in the Vietnamese language, culture, and community. By experiencing her coming-of-age journey in the place of her ancestry, Mai comes to accept and embrace her family’s roots and better accepts herself as well.