Stealing Buddha's Dinner

In Grand Rapids, Bich’s father works at the North American Feather Company and makes fast friends with other Vietnamese refugees who’ve landed in the city. Bich remembers, fondly, when Noi would take her and Anh to the park; if they were especially lucky, they would be allowed to tag along with their father to Meijer grocery and choose candy like “Smarties, Hershey’s chocolate bars, candy necklaces, and pink-tipped candy cigarettes” (18). Bich and Anh learn English by watching television shows like Happy Days and Sesame Street.

On summer days, Noi takes them to the farmer’s market to pick out fruit and vegetables. The fruit enchants the girls, but before they can eat them, the fruit must be offered as a sign of respect to their ancestors. Noi places the fruit on an altar in front of a golden statue of Buddha in the living room for two or more days. When she would finally let the girls eat the fruits, she would peel and slice them carefully, like little treasures, and Bich writes, “The fruit seemed dearer to us than candy, and I believed that the transition from globe to glowing slices involved some kind of magic” (19).

Her father meets a Mexican-American woman named Rosa at a party on New Year's Eve, and soon “she slid right into our lives,” (22) bringing gifts like milk and mittens for the girls. Two months in, Rosa starts talking about how Anh is going to be five years old and that they should have a party. Bich explains that the birthday on her and Anh’s respective legal records have the wrong birthdays because their father forgot them when he had to write them down in Guam. The party goes well. Soon after, Bich and Anh meet Rosa’s daughter, Chrissy, who teaches the girls about swear words.

Bich’s father and Rosa get married at the courthouse, and two months later they have a son who they name Vinh. Chu Anh marries Rosa’s friend, Shirley, and is in college studying engineering. Chu Cuong and Chu Dai are both single and work at a jewelry plant. Bich’s father is promoted to better hours and machinery at North American Feather Company, and on weekends he works on his Mustang. They move into a different house on Florence Street, where the girls all share a room. Bich learns when it is appropriate to ask questions, becoming “more aware of the construct of family” (26). Rosa’s presence means a lot of adjustments to their living arrangement. The statue of Buddha is set up in Noi’s room, now, and Chrissy has to be part of their nightly fruit-eating ritual.

Bich’s grandmother, Noi, is born in 1920 outside Hanoi. She attends a French academy and has her teeth dyed black, a traditional beauty ritual. At 20, she meets and marries a man who owns an import business. They have four sons and are well-off enough to afford a nanny for each boy. Noi’s son, Chu Quan, dies in combat.

As Vietnam speeds towards partition, the North Vietnamese target educators, writers, and businesspeople. Noi’s family is soon spending their money on survival, and the simple, substantive things. At one point, her husband, Bich’s grandfather, is taken and tortured for nonexistent ties to the Communists. Just before the partition, they flee to Saigon, and Noi leaves behind her brothers and sisters, who she won’t see again for another forty years. Noi starts to sell pho on the streets and spends time meditating at the local temples. Her husband falls into a depression and then dies of a heart attack, though Bich’s “uncle Chu Cuong said it was sadness” (32). Bich’s father is eleven.

Bich recalls that when she asks what happened between her grandfather’s death and their flight from Vietnam, her father responds, “too much, [...] and with never enough money” (33). She does know that during this time, her father meets her mother at a cafe, and they begin to see each other. They live apart, but over the next few years have Anh, and then Bich. When the city starts falling apart, Bich’s father takes the girls to Noi, and soon after they are gone.

The memoir returns to its narrative present. Bich describes falling in love with ice cream, ca lem in Vietnamese, and “[b]efore Florence Street, before Rosa” (34), Noi would take her and her sister to Purple Cow ice cream while their father shopped for groceries. Now, when Rosa buys ice cream, she buys giant plastic buckets. Rosa uses ice cream as a distraction; Bich recalls that they have ice cream the day Rosa and her father bring Vinh home from the hospital, when Bich is four and a half. Up until then, the pregnancy had been a subject the family didn’t discuss. Once Vinh is born, Rosa starts to acclimate more, and now accompanies the family to Vietnamese parties. She stands and talks with the other wives in the kitchen, but her Vietnamese is stunted and slow. Chrissy refuses to learn Vietnamese and often makes fun of Anh and Bich for their ethnicity.

To celebrate Vinh’s birth, they throw a big party. Noi spends days in the kitchen, preparing food: cha gio, goi cuon, shrimp cakes, spring rolls, banh xeo, and beef satay, among other dishes. Anh and Bich are waitresses for the party, and they are dressed identically, with the same bowl cut hairstyle. Anh and Bich both are jovial, but that’s where the similarities end. Rosa introduces the girls to party guests as “the pretty one and the smart one” (37). People pass Vinh around and praise the other girls but overlook Bich. She doesn’t mind, though, because she doesn’t like the way adults laugh at children when they speak.

Vinh’s birth also means Rosa’s reconciliation with her strict Catholic family. Her parents, Juan and Maria, are migrant workers who came to Michigan from Texas to follow the crop seasons. Rosa’s siblings think she is hoity-toity because she went to college instead of getting married. Working as a teacher in Grand Rapids after she graduated, Rosa becomes pregnant, and then raises Chrissy alone, becomes involved in liberal activism, and builds a life and career.

Since moving into the house, Rosa has instilled many new rules for the children to follow. They must ask if they want to have a snack, and half the time, Rosa denies their request. To counterbalance this, Bich begins stealing food: cookies, popsicles, entire meals hidden in her shorts and stolen away to her bedroom. Ice cream is the one thing that's hard to take, but that’s ok because her uncles give Bich and Anh change to chase down the ice cream trucks in the neighborhood. Sometimes they go to the Dairy Cone, which replaces Bich’s love for The Purple Cow. Chu Cuong and Chu Dai take the girls once or twice a week all summer, and they can get whatever they want.