Ha is 10 years old that has different minds. Ha lived in North Vietnam before the war, when the war started ha and her family moved into South Vietnam. She lived in South Vietnam and settled there, her family thought that they were safe but they are not. The poem states, “The war is coming closer to home.”(pg 4) They saying that when they went to South Vietnam, they are still not safe, and that the war is moving and moving and coming closer to South Vietnam which is there home. Ha and all the Vietnamese life’s turned inside out. Their life was in danger and they were suffering, all of a sudden they make a change and is heading to go to America. Even tho they suffered in the ship and they were in danger in the ship, there was still a good chance they will have a better life.
The poem states, “Our ship creeps along the river route without lights, without cooking, without bathrooms”.(pg 74) They are really suffering, like Ha saying that “without cooking” which means no food, so that’s how there suffering in the ship, but it’s worth it. Ha is sad she left her own country without her father. The poem states, “we must consider the shame of abandoning our own country and begging toward the unknown where we will all begin again at the lowest level on the social scale”.( pg 79) That means that they miss their country and are sad that they are leaving it, and that they are ashamed and embarrassed by them self for ditching their country and making it suffer.
Ha life and all the refugee’s life with them turned inside out, because they were suffering and in war, and all of a sudden it turned inside out to a better place where there is not war, and only peace, which is Alabama.
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A lot of refugees life’s turned inside out because of the war. In Fact, most of the refugees wanted to kill themselves because of their family or country. The poem states, “after two weeks at sea the commander calls all of us above deck for a formal lowering of our yellow flag with three red stripes. South Vietnam no longer exists. One woman tries to throw herself overboard, screaming that without a country she cannot live.”(pg 85) They mean in this poem that, the refugees are really sad their country does not exist anymore and that everything there is destroyed and will never come back again. The reason why a lot of people from Vietnam is leaving their country is that there is war in there country and that they are really sad to leave their country.
Other refugees are crying day and night, crying because one of their family members, which is most likely their husband, went to war, and never came back. Which basically means that there dead. One of the families that lost their father, is Ha’s family. They lost their dad in the war, and he never came back, There dad left them when Ha was 7 years old, he went to fight in the war. The poem states, “wish father would come home so I can stop daydreaming that he will appear in my classroom, in a white navy uniform and extend his hand toward me for all my classmates to see.”(pg 31) They mean in this poem, that all the families, or should I say, ha’s family is always thinking and praying that their father would come back.
The refugee’s life turned inside out because they were living in a peaceful life and having fun, all of a sudden a war happens and their men need to go. The families life’s turned inside out because they have to deal with all the sadness and have to deal with their loved one’s passing away. It also turned inside out, when all the refugees went to America and are trying to get used to life in there and adapt to it. “ We are flown to another tent city in humid, hot Florida, where alligators are shown as entertainment. The people in charge bring in Saigon-famous singers to raise refugee spirits, but faces keep twisting with worries.”(pg 107) In this poem, they mean that they not comfortable, or they did not get used to what Americans do and their style, they still did not adapt to there way of style.
As Ha was trying to fit in the society, and trying to get used to her new culture. Ha life, day by day, it’s turning back to normal, but in a different place. The poem states, “A man and the/ do not exist in Vietnamese/ and we understand/ each other just fine”. (pg 167) What she means about this, is that she’s really annoyed by the English language, but she’s really trying hard to adapt to it. In order to move on and adapt to their new lives, all the refugees need to let go of things they had before in Vietnam, or things they do in Vietnam. The poem states, “I feel guilty, having not once thoughts about father”. (pg 90)
I possibly think that, in her new life, she’s really not thinking about what happened, and how she suffered from Vietnam. She is mostly thinking of what’s happening in front of her, “right now”. Ha, life is closely coming back normal again when she adapts to the new environment. The poem states, “not the same, but not bad at all”. (pg 234), it means, that it’s not like Vietnam culture, but it’s still not bad, so she kind of got used to the environment, and now she’s having a normal life.
Not only Vietnam refugees life went back to normal. But other refugees from around the world lives went back to normal. The story states, “after a year of tutoring, these things are no longer a big problem for her. Now she has more confidence and more language skills to help herself and her family.”(Gurung) He is explaining, how he used to struggle with life and English, and now he is not struggling with anything, bc he got used to life and society, and learned English. Also, if you’re a refugee, and you want to have a good life, then you need to get used to the new life, it’s not going to be the same. One of the refugees says, “it’s good now. It’s not as good as it was in Bosnia, but better than Croatia”. (page 2 from Brice)
What he means, is that it’s a good life, but not as good as it was before the war happened in his country. So his life turned normal again, but not as good as, when he was in his country. Some people life turned normal again, but they still want to go back to their original country. One of the refugees says, “am still hoping the war will stop and I’ll go to Bostina soon.”(page 2 from Brice) One of the refugees explains how if the war stops in their country, they will go back, even though they got used to their new life.
There is a lot of similarities between the Vietnamese and the universal refugees, and one of them is “war”. One of the Vietnamese experience of being a refugee, is in inside out and back again, When Ha and her family migrate to another place, because of war in their country. In the poem, Ha states, “maybe soldiers will no longer patrol our neighborhood, maybe I can jump rope after dark.”(page 4 from Ha) In this sentence, Ha is trying to express, that soldiers always patrol there neighborhood, which means that there is war.
That is the Vietnamese, but let’s see the universal experience of refugees. Other refugees from around the world suffered from the same thing as the Vietnamese, which is war, war is so not cool, a lot of people want to avoid war, because they can risk their lives, so that’s why, they migrate to safer places, like America. The refugees state, “The war in Balkans has caused grievous suffering from millions of people.”(page 1 from Brice) the war in there made a lot of damage, the writer states that it killed 200k people. The similarities between Vietnamese and universal refugees experience is that they both migrated from their country because of war.
