Sohaila

“Even if refugees, undocumented immigrants, and legal immigrants are not all potential billionaires, that is no reason to exclude them. Even if their fate is to be the high-school dropout and the fast-food cashier, so what? That makes them about as human as the average American, and we are not about to deport the average American (are we?).”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Refugees

“The past is a black hole, cut into the present day like a wound, and if you come too close, you can get sucked in. You have to keep moving.”
― Ling Ma, Severance

“I am a refugee, an American, and a human being, which is important to proclaim, as there are many who think these identities cannot be reconciled.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Refugees

“I came to understand that in the United States, land of the fabled American dream, it is un-American to be a refugee. The refugee embodies fear, failure, and flight. Americans of all kinds believe that it is impossible for an American to become a refugee, although it is possible for refugees to become Americans and in that way be elevated one step closer to heaven.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Refugees