︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ Steph ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿

“A lumpy mass of American stereotypes was metastasizing inside me. It made me cringe when I heard Mr. Miyagi say "Wax on, wax off, Daniel San." It made me pretend to laugh when I saw Long Duk Dong in Sixteen Candles. It made me sign up for tae kwon do that year because that was what Asians did. It would be decades before I diagnosed the lump of alienation, dual consciousness, and self-hatred, but it was already growing quickly, bilious and caustic. I only saw myself as the piece that did not fit in the puzzle.”
― Phuc Tran, Sigh, Gone: A Misfit's Memoir of Great Books, Punk Rock, and the Fight to Fit In

“That is the promised glade, The hill we climb, if only we dare it: Because being American is more than a pride we inherit— It’s the past we step into, and how we repair it.”
― Amanda Gorman, The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country

“Tiptoe past the dogs of the apocalypse
asleep in the shade of your future.
Pay at the window. You’ll be surprised: you
can pass off hope like a bad check.
You still have time, that’s the thing.
To make it good.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, How to Fly in Ten Thousand Easy Lessons

“In Vietnamese, the word for country and the word for water are the same: Nước. Context obviously makes it clear if you're talking about the former or the latter, but in Vietnamese, your country is not the terra firma or the nationality; it's the water. The waters that feed the soil. The waters that lap your shores. If you ask someone where they're from, you're asking them literally from what waters do they come. The county of America is called, in Vietnamese, nước mỹ: the waters of America.”
― Phuc Tran, Sigh, Gone: A Misfit's Memoir of Great Books, Punk Rock, and the Fight to Fit In