Lauren

“After they returned home, a txiv neeb performed the ritual chant that accompanied his journey to the realm of the unseen. During the chant, the cow’s severed head was sitting on the Lees’ front stoop, welcoming Lia’s soul. When I asked the Lees whether any American passersby might have been surprised by this sight, Foua said, “No, I don’t think they would be surprised, because it wasn’t the whole cow on the doorstep, only the head.” Nao Kao added, “Also, Americans would think it was okay because we had the receipt for the cow.”
― Anne Fadiman, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures

“In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.”
― Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

“If somebody says 'I love you' to me, I feel as though I had a pistol pointed at my head. What can anybody reply under such conditions but that which the pistol holder requires? 'I love you, too'.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Wampeters, Foma and Granfalloons

“Our view of reality is only a view, not reality itself.”
― Anne Fadiman, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures