I think all immigrants and refugees are preoccupied with memories to one degree or another. But again, this question of how much to remember and how much to forget is really aggravated for those who have lost a tremendous amount.

Immigrants, as troubling as they are to some people, are an integral part of what the American Dream is supposed to be. They're understandable to a considerable number of Americans.

I've never stopped being a refugee.

Refugees, especially in their early years, are still caught up in the experience that made them refugees. And they're much more melancholic. They're much more oriented towards the past and towards the country of origin. That can make the process of becoming a part of the new country much more fraught for them.

By college, I had a really grand, preposterous vision of myself as becoming a writer, but I don't think I had the discipline or the patience - or the ability or the humility. It took 20 years to acquire those things.

Immigrants who come to a country are going to lose something, for sure, but they hope to gain a great deal by making this journey, whereas refugees by definition have lost a tremendous amount - not just country and society, but also more personal things like careers, prestige, status, relatives, identities. This inevitably makes the longing to remember the past even more powerful among refugees, to the point of often debilitating them.

You have to wear a different face when you're interacting with the larger culture. And you can be more of yourself at home or in the local market or in the local church speaking your own language. That was my sense growing up as a Vietnamese refugee in San Jose.