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Writer's pictureBen Taylor

Understanding The Red Plastic Chair is a Vietnamese Cultural Institution, and My Anchor - Writing About Personal Journeys

The red plastic chair becomes more than a utilitarian object in Amy Duong’s essay/memoir; it transforms into a symbolic anchor, tethering her to a shared past and a cultural identity. However, whilst the chair acts as a metaphorical cornerstone in her journey through childhood as the child of immigrants, Duong’s passage into adulthood also sees her moving away from those who raised her and lamenting the things that get lost as lives are established in a new home.


Duong outlines the need for a shared language in order for people to share parts of their journeys. As she reaches for words that may help her better understand and relate to her parents and aunty, Duong finds herself limited in this connection, reaching the end of a road that leads to greater understanding of her past and her culture. Despite this painful realisation and frustration with herself, Duong is able to depict the red chairs as a language of their own; a shared tool spread amongst family and community that is understood by all who take part in any celebration or gathering. Through this, the idea of individual journeys, and the ability to share only parts of that journey, even with those we love, is examined. There is great comfort in community and family, but there is also a place where individuals cannot fully comprehend the life and journey of another; it is simply impossible for them to grasp.


Duong expands on this idea by outlining the great number of events which make up a life and how a person’s journey can be impacted by so many different events. Knowing her only from her time in Australia, Duong is only able to see that part of her Aunty. The extraordinary events of her Aunty’s past are facts known to Duong, yet this is where they stay; she simply cannot fully comprehend the person her Aunt must have been in those times. Similarly to how Duong’s upbringing of “Cheez TV” and “bubble tea” is foreign to her parents, she comes to understand that what she knows of her parents and extended relatives is only a small part of their complete life story.


"My aunty was the oldest of my mother’s siblings and when she died, she had already survived everything else. As a teenager, she had fled from China to Vietnam where she watched her country fall to the communists. In 1987, she and my mother’s family clambered onto a fishing boat in the middle of night to set sail for an uncertain future. A few years later she ended up in Mel- bourne’s south east. It was there that I knew her.”

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Duong’s description of the red chairs as an ‘anchor’ helps her explore the idea of one’s journey relying upon a sense of home or some sort of constant through which they can understand themselves as they move away from it. In order for one to journey, they must have a place of origin. The upheaval of her parents’ lives provides a further gulf as Duong comes to realise the immense differences between her and her elders and how this impacted their ability to truly understand each other’s lives.



"My life was not like theirs and could never be. I was born in Australia and all that I had ever known existed within its lucky boundaries. Their lives were split across continents with pieces held captive somewhere distantand unreachable. Our generational gap was real and it grewwider with each passing year."


Duong’s piece also details her unintentional journey away from her cultural roots. In her childhood aim to emulate “Australian perfection” found in “Dolly magazine and Home and Away”, Duong drifts away from the language and practises of her people. There is a sadness as she comes to realise how effortlessly her ability to communicate has evaporated. In establishing herself as a first generation Australian, Duong’s desperation to conform to the wider culture has led her down a path that has slowly stripped her of her family’s past. The tragedy of this is in her acknowledgement and understanding of this coming to her too late. Thus, the bittersweet nature of personal growth is exposed as Duong simultaneously forges her own identity whilst the ties to her past gradually fade.


The heartbreak in Duong’s narrative surfaces as she grapples with the inevitable drift from her parents and the cultural narrative they embody. Her description of the gathering to pay respects to her Aunt, including the divide between children and adults, is symbolic of a growing chasm between one generation and the next. And so, as she lifts the chair at the conclusion of her piece, Duong begins yet another journey, the slow yet inevitable expedition away from the past and a life that is removed from current experience.

 

The teaching package from where this reading has been taken from is available on our resources page. Please reachout if you would like any further support with your teaching of this area of study.

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