Updates (Nov 1, 2025)
I have a friend from Vietnam my age who has a family and relocated to the Americas.
The difference between him and I is just that he has a family.
It finally occurred to me when we were talking. I am just an old guy sharing my trail and thoughts just like any other old man on this planet. OLD OLD!
Everything I say is just things an older South Vietnamese guy would say to the youth or any other person. This is a game changer. I can say pretty old adages now and it is OK.
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But my father and mother have wisdom beyond me in their 70s. That is what an extra 30+ years difference is.
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But I am old now and have things to say. To vent, to share and to grow like my parents one day.
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The difference between my dad and I is that he works everyday outside in the real world. His wisdom is beyond mine.
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But if my dad did anything else, he would fall ill.
It is good to live like my father.
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Feelings … In Nov 2019, I was a 35 year old healthcare Scarborough college student. I had a mountain of debt still from 15 years back at university and would get stressed during school studying. I would venture out to Scarborough area for eats. I would walk around the Asian area. I realized this …
To study health and the human body would take at least 20 years …
But …
But to also do so … you got to eat, vent, walk and socialize, stress out, play, take it day-by-day to balance.
Your mind would be so preoccupied studying the human body … exams, quizzes, updates, news, events
It is pretty good.
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If you have 2 parts to your being … or even more as a Vietnamese (coloured) person in the West … doing your thing and learning about healthcare and possibly working another service job experience … you become very balanced.
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After socializing with Vietnamese born in the Western sphere … things became stagnant … I pushed to do my thing … which is refactoring … doing refactoring for a few years grew me old. I bridged to the other phase of life which is staying home more, thinking broader and bigger and older, and even experimented with cooking.
I experiment with the best foods like Italian pasta. I learned to cook the most amazing pasta sauces even when using jarred sauces.
For example, I learned to brown meats to caramelize and add a whole fresh garlic sliced and diced a bit at the end to simmer for 30 minutes. The sauce is so sweet, strong and flavourful. I forget I am eating pasta as it is a whole different level of enjoyment.
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It seems now there is a component location I understand now.
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If you have 3 parts of life experience in you … life is good for me.
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The racial component is a big deal where I live … Now how to pass through …
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There is a component of being Asian in the Americas …
I went to university in 2002.
I finally bonded with Asians in the Scarborough area.
Fast forward 2019 … Most married ‘Canadians’ and have mixed kids.
In 2019, I went back to school for healthcare (to finally settle down) and saw 2 problems living my passive general way since birth here in Canada:
- Canadians and the world think not much of Vietnamese people really. I can’t really give health advice except to live balance and eat well
- People still think Vietnamese is a 3rd world country, agricultural centered and tourism.
I only bonded with people who have the same climate as me in Vietnam. It was OK.
But there is a gradient. People think people near the UK are smarter and have better culture naturally. Most people think nothing of more east and south people.
So in healthcare we are just floating doing whatever and thinking of things that might amuse us.
In healthcare, race and genetics dominate the discussion. Whoever has X genes people will listen to and recommend. People who have Y genes are left unheard from.
That does nothing for me as a Vietnamese born in Canada in healthcare. I just float around as I am Southern Vietnamese.
Even if I sit around in Oshawa and wait till my genes change to be more Oshawa based, in medicine no one really cares as they look at your base race.
It is OK still. I just float and think whatever.
But when outside the classroom and outside the workplace, people make race and genetics a topic then you still get no where really.
So you address what you really want to do internally as just a person??? Like a kid in grade school in safe Canada???
I guess so. Floating is fine but if it becomes negative and strains you then you just got to live for yourself and do things you like to avoid racial and genetic discussion because those people talking about that will just ignore you.
There is a component where I may think darker (negative) and naturally South Vietnamese then it doesn’t help the discussion really unless half the population is Southeastern people.
So there is the thing then.
People might just focus on you being darker and negative from their perspective because you are from the Southeast. If that is what happens daily and you keep getting ignored then you become a researcher or doer doing your own hobbies avoiding the 1-to-1 interactions where you are ignored.
Also the way I look at first glance might be a problem. I look Southeastern so I get ignored.
Then what jobs are available to me here in the West? Time to settle down.
And is this really a big problem? In Eurasia it is less of a problem.
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I realized this from talking to friends from South Vietnam here in the Americas …
We don’t live external … that is different.
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Then when I worked with Vietnamese further North they taught me to learn their way and their core is external based which helped me live in Canada and do the things I do. I guess interactions between all sort of people are good.
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Things I realized too.
Because of race and class sometimes it is good and bad to offer advice because people are in their own world with a level of stress. The stress they have can be unique. But at the end of the day just be open.
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One time I went to the Toronto Hospital for my mom, the nurses there were happy and had a great perspective broader than mine.
It is worth considering too.
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After a while socializing with Vietnamese from all parts of the world … you realize life can be about cultural perspectives too at times. Most of the time you are at home so you socialize in your culture.
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After socializing more … you realize when its 10PM at night and all you have is your old thoughts.
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I realized now .. . Being Vietnamese is really controversial because we are a junction country.
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