Conversations with my Parents by Ooah Thi Tran

1. What is ironic about the way the author and the father become close? What has to happen to the father? It is ironic that the author and her father become close when the father is in hospital not when he is well. The father has become very sick.

2. How would you characterise the conversation that the author has with her parents? The conversation is very brief with no long sentences.

3. What is it that worries the author most about these conversations? That she never has a chance to say that she loves them or that she misses them.

4. There is a gap between the author’s need to express feelings common in western countries and her family’s lack of desire to express their feelings verbally. How does the family still express their feelings for their child, just not verbally? The family express' their feelings for the child by recalling memories about happy times and that they always try to call and listen to the child. They also pressure her to live like they did such as by buying Vietnamese food and talking about meals such as Banh Xeo.