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An American immigrant success story


Fnfalman
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No, this lady isn't a millionaire.  Nor is she an aspiring politician or any sort of social influencer.  She's just an honest-to-goodness naturalized American citizen who came to America from Vietnam back in 1999.  All she had ever done since then career-wise was being a mani-pedi worker (I think they're called cosmetologists).  However, her eldest daughter at 28 is getting a PhD in Physics at Boston College.  Her middle son is getting his undergrad in Biochemistry in UT Austin and youngest son at 17 is already second year at US San Antonio pre-med.  Her husband has dementia at the ripe young age of 54 (she's 53, two months older than me).  

She works seven days a week from dawn till dusk to put the kids through undergrad (grad school is on them) and to take care of the invalid husband.  She doesn't have a big house, a fancy car nor does she travel abroad for tourism unless it's once every two years back to Vietnam to visit the parents.  She doesn't whine, she doesn't cry, she doesn't complain about how hard life is or how she wasn't dealt a good hand.  She was grateful for the opportunities to put her kids through school, to raise them right and to take care of her personal needs.

She speaks passable Russian (Russia was the new America after the Vietnam War), and wants to match me up with a "good" Vietnamese woman.  LOL.  That ain't gonna happen.  No dragon lady is gonna corral up this mustang.

I just thought that it was a cool story to share.  

Her story is not too different from the story of a chick that I currently see.  She's a Mexican waitress at a Corpus Christi Mexican restaurant who toils away six days a week from morning till night so that she can send money back to her mom and young kids living in El Paso, and hopes that she can provide for her kids' futures.  She has no time to gripe, bitch and moan about fairness or injustice.  She's too busy taking care of business.  

 

 

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31 minutes ago, Fnfalman said:

No, this lady isn't a millionaire.  Nor is she an aspiring politician or any sort of social influencer.  She's just an honest-to-goodness naturalized American citizen who came to America from Vietnam back in 1999.  All she had ever done since then career-wise was being a mani-pedi worker (I think they're called cosmetologists).  However, her eldest daughter at 28 is getting a PhD in Physics at Boston College.  Her middle son is getting his undergrad in Biochemistry in UT Austin and youngest son at 17 is already second year at US San Antonio pre-med.  Her husband has dementia at the ripe young age of 54 (she's 53, two months older than me).  

She works seven days a week from dawn till dusk to put the kids through undergrad (grad school is on them) and to take care of the invalid husband.  She doesn't have a big house, a fancy car nor does she travel abroad for tourism unless it's once every two years back to Vietnam to visit the parents.  She doesn't whine, she doesn't cry, she doesn't complain about how hard life is or how she wasn't dealt a good hand.  She was grateful for the opportunities to put her kids through school, to raise them right and to take care of her personal needs.

She speaks passable Russian (Russia was the new America after the Vietnam War), and wants to match me up with a "good" Vietnamese woman.  LOL.  That ain't gonna happen.  No dragon lady is gonna corral up this mustang.

I just thought that it was a cool story to share.  

Her story is not too different from the story of a chick that I currently see.  She's a Mexican waitress at a Corpus Christi Mexican restaurant who toils away six days a week from morning till night so that she can send money back to her mom and young kids living in El Paso, and hopes that she can provide for her kids' futures.  She has no time to gripe, bitch and moan about fairness or injustice.  She's too busy taking care of business.  

 

 

These are the life blood of immigration.  They have the ideals that America is based on.  Work = success.  

The people that work the hardest are given the least publicity.  It's unfortunate!

 

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2 hours ago, Fnfalman said:

One of them dragon ladies almost got me back in 2002. Never again. 

Narrow escapes aside, cool success stories.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Lady

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Dragon Lady is usually a stereotype of East Asian and occasionally South Asian and Southeast Asian women as strong, deceitful, domineering, or mysterious.[1] The term's origin and usage arose in America during the late 1800’s with the passing of the Page Act of 1875 which radically lowered immigration of Chinese women.[2] Inspired by the characters played by actress Anna May Wong,[3] the term comes from the female villain in the comic strip Terry and the Pirates.[1][3] It has since been applied to powerful Asian women and to a number of racially Asian film actresses. The stereotype has generated a large quantity of sociological literature. "Dragon Lady" is sometimes applied to persons who lived before the term became part of American slang in the 1930s. It is also used to refer to any powerful but prickly woman, usually in a derogatory fashion.

 

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One of my best friends served in the Marines in Vietnam.   He saw some $#!^ while there including Khe San...among other interesting events.

A couple of years ago i had lunch with a young consultant who was Vietnamese.  He told me his family fought as long as they could on the side of America and when i say fight...it was with rifles.

When his parents moved here it was a desperate act to avoid being killed in Vietnam.  His parents gave him a tremendous love of America.

And i couldn't help but think....he was a victory of sorts.   Young, very smart, the world at his finger tips.

He is a great example of immigration gone right.  He is...my friend's legacy.

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2 hours ago, Fnfalman said:

Pretty sure they have different names for these chicks.  Stop appropriating our culture.

So, you're saying that it was an inappropriate appropriation?  Okay.  Not going to do that again. 

Hey, I've got a success story for you.  My grandfather owned a trucking company in Italy.  In the 1920s Mussolini's fascists beat the crap out of my great grandfather because Nono (Italian for grandpa) wouldn't join his labor union.  My grandfather, grandmother and father had to leave Italy and come to America.  They had to leave everything behind.  Dad served in the army during WWII.  Got a couple of Bronze stars (D-Day Utah Beach, Battle of the Bulge).  yada yada yada ....  Got back.  worked 40 hours a week at the Coca Cola bottlery loading trucks while he got his BS (double major in zoology and biology) at UCSB.  Then mom worked as a senior executive assistant at a fledgling Hewlett Packard while dad got his Master in Education at Stanford.  He went on to be a school principal and assistant superintendent. 

My wife's family has a similar story.  Fled fascism in Europe.  Started with nothing.  Went to a good college.  Ran some stores.  Owned some property.  Put all three of his kids through college.

Some of the more successful people I've known were the poor kids that I met while I was in college. 

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17 minutes ago, minervadoe said:

Some of the more successful people I've known were the poor kids that I met while I was in college. 

They understand hunger and what a chance they have.

I've seen kids like that just run circles around others.  Because they have some skin in the game.  They want it...very badly.

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52 minutes ago, Historian said:

They understand hunger and what a chance they have.

I've seen kids like that just run circles around others.  Because they have some skin in the game.  They want it...very badly.

I went to high school with a bunch of rich kids.  They all thought they were god's gift to the world.  Most of them did not come close to repeating their parents success.  I heard a story about one loser with rich parents "trying to straighten his life out."  His parents bought him a gas station and the first load of gas.  When the station ran out of gas, he called his parents up and asked them to refill the tanks. They had spent all the revenue on partying. 

Compare that to when I was getting my MBA.  One of the students that I met was a total straight arrow.  I figured he was some rich prep school brat.  When I finally got a chance to talk to him, I learned that he had grown up dirt poor.  Education was his ticket out.

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2 hours ago, minervadoe said:

So, you're saying that it was an inappropriate appropriation?  Okay.  Not going to do that again. 

Hey, I've got a success story for you.  My grandfather owned a trucking company in Italy.  In the 1920s Mussolini's fascists beat the crap out of my great grandfather because Nono (Italian for grandpa) wouldn't join his labor union.  My grandfather, grandmother and father had to leave Italy and come to America.  They had to leave everything behind.  Dad served in the army during WWII.  Got a couple of Bronze stars (D-Day Utah Beach, Battle of the Bulge).  yada yada yada ....  Got back.  worked 40 hours a week at the Coca Cola bottlery loading trucks while he got his BS (double major in zoology and biology) at UCSB.  Then mom worked as a senior executive assistant at a fledgling Hewlett Packard while dad got his Master in Education at Stanford.  He went on to be a school principal and assistant superintendent. 

My wife's family has a similar story.  Fled fascism in Europe.  Started with nothing.  Went to a good college.  Ran some stores.  Owned some property.  Put all three of his kids through college.

Some of the more successful people I've known were the poor kids that I met while I was in college. 

I believe that the person who had to fight for every little success, is more apt to achieve great success.  Perseverance should never be underestimated.  Edison comes to mind!

Two of my daughters wanted to work at my company.  They had no expertise in technology, but were adamant about wanting to  work there.

They applied and were turned down.  I told them to keep applying and coming back.  They did numerous times.  The last time for each of them, was when they were given jobs and told that with their perseverance, they demonstrated what the company wanted.  Initiative and drive.

I had no part in this because I wanted their success to be due to their efforts, not mine.  They both turned out to be excellent employees and many times people from other departments would stop my and tell me that. 

Edited by janice6
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On 2/16/2020 at 5:08 PM, Fnfalman said:

One of them dragon ladies almost got me back in 2002. Never again. 

Is this the one that got away?

Iowa professor accused of murder in husband's bizarre death

https://www.foxnews.com/us/iowa-professor-accused-of-murder-in-husbands-bizarre-death

 

Quote

 

An economics professor at a private Iowa liberal arts college has been arrested in her husband's death after he was bound, gagged and tied to a chair, according to reports.

Gowun Park, 41, was charged Wednesday with murder in the bizarre death of Sung Woo Nam, West Iowa Police said. Nam, also 41, died Saturday.

Her students at Simpson College in Indianola knew something was wrong when she notified them in an email Sunday that her classes for the week were canceled because of a “personal issue,” the Des Moines Register reported.

The night before, she called 911 to report an unconscious person at her home.

Police said Park bound her husband’s hands and feet with zip ties, and tied him to a chair with rope, the paper reported.

Court records said Park duct-taped Nam’s mouth after stuffing “an item of clothing” down his throat to prevent him from yelling, according to the paper.

The complaint said Park ignored her distressed husband’s pleas to be untied, the paper reported.

“Ms. Park made efforts to hide and conceal the binding items prior to the arrival of emergency personnel," police said in a criminal complaint, according to the Register. "The injuries sustained by Mr. Nam were not self-inflicted.”

 

 

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On 2/17/2020 at 1:57 PM, Fnfalman said:

Pretty sure they have different names for these chicks.

When I was working in a hardware store, this lady came in one time and she was a dead ringer for Ethel Merman in It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963).  That's the way I referred to her at the store.  She definitely was a specific type.  Ever seen one of these?   ?

 

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