Category Archives: family

Proof that my child will become an omnivore (or stated differently, will not become a vegan)

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I’ve been clearing out most of the meat-based proteins in the freezer ahead of our upcoming Costco trip, and I found that I still had two packs of bone-in chicken thighs from Butcher Box. So I marinated them last night and roasted them, Vietnamese garlicky-style. I pulled all the meat off the bones and assembled what my mom would call a “cuon cuon” station: a shallow bowl-plate for dipping rice paper, a stack of rice paper, bowls with various herbs, lettuce, sliced cucumbers, pickled daikon/carrot, cooked rice noodles, crushed toasted peanuts, scallion oil sauce, a plate of just roasted garlicky chicken, bowls of nuoc cham for dipping. And because I had a random single egg remaining from the carton I just threw out, I also ribboned an egg omelet into strips to add to the cuon (rolls).

Kaia had her own vegetables and chicken on her plate at dinner time, but she was watching as I rolled chicken cuon for Chris and me. For the first time watching me do this, she was actually very fascinated. First, she asked if she could do it. Then, she realized quickly how finicky it was (these rice papers are very sticky and pliable for a 4-year-old!), so she asked me to make some cuon for her. And then, she happily tore into them and chewed them vigorously. She was very excited to finally “participate” in her cuon cuon station that her mama made. She instructed me on exactly how much of each filling she wanted in her cuon. I was so proud that she was embracing this for the first time, at age 4. There’s a first for everything!

Then at bedtime, we read a book together that included a unicorn and lots of food. And as per usual, Kaia likes to “pretend eat” all the food by “grabbing” all the food on the pages and pretending to chomp on and eat them. For the first time, she “grabbed” the unicorn and pretended to eat it.

“Pooks!” I exclaimed, a bit confused. “You can’t eat the unicorn!”

She smiled mischievously at me in response, then her face went blank. “Why not?” And then she paused and giggled. “I’m just pretending, mama!”

Unicorns are mythical animals. But my Pookie insists that she wants to “eat” them. I guess this may be a sign she has zero desire to become vegan anytime soon.

“Why is it just three of us?”

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Kaia woke up this morning to see that her paternal grandparents were not in the house anymore. As they usually do, Chris’s parents left on one of several side trips on this trip: for the next week and a half, they are off to Utah, Nevada, Toronto, and Maine. She came out of her bedroom and peered at our bed where Chris’s parents would sleep and did not see them. Instead, she saw a fully made up bed. She also saw me lying on the sofa bed, still under the covers.

“Where did Suma and Topa go?” Kaia asked, as she got into sofa bed with me.

“Remember we told you they’d leave this morning for about a week and a half?” I said to her lightly. “They’ll be back next Wednesday! They’ll be back before you know it.”

She gave me her contemplative look. She was clearly sad and did not like that they weren’t at home with us anymore.

As she ate her breakfast, she said to me, “Why is it just the three of us?” And when I told her that Suma and Topa couldn’t stay with us forever, she kept asking me, “Why? Why?”

Kaia wants everyone she loves with her all the time – forever. Like most kids her age, she never wants the fun to end, and she always wants to be loved and cuddled and given attention to constantly. It’s hard to explain to her in a way she will understand why some people she loves live so far away, and why these same relations (like grandparents) can be closer in proximity like her classmates’ grandparents may be. But I guess that’s all the things you start learning and understanding the older and more mature you become.

When part of your family thinks that doctors are the “persecuted class”

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I think it can be universally stated no matter what country you are in that doctors, as a group of people, can be considered a “prestigious” profession or class of people. They are known to earn good money regardless of where in the world they live. There’s pretty much no one you would meet, regardless of nationality, ethnicity, race, or gender, who would say that to be a doctor is not a ‘high class’ profession. And there is no one who would say that nurses are equal to doctors in prestige and/or pay.

But then, I met my in-laws and listened to a very big and loud debate they had with Chris tonight, and I realized that they are actually the only two people I have met on planet earth who actually do believe that doctors have the same level of “prestige” or “status” as nurses, and would even argue that nurses get paid the same — at least, in Australia. And I also heard my mother-in-law say that she thinks that doctors are a “persecuted class” of people in Australia.

I asked my good friend Claude (AI) what the average salaries are in Australia for nurses versus doctors. Claude informed us that on average for the last available year of data, doctors as a group make about double what nurses make there. Both in-laws refuted the data and insisted the stats were inaccurate. My mother-in-law kept insisting her own personal experiences were representative of all doctors in the country, and that her own anecdotes held more weight than national statistics.

I love my in-laws and think they are generally good people. But this doubting of real statistics feels like the spread of fake news. Now I understand why Chris and his brother always say they’d never take real career advice from their parents.

Chè Thái (Vietnamese fruit cocktail)

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I grew up eating many variations of chè, or traditional Vietnamese sweet soups and puddings. As a child, I enjoyed them just as much as I enjoyed western desserts like cake or ice cream. Plus, I didn’t have easy access to these Vietnamese desserts unless we stumbled upon a Vietnamese bakery or were in San Jose or Orange County. My mom never made very much Vietnamese food given our favorite Vietnamese dishes can be very laborious, and there was no way she’d ever go to the great lengths it takes to put together a Vietnamese dessert like these.

I never realized when I was younger how much healthier most of these Asian desserts were because they actually had good-for-you ingredients like real fruit and even beans — yes, beans! The one my mom got for me most often in my early years was che dau xanh, or mung bean pudding. It’s a pudding-like che that has mung beans cooked down until soft with some sugar, and sometimes flavored with pandan. Then it’s topped with a very luscious, whipped coconut cream. Another one I enjoyed occasionally was che ba mau, also known as “three colored dessert.” This one has layers of pandan jellies, mashed sweetened mung bean, red beans (sometimes even kidney beans), and a thick layer of sweetened coconut cream.

One version of che that I’ve been thinking about a lot since we were in the Philippines (halo halo!) was che thai, which is translated to mean “Vietnamese fruit cocktail,” in the style of many Thai desserts, hence the “Thai” in the name. I suppose that to describe it a a “fruit cocktail” is fairly accurate given it’s a few different types of fruits and jellies served in a sweetened “soup” that uses coconut milk/cream as its base. So I decided that once the weather got warmer and we had company over that I’d make it. Chris’s parents have arrived for their annual visit, so this will be their first dessert at home with us. It’s pretty straightforward and easy given most of the ingredients are from cans: canned longan, lychee, jackfruit, toddy palm seeds, young coconut flesh, and even aiyu jelly can be used. If you don’t want to use aiyu jelly from a can, you can either make your own, or make a pandan jelly. I made and cubed pandan jelly this morning using agar agar (seaweed) powder – it took less than ten minutes! I also sliced up some jackfruit and toddy palm seeds, and then peeled and cut some fresh mango. I added some canned longans whole. And as the last step, I mixed the “soup” base, which was about a cup of coconut milk, some coconut water, and added some jackfruit syrup/juice from the can until the sweetness was just right. I mixed everything in a big bowl and put it in the fridge to cool.

The che thai was a success: everyone enjoyed it! Chris’s mom even had seconds. And Kaia finished the little bowl I prepared her; she was especially fascinated by the pandan jellies and got so excited she was able to eat jellies with her mama’s approval ( did make them, after all!). If it were in season, I would have liked to include pomegranate seeds to give the che thai a red color to make the soup “pop” more, but I guess I can save that for another time. Some recipes, to add a “red” fruit, will take canned Chinese water chestnuts, chop them into small pieces, coat them in tapioca starch and red food coloring, and then boil them to infuse the red color into the water chestnuts. But I am trying to avoid artificial colors and flavors as much as I can, so I nixed this. And I don’t think anyone would have thought that could enhance tonight’s dessert. Sometimes, it really is the simplest desserts that are quite delicious.

All relationships are work

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The Oxford English dictionary defines work as, “activity involving mental or physical effort done in order to achieve a purpose or result.” If you know the strict definition of work, I think most would agree that all relationships are work. It doesn’t matter if it’s the relationship you have with your spouse, child, mother, friend, or colleague: all require a certain level of effort in order to sustain the relationship — at least, in some semi healthy way.

Chris and I just hit our 10-year wedding anniversary last month. His parents sent well wishes on our family Whatsapp group. Then his brother wished us a happy anniversary, also saying, “Good work on reaching 10 years of marriage!”

I looked at his message and smirked. “Thanks!” I responded back. “Ummm, yes. It is most definitely work!”

I told my friend, who is uncoupled, that we had reached our 10-year wedding anniversary and had been together for over 14 years now. She was flabbergasted.

“Shit, I don’t know how you do it!” she said to me after wishing us a happy anniversary. “How can you stand someone for that long, constantly in your space and not doing things the way you want them done?”

This friend knows I am anal-retentive with cleaning. She knows I like everything done in a very certain way in the kitchen. She also knows that I have very strong opinions. And on top of all that, she’s met Chris a number of times now and has had the chance to speak with him a decent amount, so she said she could already imagine how ridiculous and intense our disagreements and arguments would be.

I always wanted to get married. Ever since I learned what marriage was, I wanted to get married and live “happily ever after.” But I don’t think Disney fairy tales or the example of what “marriage” is supposed to be like based on my parents’ relationship were ever the best examples that set me up for success. I’ve spent decades reading psychology and sociology articles and studies, and took a number of classes on these topics. Hell, I even took a sociology course on sociology of marriage and family in college. And when I did therapy two different periods of my life, I spent a good amount of time talking about my relationships with my parents, friends, and Chris, and what I want and do not want to be or become. All of this has been really hard work and required a lot of thinking and introspection. Sometimes, getting to a state of self-awareness can be quite painful. Yet despite all that hard work, I still mess up and do and say stupid things I don’t really mean to say or do in the way it comes out. It’s like every day, I am trying to break out of inherited intergenerational trauma and redefine what I want to be in my relationships with Chris and others I love. I guess everyone is a little bit like that: we only know what we know — until we try to break unhealthy cycles — again, assuming we have a certain level of self awareness, or someone helps point it out to us.

But the work we put into relationships with those we love most is important. It’s probably the most important work of your life. It’s hard for me to imagine a life without those who are closest to me who I love the most. Frankly, I don’t want to be my dad in that sense: I don’t want to be a total loner with zero friends. I also don’t want to be in a marriage where I feel emotionally estranged from my spouse. So while many reject close friendships or serious romantic partnerships, I guess at the end of the day, I am still a romantic and want all these things to be a part of my daily reality.

So, the work continues.

Priorities in the ‘hood, according to my 4-year-old

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A school activity this week was to discuss what makes up the school community and the area around it. The kids were asked to name parts they notice and like, and to draw them. One kid mentioned the bank across the street. Another drew the bubble tea shop across the other street. And my Kaia Pookie called out the bakery next door and drew a picture of it.

Chris showed me the photos uploaded to her class site for the activity this week, as he knew I’d be excited to see that Kaia mentioned the bakery first. I immediately started beaming when I saw the photos of the kids’ illustrations and the class topic. But his commentary was not as pleased.

“I would’ve preferred that she did the bank,” Chris said. “Everyone needs money. Money buys the stuff at the bakery.”

“She’s our kid,” I insisted to him. “Of course she’s going to point out the bakery first! She loves bakeries (just like us)!”

“No money, no pastries!” Chris retorted back at me.

I don’t care what Chris says. Yes, his logic is correct that there would, in fact, be no pastries without money. But bakeries make Kaia Pookie happy like they make us happy, and it’s yet another sign that she is most definitely our child — or at least, mine.

Thumbs up, thumbs down

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When Kaia was learning different gestures, including sign language as a baby/toddler, she got most of them pretty quickly. She understood the meaning of them and embraced them. She especially loved signing “more” (isn’t that everyone’s favorite?). But one gesture that she absolutely refused to do for the longest time was “thumbs up.” Every time I tried to get her to do this, she’d shake her head rigorously and yell, “No!” She’d even cover up my thumb(s) and even refuse to see me doing the gesture.

It wasn’t until the last year or so when she finally gave in and started doing it. And when she does it, she especially loves to do a double thumbs up, and then do a “thumb hug,” which means that we tap our thumbs together and then try to wrap our thumbs around each other in a bit of a thumb embrace. For Kaia, “thumbs up” is not complete without this last shared step.

I explained to her at dinner this evening in Chinese that tomorrow, her mama would be leaving again to get on a plane to go to Raleigh. So tomorrow morning, I’d wake up earlier than usual to go work out, then Daddy would get her ready. And I would take her to school, but Daddy would pick her up that late afternoon and have dinner, shower her, read, and put her to bed. I let her know I’d be coming home later that evening.

Every time I tell Kaia multiple things at once, you can tell that she’s processing all the new information and trying to decide how she feels about it. She gives the “side up” look. Then in this instance, she started frowning.

“Hao ba? (Okay?)” I said to her.

Her frown became even more intense.

“No!” she yelled. “Bu hao! (NOT GOOD!)”

Then, as if on cue, she did a double thumbs down, and then motioned to me to match her two thumbs down.

Oh, well. At least she gets how to use thumbs up, thumbs down now!

When your kid ends up in urgent care while you’re on a flight home

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I came home today, ready to give my sweet Kaia Pookie a big hug when I got through the door. But coming home this afternoon wasn’t quite what I envisioned. It was weirdly quiet when I entered the apartment. Chris turned over to look at me, barely greeting me. Instead, the first words out of his mouth were, “She had an accident.”

I looked over his shoulder at my Kaia Pookie, sitting quietly on the living room rug amidst a bunch of her toys. Her arms were sprawled out as though she was just leaning back on the couch, but the entire center of her face was bloody and mucusy. I slowly walked up to talk to her. While she looked straight up at me, she didn’t respond or smile; she basically had no reaction. She was lethargic and seemingly in pain and/or shock. I took her in my arms to hold her, while also occasionally pressing an ice compress to her nose and wiping away more blood and snot. She was eager to come into my embrace and clearly needed the cuddles.

Chris explained that while they were at the Transit Museum earlier today, Kaia was running around on an old bus when suddenly, she tripped on something and fell down very hard, face first. He actually didn’t see this happen, but some bystanders in the museum told him that his child had fallen. As soon as he got to her and lifted her face up, all he could see was blood everywhere. He immediately took her to the bathroom to get cleaned up, but the blood just kept coming out. A museum worker waited outside to see if she was okay, and kindly offered an ice pack. Chris wasn’t sure if she was okay or if something more serious could be wrong, so he took her to the closest Urgent Care, where they checked her out, did a few tests to ensure she didn’t have any major head injury, and then said that we just needed to monitor her to ensure she was “still herself” and that she didn’t lose consciousness.

We spent the rest of the early evening intermittently icing her nose and wiping away her runny nose snot and blood. I knew she was quite herself, though, because I kept talking to her in Chinese, and she responded logically and with expected answers. When I asked her if she wanted a surprise gift I brought back for her, she immediately nodded. Then minutes later, she kept asking for her surprise gift. I took it out for her: a deluxe princess coloring book. She looked at it and was clearly in love. I asked her if she wanted to color with it now, and she nodded and ran to get her markers. Chris teased her and said it was actually his gift; I had already presented him with dark chocolate covered sour cherries from a popular local Asheville chocolate shop when she was sitting down. My Kaia Pookie was clearly lucid and understanding every single thing that was happening. Her face turned down, and she yelled, “No, that’s mine! You already got a present!”

Phew. So fingers crossed, it doesn’t look like she suffered any major head injury. But what crappy luck that this happened when I wasn’t home. I asked Chris if he missed me while I was gone. He responded in his usual in-character Chris way: “Well, you would have been really useful here today.”

And that is what a “romantic” response sounds like when you’ve been together for 14-plus years, and married (at least, celebration-wise) for ten years — just in case you weren’t already familiar with it.

When your 4-year-old topples over an entire table of hot chocolate and tea

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Dining out with young children can be anxiety-inducing — so much to the point that a number of my colleagues have explicitly told me that unless they are dining out at a chain restaurant or McDonald’s, their kids are not coming with them. We’ve been dining out with Kaia at least once a week since she was about four months old. We’ve made it a point to expose her to lots of different neighborhoods, foods, and cuisines from a very young age, hoping this would make her adaptable not only to different foods, but also many different dining environments. And so far, while she has certainly had her number of tantrums, outbursts, and meltdowns at restaurants, for the most part, she’s been pretty “good” by public dining standards. Until today, she had never had a major spill or broken any glasses or plates. Yes, that is — until today.

We were at this small, quaint Thai-fusion cafe called Blue Brown Cafe in Williamsburg late morning today. It was the first stop during this Saturday’s food crawl. They had a small, narrow seating area, so we sat down at a tiny little table and ordered a Thai tea with steamed milk and homemade cardamom ginger syrup, a raspberry hot chocolate, and a pandan cream-filled croissant. Kaia was acting a bit unruly, insisting that she sit in a certain way and potentially grab the marshmallow off the raspberry hot chocolate. Chris was trying to move her so that she didn’t get too close to knocking over the table, but she kept resisting him. I had just taken a single bite of the pandan croissant — the pandan cream was delicious, but the croissant itself was not great and reminded me of Costco croissants. Just as I placed the croissant down on the tiny table, Chris got our hot drinks and put them down. Then, Kaia proceeded to push against the seats. And just like that, her back knocked over the entire table — hot drinks, croissant, and all. All it took was about three seconds and we had the messiest, stickiest hot chocolate and Thai tea spillage all over the place. Luckily, nothing spilled on or hurt/burnt anyone; and also luckily, the drinks were in to-go paper cups, so we didn’t break any mugs. One of the employees quickly came from around the corner with multiple wet towels to wipe up the floor. I instinctively jumped up to grab a ton of napkins from the counter to help the cleanup. Kaia knew immediately she had done something very wrong; she burst into tears and kept saying she didn’t mean to, that it was an accident and she was sorry. At that same time, a number of people were in line for coffee… and likely took theirs to go given the sticky mess and the sobbing 4-year-old situation.

When the employee finally finished cleaning our mess, I looked at Chris and said in a monotone voice, “So, do we want to do a re-order?” And the employee gave me a sympathetic look and said they’d remake our drinks then. It was a very kind, generous gesture given that they’d obviously already made the drinks that got spilled, plus we inadvertently made them do extra work with the spillage. So this time, we got the same two drinks, and the employee put tight lids on both of the drinks — probably just in case. This time, Kaia was super obedient, sat very still while we had our hot beverages.

These are the situations that you never want to have when going out with a young child. We were *that* family today with the unruly child who made a total mess at a cafe, and likely scared away other patrons from sitting down and enjoying their morning coffees and teas. Accidents happen, and honestly, I was always curious when something would get broken or spilled in a major way when we dined out with her; that finally happened today, at age 4 years, 3 months. But if nothing else, I hope that Kaia remembers this and knows that when she’s told to sit in a certain place and not kick or move too much that she realizes what could happen if she’s disobedient and doesn’t listen. We definitely do not want a repeat of today happening ever again.

Bánh bột lọc: a labor-intensive, finicky, and annoying dish

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Bánh bột lọc, a Central Vietnamese (Hue) specialty, is a tapioca dumpling, usually wrapped and steamed in banana leaves, stuffed with seasoned shrimp, pork, and sometimes mushrooms. My mom introduced these to me as a kid, but it was very rare to find them even at Vietnamese restaurants and bakeries in San Jose because these dumplings are so laborious and annoying to make. The “annoying” part is due to the tapioca starch: unlike using glutinous or regular rice flour doughs, tapioca starch is extremely, extremely finicky and difficult to manage. Sometimes, it can feel like liquid sand in your hands, and it’s hard to get the texture just right so that you can actually knead and shape it properly. But it’s imperative that you get it to a bread dough-like stage, otherwise shaping it will be a nightmare.

The last time I remember having these tapioca dumplings was probably over 12 years ago. My mom met and befriended a Vietnamese woman who had an underground Vietnamese catering business. This talented lady made all the Vietnamese dishes we love that require so much effort, dishes like banh uot, banh cuon, banh it tran, and bánh bột lọc. My mom did a massive bulk order of banh bot loc, knowing that I’d be home. And then, she sent me back to New York with a big bag of banh bot loc, all individually wrapped in banana leaves. She ordered me to store them in my freezer and pop however many out for Chris and me, and to then steam them to eat. “And don’t forget the nuoc cham!” she said, before I went back to New York.

So I decided that for my Lunar New Year party this year, I’d finally attempt making bánh bột lọc. I always have banana leaves in the freezer. I just thawed the shrimp. And I had tapioca starch. I was always up for a challenge, right? And well, this was certainly a challenge.. and a real mess. The tapioca starch dough was so finicky and infuriating. But when I finally got it, I was on a roll. A few of the dumplings I rolled with banana leaves had errors, resulting in the “dough” oozing out of the leaves like liquid. So I promptly steamed my “mistake” dumplings to see how the texture and flavor turned out. And I was shocked: even the “mistake” bánh bột lọc looked decent, and the flavor and texture were spot on! The flavor was savory and briny; the texture was nice and chewy, just as tapioca should be.

My mom doesn’t really like that I love cooking, especially laborious, intense projects like bánh bột lọc. She will likely get annoyed when I tell her that I already made a batch of these, and it’s currently sitting in my freezer, waiting to be steamed. But I hope she realizes that it’s one tiny way that I try to keep her culture alive.