This (very) short film is super silly, stoopid, campy; loosely based off real life family herstories, each character played by mwah. As humorous and absurd as it is, it’s a gateway to processing the complex intergenerational cycles of suffering, shame, guilt, competition carried by the Vietnamese women in my family. So much pain has resonated from events occurred decades ago, so much unspoken despite remaining heavy and suffocating. I made this at a time when I felt pressure to carry this baton, to remain implicit in continuing cycles of judgement and impossible standards of approval. My sister and I are the only (non-white) mixed-race grandkids, and grew up as fairly poor Vietnamese speakers, so I always felt like an audience member to the ongoing chaos unfurling in Sunnybank Hills living rooms, perhaps this is akin to that experience.

This film was displayed at Composite Moving Image in October 2023 alongside neon works from the ‘Hiểu lầm’ body of work.