“I remember my very first memories of the front door of the house I grew up in. At nighttime, the AC was beeping. I remember waking up, and I think I got up off the bed, so I was consciously walking at this point. I went downstairs and I found my mom while she was washing dishes. I was nagging her, saying “pick me up,” in Vietnamese, because that was the only language I spoke at the time. She turned and said, “No, go away.”

My parents didn’t let me see friends outside of school, so growing up, my friends were my cousins. Usually, I’d just leave anyway and waste time. I’d rather be out and about. I’m always with a friend if I’m out. When I go out, I’ll just go to a friend’s house and play video games. You can’t keep me constrained in your household forever, Dad. But I’ve also grown up with really strict parents.

I like school because I get to be out. I have good grades. I’ve got Asian parents. Do you want to quote my mom? She told me one time: “We’re Asians, not ‘B’ sians.” I have to get all As, because my parents treat it as though everything below an A is an F. It’s a lot, but I manage to do it. My classes aren’t that hard this year. They were pretty hard midway freshman year to junior year. My grades were good going into freshman year, but slowly, they dropped. I always got them up by the end of the year, somehow. I just procrastinate a lot. Most of the time, I would lie to my parents and tell them I did all my homework, so they’d let me go.

I have to go to college to be considered “not a failure.” I want to go to PSU and major in business; that’s a goal I want to achieve. I might go somewhere else, but I want to stay in Oregon. I’m not ready to leave my family behind.

I like to draw. I like to draw everything. When I was young, I would get paper and a pencil, and just scribble, making shapes and shit like that. At first, it was shapes, but then, my parents gave me unrestricted internet access. I would go on YouTube and see all of these videos on how to draw dinosaurs. Eventually, that turned into more details. I had a phase–it was a bad phase. I kind of got tired of all of this cartoonish stuff, so I actually taught myself to draw. I would look stuff up on YouTube. Now, I’m pretty decent at it. I like doing that.

I was an active little runt when I was a toddler. When my brother and I were climbing on my mom’s bedframe, we liked to cannonball onto the bed. When we were kids, my brother managed to climb a tall bedframe. He jumped up and pulled himself up on his own, but we would leave stuff on the bed. He would put stuffed animals, his iPad, and toys on the bed.

I remember one time I looked behind me, and he was just crying. Let me think: He’s on the bed, and his eyes are all swollen. He’s screaming. I got my mom, and he had jumped on his iPad, and it hit him in the face. My brother and I were never mean to each other, but when we were evil, we were evil together.

I guess another goal would be to have a kid someday. I would want a boy first. As toddlers, that’s when they start getting fears and wants.”