1 Family Life by diem vo Lam Miao

Key vocabulary  Miserable: If you are miserable, you are very unhappy  Refuge: A refuge is a place where you go for safety and protection  Isolated: If you feel isolated, you feel lonely and without friends or help.  Struggle: A struggle is a long and difficult attempt to achieve something such as freedom.  Vietnamese-Australian: Vietnamese who was born and live in Australian.

The summary of the story The author of this story is a Vietnamese- Australian. Her parents owns a video shop and she spends a lot of time in the video shop with her sister. She and her sister always complain about it. After she grows up, she realizes the trouble of their parents and how struggle their parents. She starts think a lot of Vietnamese kids who live in Australia don’t understand their parents. At the end of the story, she reviews her childhood and she feels she has a wonderful childhood.

quote 1.My sister and I would complain sometimes about having to work and having no life. 2.Having witnessed all this, we understood that our parents were struggling people who had recently left a war-torn country. 3.Hearing these stories made me realize that I would never be so isolated.

Harry PotterDiem Vo Have a few friends Comes to live in a strange environment Parents have huge impact on their ide- ntity and belonging Contact with different culture Feel lonely and lost Hasn’t parents Speaks English Makes friends who have different culture Doesn’t like his only relatives Only child Speak Vietnamese Make friends with Vietnamese Grow up with their parents Love their relatives Can’t use magic

links between story and identity  Most of Vietnamese parents only fits in Vietnamese group and their children feels akward when they go out with their parents.  Vietnamese-Australian can’t fit in local students group well because their ethic background.  Vietnamese kids sometimes can’t feel the sense of belonging because their parents only have Vietnamese friends and their kids are hard to make friends in school.

statements  Parents have important influence on kids and it can be negative or positive.  People will be confused about their identity especially when they are in a different country.  Children’s identity and belonging will change as they grow up and their identity are not shaped when they are young.