My Ethnic Value

I grew up all my life in a suburb of Portland, Oregon; a small city today of 80,000 Beaverton. The diversity doesn’t compare to some of the bigger cities such as LA, NYC, and the likes, but it was diverse enough that you can find various pockets of ethnic groups. I was raised in a Vietnamese community (church). Amongst the friends that I met through my church, we predominantly spoke English with one another, and I felt that when connecting with other Asian Americans, it wasn’t much of a difference culturally to connect with them as well. Because of the comfort that I gained through AA communities, it almost didn’t make sense to me when I see other AA who wouldn’t embrace the idea of being part of our community.

I remember my second and third year in college when EPIC wasn’t a strong presence in my life. I wanted to continue growing in my faith and at times I felt the Vietnamese church that I grew up in lacked in the area that I felt I needed to grow in my faith. There’s a church in Portland called Portland City Bible. It’s one of the bigger ones and they happened to have a satellite service on Wednesday at Portland State. I decided to go simply because I thought it would be a nice breather after lying around in the library all day (I was the one in the group of Asians who just happened to be there, seldom studying and often distracting others). I started learning a lot and I really enjoyed being able to take in the in-depth exploration of the gospel.

One day I came early to the service and while I waited for them to get started, a busted out my textbook like a good Asian boy and started studying. Than an individual who saw me kind of just sitting there by myself came up and introduced herself to me. I’m usually bad with names, but the only reason that I remembered Katrina’s name was because of the storm that hit New Orleans, and also the fact that she was probably the prettiest half Vietnamese girl that I have ever seen.

A few weeks later she invited me to join one if their Bible study, which I wasn’t hesitant to go at first because it was on the complete other side of town. But I would say I am guilty, I went to a Bible study for a girl. The saddest thing ever was that she never came! I thought to myself and came to the conclusion that I can’t be attending this Bible study for this amazingly beautiful girl, but I had to go with the heart of just wanting to know God. I continued commuting to this Bible study for a few weeks, and I just realized that I just really felt totally out of place. Not just because I was the only ethnic minority in the group, but mostly because I felt I didn’t culturally connect with them.

I eventually stopped going, and sad to say I never saw Katrina again after that invitation from her; but I realized one thing from that experience, and that was how much I valued a community that I could connect with that I would not just understand, but would also understand me.