After a Search for Identity, a Place and People to Call Home

As “The Young & the Restless” celebrates its 50th anniversary, I look back through the years and realize how fortunate I am as an Asian American. Though my life was not as glamorous and melodramatic as the Abbotts or Chancellors on the show, there have been ups and downs.

My long journey to America from Vietnam in the late 1970s was despairing, as my family left our country behind after the Fall of Saigon – a place we once called “home.” I was only five years young then, but I vividly recall the hardships we endured along the way by boat, and the restless days and nights as we feared not knowing where our next home would be.

We hopped from island to island, wherever the natives would take us. Like the show “Survivor,” we learned to live on what we got and to appreciate that we still had each other. As you can tell, my childhood years were not the typical upbringing with Christmas presents, birthday celebrations and coloring books.

Fast forward to the new light of hope. My family settled in New Orleans in 1980, where I struggled in school during my first year, learning the new language and trying to “fit in.” Meanwhile, my mom and dad worked multiple jobs, taking care of three sons (I am the middle child) in a one-bedroom, dilapidated apartment, trying to make ends meet.

But both my parents taught me a valuable lesson: Working hard pays off in the end. They surely were right!

After saving enough money, my family moved to the suburbs, enrolled us in better schools and bought our first home. My siblings and I worked throughout high school, saving money for college.

All three of us graduated with top honors from private universities. 

In 1996, my world turned around. After earning my degree in mass communications at Loyola University of New Orleans, I moved to Northern California to start a new chapter.

I was blessed by the opportunities, diversity and inclusion in San Francisco. During my 25-plus years there, I held management roles within corporate communications, marketing and sales in the high-tech industry. I also established a network of friends in the LGBTQIA+ community and met my lifetime partner. Together, we both have traveled the world and even returned to my homeland Vietnam.

Most recently, I left my heart in San Francisco and transitioned to another world – Buffalo.

Why? It was during the COVID years, when my partner and I decided to pack up and move to be closer to his family. Along the way, I was fortunate to have found my new family here at Rich’s, a place I now call “home.” 

I am proud to be an Asian American and a Buffalonian.