Food is more than a substance that brings back memories of a childhood in which Bich longed to be another Judy Blume character. She was the kid with the bulky lunch box instead of the brown paper bag and the one Girl Scout member whose food contribution tasted like construction paper. She knows that her life isn’t the fantasy she escapes to when she reads about the Ingalls family. Food is the way she fills the voids in her life; she sneaks American food into her room to feel more American; she’s enamored with the descriptions in her children’s books of food prepared by families that set the standard for what she thinks her family must look like; and she steals a plum from underneath the statue of Buddha in the hope that he’ll awaken and answer her prayers for a 20/20 vision and prettier clothes.
Food is her way to cope with the reality of being a Vietnamese-born, not-quite-as-American-as-she-would-like-to-be American, and her way to salvage the fantasy that she has of being a leggy blonde; when she eats like her Grand Rapids neighbors, for those moments she believes she has the power to change herself from the inside.
But food is what snaps her back to reality as well. After all of those visits to Ponderosa, a place more like a cafeteria than an actual restaurant, she sees the false hope it represents as it brings her family together then fails to keep them that way. Ponderosa represents a world of possibility, like the move to Ada, but like her and her family, it doesn't turn out to be what she hoped for. And stealing Jennifer's Toll House cookie doesn't make her any less Vietnamese on the outside.
Food is also the way through which she begins to recognize the complexities of her adolescence. She writes, “Gone were the days of bread and honey.” Bread and honey are reminders of Anh and Crissy, who have embraced the teenage lifestyle and left Bich behind. Once Bich realizes she is old enough to deny her sisters' commands without feeling fearful of not fitting in, it comes at a point where she is so disconnected with them that they no longer share any playful moments. I think it's this detachment from her sister and stepsister that she becomes aware of the influence of other female figures in her life--Rosa and Noi.
A part of me was expecting an ending in which Bich totally abandons any feelings of shame in being Vietnamese, and rejects the part of her that tried so hard to be American. It makes sense that the ending is ambiguous (will she see the turtle and find good fortune, or will she be the person who sits day after day waiting for it to appear?). I get the sense that she has come to peace with being a "Vietnamese-born American girl", but still has the same internal conflict; Bich ends the book in a scene where she's in Hanoi, left with an empty journal that she cannot fill in this place where she's always a visitor.
The ending took me off guard a little. After such long descriptions of her childhood filled with food and longing, I was surprised the ending didn't involve food too. After reading so many books growing up, I guess I have gotten used to the feeling of closure at the end of a book, which is not something you can always get with memoir. I was hoping we would see her shed away those feelings of shame and come to terms with who she is as a Vietnamese-born American girl. But once again we are left with her feeling like an outsider, a tourist out of her element. I loved the book and the ending, it just wasn't how I was expecting it to end.
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