“Eggs and Rice”

Choua Xiong

Hmong | Minneapolis, MN | she/her/hers | Private Sector

‘Me ntxhais, we don’t have a home. We don’t have a country, and we don’t have a flag that we can proudly raise. Don’t tell him that you’re Hmong.’

I was 11 years old. I had been sick all week. On my first day back in school my mother packed lunch because she felt that the greasy school lunch of pizzas and hamburgers weren’t going to help me get better. I opened my lunch box; inside were two hard boiled eggs and some warm rice. As I opened my lunch box lid, I heard whispers. I saw fingers pointing, and confused glares all around me.

“What is that smell?”

“Why are you eating that?”

“Why do you eat eggs with rice?”

“Your food looks weird!”

I became too embarrassed to eat my mother’s food. That was the last time I brought a home-packed meal to school.

The following year, I traveled with my family to California to celebrate the Hmong New Year in Fresno. My mother sat on my left side, and a large White “uncle” sat on my right. (We call all elders “uncle” or “auntie” regardless of relation in the Hmong language).

I sat excitedly dangling my feet, because it was my first airplane ride. I was eager to wear the new Hmong clothes my mother had designed. Then I felt a nudge on my shoulder. It was the large White “uncle.” Wanting to converse with someone other than my mother, I welcomed the conversation with him about our destinations. I told him we were going to the Fresno Hmong New Year. He looked puzzled.

“Hmong? Like, Mongolian?” he asked.

“No, no, I’m Hmong. We’re a group of people from the mountains in Thailand and Laos, but we’re not Thai or Lao. We’re…”

I felt a pinch from my mother.

She darted me the look – that look she gave my siblings and I when she was serious and wanted us to not speak a word. I complied.

When we got off the airplane, my mother turned to me and said, “Me ntxhais, tsis txhob qhia neeg hais tias koj yog Hmoob. Hais tias koj yog Thaib los yog Nplog xwb. Peb tsis muaj teb chaws thiab peb tsis muaj ib daim flag ces tib neeg saib tsis taus peb. Tsis txhob qhia hais tias koj yog Hmoob.”

Translated she said, “Daughter, don’t tell others that you’re Hmong. Just say that you’re Thai or Lao next time. We don’t have a home. We don’t have a country, and we don’t have our own flag that we can proudly raise. People look down on us. Don’t say that you’re Hmong.”

I heard those words, but I never questioned it. It wasn’t until college when I sought to understand my own identity that I realized my mother’s words were an expression of how she had experienced judgement and misperceptions about our Hmong community from others. It’s the reason she had not been able to call this place our home; she didn’t feel accepted.

#MinneAsianStories Series