Orcas and Mandala

A little girl squirms on a cold bleacher seat, eyes twinkling with anticipation. "Ladies and gentlemen, Shamu!" the announcement blares from the speakers, echoing through the crowd. A wave of excitement ripples through the stands, followed by a wave of icy saltwater. An enormous, majestic dolphin leaps high above the tank in front. Another rises from the waves, a trainer perched on his black and white rostrum, white belly to the crowd. As the trainer flew through the air and dove gracefully into the tank, I remember one thought resounding in my mind, growing louder and louder until I wanted to shout it out for the world to hear. My mind screamed, "That is what I will be when I grow up!"

That moment of awe came to me in second grade. That resounding thought stored somewhere in the back of my mind echoing back to me when I needed a reminder of who I was, my essence revealed. From that day, there was only one real career choice my soul allowed, the realm of reality having already excluded “famous actress.” Ever since that fateful trip so many years ago I have known that I will be a marine biologist. Only a few years before my moment of self-completion, Andrew X. Pham, author of the memoir Catfish and Mandala, received a shock that made him reassess his current career and his future. Like the splash of water from an orca’s tail, Chi's suicide, awakened Andrew and caused him to examine his own future.


Andrew had an unpleasant childhood focused on his parents’ dreams for him rather than his own dreams and aspirations. His sad beginnings made him destined to find his own voice and discover his fate at a time of sorrow. When he finally found his voice, he quit his job and went to the career he wanted to have all along, writing. I, on the other hand, had a joyful childhood and always had my voice heard. Therefore I was able to choose my career at a happy time like a trip to an amusement park.

Pham's parents decided his future for him when he was a child. When they still owned the tavern that Anh said to Andrew, “My son, this money will take you abroad to study. In America you will become a great engineer” (Pham 309). His father and mother both agreed that Andrew was going to be an engineer. He went through college a major in Aerospace Engineering, not because he had any longing or aspirations to be an engineer, but because that was the career his father chose for him. Andrew's true passion however was, and still is, writing. Before writing his memoir, mastering his art and sharing it with the world, Andrew needed to go on a quest to find himself. He needed to determine if writing was really his true passion or if it was a random and spontaneous emotion. Did he have a deeper passion for something else? Did he have a strong hidden passion for Vietnam, veiled by years in America? As he embarked on his writing quest, he searched for the answers to these questions.

Unlike the doubt Pham felt after quitting his job, I knew for a fact what my college major would be. Occasionally my mind wanders toward a different career path, but my thought tendrils recoil after considering other options for a very short while. Since I was so young at the time of my career choice, I cannot be certain what crazy and impossible options my mind would have dreamt up, but I can guess. My horse-obsessed little sister and I have a lot in common when it comes to imagination, and I remember what she was positive she would be doing when she reached adulthood. When she was the same age I was at the time of my Sea World experience, my sister was insistent that she would be a famous veterinarian who traveled around the world, on horseback, healing ill and injured animals. She would always be on the go, so she informed us that in order to get her fill of artistic expression, she would be painting while on horseback.

If I had not found a real career while I was still young, I would likely have been similarly daydreaming through school. I would be thinking up a wide variety of impossible career choices, some likely involving my discovery of dragons and flying on their backs. By contrast, as a child, Andrew Pham was deprived of the privilege of forming wacky plans for the future. Pham knew as a child that he was obliged to be an engineer; his father repeatedly reminded of this expectation. Hence, Thong was deeply upset when Andrew quit his job to go on his expedition for self-fulfillment, “loathing the way I squandered the opportunities he had secured for me with his sacrifices" (Pham 319). When Pham quit his job, it was the first time he did something for himself and not as a duty to his father or family. He said to himself, "Forget this miserable life of a job that isn't me." He took a chance for himself and look at the good that came from it. The award-winning best seller likely brought in more money and glory than his engineering job with the bigoted boss Pete Thong had so desperately wanted his son to keep.

I believe even the most dismally gray cloud has a silver lining. For Pham, a suicidal sister opened his eyes to the possibilities in life that he was missing. If Chi had not taken her own life, Andrew may never have seen that there was a better way for him to be living his life, his own way of life and not the life his father wanted him to live for pride. I hope Andrew's father is proud now, even if he is "just a freelancer."

Thong was angry that his children did not understand sacrifice. What he didn't realize was that Andrew had made one of the biggest sacrifices a college student can make, his own happiness. Andrew Pham paid to go to UCLA for a major he didn't want. He worked his way through school, living in a car because he could not pay rent, in order to earn a degree in a field in which he had no interest. He forfeited the comfort of a home as well as pursuing his own passions in order to make his father happy. In addition, the Pham children studied when they wanted to be doing more social things such as going to school dances. They studied because their father wanted them to and they studied what their father wanted them to. Yet, their father was still upset that his children did not understand sacrifice. In short, Thong was so wrapped up in his own sacrifices that he didn't have time to acknowledge, or even recognize, the sacrifices his children were making for him.

Andrew never had support from his parents when it came to choosing his own career. By contrast, my parents have always supported my dream to become a marine biologist. My own mother was unfortunate enough to know the feelings of the inability of choosing her own career. My grandparents decided all three of their children would be working in the computer industry. Now none of them does for the same reasons Pham left his engineering job: they were not happy.

Unlike Pham’s family, my mother has always given us the freedom to choose our paths because she knew the pain of being told, "No, you must do this." My parents let their two daughters blossom to explore their own desires, supporting even their wildest dreams. They never said marine biology was not good enough for their older daughter. They never insisted that I get a high degree in a well-paid field. They never even said my sister couldn’t paint on horseback.
Pham had parents that forced him into an unwanted career, making him become a "full-fledged suit and a walking immigrant-success story" (Pham 269) whether he wanted to be one or not. Just as with the beatings, Thong and Anh had their hearts in the right place. They wanted their son to be successful and not live a poor life as the family did when the first arrived in San Jose. They wanted their son to be happy. Their flaw was not considering the most important factor: what Andrew wanted.

Even as a child, Andrew did not want to have the elite education that his parents were buying him. They sent him to an expensive French private school when they lived in Saigon, but he did not want them to spend the extra money on his elementary school education. "I wish I could go to your [public] school. I don't belong in mine" (Pham 96), Andrew admitted to the girl who lived next door to his family in Saigon. His parents were never informed of his school woes. If he ever told them, he probably would have been beaten like Chi was for being ungrateful. They did not listen to what Andrew wanted. They didn’t listen or ask when he was a child and they did not approve of his choice when he was an adult. Andrew forgot to listen to himself for a while. When Chi died, he began to listen to his own heart.

I never stopped listening to myself. My inner voice rarely stopped screaming out, pounding in my head ever since second grade. Whenever my mind turns to plans for the future, all I can hear is "Marine biology, marine biology, UC Santa Cruz and marine biology!" Over and over, my mind plays that message. My essence impresses it into my thoughts like a branding iron fresh from the inferno of fate, marking who I am today. I have occasionally had people scoff at my career choice. Some snigger that it is immature, a crazy, babyish plan that I will abandon when I “grow-up”. Despite these people who have told me “no” for some reason or another, I have stuck to my dream.

Now my dream begins to unfurl its wings. My future in marine biology is exploding from its cocoon of childhood schemes, emerging as a butterfly of certainty now that I am in college. I nurture that butterfly, strengthened by nine years of believing in its birth and the support of my family. I live in a house where all choices for the future were encouraged. When I yearned to act, my mother looked into options for me to be discovered. When all knew my love of marine mammals, my grandmother paid for me to have an interactive experience with some bottle-nosed dolphins. My little sister and I have had every dream of ours strengthened by parental encouragement, each spark of a dream for the future nurtured to a crackling wild fire within our hearts. Our decisions were supported whether they came from a joyous experience or one created from despair. Without my family by my side, the dream may have died hard many years ago. My story may have resembled Andrew's.

If Pham had received support from his parents on his decision to write, he would never have attended UCLA as an Aerospace Engineer major. He would never have been forced to live out of his car due to lack of money. Similarly, if Thong and Anh had supported their children's decisions and encouraged their growth into their own lives, many hardships would have been avoided. Chi might not have committed suicide and Andrew would never have needed to go on a long expedition to find himself. Of course, if Andrew had had better parents, Catfish and Mandala would not have been a very exciting book. and his plans to become a writer may never have had the happy ending they have now.

Andrew X. Pham did not have a nurturing household as a child. His dreams and aspirations were always extinguished before they had even flared to the size of a Bunsen burner's flame. He did not, could not, overcome the hurdle created by lack of parental support until he saw what misery could bring to a person. He stopped trying to rekindle his flame of desire until he suffered despair great enough that he needed to prove to himself that he could be different than Chi-Minh. He needed to believe what he told Tien "I always think I have one last ticket, one last hand to gamble" (Pham 33).

Pham has had a very difficult life, beginning with the pressures his parents placed on him. I have had a relatively happy life, so it is no surprise to me that Pham’s turning point would be a moment of horror while my turning point would be one of overwhelming joy.

My first encounter with a marine mammal was one of the happiest experiences in my life. Even as the details begin to fade, the feelings will forever remain in my heart, the joy never fully gone. Chi's suicide will never leave Andrew's heart. The moment will always leave some anguish in his soul. As I watched the show that changed my life, my heart soared higher than the beautiful orcas in front of me. As Andrew sat in the very room where his sister had taken her own life, grief tightened in his chest, like a boa constrictor wrapping his heart for the kill. Yet, just as I chose the path I would follow for the rest of my life, Andrew was doing the same. I chose a path I knew would be supported, for I knew any path would be supported. Andrew, on the other hand, took a path he knew would be frowned upon by his parents. Like riding up a steep hill into a headwind, Andrew knew the journey would be hard, but he started up that hill hoping he would reach the other side, the smooth, comfortable ride down. The happy finish he desired came to him in a book, a memoir of his own creation. Though our paths are incredibly different, they both lead to one common destination, self-completion.