Free We Are Here by Cat Thao Nguyen Page A

stage of preparation, whether it was roasting peanuts, grinding peppercorns, slicing the mint, making the fish sauce or holding the bowl of blood. There was a communal festive air in the momentum of production, like we were celebrating in some village in the countryside of Vietnam—but instead of mud huts and rice fields there were tiled floors and local council regulations to adhere to.
    The duck, its feet and beak tied together, would flap wildly as it was brought into the kitchen to be killed. I would feverishly watch as it was clamped between the knees of one of the men. With one hand the man would hold back the wings, while another man would pluck the fine neck feathers from a small area. Each motion was resolute, precise. A small area of pink on the duck’s neck would grow larger and larger with each jerk of the hand, like a multiplying organism. The throb on the patch of duck skin would be fierce and ready to bounce out rolling onto the floor. After the patch was clean, a sharp blade would be produced and a small white china bowl would be held in place. Then, with one swift slice, the duck’s neck would be cut, the blood draining directly into the bowl, bubbles forming on top. The blood would be evenly poured into and shared among a number of plates. Lemon, mint, peanuts and pepper were sprinkled on top just as the blood began to congeal. Then the duck was plucked, cleaned and quickly boiled. Its flesh was used as broth for the rice porridge. The science was all in the timing. The scene could not be complete without lots of women running around, fussing, chopping and gossiping. The men, meanwhile, stood around talking about the size of the duck, which farm to go to, the best part of the neck to slice, and when and where they’d had the best congealed blood duck salad in Vietnam.
    At the time, as the blood oozed from the live animal, I somehow did not register that it was in fact bleeding to death. Maybe I expected more sound. More flapping. More resistance. But towards the end of the duck’s life, it seemed calm, resigned to its fate. As a child, this act of submission in the face of killing and annihilation seemed somehow natural.
    After the food had been prepared, the familiar blue plastic sheet would be taken out again and unfolded in the backyard. It became a reliable old friend who, over the years, would come to bear witness to trails of beaming banter, silently recording the gradual weariness of these men, these story keepers. The beer cans would form a symphony of mixed song and the garden sprites of Bee-chump Street would tumble out of their roots to whiff at the commotion.
    Growing up, my father seemed quite remote to me; a functional character who was head of the household, he existed mostly to provide and enforce rules. On these fleeting drunken occasions, though, I would catch glimpses of a spirit long buried. My yearning to be held by this spirit, to be nurtured by him, to know and understand him, was only compounded by his stoic character. My concept of my father over the years was a tapestry of these drunken, vulnerable and precious moments when he would tell stories of the old days of old Vietnam, and sing in French to me a lullaby that his father sang to him—a song sung from a child’s point of view about his father’s beautiful garden and all the lovely plants inside this space and time of freedom where all things flourished. My father would clap jovially in time with the vibrant backbeat of his song, sometimes still in his factory overalls and steel-capped boots. These glimpses gave me a brief view of the real man behind the father figure, and I longed to know and understand him. They were clues in my later search for his spirit, a search not for my father, but for a simple brave man before the heaviness of his world burdened him.
    As the cans piled up, we would store them out the back near the garden. One by one I would place the empty cans on the concrete then jump on them to flatten each