The Unwanted Sparknotes

The Unwanted: Review

Before 1975, Vietnam was divided into a North and South. The North was ruled by communism while the south was under United States protection. On April 30th 1975, communists attacked South Vietnam with the intentions of ruling both north and south in which succeeded. The Unwanted is a self-written narrative that takes place in Vietnam, 1975. At this time the United States had just pulled out of Vietnam as a result of the communist’s takeover. In effect of the flee, the U.S. left behind over fifty-thousand Amerasian children including Kien Nguyen. Kien was one of the half-American children that endured the hardships of communist’s takeover. Born in 1967 to a Vietnamese mother and unknown American father who fled to the U.S.

During this time Kien had faced many hardships, but in turn they did not affect him as communism has. Once liberation began, Kien and his family were stripped of their belongings, home and wealth. They were left poor, often starving and in constant fear among the streets. Those around them who began to stand out and fight against communism were killed. From these examples their behaviors changed dramatically. They were oppressed and had to conform to communism to simply stay alive. Khoun, Kien’s mother, had to participate in various activities just to feed the family who starved for days at a time. She went from selling her blood to selling her body just to feed her family. Kiens family went form high class to poor within moments of communist’s takeover. They had to adopt and respect their new role in the community in order to

helicopters. After waiting upon the U.S. embassy for days, the helicopter never showed. The hardships continued for Kien as communist stripped his family of all of everything they had. With his mother continuously threatening to leave him behind, Kien reached out to his father who was an American soldier. He sent a heartfelt letter which returned to him unopened. With all of these hardships Kien liked to pretend that they didn’t happen. He tried to think about other things to take his mind off of the situations which only worked occasionally. With the change of his community in effect of communism, Kien could not avoid the problem. His family had to conform to the ways and rules of the communists in order to