Anh Do's "The Happiest Refugee" teachers' review

Brief description and distinctive features

Brief description of The Happiest Refugee

Anh Do was born in 1977 in South Vietnam. He came to Australia as a refugee when he was two and a half. The Happiest Refugee tracks the family’s early years in Vietnam and then takes the reader on a compelling journey by boat to Australia. The description of the attack by pirates is one of the most poignant experiences of the memoir. On arrival in Australia the family experienced hardship and family tensions. When Anh was thirteen their lives become even more difficult  when his father left the family.  Not only did the family suffer hurt and loss but Anh’s mother now struggled to support the family on her own. His mother's sacrifice was an inspiration to Anh and he worked hard during his teenage years to help her both emotionally and financially, also managing to graduate from high school and then university. 

There are many moving vignettes from his life, but most are told with humour and joy. This is an uplifting, inspiring, interesting and very readable memoir. 

Anh Do has a combined Business/Law degree from UTS . He has three sons, is a successful standup comedian, prolific children’s author of over 35 books, film writer and producer and a popular television personality. He is also a skilled portrait artist which was showcased on the ABC television series Brush With Fame. His brother Khoa Do is a film director and Anh has acted in several of Khoa’s films including Footy Legends, which he co-wrote and produced. Anh has also appeared in a number of other films including Double the Fist (2008) and Little Fish (2005). 

This text is well suited to Stage 5 but could also work well with Standard in the preliminary course in the Reading to Write Module. 

It could be a key text in a range of different focus areas:

1. The World of Real: an exploration of a range of diverse non-fiction texts which represent different life experiences of real people and real situations. 
2. Memoirs and Life Writing. 
3. A close study of The Happiest Refugee.
4. Leaving Home: the migrant voice. Exploration of a range of texts which represent the challenges of leaving one’s home to settle in Australia.

Distinctive features of The Happiest Refugee

• Written by a well-known and popular comedian who also writes children’s books
• Narrative voice is in the first-person
• Mainly written in the present continuous tense  
• Combines reflection/interior monologue and acute observation 
• A wry and at times self-deprecating humour.
• Provides insights to racism and personal challenges.

Ways to use The Happiest Refugee in the classroom

Use the “appeal of the real”: introduce the genre of non-fiction. 

Pose questions to students for a class discussion. Who prefers non-fiction to fiction? 

What is the appeal of non-fiction? Who has read or watched a film about a real person? (In the past twelve months there have been a number of films exploring real people and real events eg Oppenheimer, Napoleon, Golda.)

Memoirs are histories composed from personal observation and experience. While closely related to autobiography, a memoir is less formal, less well-documented, and often, about only a segment of a person's life.

The Happiest Refugee can be classified as memoir or life writing. 

Group work: In groups, students could “walk through” the text and note the features which belong to non-fiction e.g. photographs. In later reading take note of the conventions of memoir which you recognize in The Happiest Refugee.

Interrogate the title: What does the title, The Happiest Refugee suggest about the subject and point of view? 

Background viewing about the author: If your students are not familiar with Anh Do consider a viewing of a television clip or some of his standup or access websites to read about him:

• Pictures of You - Anh Do | Black Dog Productions (YouTube)
• Anh Do in the Sit Down Comedy Club
• Anh Do in Artist Profile
• There are also numerous radio and television interviews on the ABC website.

Context of the Vietnam War and Australia’s immigration policy: Students may have a basic knowledge of the Vietnam War; to broaden that knowledge invite a history teacher to your class to give a potted chronology of the Vietnam War or show a short documentary on the war. Over ten years from 1976, 94,000 refugees from Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam settled in Australia. The first to arrive were five Vietnamese refugees who reached Darwin Harbour in a 17 metre-fishing vessel; a boat almost twice the size of the one Anh Do and his family travelled in.  Another 2,000 Vietnamese in 55 boats fled to Australia followed in the next six years. About 155,000 Vietnamese-born Australians live in Australia today.

The Australian government has a detailed and informative document on the history of immigration and on p. 57 there is a valuable diagram which captures the context of immigration covered in The Happiest Refugee. Download the pdf document from homeaffairs.gov.au. 

Consider an audio recording of The Happiest Refugee to engage students who may be reluctant readers.

Read and use the Prologue to complete this table about Vietnam in 1975:

Close Study of Chapter 2

Chapter 2 takes us into the world of desperation and danger experienced by people who   have to flee their country and seek a new life somewhere else. 

This chapter is a powerful recount of the treacherous, dangerous and at times disastrous journey the toddler Anh, his family and fellow Vietnamese take as they escape their home country for the hope of a safer and improved life. This will become a recurring theme in the story where Anh and particularly his mother recall why they left Vietnam and their genuine and heartfelt gratitude to Australia and their new life.

Identify five specific events or situations in chapter 2 which for you encapsulates the group’s courage and resilience as well as the perils of this journey. 

This chapter is enriched by re-reading as the courage, terror, resilience, common sense and the terror of their experiences is palpable. 

It is important to recognise the specific language choices made by Anh Do which are evident in this chapter and through the memoir. These language choices position us, the reader, to experience and feel the perils of their journey. 

For example:

• First person narrative 
• Creating tension and pace e.g. p.16, 23
• Specific detail to add interest, colour and poignancy e.g. the ‘stench of petrol fumes and old fish combined with vomit and human excrement’ (p.15), the death of Loc p.19, the ‘vomit’ lubricant for the jade bracelet on. (p.21 and the terror for the group when the pirates threaten to throw baby Khoa overboard p23. 
• The now familiar first-person narrative: “We were scared to move, afraid of what we might find up on deck’. P.17.
• The use of humour to ameliorate some of the tragedy and despair 
• Anh’s retrospective reflection eg p.24
• Choose two of the photographs and captions from the book and explain how these enhance your understanding of the story and Anh Do. One of the photographs is of a Vietnamese refugee boat, being towed. Anh Do says - “Our boat was crowded much like this one”. Did you notice Do’s wry humour in some of the caption? 

Create a table of these language choices and explore three other chapters that appealed to you to add 2-3 examples of each language feature.

There are also sections of the book that give us insights to the importance of family especially in all cultures. Re-read Anh Do’s affectionate and warm vignettes of life with his extended family. For example:

• Wrestling with his cousins p. 42 
• All sleeping in the same bed p. 44
• His first girlfriend and spin the bottle p. 49. 

These events alert us to the importance of specific people in our life who enrich us, for example Anh’s grandmother and the delightfully affectionate descriptions of her with the Nintendo (p. 63) and when she wraps the fish heads in his citizenship certificate (p. 65). These insights are engaging, endearing and a significant contributor of the book’s charm.

Writing Task:

Using some the delightful recollections of family experiences in The Happiest Refugee compose 3-4 vignettes of about 300 words each which capture special times with cousins, your grandparents, family, holidays, school escapades, weekend activities. 

Use some of the language techniques that Anh Do uses and try to capture the innocence, joy, fun and affection of these life experiences. Try for realism, some humour and a genuine voice.  Include a photograph.               

Critical response:

Offer students choice: 

1. “Anh’s story will move and amuse all who read it’. With close reference to The Happiest Refugee discuss this statement.
2. The Happiest Refugee offers us a window into a different world. Discuss how Anh Do achieves this. In your response reflect on how reading texts like The Happiest Refugee promotes a broad and balanced understanding of the world and enables students to explore wider universal issues. 
3. Collaborative construction of a feature article or digital essay. Choose two other texts from the non-fiction connecting texts list below. Explore how these texts and The Happiest Refugee help us understand ourselves and make connections to others and the world. Include a clever and evocative headline, a lead paragraph which addresses the power of non-fiction to enhance this understanding and connection,  a brief summary of each text, information about the author, engaging images and links to take the reader further with the texts and context.

Relevant details in relation to the new NSW English 7-10 syllabus

Text requirements: The Happiest Refugee is an extended prose non-fiction memoir/life writing by an Australian author. It is regarded as quality literature.

Concepts could include Representation, Genre, Perspective and context.

Relevant NSW English 7-10 Syllabus content

Reading, viewing and listening to texts

A student uses a range of personal, creative and critical strategies to interpret complex texts EN5-RVL-01

• Develop a deeper understanding of themes, ideas or attitudes by revisiting and reinterpreting texts to find new meaning
• Analyse the main ideas and thematic concerns represented in texts
• Clarify and justify personal responses to texts, explaining how aspects of the text, such as character, genre, tone, salience or voice, position a reader and influence these personal responses
  Analyse how the use of language forms and features in texts have the capacity to create multiple meanings
• Evaluate the ways reading texts help us understand ourselves and make connections to others and the world
• Reflect on how reading, viewing and listening to texts has informed and inspired learning
• Reflect on how an appreciation of texts can be enhanced through re-reading, and close or critical study
• Understand and reflect on the value of reading for personal growth and cultural richness
• Use reading strategies, and evaluate their effectiveness, when reflecting on the successes and challenges of extended reading
• Reflect on how reading promotes a broad and balanced understanding of the world and enables students to explore wider universal issues

Understanding and responding to texts B

A student evaluates how texts represent ideas and experiences, and how they can affirm or challenge values and attitudes EN5-URB-01

• Analyse how elements of an author’s personal, cultural and political contexts can shape their perspectives and representation of ideas, including form and purpose
• Analyse how an engaging personal voice in texts can represent a perspective or argument and communicate a sense of authority, and experiment with these ideas in own texts

(English K-10 Syllabus 2022 © NSW Education Standards Authority for and on behalf of the Crown in right of the State of New South Wales, 2023)

Connecting texts