“Is this all you have?” asks my grandaunt in a tone that makes me ashamed. I nod, coloring, because I have neither money nor gifts for them, only some traveler’s checks and camping gear, no room for gifts for fourteen people and not much money to play the good-conquering-son returning home with a cargo of treasure. The Vietnamese I know who came back brought on average three thousand dollars’ worth of gifts. Every passenger off the plane has cartloads of goodies: cameras, microwaves, computers, microscopes, tennis rackets, badminton rackets, boom boxes, clothes, soap, shampoo, facial cream,
...more
