AustLit

This anthology collects together scores of essays about Asian-Australian childhood and adolescence. Some of the stories focus on food, others on language, some on bullying and belonging. The stories cover a wide range of experiences, and tend to focus on the period from the 1970s onwards.

Wu was a teenager when she wrote this picture book, which is illustrated by her father and mother, Di Wu and Kathy Huang.

Gabrielle Wang tells a childhood story of trying to glimpse a witch who supposedly lives in the mansion down the road. She undertakes this adventure with her friend, Wendy. Wang also writes about being part of 'the only Chinese family for miles around' and feeling different.

Among these stories of the Vietnamese exodus are first-person accounts from former child asylum seekers. Thuy Trang Lai writes in 'To See My Mother Again' of her journey as an 11-year-old across the sea, her time as a refugee in Malaysia, and her arrival in Australia. Dai Le writes in 'The Girls, Hide the Girls' of her journey as a seven-year-old with her mother and sister. They spent time in three refugee camps before finally arriving in Australia.

Christine Wu Ramsay writes about her childhood growing up as part of a Chinese family in Penang, Malaysia, during and after WWII in a wealthy family. The book contains dozens of photographs that provide a rich visual impression of the family's living conditions, fashions, school life, and so on. Right at the end of the book, Ramsay very briefly describes arriving in Adelaide in 1958 to complete a matriculation year at an Adelaide high school. She would never return to live in Malaysia.

​Voyage of Hope describes the experiences of Vietnamese women who arrived in Australia as refugees after the end of the Vietnam war in 1975. The chapter 'Refugee Children' tells the stories of two women who arrived in Australia alone as unaccompanied child refugees. Dzung left Vietnam as a ten-year-old. Her boat was intercepted by a German ship, and she eventually was taken to Palawan refugee camp in the Philippines, where she lived with hundreds of other children for over two years, before finally being sponsored to live in Australia. Thi left Vietnam at the age of twelve. Her first attempt to leave Vietnam resulted in her being apprehended by police, strip-searched, interrogated, and placed in solitary confinement. This experience strengthened her desire to leave Vietnam. She was successful on her second attempt, and ended up in Songkhla refugee camp, in Thailand. Traumatized, Thi attempted suicide in the camp. She eventually was accepted into Australia, arriving at the age of fourteen.

Alone, Together: Writing from Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Australia contains short memoirs and poems from adult and child asylum seekers. It incudes stories about being a child in Afghanistan and Vietnam, among other places.

Shrimp is an autobiographical play by Dominic Hong Duc Golding. Golding was a Vietnamese war baby who was adopted by Australian parents in Mount Gambier. He later returned to Vietnam.