Today we’d like to introduce you to Angelina Nguyen.
Hi Angelina, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
Perhaps because I grew up bilingual and bicultural as a Vietnamese child refugee in Minnesota, I lead a multi-faceted life. I studied the social sciences and work in the government sector by day. I’m a writer and photographer by night and weekends. All of these different hats revolve around story-telling, whether by using data, narrative, or candid moments captured through my camera.
My parents are Vietnam War refugees. My dad was drafted to serve in South Vietnam’s army in his late teens. When they lost the war in 1975, he was held was a prisoner of war for ten years. Life was very difficult, near impossible, after his release. He sought asylum and our family arrived in Minnesota in the early 1990s when I was 8 years old. We didn’t speak English. My parents sold everything they had and carried a couple of thousand dollars with them. The only person we knew in Minnesota was my dad’s best friend during his POW days, which was the reason he chose to come to Minnesota out of all places. The small Vietnamese community in Minnesota sponsored us and helped us resettle in our first year.
The first few years were difficult for all of us. My parents navigated complicated systems in a foreign language to find affordable housing, healthcare, education, work opportunities. Their education and work experience in Vietnam didn’t count in the U.S., so my mom enrolled in classes at the University of Minnesota and started her college education all over despite having already completed two degrees in law and economics in Vietnam. My dad bused tables at a local restaurant for below minimum wage while studying English at night and taking vocational classes at a community college.
We grew up in public housing and attended underfunded inner city schools. Looking back, I see structural racism in every aspect of my family’s experience. But at the time, we just told ourselves that of course, it’s hard to start fresh in a new country. We hustled.
My little brother and I coped with our own difficulties in a public school system not built for refugee students, dealing with teachers and bullies and assignments that didn’t make sense on our own. At home, our parents were suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and passing on intergenerational trauma, but none of us had the language or awareness to name what was happening.
So much of history, that of my Vietnamese people, my family, and myself, need space and attention to unpack. Storytelling is a vehicle of healing for me. I developed a journaling habit in my early teens to process my feelings and cope with tensions growing up with intergenerational trauma and intercultural conflict. My writing turned into a personal blog and will someday become a published book. I taught myself to use a camera in my early 20s to capture candid everyday moments and my travels, which developed into a photography service for my community and clients. I capture defining moments of their family story.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It’s easy and tempting to do what’s trendy or popular, whatever is already socially recognized. It’s harder, but more important and meaningful in my opinion, to advocate for the parts of humanity that are historically oppressed and marginalized. That work might not be as lucrative or welcomed or popular, but it needs to be done. I value justice and equity. I believe in moving towards a future where everyone’s human rights are respected, their voice and experience acknowledged and valued.
As a photographer, I love raising up stories of intercultural families and experiences, whether it’s a wedding, love story (read: engagement), birth and family, or personal branding of multicultural individuals, projects, and businesses. Creating a space where my clients feel comfortable being themselves and expressing their multicultural identity is my biggest job and challenge, as is elevating their story and exuding pride in diverse perspectives.
Personally, balancing motherhood, intergenerational trauma in my family, my day career, and my creative work is a challenge. Some periods are exhausting and stressful. And there are many moments when I overflow with joy and a sense of purpose doing this work.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I’m a wedding, engagement, and family photographer for introverts, especially multicultural couples and families. I provide professional photography for engagement sessions and weddings. I deliver digital photos, and offer photo albums, wedding invitations, save-the-date and thank-you cards, and wall prints. I also photograph family and portrait photo sessions for various occasions like graduation, holidays, career promotions, birthdays, anniversaries, and other family milestones.
The value of photos increase with time. Yes, it’s great to have photos of your family and friends for big occasions in the present, like your wedding. It’s important to note that those photos become more precious with each passing year. Eventually, your children and grandchildren will rely on those photos to make sense of their family history. That’s a big return on your investment.
If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
My mom loved taking family photos of everything we did growing up. She bought a handheld camera and regularly asked me to photograph our family’s activities from mundane things like blow-drying hair, cooking in the kitchen, a relative visiting from out of state, a family outing at a local park, us standing by our very first car in the U.S., to big milestones like her finishing a college degree in the U.S., us becoming homeowners, our first trip back to Vietnam to visit family.
At the time, I cooperated but occasionally felt annoyed at some of her requests to capture such mundane things that didn’t seem special to me. Now, our family albums with all of those pictures are priceless to me. That’s the biggest record of our family refugee story. Those photos are my main tools to talk to my children about their ancestors and where they came from.
I didn’t know it at the time, but my family story trained me to be a photographer and storyteller.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.angelinanguyenphotography.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/angelinanguyenphotography
- Facebook: facebook.com/angelinanguyenphotos
- Other: www.angelinatram.com
Image Credits
Angelina Nguyen Photography
