Luckily, as soon as we resettled, west of Camp Pendleton in San Clemente, my mother began cooking up a storm, recreating family favorites as she was able to find Vietnamese staples such as fish sauce and sticky rice.

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"It's my fault, " announced my mother as soon as he began to recount at the dinner table what had transpired there on the eighteenth floor of 1 Madison Avenue.

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As word of my annoyance began to get around both our families, both my mother and soon-to-be mother-in-law decided this was a perfect opportunity to re-open discussions on locales we had passed on.

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