Huong Ahanonu's mother offered final advice: "Go to America and have a better life."
After her mother died in Vietnam, Ahanonu, then 18, brought her two little brothers to the United States as part of the Amerasian resettlement program. She found work as a seamstress and attended night school to learn English.Because her mother was Vietnamese and her father American, she didn't know how to define herself.
Tuesday, in Salt Lake City, she got a nationality and the keys to the country, metaphorically speaking. Ahanonu, now a student at Utah State University, was among 300 immigrants from 59 countries who took the naturalization oath and became American citizens. Now she knows where she belongs.
"I thank the American government for the opportunity to come to this country. To show my appreciation, I will be a good citizen and obey and abide by all laws," the 23-year-old said during the noon ceremony at Salt Lake Community College.
Several of the soon-to-be Americans were selected from those taking the citizenship oath to tell why they were becoming citizens. An emotional Sela Palekave Tuako, born in Tonga, said she has been in America 20 years and is "impressed at the blessings this country has."
Jaime Lara, here 20 years from Mexico, spoke of embracing the responsibility of citizenship. And he warned that voting is a right Americans take for granted, instead of guarding and treasuring it.
Responsibility, in fact, was a constant thread running through the 80-minute program. U.S. District Court Judge J. Thomas Greene, who presided over the festivities, spoke of the privileges and responsibilities new citizens assume.
He told them not to "only think about it," but to go home and write down their feelings about becoming citizens so they could look at them in a year or so. And he warned that rights and opportunities are accompanied by obligations.
U.S. District Judge Dee Benson said that naturalization ceremonies are one of the most joyous parts of a judge's job. "It's one of the few occasions when everyone's happy and everyone's winning." And he quipped that although the participants are "here because you want to be," in light of recent budget battles in Washington, "you might want to reconsider.
Prior to the taking of the oath, Greene summarized what he thinks makes America special.
"We celebrate different backgrounds. We're a melting pot. We celebrate and appreciate each other," he said.