Education, music, and poetry are parts of Vietnamese culture. Anhthao Bui inherits the artistic germ and the educational desire from her family. In the re-education camp, her father held an English dictionary, a guitar, and a poetry notebook hidden in his pocket as he exhaled his last breath. In the United States, her mother took a bus to attend Adult School to learn English, although she was over 70 years old. Anhthao earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in English in 2004 from San Jose State University. She tried to apply to the Master of Arts in English program several times, but was rejected. She has kept learning in the hope of putting her foot into the Master of Arts in English program soon.