In recent years, the Australian political establishment has taken to calling Australia ‘the most successful multicultural country in the world’. However, the phrase is not employed as a way of celebrating Australian diversity, but of obfuscating the system that exploits immigrant labour and lives.

‘Well, it’s just that no-one has ever wanted to come here,’ my cuñada tells me.

I was stopped by immigration officials and asked questions like: why had I travelled to India in the past? Why had I stayed so long on my previous trip? What were the full names and professions of the friends I’d be staying with? What was my job? How many books had I written? After about an hour of this, and despite having a valid visa and an onward ticket to Bangladesh, I was refused entry to India and ordered to book the first flight back to my port of origin.

The Vietnamese have an epithet for people like me: Việt Kiều, for a Vietnamese person who lives overseas. It can be used derisively, ironically, or endearingly. I first heard it from my aunt, who found it enormously funny, on a trip back to Vietnam in 1996. At the time I thought I was returning home, a chance to complete the broken loop of myself, but this label made it clear it wasn’t going to happen there either.