New Orleans

New Orleans enters the account as the city where Duan’s father moved the family during the years his parents remained together. The relocation is recalled while Duan explains that his mother stayed because she believed his father would improve, despite the abuse Duan says she endured.

Place in Duan’s Family History

Duan places the move within a painful stretch of family life that ended when his parents separated while he was in high school. He describes that separation as one of the happiest days of his life, contrasting the relief of the eventual break with the years his mother had remained hopeful.

Narrative Significance

The city is mentioned as part of Duan’s account of his parents’ history, not as a setting for a separately described episode. Its significance is therefore contextual: New Orleans marks a relocation within the family’s troubled years, before the separation Duan remembers as a profound change.