Early Life: What do the Work Tila Tequila?

Early Life: What do the Work Tila Tequila?

Nguyen was born in Singapore to French Vietnamese parents[1], where her family emigrated from Vietnam after the Vietnam War.[4][5] When she was one year old, she and her family lived in a neighborhood in Houston until they were admitted to a gated community run by a strict Buddhist temple.[6] The family left the community when Nguyen was eight.[7]
While in middle school, Nguyen became a tomboy and was eventually sent to a boarding school for six months for her combative behavior before transferring to another school.[7] While in high school, she used her sister's identification card to enter nightclubs, where she began taking drugs[7] and joined a gang. In an interview with Import Tuner, Nguyen said she had been searching for a sense of identity: "I was really confused then, [because] at first I thought I was black, then I thought I was Hispanic and joined a cholo gang".[8] Later, friends outside the gang briefly helped turn her life around. However, her past caught up with her, and she fled to Queens, New York at the age of 16.