Things that happen in the present can unexpectedly bring up emotions from the past. Sometimes it’s even feelings we never knew we had, but healing can be the first step to understanding. KBIA’s Annie Le (lay) takes us to St. Louis to show us how one person is using her family’s history to heal.
While ships were returning home after the Vietnam War, one boat carrying refugees was leaving Vietnam.
“They heard on the radio that Saigon had fallen, and they actually passed by several other boats, one of them had soldiers who were actually returning,” Chi Nguyen said. “They were going the other way because they had all surrendered and they were going back to their homes.”
Nguyen is all-too-familiar with her family’s stories. They have recounted their experiences many times, each with their own version of events.
Her parents, dad’s siblings and grandparents were some of the 39 refugees on that boat.
“They didn't know that they were leaving the country forever, for good or for what,” Nguyen said. “They just knew that things were very dire.”
Nguyen’s family fled South Vietnam on April 29, 1975.
This was not the first type of journey her family had made. Almost 20 years before, her paternal family migrated south to Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam at the time. The St. Louis author traced her paternal family to the central region of Vietnam. Her great-grandfather was one of the tutors for the last emperor in the country.
Nguyen’s family was worried that they would be imprisoned because of their former association with the imperial government when the country reunified in 1975.
“I think that's why they sort of made this kind of bold, kind of desperate move to just get on a boat,” Nguyen said. “And at that time, the boat was actually in disrepair. It wasn't sea-worthy, but they just had no other choice.”
The boat was initially owned by a USAID employee who was evacuated along with other American government workers. The employee left the boat in a friend’s possession, and this friend knew Nguyen’s aunt.
“That was kind of an interesting story of intrigue or whatnot, that kind of wove together all the people who ended up being on this boat,” Nguyen said.
The boat was intercepted, but by whom depends on who is telling the story. In one account, the boat was intercepted by the US government. In another, it was a Korean fishing boat.
“At one point they were told to go to Malaysia, but in the words of my aunt, it was lucky that the person steering the boat kind of didn't steer in the right way,” Nguyen said. “Instead of going to Malaysia, where they would have been stuck for a while, they said they were picked up by the US government and then transferred to a refugee camp.”
At the refugee camp in the Philippines, representatives from Canada and the United States interviewed the refugees. It was uncertain where Nguyen’s family would resettle.
“My mom got on a plane thinking that they were going to Pennsylvania, and they didn't know any difference,” Nguyen said. “But at the very last minute, they're like, ‘No, you're going to California,’ and again, they had no say. They were just kind of at the mercy of the winds at that point.”
Nguyen’s parents were sent to San Diego. They had three children, including Nguyen, who was the first person in her family to be born in the United States. Her parents worked on an assembly line, putting circuit boards togethers. But their story doesn’t end there.
“Me and my sister have been talking,” Nguyen said. “We call it the family epic. We've been talking about writing a story just about our family, a creative memoir about our family.”