Incredible story of woman who sent her son off from Vietnam after the war

[Syringer]

http://vietq.wordpress.com/2006/12/20/a-desperate-mother-ignores-the-odds/

Long, but even though I'm ADD I read right through it..

HE was 16 when she sent him to the boat. For his passage out of Vietnam, the price was two bars of gold that she spent a year buying on layaway. It was 1986, and Ho Chi Minh City was a desperate place. Everyone she knew was starving.

She knew Tuan?s escape would be risky. Once before, the scrawny, gap-toothed boy had tried to flee the country only to be seized by police and thrown into jail for six months, to return home even more haggard and emaciated than before.
...

SOON Tuan?s letters started arriving. He wrote of many days at sea, of running out of food and water and then being rescued by a commercial fishing boat that took them to Malaysia. Of how he found his way to the United States, to Minnesota, which was so cold he moved on to Denver, then farther west, to Southern California.
...
In 2001, doctors diagnosed Nguyen with ovarian cancer and gave her two months to live, a prediction she was able to defy with chemotherapy and surgery. Tuan sent $500 and spoke of visiting. Then his letters stopped coming. Twice, medical bills forced her to move to smaller quarters, so she thought perhaps his letters were getting lost.

 

[NoShangriLa]

That is quite a moving story of a mother love for her son.

If all mothers are like Hai Nguyen we wouldn't have as much problems as we are having.

My heart goes out to the Nguyen family.

 

[HaxorNubcake]

uh sounds like the mother sent her son to the US...

(not to Vietnam as stated in thread title)

 

[UFOfreak]

This should make another great movie!

 

[zerocool1]

Originally posted by: NoShangriLa
That is quite a moving story of a mother love for her son.

If all mothers are like Hai Nguyen we wouldn't have as much problems as we are having.

indeed....you wouldn't have parents medicating kids to just because they have more energy than they 'should have' as opposed to dealing with it.

 

[Juno]

someone needs to buy this script!

 

[Aharami]

wow. what an incredible story. I came here when I was 12 but my situation was 1000x better than that of Tuan's. really humbling story. makes you stop and think about all the waste we create and how much better things would be if we didnt waste so much

 

[OulOat]

Now compare this against "The pursuit of happiness." Ambition FTW!

 

[JS80]

Originally posted by: Juno
someone needs to buy this script!

Unfortunately this would not work in Hollywood. Americans want to see "escaped the communists penniless to America to become a successful [insert generic Asian mother's dream occupation for son here] in the land of opportunity."

What a tragedy. I feel like I died a little reading it. The only redeeming factor is the determination of the mother. She's a survivor. She would have done well here if she escaped during the war.

 

[Syringer]

Yeah, in my case, my parents fled Vietnam in 1982 when my sister was 4. They spent 7 months in the Phillipines before finding a boat headed toward the US.

They ended up in Sacramento, where eventually I would be born in '83. We all lived in a tiny rundown, 2 bedroom apt, which consisted of a just-born me, my sister, my parents, my 75 y/o grandmother; along with, my aunt, who was pregnant, her husband and two kids, and my 14 y/o cousin who my uncle wanted to come with us rather than spend another second in Vietnam--they and their three kids would eventually come about 12 years later. That's 10 people, including one pregnant woman in a place barely big enough for 2 people.

We had no money and none of the adults spoke English all that well. My dad who was 38 with an engineering degree and graduated near the top of his class resorted to working as a dishwasher at a Mexican restaurant, leaving the "women" behind taking care of the kids.

To make a long story short then, the families eventually separated, we moved down to the Bay Area, where my dad would start his own gardening/landscaping business--and we ended up doing pretty well for ourselves.

I'm sure a good number of the million or so Vietnamese immigrants have similar stories, some worse than others, as my parents and the subject in the article..

 

[timosyy]

 

[Svnla]

This is why most immigrants to the US are successful. After all the things we went thought and circumstances we faced, we have no where to go but up. Sadly, there are a few that fall on the wayside.

I came to the US when I was a little boy with nothing but clothes on my back and a plastic bag with some personal items. I studied hard and work hard and now I am fairly successful. I remember how proud my mom was when I went back home to visit and show her my two American college degrees. I knew I made her day when she showed me around the old neighborhood.

BTW, I watched "Pursuit of Happyness" last week and all of the "whitemen keep us down/all racists faults/fill in the blank excuses/etc." people need to watch it and learn.

 

[aceO07]

Such a strong woman. I'm glad she found her son.

 

[santz]

truly moving!

 

[Syringer]

Originally posted by: Svnla
This is why most immigrants to the US are successful. After all the things we went thought and circumstances we faced, we have no where to go but up. Sadly, there are a few that fall on the wayside.

I came to the US when I was a little boy with nothing but clothes on my back and a plastic bag with some personal items. I studied hard and work hard and now I am fairly successful. I remember how proud my mom was when I went back home to visit and show her my two American college degrees. I knew I made her day when she showed me around the old neighborhood.

BTW, I watched "Pursuit of Happyness" last week and all of the "whitemen keep us down/all racists faults/fill in the blank excuses/etc." people need to watch it and learn.

I don't think you necessarily have to be an immigrant, but rathe raised on immigrant values. I was born in the US, while my sister was raised in Vietnam for a while, and we essentially have the same values and whatnot, and I'm not sure if I would've "benefited" any more had I been born in VN.

 

[bennylong]

My story would make a great movie!

My family was kicked out of Vietnam in 1979 because we were ethnic chinese. There were about 40 people that escaped with us in a little junk boat, we were rubbing elbow to elbow. My dad told me I was wandering the street when the boat was about to leave, but he saw me from a distance and grabbed me. I asked him what would have happened if he haven't saw me and he said, "we would have left you behind because another boat wasn't coming and we would all died if we didn't leave on this boat." We went to Hong Kong and spent 6 months in a detention camp where the Hong Kong government treated us like criminals. Finally, we were approved to go to the USA in December 1979. We flew to San Francisco where we lived in the seedy part of San Francisco, the Tenderloin district. There were 7 of us and we all slept on the same mattress in a little studio without any lights or electricty. I remember waking up once with my mouth opened and there was a rat in my mouth.

My dad was an auditor in Vietnam. In San Francisco, he had to resort to becoming a butcher in a Chinatown shop. Butchers in Chinatown were paid under the table and below minimum wages and the working hours were 7 am to 7 pm, 6 days a week. My sister and I sold fishes in the alleys of Chinatown that we caught on the Pier. We were arrested once by the cops when I was 7 years old for selling fishes on the street without a license. I also went through garbage cans to pick up soda cans to earn money from recycling the cans at 5 cents a can. We could make $5 on a good day walking around Pier 39 for the entire day in our soleless shoes. Sometimes my mom would pick up piecemeals sewing work and we could earn 10 cents for each sleeves we sewed. It came out to $1 a hour.

 

[SSSnail]

Wow, I can almost guarantee that every single story of Vietnamese that had to escape from their own country after the war would make a great and heart wrenching movie. This is a story of one that made it, millions were lost at sea to weather, starvation, pirates, etc... This is one story in millions, I do sympathize for every single one of them.

 

[Syringer]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0433398/

Not out on DVD yet, but I saw a screening when it opened in Orange County. It told a great story and was well done, but you can tell it wasn't the most professionally done film ever..

 

[V00DOO]

 

[CTrain]

What tragic for her to find her son and hes homeless.
Can't fault the guy if he came here and didn't have guidence.

 

[CTrain]

Yeah my story is like most other Vietnamese.

My mom and dad was pharmacists in Vietnam and had a successful pharmacy until the war.
My dad was thrown in jail for a year after the war because he worked as a medic for the American in the war.
After he got released from jail in 1978, he made us all learn Chinese so we can escape.(Vietnam was trying to get rid of all the Chinese-Vietnamese).
We were on a small boat going nowhere and we were attacked by pirates(these people prey boats like ours to steal valuables).
As my parents told me(I was around 5 at the time), during the attack, I jumped off the ship. They were frantically looking for me when they found me in the water hanging on some floating stuff).
Our boat had a big hole but somehow found its way to Indonesia.
We lived there for a year(it was great there as I remembered) until we got sponsored to the States.
We went straight to Orlando cause a relative lives there.
She and her American husband let all 8 of us stay with them for a few months.
After that the Rotary club let us move to a pretty nice house with another family until we got on our feet.
My dad learn the mechanic trade even though he's very smallish.

Yeah we were quite poor growing up since my parents had to support 6 kids but we never struggle.
One thing that sucked was that my dad finally hit it big when I was already in college.
Every one of us graduated from college and even though I'm considered the black sheep of the family, I still do very well for myself.

Its too bad that growing up in Florida, I have distanced myself my the Asian culture cause theres no Asians over here.
I've been trying to go back to Vietnam for a while now but thats another story.

 

[alkemyst]

Originally posted by: bennylong
My story would make a great movie!

My family was kicked out of Vietnam in 1979 because we were ethnic chinese. There were about 40 people that escaped with us in a little junk boat, we were rubbing elbow to elbow. My dad told me I was wandering the street when the boat was about to leave, but he saw me from a distance and grabbed me. I asked him what would have happened if he haven't saw me and he said, "we would have left you behind because another boat wasn't coming and we would all died if we didn't leave on this boat." We went to Hong Kong and spent 6 months in a detention camp where the Hong Kong government treated us like criminals. Finally, we were approved to go to the USA in December 1979. We flew to San Francisco where we lived in the seedy part of San Francisco, the Tenderloin district. There were 7 of us and we all slept on the same mattress in a little studio without any lights or electricty. I remember waking up once with my mouth opened and there was a rat in my mouth.

My dad was an auditor in Vietnam. In San Francisco, he had to resort to becoming a butcher in a Chinatown shop. Butchers in Chinatown were paid under the table and below minimum wages and the working hours were 7 am to 7 pm, 6 days a week. My sister and I sold fishes in the alleys of Chinatown that we caught on the Pier. We were arrested once by the cops when I was 7 years old for selling fishes on the street without a license. I also went through garbage cans to pick up soda cans to earn money from recycling the cans at 5 cents a can. We could make $5 on a good day walking around Pier 39 for the entire day in our soleless shoes. Sometimes my mom would pick up piecemeals sewing work and we could earn 10 cents for each sleeves we sewed. It came out to $1 a hour.

and now you have a mailorder bride.

 

[UberNeuman]

The only way this story would work as a movie would be the last scene when the Mom looks at the camera and says, "You want happy ending?"

 

[newbiepcuser]

Originally posted by: V00DOO

 

[Inspector Jihad]

man, thats a great story.