You both have endured such hardships
because I brought you with us.
Now I am very happy
you are joining your baba
and will have a good life.”
I assure him that
we are so lucky that
we have had them on this journey.
I assure him that
they have not just been a noble man and woman;
they have been just like parents to us.
So I give an eye signal to Dee Dee.
Like Baba did to his ma
before he left home,
Dee Dee and I bow three times,
solemnly and respectfully,
to Uncle,
as if he were
our baba.
142 | TELLING DAO
I can’t sleep,
again.
I have so many, many things to tell Dao.
I tell her that I can’t fulfill my duty
of taking care of Uncle and Nam and her ma.
I tell her that sometimes
people can’t control their own fate.
I tell her that Uncle and Nam have to stay here
longer.
I am not worried about them now
as much as I was
when I first parted from them.
I tell her that
she doesn’t need to worry about them, either.
Uncle has finally come out of his depression.
By helping others,
he has healed himself.
I tell her that now Uncle has many friends
and is respected by many parents,
so I am no longer feeling so sad
about leaving them behind.
I tell her that someday
we all will meet again.
Then we will all go to Disneyland
to see Snow White
and to the mountains to see snow
for her.
I know Dao is listening,
even though she doesn’t say a word.
143 | FAREWELL
The International Refugee Organization (IRO)
lets us borrow the money for airline tickets
without charging us interest.
The cost is $325 for one person,
half of what the adults pay.
On June 7, 1980,
I leave everything behind,
except the two pairs of chopsticks
Uncle gave us,
Dao’s sandals,
our exercise books,
and the gratitude for Uncle.
Dee Dee takes only the shells
he and Nam exchanged.
We and the other refugees
are given a white travel bag
as we get ready to board a boat at the ferry.
We will transfer to a big ship
that will sail to Singapore.
We will spend two days in Singapore.
Then we will fly to San Francisco.
Before we board the boat,
many people say, “Have a good life!”
They hope that the next boat
will be for them.
I say goodbye to my cousin and her family,
to the Phams,
and to my friends.
I wait until the last moment
to say goodbye to Uncle and Nam,
for my throat
is already feeling
like something is choking me.
So I try very hard to avoid looking into
Uncle’s eyes,
for fear I can’t control myself.
It is Dee Dee
who wails
as Uncle and Nam embrace him.
Suddenly, all my tears,
which I have been trying hard
to keep stored away,
drain out
like a waterfall.
I can’t help it.
I hug them, too.
I say, “I will never forget you, Uncle.”
Uncle wipes his eyes, too.
He pats me and says,
“You have a good life.
You study hard.
We will meet again.
Okay?”
Cousin parts us from Uncle and Nam.
She urges us to board the boat.
I clean my nose and sob,
“You take good care, Uncle.
We will meet again.”
I hear someone ask as I
unwillingly head toward the boat,
“Who is that man to this girl?”
I turn and reply,
“He has been a father to me!”
144 | THE JOURNEY
On the way to Singapore,
motionless,
even though the others are amazed
by the big ship.
Two days later,
on the plane to San Francisco,
Dee Dee and the others are fascinated
by the new experience of
taking a plane
and by the floating clouds
that surround us.
He tells me
what he wants to see first,
while I am wondering
if Baba will still recognize us.
It is the first time
since I left Vietnam
that I have really thought about Baba.
I am wondering
if Baba will meet us at the airport.
I am wondering
if I will like America.
I am wondering
if people will pick on us
because we don’t speak English.
145 | I AM NO LONGER AN ORPHAN
The plane lands.
Many passengers applaud.
We are safe in this new country.
We, the refugees, follow the translator and
enter the terminal.
We clear customs.
We are fingerprinted by immigration.
Then we follow the translator into a big room
where many people
are waiting.
They are holding signs with names on them.
My heart suddenly beats like an
elephant trumpeting.
I am afraid to look at the crowd.
I am afraid Baba might not be there. . . .
Then I hear Dee Dee call out,
“Baba! Baba!”
Baba looks just the same as
when he left two years ago.
But he stares at us
like he is seeing ghosts.
Then he rushes toward us and embraces us.
He cries, “Oh, I thought I had lost both of you!”
We bury our faces into his chest
and cry.
We hold each other
for a long time.
In the taxi on the way to where Baba lives,
Dee Dee looks outside and tells Baba
what he wants to buy and
what he wants to see.
I just hold Baba’s hand
the whole time.
At this moment,
I do not look out of the window
at the high buildings
and the cars snaking along curves in the road.
I don’t want anything:
not Disneyland,
not real snow.
I just want my baba.
He is enough.
EPILOGUE
In June of 1980, thirteen months after we left our home in Vietnam, Dee Dee and I were finally reunited with our baba in America.
We enrolled in school right away. We studied English all day long with other refugees. We all started with the ABCs, which I already knew because of Uncle.
Baba paid back the cost of our airplane tickets to the International Refugee Organization.
Life in America was good, but it was much different from Vietnam. In school I was teased a lot by the students—the white, black, and even ABC’s—
American–born Chinese. So was Dee Dee. They laughed at our pronunciation of English words. Sometimes they even told us to go back to where we came from. It didn’t bother me as much as it did Dee Dee. Compared to what we had gone through, this teasing and laughing were nothing! I could face anything!
My daigo later escaped again and then came to the United States. Today he lives in Australia with his family.
After I graduated from high school, I got married. Together with my husband, we opened a Chinese restaurant in South Carolina and raised three kids. Dee Dee also worked in our restaurant. But he wasn’t as lucky as me. His wife died from diabetes and left him with no children. He still remains single.
We applied for my ma to come to the states in 1985, and she was able to come in 1990. We united happily in an emotional reunion after eleven years of separation. Unfortunately, my ah mah didn’t make it. She died before my ma came here.
After my cousin and her family left Indonesia not long after we did, they settled down in Canada.
Now I have fulfilled my desire to tell the world about our journey and the kindhearted Russian captain. I don’t know if he is still alive. But I hope that he and his descendants have had a good life. He will live in my heart forever. And I also thank the Indonesian government for accepting us to stay in their country until we could leave for America.
—Lam Chan, June 2013
GLOSSARY
• ah mah—[ah mah] term for one’s “paternal grandmother” in Cantonese, which is the most common Chinese dialect of ethnic Chinese living in Vietnam
• auntie—a respectful term to address a lady, not necessarily related
• baba—[bah-bah] “father” in Cantonese
• bà ngoại—[bah wai] “maternal grandmother” in Vietnamese
• bow—[bough] the front of a ship or boat that sticks out when it is underway
• cha—[jah] “father” in Vietnamese
• China and Vietnam War—also called the Sino-Vietnamese War or the Third Indochina War, this short-lived war was initiated by Deng Xiaoping, the leader of China during this time, in support of their ally the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia, because of the mistreatment of ethnic Chinese minority in Vietnam and the occupation of the Spratly Islands, which were claimed by China. This brief war between the border of Vietnam and China officially lasted from February 17, 1979 to March 16, 1979. Tens of thousands of lives were lost on both sides of the conflict. Yet the war did not receive much attention in the West.
• Cholon, Vietnam—Chinatown in Saigon
• daigo—[die goh] a respectful term for “older brother” in Cantonese
• dee dee—[dee dee] the commonly used Cantonese term for younger brother
• dragon bone—a slang term for the keel of a ship, the bottom-most structural part of the ship that runs from the bow to the stern
• Duc Me—[duke mayah] the Virgin Mary in Vietnamese
• giúp tôi!—[zep doi] “Help me!” in Vietnamese
• hatch—an opening on the deck of a ship through which there is access to parts of the ship below the deck
• Heaven God—Chinese name for the universal God
• IRO—International Refugee Organization
• Kwun Yum—[kwoon yum] the “Goddess of Mercy” in Cantonese, also called Guānyīn in Mandarin. She is the most important Chinese deity.
• lai see—[lie see] “lucky money” in Cantonese. It is money given in red envelopes to children or younger relatives by adults, especially at Chinese New Year or for birthdays.
• ma—[mah] “mother” in Cantonese
• My Tho—a city settled by Chinese fleeing China in the 1680s and now considered the gateway to the Mekong Delta
• pau pau—[paw paw] term for one’s “maternal grandmother” in Cantonese
• pho—[fuh] Vietnamese rice noodle soup, served with meat, herbs, and bean sprouts
• sampan—[sam pan] a relatively flat-bottomed Chinese wooden boat, generally used for transportation and often used as a traditional fishing boat
• tael—[teel] a unit of measure weighing about one and one-third ounce
• uncle—a respectful term to address an elder man who may or may not be a relative
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you so much to my friends Chou and Yeung for sharing with me details of their gripping journey to freedom in 1979.
My heartfelt gratitude goes to the unnamed refugees I talked with in 1992 at the Hong Kong refugee camp, who provided me more details of their escapes and gave me the inspiration to develop the story of Uncle and his family.
My sincere appreciation to my agent, Adria Goetz of Martin Literary Management, for believing in my work; to my publisher, Sonali Fry of Yellow Jacket, for liking this work and patiently editing it repeatedly; to my copy editors, Dave Barrett and Christina Solazzo, who checked this manuscript thoroughly; and to Wendy Cheng, my friend who provided my name in Chinese characters.
Last, but not least, thanks to my husband, Phillip Russell, who is my first editor and who has helped me in many ways in my adopted country.