Shedding Old Passions Against the Homeland
November 24, 2000
Years ago, when my family and I came to America as refugees from South Vietnam, we considered ourselves living in exile. We’d gather and commiserate with the countrymen every April 30, the day the war ended. We’d wear white headbands and stand in front of City Hall in San Francisco with our flags and banners to denounce Vietnamese communism and human rights abuses back home.
A quarter century later, as President Clinton visits Vietnam — the first U.S. president in three decades to go there — that singular passion for protest is less shared.
My sister is planning a ski trip to Tahoe, my brother busy building his dream house in Silicon Valley, my mother preoccupied with the grandchildren. My father alone remains staunchly anti-communist, and frets over whether or not Clinton will push for human rights and democracy while visiting Vietnam.
Like my family, in the aftermath of the Cold War, the rest of the Vietnamese community has grown more prosperous and entrenched in the American landscape.
And our relationship with Vietnam defies simplification.
A recent poll by the Viet Merc, a Vietnamese-language paper in San Jose, Calif., where 125,000 Vietnamese Americans reside, showed that 62 percent of Vietnamese Americans agree the presidential visit is a good thing, believing interaction will spur political change.
In a San Jose pho noodle restaurant, Mr. Tri Nguyen, 43, said the president’s trip is “about time,” but doesn’t believe it’s going to change Vietnam. The trip is “eclipsed by the story of who’s going to be in the White House next year,” insisted Nguyen. “That will affect Vietnam more than Clinton’s visit.”
Nguyen, once a boat person and now an engineer, often returns to Vietnam and says he no longer regards himself as an exile from his homeland. Like Nguyen, some 250,000 overseas Vietnamese return yearly to visit relatives and celebrate Tet, the Vietnamese New Year. They may not like the communist government, but they no longer think Vietnam’s isolation will do anyone any good. Estranged or not from the homeland, the estimated 1.3 million Vietnamese Americans in the United States, the third largest Asian group after Chinese and Filipinos, have played a big role in Vietnam’s history since the Diaspora began 25 years ago. They send home about $5 billion a year, about 20 percent of Vietnam’s Gross National Product.
With news of their great successes and freedom, the Viet Kieu — Vietnamese Americans — serve as a mirror against which the entire nation of Vietnam, still mired in poverty and political oppression, reflects on its own lost potential.
It is not an exaggeration to say our successes and transformation have subverted the language of nationalism in our homeland. And there’s irony in the wake of that bitter civil war: Twenty five years after our bitter departure, those persecuted by Uncle Ho’s followers and forced to flee abroad, are now being actively solicited to return to Vietnam to help rebuild the country.
No one wants to see Vietnam stuck in poverty, said Dr. Le Xuan Khoa, a former diplomat who now teaches contemporary Vietnamese history at Johns Hopkins University. “But the tragedy of ‘boat people’ — tens of thousands of whom perished at sea or were victimized by pirates — and the extreme maltreatment and humiliation imposed on tens of thousands of others in re-education camps will not be easily forgotten.”
Yet interaction between Vietnamese and Viet Kieu has increased dramatically in recent years, thanks to the information age.
Take music. Before the cold war ended, musicians in Orange County and Paris made video tapes and sent them home for those who had little in the way of entertainment. These days, thanks to more freedom in Vietnam and the information age, Viet Kieu the globe over download entertainment Web sites from Saigon and Hanoi so they can watch new favorite stars from back home.
Like many others, I’ve made good friends on visits to my homeland and stay in touch constantly via e-mail.
Some overseas Vietnamese, of course, will never be able reconcile with the past as long as the present government remains in power. Nga Nguyen, a 27-year-old student at San Jose State University who lost her father in a re-education camp, said she cannot forgive the communist regime. But even she sees the benefit of the visit: “If President Clinton can help start a new atmosphere of democratic activities in Vietnam, it would be a very good thing.”
Last week at a local art gallery, I met three young Vietnamese artists touring the United States. All spoke fluent English, carried cell phones and have e-mail addresses. Thanh Nguyen, 29, born and raised in Hanoi, drew portraits of Viet Kieus wearing traditional clothing. “I see Vietnamese and Vietnamese Americans as having the same essence,” he told me. “We suffered from the same history, even if the Vietnamese Americans have changed to adapt to a new country.”
Twenty five years ago, as a flag waver in front of City Hall, I could only see Thanh and his friends as my enemy. Now, listening to him and looking at his artwork, I can’t help but share his sentiment.
Pacific News Service editor Andrew Lam, born and raised in Vietnam, is a San Francisco-based journalist and short story writer.
Pacific News Service editor Andrew Lam, born and raised in Vietnam, is a San Francisco-based journalist and short story writer.
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