Live to Tell Our Tale

By: Loc Mai

Since escaping Vietnam twenty-five years ago, my mind has constantly wandered back to two sisters – two of a dozen on my boat who were raped, tortured and stripped of their dignity. As a young man, I had never felt so helpless. I often wonder if those women have been able to get on with life. Could they ever have become receptive to the love of a man? Would they ever see beauty or worth in living? 

I was barely sixteen-years-old when my parents urged me to escape, because they’d become fearful that I would be conscripted into the army. My attempts at fleeing the country occurred over the course of four years. I was cheated more times than I could count on one hand; on other occasions the local authorities caught me. 

It wasn’t until August 1985 that I was finally successful.  I left with twenty other people – two of whom were my sister and brother in-law – on a sheltered boat that measured 2-metres wide by 16-metres long. The problems began almost as soon as we had made it out to the open sea: on the very first day we encountered a severe storm that crippled the boat’s engine and left us drifting. We could see nothing but the horizon. No land, no sign of life.  Just twenty-one boat people consumed with the thought that they might die at any moment.

But we weren’t alone for long.

They were unmistakable. The sarongs they wore were a dead giveaway. And their menace was palpable. Even so, we had no idea what these pirates were capable of.

We were violently stripped of our clothing as they searched for valuables. The men were then separated from the women and girls and told to remain on our boat while they forced the women onto theirs. They tied the two boats together. Then, with lecherous expressions on their faces, the pirates scrutinised each and every female. They spared two of them, and I was deeply thankful that one was my sister – though I made sure my relief didn’t register on my face. What saved them was that, from the time they got on the boat, these two women had been lying down and remaining motionless, to all appearances like two dead bodies.

For five days they raped the girls and the women over and over and over. This all took place in front of a five-year-old boy and his three-year-old sister, who were taken on board along with their horrified mother. 

Eventually they released us, but three days later we were captured by another group of pirates. The fact that we now had nothing left for them to steal made them very angry, and they pulled out our gold teeth with pliers and bashed us senseless afterwards. We tried to fight back but our attempts were futile – they outnumbered us and, in any case, were armed. We knew we had lost the fight when they took the girls and women away.

There were twelve females in total. Three of them were married. The oldest woman was in her mid-fifties. Three of them were sisters, aged about thirteen to fourteen.  Again, the two young children were forced to look on. No-one, of whatever age, should ever have to witness what we saw.

A beautiful Chinese lady was taken by the pirate captain and kept in his quarters. Every night we could see her silhouette through the window. The moving shadow of her fragile figure was the only indication that she was still alive.

Frustration mounted until it became too unbearable to think or sleep. We felt defeated, humiliated and completely helpless.  And we were riddled with guilt for being so ill-prepared, for not fighting back hard enough, for not being able to protect our women.

During this time a third group of pirates challenged our captors for their prize.  By then we had become almost nonchalant. There was nothing more we could lose if this new lot won the contest. We watched rather indifferently as the two groups fought each other.  Eventually the newcomers were driven away. 

So nothing had changed. We were still drifting on a storm-ravaged sea and still prisoners at the mercy of pirates.

Then there was a momentous change in the situation: we awoke one night to find the pirates gone and the women and children gone with them. Panic swept through the vessel. We feared the worst of course. Where did those bastards take our loved ones? Hadn’t they taken enough from us?

Whenever I managed to sleep I had horrific nightmares.  I existed in a hopeless state among dead-looking bodies that sprawled all over the boat.

When even the smallest amount of rain fell, a mass of bodies crawled onto the plastic sheet, lapping up each droplet until our tongues bled.

Then someone noticed a small black shape on the horizon. It was heading in our direction and had a threatening air about it. We braced ourselves yet again, but this time we were quite resigned to dying.

As the boat came closer we realised it was the pirates returning, and we could see the women on board. Though not sure what was going on, we breathed a heavy sigh of relief. It turned out that the rope that tied the two boats together had broken during the night, and they had drifted apart. When the women came to the shattering realisation that their husbands, brothers and fathers were no longer in sight, they begged their captors to come and find us, threatening to kill themselves if they refused. Thankfully, the pirates did retain some small trace of humanity, and they brought them back.

As the women returned to our boat, we saw that their clothes were ripped to shreds, in many cases torn in such a way as to deprive them of any vestige of dignity. Some were bleeding, and obviously in great pain.

We were on our own again, bobbing along with no map and no navigational skills.  I was close to death: I had not eaten in days, and had had very little water. Cannibalism was beginning to cross our minds. Not that any of us could boast any meat on our bones.

Mr Hoang was his name. We stumbled across him as our boat took its aimless course across the ocean. He was a Vietnamese fisherman, and he saved us from death by giving us food and water that would last us a couple of days. 

Then we came across an oil rig where the people were able to direct us to a Malaysian island called Terranganu.  It was the first land we had seen since leaving home.  We landed on a beach, and it wasn’t long before the local police got wind of the fact that a group of Vietnamese boat people was there. It took four hours for the policemen to do the paperwork that would get us transferred to a refugee camp.

After fifteen days and fifteen nights, we had made it. We had survived. And we were going to live to tell the tale.

When we arrived at a camp at Pulau Bidong, we were declared refugees. We were no longer just a group of twenty-one people: we were surrounded by tens of thousands more who had also made the heady decision to leave their homes in the modest hope of finding freedom.  They all looked like us: skinny as hell with eyes so haunted that it would almost certainly take decades for them to find peace.

The women from our boat had detached themselves from the men. They had hardly spoken of their ordeal – or of anything else – since the attacks. They were taken to hospital to have their wounds and infections attended to, and two of them were hospitalised for over a week. These women had been badly damaged. Their eyes no longer sparkled with the hope and beauty I once saw in them.  I knew they felt used, worthless and ashamed.

Once I settled into the refugee camp, I wrote to my parents to assure them my sister and I were safe. Having not heard from me for over a month, they had assumed we had both died at sea.

The smell of fresh bread baking in the oven is my strongest memory from this camp, which I was to live in for ten months. Food and water were scarce because of transport problems, which brought out the worst in some people. I felt ashamed to be associated with those who already had enough food yet went to great lengths to thieve more.  But I had to look forward. Freedom was waiting for me.

Eventually I settled in Perth, Western Australia.  I worked hard to build a thriving fruit and vegetable business, so that I could sponsor my mother and father to come and live with my sister and me in Australia. 

I have been diagnosed with a degenerative eye disease, but I’m determined not to let this – or my past – slow me down. I have started charities in Vietnam to help those less fortunate than myself.  And I’ve developed a passion to write poetry and practise photography. There are so many things I would like to accomplish before I go blind.

I now know what’s really important.  I intend to share everything and give everything. 

Loc works at his family Fruit and Vegetable shop in Perth.  Loc enjoys taking pictures; he publishes his own photographic books and donates all proceeds to charity. 

Loc Mai

This story excerpted from the book "Boat People, personal stories from the Vietnamese exodus 1975 -1996" edited by Carina Hoang