Exodus

Time has gone by quickly. It has been 21 years living in this new country where our children have grown up. I have often told them the story of our trip, including the selfishness of that young man. I often remind myself that we must try hard to make the former “cluster of pickerel weeds” enrich this land which is our second homeland.

We were old enough to hide ourselves, and we jumped up at once and scrambled to a place where they could not see us. There were two of them, and through my seven-year-old eyes I could see they were armed with swords that gleamed mercilessly in the sun as they jumped onto our boat…

Since escaping Vietnam 25 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.

After the fall of Saigon, things changed drastically for our family under the communist regime. Wanting a better life for their children, my parents decided we would escape from Vietnam by boat, but not all together.

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