Chapter 21 – Year One
On May 23, 1978, my family arrived in the United States with resolve to make it our new home. My parents had less than fifty dollars to their name. Back then, that could buy a few nights in a no-frills motel and a handful of meals at a fast-food restaurant for a family of seven.
Thankfully, we didn’t have to break the bank right away. My father’s sister, Aunt Michelle, and her husband welcomed us into their home. They settled in the U. S. before the fall of Saigon and now lived comfortably in a nice suburban neighborhood in Northern Virginia. I couldn’t tell them apart from their American neighbors: manicured lawns, a two-car garage, well-organized schedules. By opening their doors to us, they also opened the doors to their community. Most of the people in that neighborhood had only seen “Boat People” on television. Now, suddenly, a family “fresh off the boat” just moved in next door.
My parents often wondered what the neighbors thought of us—and suspected we were the subject of more than a few dinner-table conversations.
“Did you see who moved in next door?”
“Well, there goes the neighborhood.”
We didn’t have to wait long to find out what they thought of us.
A few weeks after we arrived, Aunt Michelle took us to a nearby church one Sunday morning. We sat nervously in the front row. Unbeknownst to us, she had already told the evangelist about our journey. Near the end of the service, he introduced our family to the congregation. He shared a little about how we got here, then invited us to stand up. I was terrified. I kept my head down, not wanting to turn around. But when I finally did, I saw a room full of smiling faces. That was our first introduction to Americans.
After the service, people came up to greet us. One man offered Tuan a job mowing lawns, which he gladly accepted, even though he had never seen a lawnmower in his life. A kind young woman volunteered to drive my mother to the store whenever she needed. A former Navy pilot struck up a conversation with my father—two veterans, fighting on the same side, getting a chance to connect. Not long after, another man brought my father and me to a room filled with racks of donated clothes and boxes of toys. “Take anything you like,” he said. I made a beeline for a toy holster and revolver. In that moment, my love of cowboys and spaghetti westerns began.
Living with Aunt Michelle felt like stepping into a television show. The houses, the families in the neighborhood—they all looked like the characters from The Brady Bunch or Eight Is Enough. We ate food we saw in TV commercials. “You try it.” “I’m not gonna try it.” “He likes it! Hey Mikey!” Bologna sandwiches were a hit, too—“My bologna has a first name…”
It was like we skipped over the usual immigrant hard beginnings—the cramped apartments, the roaches, the scraping by—and fast-forwarded to the American dream: a white picket fence, air conditioning, and two cars in the garage.
But living the dream soon ended. After just a month, we moved out. That was about as long as my father could stomach living under someone else’s roof, eating someone else’s food.
“Thank you, sis. But it’s time to start rebuilding.”
With help from government assistance—food stamps and government cheese—we struck out on our own and moved into a cramped, roach-infested apartment. Three small bedrooms, a kitchen the size of a closet, and one bathroom for all seven of us. Every piece of furniture, every thread of clothing, every plate, cup, and spoon was donated. Our television, which had occasional reception, was likely donated twice.
I’m sure my parents felt proud to have a place of their own. I didn’t. I missed the manicured lawns, the toys, the quiet streets. But there was work to be done, character to build, and life lessons to learn, and no better time than immediately.
First on the list: learn English. It is a beautiful language—not our native tongue, but the spoken language of our new forever home. Plus, there was no “Press 2 for Vietnamese” option.
My mother, who hadn’t set foot in a classroom since ninth grade, signed up for night classes to learn a language she had never spoken. Tuan, too old for high school, joined her. That must have made for an interesting classroom experience—going to school after work with your mother.
Now, class, who can count to twenty? “One, two, tree, fo, fi, sic …”
The rest of us were enrolled in summer school, placed in English as a Second Language (ESL) programs to give us a head start before the school year began. We tried to speak English wherever we went and for any occasion. People didn’t always understand us right away, but we kept trying. We listened, mimicked, and repeated. We soaked up every word.
Television became our in-home tutor. We studied the way people spoke, trying to catch the rhythm and pronunciation. But we were warned to avoid cartoons. A Yosemite Sam southern drawl, a Vietnamese accent, was not the kind of English we were aiming for.
Next, get jobs. My father enrolled in the Computer Learning Center (CLC) to become a computer programmer. Back in Vietnam, after he was grounded from flying, he dabbled in basic computing while managing logistics as an Air Force officer. Soon, keypunch cards – a precursor to the keyboard, mouse, and touchscreen- were scattered all over the apartment.
After graduation, he landed his first job as a junior programmer at the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA), thanks to the help of a Vietnam Veteran—a former pilot who had spent seven years in the Hanoi Hilton. Despite what he endured in the notorious North Vietnamese prison, this officer remained kind-hearted and wanted to help a stranger in need. Not just any stranger, one from Vietnam, a faraway land that still tormented his sleep. His kindness was the springboard to my father’s second career, starting over at age forty.
My mother took a job as a seamstress at a department store. All those years sewing clothes for her children turned out to be a marketable skill. She worked the night shift, after preparing three meals a day for a household of seven. Tireless and determined, she kept our family orderly and well-fed.
Tuan got a job picking up trash at a local park after his stint mowing lawns. Sometimes he brought home apples that had fallen from the trees. Stephen and I couldn’t believe they were real apples—just like the ones we saw in the grocery store. Vietnam had an abundance of tropical fruits, but not apples. To us, they were the most American fruit. Every afternoon when Tuan returned, we’d wait by the door, excited to see how many apples he brought home. We devoured them all—even the bruised ones.
Amy landed a job at McDonald’s a mile from our apartment, starting in the kitchen before being promoted to the cash register. Every night she came home with milkshakes and fries. The apple pies were delicious, even if they scorched our tongues. Tim’s daily routine – eat a Quarter Pounder in three bites. Amy’s job marked the start of her long and successful career in the food industry—a career the whole family enjoyed.
Tim got a paper route delivering the Washington Star, an afternoon paper we could deliver after school. He subcontracted part of the job to Stephen and me: I took the first floor of the apartment buildings, Stephen had the second, and Tim sprinted up to the third. But our biggest contribution came at collection time. With Stephen and me tagging along, people always seemed to tip a little more.
With everyone pitching in, we were able to pay the rent on time each month—and even had a little extra to splurge. After saving a bit from each paycheck, Tuan bought our family’s first luxury item: a portable stereo.
It was a big day. We all went with him to the department store. Tuan proudly carried the stereo to the cash register, ready to bargain.
That’ll be $14. 99,” the cashier said.
“No, no, no,” Tuan replied, wagging his index finger as if the price were deeply offensive. “How about $10. 00?”
“The price is $14. 99,” the cashier repeated.
“Okay, how about $11. 50?”
Still: “The price is $14. 99.”
They went back and forth a couple more rounds, while the line behind us grew longer—some people looked annoyed, others laughed. That day, we learned there’s no haggling in America. Just wait for a sale or clip coupons.
There were several more firsts that year: first apartment, first job, first day of school, first American friend, first movie, first snowfall, first Thanksgiving, first Christmas, and first Super Bowl. Each small experience made us a little less foreign and a little more American. And a little more at home.
Bit by bit, we stopped doing weird and odd things that “made sense” to us but nobody else, like planting herbs in public greenspace near our apartment or taking home extra free napkins and ketchup packets to fill out our pantry. And started doing things that made sense to everyone else but not to us, like eating certain foods only at certain parts of the day (eggs are only for breakfast, and hamburgers are only for lunch and dinner) when before we just ate what was available (ramen noodles for breakfast, lunch, or dinner).
But I imagine my parents experienced the most culture shock and were the slowest to adapt. Not long before, they had come from a life of means. They stood at the top of the social order in Vietnam—respected, admired, influential. The war took much of that away, and escaping to America erased it. Where people once looked up to them, now people sometimes looked down on them—because of the jobs they had, the place we lived, the beat-up, church-donated car they drove, the clothes they wore.
But I never saw it get to my parents. In some ways, they agreed—those people did have better jobs, better cars, and more fluent English. In that sense, they were better. My parents' answer to any of that was “we’ll just have to get better, don’t we?” And if someone thought we were beneath them—not because of material things, but because of our background or the color of our skin, that was just their opinion. What people thought about us didn’t make it true. My parents never gave up that control. We would always be in control of who we are, what we think of ourselves, and how hard we will work. That is America. And we believe in America.
By the end of our first year, our family of seven became eight again—Tu came home. He had been living it up in Australia, soaking in everything the Land Down Under had to offer, when fate—and the Australian immigration authorities—sent him packing to the U.S. By some small miracle (or bad luck, as Tu saw it), immigration records linked him to us. Because he had entered Australia as a minor, the government required him to reunite with his parents in America.
For most people, that might’ve been good news. But for Tu, who had effectively exiled himself after clashing with our father, it felt like the death sentence was reinstated. Still, time has a way of softening hard feelings. When he finally reunited with us in the U. S., the homecoming was far less dramatic than the last one in Malaysia. And soon enough, Tu and Tuan were back together again—two brothers reunited, with an entire country to explore.
That first year also marked something deeply meaningful to my mother: a chance to right an old wrong. Years earlier, my parents had made the difficult decision to let our sister Huong live with a distant relative. She was the fifth child born in five years, and a particularly colicky baby. Overwhelmed and still very young themselves, my parents thought it would be temporary. But weeks turned into months, then years, and eventually that family “adopted” her—and she adopted them in return.
When it came time for our family to escape Vietnam, the situation was complicated. Huong was nine and didn’t want to leave the only family she’d ever known. My parents made the heartbreaking decision to leave her behind. But now, several years later, with more stability and a clearer path ahead, my mother knew it was time to try to bring her back.
Through the Orderly Departure Program—a resettlement agreement between the Vietnamese government and the UNHCR—she began the painstaking process of reuniting Huong with our family. My mother, who spoke broken English at the time, somehow navigated the maze of federal agencies, forms, and procedures—all without the help of the internet or online translators. It took her four long years, but she made it happen.
She brought Huong home. She is every bit a part of our family now—and every bit as part of our escape story—as if Huong had been with us through all those times at sea.
***
Years later, the enormity of my family’s journey to America hit me in the strangest setting. I sat in a dentist’s chair, waiting for the hygienist, trying to tune out the familiar whirr and buzz of dental drills. To distract myself, I looked out the window. Across the street stood an old apartment building—the kind built in the ’70s, with faded light-brown bricks, rusted railings, and tiny, cluttered balconies. The place looked dark and stuffy inside. The windows and sliding doors seemed like they hadn’t worked properly in years.
“I don’t know how we did it,” I said as the hygienist walked in.
“My family lived in an apartment like that when we first came to America over forty years ago,” I added.
She smiled knowingly. “We lived in one just like it when we came over from India.”
I shook my head. “I can barely imagine living in a place like that by myself for a day—let alone cramming eight of us in there.”
“But we did it,” she said.
“We sure did it,” I nodded.