Day 2 of my school district being down and everyone being told to stay home: · 2:42am Mar 18th, 2020
So, looking past the fact that I temporarily crippled my left wrist, I'm still able to write!
And guess what? My dad decided to go into further detail about his escape from Communist Vietnam:
Read it below:
Background: My dad’s older brother was very quiet, but made up for it with his technical skills. Before the communist takeover, when my dad was around 6 years old, his older brother found himself supplying machines and materials for an international business in the southeast Asia region, mainly relating to bicycle parts and other mechanical contraptions, given the family business.
Additional info: Unlike my mom, whose rich uncles in the United States would help with the transition to American life for a bit of time after arriving, my dad’s uncles weren’t so fortunate to help. His dad (my paternal grandpa, who died before I was born) once wrote to one of them asking for a radio for the family to use, and in return, his uncle’s wife wrote a scathing rebuke complaining that they themselves had no money, and they wouldn’t ever have enough to buy and send a radio over, even when she herself had been known to send gifts to her own relatives in Vietnam. This more or less left his family on their own.
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After they were finally released from the labor camp, they returned to find that their home and business were both taken by the Communist governments. However, one of my dad’s family’s few remaining possessions, a rubber band machine, was left behind. The machine wasn’t entirely operational though, so my dad, along with his inventive older brother, set off into the black markets to find, copy, and reproduce the needed parts to repair the machine. He recalls that there was one time where he was able to find a couple of gears, and copied them by hand to bring home for his brother. Eventually, with the parts they acquired and produced, they were able to repair the machine. There was also the issue of power, though—electricity was rationed, with their area having electricity for three days a week. This meant that even when the machine was operational, they wouldn’t be able to produce very many rubber bands with it in a single week. Their solution? Human power. Using scraps of rubber from bicycle tires and other items they could scrounge off the black market, they put the machine to work, turning scrap rubber into bundles of black, sooty rubber bands to sell on the black market. To solve the power issue, they used the little money they earned from sales to hire a 10 year old kid, who my dad remembers was a scrawny little boy who he and his brothers put on a bicycle that they’d turned into a generator to power the machine. So, beyond those three days of electricity, the machine was powered by a kid on a bike.
The machine wasn’t all that complex; all it really did was take rubber tubing and slice it up into rubber bands. Most of the rubber they used for the machine ended up being scraps of inner tubes from tire manufacturing, as given the wartime production climate of the communist government, there were plenty of those around. They would take the scrap tubing thrown out from production, and use those to make rubber bands.
Eventually, they got enough money to try escaping again. They were more discreet this time, dressing themselves up to look like beggars before buying bus tickets with all the money the family had earned and saved from their black market dealings. The bus was meant to take them to a dock to board a ship, and there was a doctor onboard the bus. Word was going around that if a baby ever started crying on the bus, then it’d have to be drugged with a sleeping pill. The doctor relented, saying that doing so wasn’t safe, though he was drowned out by the other side. However, inevitably, a baby onboard the bus did in fact start crying, and it was too late by the time the baby quieted down. The bus had no air conditioning, and so the windows were opened by the passengers. The baby’s crying alerted the dogs of many of the townspeople, whose barking then alerted more, and more, and so on. The bus halted, and everybody was told to scatter. My dad and his brother managed to hide behind a building, but not everyone was so lucky. Eventually, the communist police forces arrived, and brought many of the people on the bus into a line in front of the bus, where they were searched for any valuables or money. Those who had any amount of riches were given harsher or longer sentences in the work camps, while those with little were treated much better. The people who brought jewelry and cash with them were quick to try and hide their valuables by either tying them into their belts, stuffing it into their pants, or even simply throwing it on the ground behind them. However, the police were certainly smarter than this, even with how corrupt they were. Officers snuck behind the passengers, catching the belongings that were tossed to the ground, which let them know who should be arrested for owning “riches”. Of course, these officers also stuffed said valuables into their pockets for quick and easy cash for themselves as well. Now being absolutely dirt-poor, my dad’s family was spared. Though, he and his brother remained hidden anyway until the next morning, where, upon peeking around the corner, they discovered that the bus just so happened to be passing by a police building, which explained why the response was so sudden and rapid. Before they could do anything else, however, they heard a voice: “What are you two doing, hiding behind there?”
Of course, he and his brother were then arrested as well. Though, because they themselves were poor, they only spent about two months in the work camps instead. Upon being let out, they would try one last time to get out of the country, and this time, they succeeded.
Given my political leanings, somehow I don't think your dad and I would get along. Until recently, I lived a few miles from Orange County's Little Saigon, and most older Vietnamese expats are extremely conservative.
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Both my mom and dad are centrist leaning Democratic.
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Centrist democrats don't tend to really like communists like myself.
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Ok
Such an amazing story your family has. Getting away from this horrible situation