The Price of Freedom
by Tammy Trinh
When Vietnam became a Communist regime, survival was difficult at best. The country's history of turmoil did nothing to prepare us for the harshness of the conditions we endured. The French colonized my country in the 1800s, Japan invaded us during World War II. Then in 1954, the country split in two, regaining independence from the French, but dividing us, north and south, with the north controlled by the communist party, and the south by a republic. The north was supported by China, the south by the U.S. and other western democracies. The Vietnam War occurred when Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Cong from the north sought to unify the country. The U.S. supported the south, but conceded in 1973, leaving us in a state of severe economic hardship, which in turn led to a mass exodus of refugees from Vietnam all over the world.
I grew up in central Vietnam, in a small city, Quang Ngai, not too far from Da Nang. Like Saigon, we were in the south, and we were overtaken by the Viet Cong. We fled to the U.S. in 1981, not the first of our attempts to escape from the horrible conditions we were living in. I was a former U.S. government-related employee, and because of that I had to escape Da Nang, where I lived and worked, to hide my identity. If I had been caught, I would have been sent to an "education camp," which is essentially forced labor imprisonment. There you have to work for food, converting jungle to farmland to make money for the government. They work you to death.
When I left Da Nang, they took my house. But I settled into a new city, and with what little I had left of my savings, I bought a small fashion boutique, selling women's clothes for about a year. Then the government took it away from me. They said everything had to be owned by the government, thousands of owner-operated businesses were taken over. Along with confiscating my business, they forced my eight- year-old daughter go collect recycled items for her school to sell, sending her out at 5 a.m. every morning before classes started. They told the children that laboring for school is your privilege; and at the same time, we had to pay for our children to be able to stay in elementary school. On top of all this, they were politically brain-washing the children. My kids brought home horrible homework assignments, for example, there was a math exercise that read "If there are ten Americans, and you kill five, how many are left?" and "If you have three guns, and someone gives you two more, how many guns do you have?"
The Viet Cong controlled and watched us, teaching our children to report on what we did, said, and even ate at home. We were only allowed limited amounts of rice and meat from the government. If we wanted more, we had to buy it from the black market, and if we did, they'd question where we got the money to pay for it. They used us, making everyone work at hard labor with little benefit. The Communist regime wanted the people to live in poverty, so they could control us with the daily necessities of life. For all these reasons, and for the sake of our children, we were ready to risk our lives to escape Vietnam.
First, we tried to build a boat to escape. My uncle had a friend who lived in a fishing village. He helped us build it. We gave him the money to buy the materials, but one of his neighbors noticed and reported what he was building to the authorities. He was taken in for questioning, and they confiscated his materials - we lost all the money we'd spent. Another time we paid a woman who organized an escape through my older sister. Two months later, when my sister arrived at the woman's house to confirm the journey, the woman's son said she'd killed herself. It turned out she was only collecting money from the people who wanted to escape and using it on herself instead. When people began to find out, they wanted her to pay them back or go to jail for stealing their money. Because she was afraid to go to jail, she committed suicide.
So many times, we gave deposits to people who said they could help us leave the country but instead just disappeared, and we could do nothing about it, because everything had to be done in secret. More than two million Vietnamese people had tried to get out of the country, some leaving by boat, some by foot, reaching neighboring countries like Cambodia and Thailand. Hundreds of thousands of those who escaped may have died at sea or in the jungle. But because of the cruelty of the Viet Cong, everyone wanted to leave, no matter the risk or the cost. We were no exception. And then, when we finally were able to leave, to find an organizer and get on a boat, I lost my beloved son Hung Tran.
Coming to the U.S., and writing this story is my way of honoring him, and my way to let my other children, grandchildren, and our generations to come, realize just how valuable it is to find freedom, no matter what the cost.
***After trying so many times to leave, our family was financially exhausted, emotionally depleted, and on the verge of giving up. But one day in 1981, by chance, my then-husband met an agent who organized escape trips. Unlike the others we had tried to work with before him, he was successful at it; he planned these trips for a living. Because there were so many thieves involved in organizing such a journey, it was essential to find someone we trusted. It seemed as if we could trust him. The organizer my husband found introduced us to a group of three other families, one of the husbands among those families was my husband's friend. Together, the three of us shared the cost of the trip. One family owned the boat we were to take and was paid fifty percent of the boat's value for using it. Another family provided food, water, and supplies, and the third family provided the money for the organizer, and necessary bribes to the local authorities.
Together, the families agreed how many people each family could bring - the number ended up being ten family members each, for a total of 40 passengers. The limit had to be set because of the boat size, which measured 10 meters long by 3 meters wide. It was a river boat, typically used for carrying cut firewood for local businesses, and not meant for the open ocean. Our family's group of ten consisted of myself and my five children, my daughter Trang, then age 10, and my 4 sons: Phu 9, Phong 8, Hung 5 and Thien 4. My niece Tuyen 20, a close friend of mine named Hoa and her two sons, 10 and 12, and my business colleague's son, Khanh age 19, made up our planned group total of ten. We chose the April 28, 1981, as our departure date. It was chosen because the new Vietnamese government would be busy: April 30th is a big holiday, a celebration of the north taking over South Vietnam. There would be fewer security checks on our activities. It was also the last day in the March lunar calendar, so there would be no moon to shine on us and expose us as we snuck out that night. Perhaps most importantly of all, the weather was predicted to be good that week.
With the date for our departure decided, and imminent, my family and I took the bus from Saigon to Ba Ria province, bound for a fishing village near the Tung Tau resort. We rented a farmhouse there. The owners agreed to house us secretly until we left. Late that afternoon, all forty of us arrived, squeezing into the tiny house, using only sign language, or whispering, to keep our presence there as quiet as possible. We had a very simple dinner provided by the owner of the house. It was difficult to eat, we were all so anxious to leave.
When night finally came, our guide arrived, and led us from the house on a walk through a muddy rice field. We crawled most of the way, dragging ourselves along the rough, uneven, mud-caked ground. It was dark and damp, and the green, wet smell of the field surrounded us. I carried my youngest, Thien, my youngest. My niece Tuyen carried some of our personal belongings, including extra food, medicines, a few sets of clothing for all of us, and a couple of light blankets. Khanh, my business colleague's son, helped carry Hung. My daughter Trang and my two older sons Phu and Phong walked by themselves.
The rice field went on endlessly, a dark, undulating sea of mud and green. We'd been walking about ninety minutes when I heard a familiar voice mumbling.
"I stepped on something, my feet hurt. It's hard to walk, and I can't see…"
I reached behind me, and I touched the speaker's hand.
"Is that you, Don?" I asked, incredulous.
My brother's oldest son, ten years old, replied "Yes, it's me."
"How did you come to be here?" I asked.
"We're going with you, my mother, and my brothers and sisters are up ahead in front of us," he replied.
I couldn't see them in the darkness. "What about your father? I asked.
"I don't know, I don't see him," he said.
This was all such a surprise to me. I wasn't aware that my brother and his family were joining us on this trip. I certainly didn't seem any of them at the house we were hiding in before our walk began. When we first started planning the trip, our agent told us another trip would be organizing soon, the one we were scheduled to join was too crowded. My brother agreed to wait, so why was his family joining our group now? I didn't know what was happening, but I soon found out that only my sister-in-law and their five children were aboard. The greedy organizing agent had in fact collected money from my brother to let him as well as his family join us, but in the end forced him to stay behind, because he wanted more money. It was all about greed. It took four years for my brother to leave the country, and make a harsh journey of his own.
But at the time, I didn't know any of this. I only knew that we were still walking another hour later. My kids were scared and tired.
"How much longer, mother?" they asked me.
I kept saying the same thing over and over "Soon."
The truth was I had no idea how much longer we would have to go. But finally, we reached the riverbank, our feet aching, our bodies muddy, wet, and cold. At this point we'd walked about three hours in that rice field.
There were a couple smaller boats on the water, a little bigger than a canoe, their outlines barely visible on this moonless night. These were our "shuttles" or "taxi boats." Because they were so small, we had to split into a few small groups, children and women climbing into the boats first, and the men following in different taxis.
They brought us to the main boat about midnight. We were asked to group together and be counted. As we fell into our individual family groups, I had another surprise. My sister-in-law and her five children were counted in as part of our group - along with my neighbor, a man and his son who lived two doors down from us. His presence was another surprise. It turned out that he had been secretly watching and following us every time we attempted an escape, and this time, when we finally made it - he followed us along, grouping in with us.
My husband handled the arrangements for this journey, so I didn't really know who else was going with us, except for Hoa and her two sons and my business colleague's son, Khanh. That was how our neighbor was able to join us because I wasn't aware of all the details - but he'd never paid for the trip at all; he lied and said that my husband had collected the necessary money from him and his son.
At the time I was more concerned with having eight extra people in my group than the finances of the journey. Everyone was trying to clamber onto this main boat, and there was only so much room to be had. It wasn't only the extra eight people in my group that was so concerning and confusing. I saw so many kids and unfamiliar faces boarding, it seemed like too many people. And all the time we were fighting the clock, trying not to let the authorities know what we were doing. Everything needed to be fast and quiet. The main boat was already moving as we taxied up to it.
I tried to push my kids, my brother's kids, and my niece onto the boat. Kahn and Hoa, along with her two children, got on by themselves. I was so busy pushing everyone up onto the boat, that at first, I didn't even realize the main boat was speeding up, and there I am left behind. At this point I was standing in the water, and as the main boat started to move, the water was getting deeper, all the way up to my chest. I called out "Wait for me, I can't get on!" I was terrified they'd leave without me. As the bigger boat moved, the water was up to my neck. It was scary, here were all these other people trying to get on, and no one was paying any attention to me standing in the water. But suddenly, someone bent down and held my feet, lifting my body, pushing me up to the boat. To this day, I don't know who that someone was, although I think it was someone who worked with the agent organizing the trip. Fortunately, it worked. I was pushed up out of the water, and I made it on board. I was soaking wet and cold, but on the boat. I was shivering, but I wasn't thinking about how I felt. The first thing I had to do was find my kids.
The boat was very crowded, and no one seemed to be able to settle down, because not everyone could find a place to sit in the boats hold. Most of the passengers were standing up, as was I. There was a wooden bar encircling the boat, about eight inches wide. Some people tried to sit on it, but it was too narrow, it would only hold about half of your body. I put one foot on the bar, one foot on the floor of the boat hold to keep myself from falling whenever a wave rose out of the river, shaking the boat as the tide fluctuated.
As the boat pushed on through the water, I started wondering just why the boat was carrying so many people. The vessel was only supposed to hold 40 of us, and there were eight extra people in my group alone. But it was more crowded than having just an extra eight passenger aboard. How many people were on this boat, anyway? As I struggled to keep my balance, I started counting the people. There were 86 of us! It was shocking and it was scary. There were too many people and too much weight. The agent organizing the trip had been greedy; he collected fees from people none of us knew, younger adults, who would've paid any price, and likely asked very few questions, just to get out of the country. None of them were familiar to us, but who was going to say anything now? If we made noise, the police patrol could catch us, and we'd end up in jail. The group organizer probably counted on our silence, and he was right about that.
All we could do was silently go along with the way things were. But there was no room to sit, and something had to be done about that. So, people began throwing things in the water, to make room. No one cared what it was they were tossing overboard, if a bag or an item was in their way, they threw it from the boat. Among the items that went over were my bag of medicine, my bag with extra food for my kids, and a roll of toilet paper in which I'd concealed ten one-hundred U.S. dollar bills. I'd hidden it in case we were caught by policeman before we boarded the boat. After all, if anyone found out I was carrying American money, they'd become suspicious that we were going to try to escape the country. But now, that money, like just about everything I brought, was gone.
The boat started to go faster and faster. We needed to get past the security check point before daylight broke. The trip organizers threw a dark plastic sheet over us all huddled in the hold, so no security guards or police boats could see us. It was suffocating under that plastic sheet, and we were all too scared to move, hunched up with barely any room under the damp, thick plastic. It felt like there was no more air to breathe as the hours ticked by. It took almost eight hours before they lifted the cover again. We were past the security check point, but we still had not reached international waters. The police patrol could still catch us if they had seen us. The kids were all crying. Some people were getting seasick, vomiting. Others were just complaining and moaning. I was still in my impossible one-foot-balanced position against that eight-inch board. I prayed and talked to myself, trying to reassure myself that I'd done the right thing, that we'd be okay, we'd get through this nightmare. "I have to be strong to take care of my children and help my nieces and nephews to go through this. They're here without my brother, I know I have to help them too." I just kept telling myself to be strong, and thankfully, I didn't get sick, and I was able to get through that night and the next day.
By the time the evening of the second day came, the boat was starting to take on water. The passengers were exhausted. My son Hung was getting a fever. He was hungry, he was thirsty, but there was nothing to give him to eat or drink after the passengers threw everything into the ocean to make room for themselves to sit. Hung was such a caring, sweet, and smart child. As thirsty and hungry as he was, he thought of others. When he heard my nephew complaining about his thirst, my son said "Mom, give Don some water." I didn't know what to do for Hung. I'd packed medicines that could've helped with everything - upset stomach, fever, headache, pain. I'd had bandages and sugar mixed with lemon juice that I dried for the trip to help keep us strong, but now everything was all gone. Hung was getting weaker from the cold air, his thirst, his hunger, his fever, but I knew I was helpless to do anything until we reached Malaysia, which the agent for the trip told us would take four days.
The plan was to avoid the waters around Thailand because there was great concern over pirates from that country. There were so many stories about these pirates, known to rob, rape, and kill passengers on the refugee boats.Although most of us had no food or water, the boat had a small cabin that was occupied by the family who originally owned the boat, a mother and son and their family. There was some food and drink in that cabin. Everyone in the original group had contributed to the cost of the boat, but the originally owners still claimed it was their boat, and that they had the right to that cabin.
As we reached the open sea, water from big waves began to splash into the boat, which was never really designed for such a journey in the open ocean. Some of the men found a small bucket and took turns using it to bail out the water.When they tired, I took over. I would not let us drown. I was the only woman who was actively helping. Even Hoa, my sister-in-law, and my niece, did not help. They were too seasick and tired. They leaned back against that narrow wooden bar, using their arms and elbows as if they were clips to hang onto the edge of the boat backwards, miserable, and sick. I just kept bailing the water out of the boat, even though I was the only one doing it for a while.
And meanwhile, Hung's condition was getting worse. His fever rose terribly. He began to jump around, screaming "I am hot, it is so hot, give me some water, please!" I tried to hold him as he started to panic, jumping and climbing on people. They pushed him off, complaining and cursing at me for not taking care of him. My youngest son Thien began to cry. He was holding onto me so tightly. I called on the boat's original owner to please give us some food and water, but they ignored me. They said it was my husband's fault - everything we were experiencing - because he must have tried to get more people on board the boat. They didn't see or didn't care to see that I was a victim, too, or that what they were suggesting was impossible. He would never have found, much less allowed, 86 people in our group instead of the original 40. Really, they were just using their accusations as an excuse to hold on to the small amount of water and food in their cabin for themselves. My niece finally calmed Thien down and he fell asleep. But Hung was delirious, still climbing around, miserable, shouting, begging for help. Finally, Khanh took him up to the front of the boat to get some fresh air, away from the crush of bodies in the hold.
Between caring for my children and bailing the water from the boat, I was growing exhausted and weak. My niece Tuyen had a small spot to sit, perched half on that wooden bar, and she told me to take it. "Auntie, you need to sit down and rest," she said. Gratefully, I took her place, with my arms and elbows bent backwards as hers had been on the edge of the boat to keep myself from falling. Somehow, I passed out, too exhausted to stay awake. I don't know how long I was out before the sound of a heavy wave crashing into the boat woke me. It was the morning of the third day. Thien was still assleep on the floor of the boat. At first, I could not find Hung - but then, when I did find him, I recoiled in horror. He was trapped against the floor of the boat hold. My sister-in-law, in her weakness and sickness had fallen asleep herself, literally sitting on his head. His face was pressed down against the ship's boards. His nose and mouth were virtually blocked from breathing, and he was so sick that he was too weak to fight back and push Hoa's weight away. I pulled him out. His face was a terrible pale gray, his eyes looked lazy, just floating aimlessly in his head. His body felt spineless, as if he had no bones. He was still breathing, but weakly. I asked the boat owner to please let him go up to the cabin, so he could have a dry place to lie. At this point, the boat hold was soaking wet with sea water and human urine and vomit. The owner agreed, and Khan helped me carry Hung up to the cabin. One kind person gave me a pack of ginseng tea for Hung to drink. We had no cup for the tea, so I asked Khanh to retrieve an empty formula can I'd seen back in the hold, used by a baby. He set Hung down again on the deck and began to crawl his way to the far end of the boat again to retrieve that can. But the tide was rising, and at just at that moment, an enormous wave hit the boat, causing it to shake and lurch from one side to another. Everyone on board was screaming, their voices wild with panic. And as the boat lurched, Khan was thrown into the ocean. There were more screams. I prayed. The helmsman turned the boat back to rescue Khan. The waves were so strong, and the boat was too small to fight the toss and tumult of the water.
The helmsman had great difficulty with the boat. He was in his late 40s, a step sergeant from the South Vietnamese Navy who'd been discharged due to his health. It turned out he knew nothing about driving a boat or using a sea map or compass, although he'd told the organizer and agent as well as the passengers that he was in the Navy for years and knew everything about navigating a boat. Had he not lied, things would have been so much better for us all. But now, here we were, under his care. Back and forth we rocked, the boat leaning to one side and then the other, all of us on board terrified the boat would sink. The helmsman was fighting with the waves, making big turns, three in all, until one of the passengers was able to throw a rope over the side for Khan to catch. Each time the rope was thrown, Khan missed it. Fortunately, he knew how to swim, and swim well. Fighting against the water, Khan finally caught the rope. It took three men in all to pull him up. From all the swimming, fighting those waves, struggling for the rope, Khan was very tired and weak. Like the rest of us, he had not eaten anything or had anything to drink for three days. He sagged down into the boat hold again and fell unconscious. Khan could not help me or Hung now.
Another woman on the boat finally got a container for me to use to soak the ginseng tea. When I did, I tried to pour a little at a time into Hung's mouth, but he was no longer able to open it, he was that weak. Desperately, I tried to force a spoon between his lips, but no matter how hard I tried, I could not get them open. I forced harder and harder - I broke his two upper teeth, prying his mouth. Some of the ginseng did finally get into his mouth, but now he couldn't swallow. His breathing became more and more shallow and uneven. His face grew purple as I watched him, helplessly. I was holding him in my own two hands when I felt him let go of his body. I knew that it was too late to save him. My heart broke as I held him. I was completely unable to help as my son left this world. I was crying and screaming. I was cursing at Hoa because she'd sat on Khan, smothering him unintentionally. Hoa sobbed, bowing before me, saying "I am sorry. I did not mean to. You can scream, yell, curse, or even kill me if you want, but I didn't know that I was sitting on him!" I had no idea what to say or do. What can anyone do in such a terrible situation. My son was gone! The sky was falling! I can't begin to describe the pain inside me.
I blamed my husband because he did not come with us. If he'd been here, maybe we could've saved Hung together. I blamed the extra people who'd crowded on the boat, making it heavier, slower, and causing the loss of important belongings that I'd prepared to help my children. If the boat was not so crowded, I wouldn't have been so tired from standing up and bailing water, and I could've had the energy I needed to take care of my son. I blamed myself, because if I hadn't fallen into an exhausted asleep, I could've kept an eye on Hung, and he would not have slipped down into the bottom of the hold, and Hoa would not have accidentally smothered him. I blamed myself for not leaving any of my children behind in Vietnam, because I thought I could take care of them.
Awash in guilt, I started saying I killed my son. I had no strength to protect him. I was unable to save him.
I cried out, "I am weak, useless, helpless."
I didn't want to live without Hung. I kept crying and crying, sobbing myself sick and breathless until I fell unconscious. When I came to again, my niece Tuyen was patting my back, crying.
"Aunt," she said, "you have to be strong and take care of your health. Remember that we still have a long way to go, and you still have four children to take care of."
I realized she was right. My other four children were my responsibility. I pulled myself together. I was still holding Hung in my arms, but I put his body down then, and I said "My dear son, I am so sorry, I am a useless, helpless mother, I brought you with me for a dream, to get you a free life, to get you a better education, get you a much better life. I wanted you to be able to eat as much of your favorite fruit cocktail, as you ever wanted to eat. But now you have left us. I know you just needed food, water, a place to rest, and more care and attention than I could provide. I failed you. I am so sorry, my dear. I love you so much. I will miss you forever."
I told him, "You will be in my heart as long as I live."
I turned to Buddha and prayed, "Please my Lord Buddha, forgive me for failing my son, and please take my son to the heaven where he does not have to suffer anymore. Please help us reach our destination soon. Right now, we don't know where we are and how long we are going to be here. In front of us is a vast ocean with big heavy waves, our life is in the hands of God and Buddha."
Some of the people on the boat did not want Hung's remains near them, so they asked me to move with his body to the very far end of the boat. My other four children and I went, along with Hung's body. I wrapped Hung in a blanket I found in the back. It was filthy, and smelled of urine and vomit, but it was all I had. I laid him next to me, with the hope that we would get to land soon so I could bury him. There in the back of the boat, I was finally able to fully sit.On the fourth day, we still had no idea where we were. We saw some ships far off in the distance, and we all began to wave, to scream. We signaled SOS, we burned some clothes to get the attention of the crew, but they didn't see us, and they sailed away.
On the 5th day, soaking wet from the heavy waves, and lying in the sun, Hung's remains were beginning to decompose. Horrifically, when I looked at him, his eyes were popping from his face. All I wanted was a place to bury him, but I could not even get that for him. All I could do was cry. There was no sign of land, and the boat hung low, heavier and slower in the water, because no one had the energy to bail.
On the 6th day, we saw a bright light coming from far away. Everyone was happy and excited, thinking a ship had come to rescue us. One of their crew jumped across to our boat as theirs pulled close, and tied our rope to their boat, pulling us along with them for hours. We didn't know where they were taking us, but that didn't matter anymore. We were all just thinking, so thankfully, "Now we are saved." We were all calmer now, waiting, resting, preparing for rescue.
***While the ten $100 dollar bills that I'd hidden in a roll of toilet paper were already lost at sea, I still had a few valuable belongings: a 24k gold chain necklace sewn around the seam line of my pants and another in my blouse, where I'd intentionally hid them. When we were tied to the boat, I took my jewelry out and fastened it with a safety pin inside the pocket of my blouse. I'd been told that when a rescue ship finds you, they give you clean clothes to replace the dirty ones you would be wearing that could bring germs on the ship, so I wanted to be sure not to lose my few precious pieces of jewelry. I'd already placed my diamond earrings and a wedding ring in each of my son's pants pockets.
At about sunset, the ship stopped pulling us. The put an anchor down, tying our boat closer, tight to theirs. Three swarthy, muscular men who looked like body builders boarded our boat. They were wearing only short shorts, small and tight as underwear, and one carried a gun, the other two held sticks that looked like baseball bats. They were not there to rescue us, these men. They were pirates.
All the same, they brought us some rice soup and a bucket of water. We were all happy and so excited just to have the food, which once we'd consumed it, some of our energy returned, at least enough to move around our boat. Once the sun was completely down, they demanded we board their ship. I suppose they waited until dark to rob us to avoid being seen, should a Navy police patrol come by. After six days without food or water, despite the food, with the boat shaking in the water, we had only enough energy to crawl over. Once we were aboard, they separated men from women and made us undress. It wasn't until then that we all fully realized we'd been caught by the kind of Thai pirate ship we'd been seeking to avoid. They searched our clothes and our bodies, even touching our private parts, searching for anything valuable we might have concealed. Of course, they didn't have to look far to find my jewelry in the pockets of my blouse and my son's pants. After a few hours of searching us, we were told to put our clothes back on and return to our boat.
The sun was rising on the 7th day as we returned to our own vessel. I went to check on Hung's remains first thing, only to find that the pirates had thrown his body into the water. I began to sob loudly, thinking that now my son could become shark food. At that point, I felt that I couldn't hold myself up anymore. The other passengers tried to comfort me and offered prayers for him. "He's gone," I wailed. "...with the waves. But forever you're in my heart, my dear son, and I pray your soul will be in Heaven even if your body will be in the stomach of a fish," I sobbed. Having robbed us, the pirates let us go peacefully. We knew that we were in Thai waters, pirates' territory. Everyone was scared, worried about what would happen next, but just praying for the best. We blamed the helmsman of our boat for not knowing the way to Malaysia and getting us stuck in Thailand.
During the day, the hot sun burnt our skin, while at night it grew freezing cold. The boat rocked up and down, up and down, in the high tide and darkness. We felt it could sink at any time. We saw another light shining far away, and even though we were afraid of more pirates, we still had hope. So, we sent up an SOS signal, and we burned some more of our leftover clothes, hoping the ship would see us, but little by little, the ship grew farther away. The same situation repeated itself several more times over the next two days, and without any more food or water, we soon grew sick and weak again.
On the morning of the 8th day, another pirate ship spotted us. This time we were expecting them, and we had no other choice than to face whatever happened and pray. Like the other pirate crew, this boat came near us and tied our boat to their ship. Once again, we were given food and water. Then, just like the other pirate crew, they waited until the sun was down to rob us. This time there were four of them, and this time their faces were mean as devils. Because we had already been robbed, they found very little gold and money left, so they grew angry. They pushed us back on our boat, and threw down everything we had left, our few blankets and towels and clothes. We scrambled to get on our boat. One of our passenger's was trying to help his pregnant wife reboard our boat carefully. But a pirate got angry because he was moving too slowly for his liking, and he shot the man in his neck. He was left to lie half on our boat and half on the pirate ship, bleeding, screaming crying. Two other passengers helped the poor man into our boat. I was terrified. Although I had grown up in the middle of the Vietnam War, I'd never actually seen anyone shot and bleeding in front of me.
After the shooting, the pirates seemed afraid. We guessed they thought we might report them to the authorities. So, one of them went down to the engine room of our boat and destroyed the engine and shot our mechanic. Another took two of the young girls from our ship as captives. One was the niece of the boat's owner. We prayed for the girls because we knew what was likely to happen to them - rape and murder. After kidnapping the girls, the pirate ship sailed away with its bright light, and we were left alone in the dark in the heavy waves. Even now I still can see how dark it was in my nightmares. There was no moon, no stars that we could see. It was the darkest night ever in my life, we could not even see our hands in front of us, in part because of the contrast from the bright beam of the pirate ship's light which was now gone. The adults were all screaming and yelling, trying to find their kids, their loved ones. I was no different. My children, my niece, and I were all separated. As I searched for them in the confusion and the dark, I accidentally ended up in the engine room.
The mechanic was sobbing. "I got shot, I am bleeding, can someone help me."
I crawled closer to the sound of his voice, feeling for him with my hand. He reached out for me and pulled my hand to his wound. He was shot in his lower right leg. My hand grew wet with his blood when I touched it.
"Do you have anything to stop the bleeding?" he asked.
I had nothing left except my blouse and a pair of pants - but then thinking quickly, I realized I still had my bra. So, I took it off and tied it around the wound as a tourniquet. My action helped him for a while, but a few days later, when we finally reached land, he died.
Once I'd helped him as best I could, I groped my way out of the engine room and went on searching for my children and my brother's children. My sister-in-law remained ill since the beginning of our journey, and my niece and I were left to look after the children. They were all my responsibility now. I kept calling their names, calling for help, but I received no answers and no help. My worry increased. The congestion on the boat was such that I could not find them, I could not even make my way through the darkness. I had an idea to get some more room, so that my family - and the other families all searching for their children and loved ones - could more easily find each other.
I asked the young men on board to help. "Can you please get off the boat and get down into the water. Hang on to the rope that is attached around the sides of the boat, so we have more room, and we can find and bring our children to us. It's not just for my children, it's for everyone's children on this boat.
I said, "Young men, you are so cowardly. I will be the first to go."
My niece Tuyen tried to stop me, crying out, "Please help my aunt, she is crazy from losing her son, don't let her go down into the water, please, instead you young, strong men go to help us find our children."
But I was already in the water, holding the rope. Clinging to it, I swam from the front to the back of boat, yelling, screaming, begging for help. The boat's owner began to curse at the men, seeing what I was doing. "You cowards, look at her, she is a woman, but has more strength than you, shame on you!"
After he spoke, one man jumped in, joining me, and then another, and another. The boat grew less crowded, until I was able to climb back on board myself with more room to look for the children. I found my son Phong, sitting in the place we had been sitting, in the back of the boat; Phu was up by the steering wheel in the cabin. Thien was next to my niece Tuyen in the middle of the boat. I couldn't find my daughter Tran, so I kept calling her name, screaming for her. I was panicked, sure she was dead.
I cried, "Please don't die on me, daughter, please, please!"
Finally, one of the men found her. She was caught under a massive pile of wet blankets and towels. She told me she'd heard me but couldn't answer, she could barely get her breath, and under the weight of all that wet fabric, she thought she was dead until the man pulled her out. I held her, hugging and kissing her, and thanking God and Buddha for saving my daughter.A little light began to show in the sky. The horrible night was over. Thank God and Buddha, all my kids were okay! Next, I found my nieces and nephews. They were all over the boat, except for my youngest niece, who was hanging onto her mother like a little monkey hangs on to its mother. My sister was so ill and weak, all she could do was hold herself against the side of the boat, using her arms and elbows like hooks, a way of holding on that gave her terrible ulcers on her skin.
As the sun rose on our ninth day on the boat, the men clinging to the side came back on board. Everyone looked as if they were dying, skin yellow, one part or another of each person's body covered with a rash or ulcers. They all looked like death trees. Some had lost their voices; they could not even raise their voices in prayer. There is a vast amount of water in the ocean, but no one can drink it. Looking at the other passengers, I felt so much pity for them and for us. This is the price for freedom, I thought. We need water and food! I kept praying. Surprisingly, after I went into the ocean, soaking my skin while I clung to the side of the boat, I felt better. I felt refreshed, almost as if I was able to drink a lot of water. Then I remembered reading an article in a magazine many years earlier. I recalled it saying that when people don't drink water for a long time, their bodies essentially dry up. But, if they can soak their bodies in water, even if the water is not drinkable - like the ocean water - they absorb some of the moisture through their skin. When it gets into the body in that way, it is almost as if they were able to drink some water. Now I felt glad that I had submerged myself in the sea. So, I started using my hands as buckets, pouring water from the ocean over my children, my nieces, and my nephews. I told everyone on the boat they should do the same. It was almost like a magic tonic, because everyone began feeling better, they were able to move a little more, open their eyes, they were coming back to life at least a little bit. But we were all still suffering. At night, it was still freezing cold, and during the day, the sun burnt our skin, and caused rashes. My poor children cried and complained.
I told them, "Even though you are suffering from sunburn and from cold, you're still alive. I don't know how long we are going to be here; I don't know what is going to happen to us, but you are still alive.". One night, we got some rain, not much, but enough for everyone to open their mouths to the sky and catch some water. We were still in the middle of nowhere. Another two days passed. We kept trying to signal ships we'd see in the distance, but we had no luck.Everyone kept praying and sobbing. We were all sure we were going to die; we told our last words to our families. Usually, I try to encourage people with a story or a joke, to make people laugh and feel better if they are stressed and worried. But now I felt like I was dying too. I was helpless. I couldn't do anything.
On the afternoon of the eleventh day at sea, clouds covered the sky, and the wind began to blow heavily. The sun had only just risen, but it disappeared in the coming storm. At that moment, another ship began sailing toward us at high speed. We all said, "It is another pirate ship again." Most of us were not that worried. We were afraid, but we were sure we would die anyway, whether at the hands of pirates or in the coming storm. One big wave rising over our boat from a strong tide, and we would all be gone. Imagine a very small boat with a heavy load, more than 80 people rocking in that tiny, fragile vessel, lost in the middle of a vast ocean in a rising storm. The ship came closer. Unlike the other pirates, these men did not tie our boat to theirs. Instead, a big, macho looking man swam over to our boat. He went into our engine room as we sat motionless, sure we would die soon. He found the mechanic bleeding, but he said nothing, and we did not question him. He went back to his ship, and then returned to our boat with tools, accompanied by one other man. They went into the engine room and fixed the engine for us. They worked for over two hours on it.
While these two men were working on the engine, another two men brought us a bucket of water, and another brought rice soup, eggs, and milk for the kids. We thought that our prayers to God and Buddha were heard. We'd survived, and these men were fixing our engine and feeding us. They were angels sent to save us. After a few hours of hard work, the engine started again. The men looked happy, and they cleaned up their tools and seemed ready to leave our boat. One of the men spoke to our helmsman. No one understood the Thai language, but with hand gestures, we all knew he was showing us where we should go. But despite all this kindness, evil and the devil still apparently occupied a part of their minds. And when they left our boat, they took two young girls with them. The mother and the fiancé of the two kidnapped girls wept badly. Everyone on board tried to comfort them, and we thanked them, too, for sacrificing their girls to the men who had rescued us. We did not want the girls to go with the men, but there was no way to stop it from happening. It seemed as if we'd paid for these pirates' work and food with the two girls. To this day, I think about those girls, and I wonder if they are alive or dead. Whatever happened to them, I give thanks to them for their sacrifice, and I pray for them.
After the men left, our helmsmen drove the boat for a few more hours. The sky kept getting darker and we knew a heavy storm was coming. Everyone began to pray loudly. But soon, the helmsman saw coconut leaves floating in the water. He shouted, "Look we are safe now."
"Don't speak too soon," we said, although we could see coconut trees in the distance, and the rooftops of houses, and the sand of the shoreline.
He turned the boat toward the shore, and we were all so happy. We could see, as we came closer, motorcyclists in police uniforms going up and down along the shore. We saw that some of them had a man on the back seat of their bikes, and those men were pointing long guns at us. They were waving at us, waving us away, giving us the message "Do not come, we will shoot you." We were all scared, realizing these people didn't want us to land. We asked the helmsman to turn the boat away from the shore again. As soon as he did so, the men on the back of the bikes put their guns down on their laps and signaled us to go straight out with their hands.
We kept going straight for a while, perhaps an hour, until they disappeared. Then we started to slowly turn in to where we could still see trees and houses again. All the time, the sky was getting darker and darker, and a thunderstorm was rumbling through the clouds. The rain began to pound down on us. We were scared. If we kept going in weather like this, we would die from the storm and the waves. The helmsman sped up and began to turn the boat in toward shore again. Fortunately, this time, no one stopped us from coming. It took us about an hour to get close to the shore, in waters that were still very deep. As we rode the sea in closer, the helmsman stopped the engine in case any of the locals got suspicious of our boat and threatened or shot at us. We just floated quietly toward the shore.
Suddenly, two young local men in a canoe appeared out of nowhere. They got down into the water and pulled our boat in until we reached the bottom of the shoreline. We were so happy to get off the boat. We were hurrying, but the two guys told us to go slowly, to make sure the boat was balanced, because the water was still deep. If the boat was to lean too much on one side, it could sink. Like the boat itself, our minds were not at all in balance. We were leaning too much. We had been on the boat so long, we couldn't walk. We couldn't even swim. The young men helped us one by one to get off the boat, and they pulled us to shore. We were near a village, and more people came out to help us. They guided us to the shore, pulling us in, and helping us lie down on the sand.
We just lay there in the rain, on the beach, until we could stand, and then we walked slowly to a little hut where fishermen rest when they come in from a day's work. Women came with water and rice soup to feed us. Outside the hut, the rain was pouring down, the wind grew heavier and more intense, and the big storm crashed down. We prayed. We thanked God and Buddha we were saved. Without their intercession we would all be gone. We ate and rested in the hut for several hours. At nightfall, a big truck appeared, and we were driven to a barn nearby. At this point it was near midnight. We asked the driver if he could take the wounded mechanic to the hospital. But the driver said the hospital was far and it was late, and he had no authority to do so. We had to wait until morning. The barn was in a poor state, with horse and cow urine and trash on the concrete floor. All the same, we lay down gratefully, free from worry for once, because we'd made it to land.
***When we woke in the morning, our 12th day since leaving Vietnam, we found the mechanic had died from blood loss. We knew his wound could've been treated if we were not in the situation that we were in. It was the same thing that had happened when I lost my son. All either of them needed was food and water and care, none of which we could give them. We prayed for the mechanic. The village chief came to visit us and allowed us to bury him at the corner of the farm not far from the barn. He instructed his people to bring food and water to us for the next several days, and to repair our boat for us, as it still had damage from the first group of pirates. While we were in the barn, we learned that all the refugee camps in Thailand were full, which was why no one was allowed to rescue any more refugees. That explained why those policemen on motorcycles in the town had pointed their guns at us to keep us away.
The storm ended on the morning of the 14th day. Policemen came with the truck to take us back to our repaired boat and give us food and water. We were not allowed to stay. We were afraid to go back to sea. In my broken English, I asked one of the policemen if we could please stay and be transferred to a refugee camp. Although he too only spoke a little English, we communicated well. He explained that his boss told him he could not bring any more people to the camps because they were already full. The other passengers asked me to plead with him. But I told them, "There is an order, he can't do anything. All they can do is help us here, now, however they can." There was no choice for us, we had to get back on the boat and head out to the ocean again. We were scared, and once again we prayed. A police boat with a machine gun in the front of it escorted us out. They were sailing behind us, with the gun pointed at us to keep us from turning back.
After three or four hours, they turned their ship back, signaling with their hands to keep going or they would shoot us, even though they knew how desperately we wanted to stay. Once their ship disappeared entirely, we all wanted the helmsman to turn the boat back to the shore again, even though now we saw no people or sign of life. But then, one of our passengers spotted a high flag waving from a distant ship. When we drew closer, we could see a couple people in military uniforms. These were not pirates. So, we put our SOS signal out. One of the officers came out to the front of the ship. We spoke back and forth, and we discovered the ship was a border patrol vessel from Malaysia. We'd reached the border between Thailand and Malaysia. We were so happy. Once again, we were saved!
We reached the Malaysian shore, and other border patrol officers came to escort us to a site on a beach nearby. We walked about an hour to a fenced-in area. Chicken wire was set up to contain us under some pine trees. The sand was hot, and the sun was hot, too. There wasn't much shade from the pines, which were ragged and almost devoid of needles. We stayed there on the sand until dark, waiting for the Refugee Commissioner to come take us to the refugee camp nearby. We were so happy waiting! As night fell, we felt the cold and our own exhaustion. It was a very dark night, and all we could see were two border patrolmen guarding us from a distance. We had little choice but to lie down on the sand to try and rest.
We had just begun to close our eyes, when I heard a voice of an older woman in the group, one of the passengers I had not seen since earlier on our trip. She was desperately trying to wake us up.
"Wake up, everyone!" she shouted.
"Wake up, the guards are coming to us, and there is no reason for that, nothing good."
But everyone was so tired they didn't even bother to answer. I was awake because Thien couldn't sleep, and he was tossing and turning next to me.
"Lady, what is the matter?" I asked.
"They've come to look for girls. You have to wake up," she shouted.
I heard a loud sound, "Pop, pop," and now she was screaming. "He hit me with his gun."
Then there was a moment of silence. I was so scared. I was afraid the woman was badly hurt. I saw two dark, shadowed figures pulling at the girl who'd been lying next to the older woman. The girl was saying "No, don't, no don't, please." I thought of my niece, and other women from the boat that could become victims to these guys, too. When the guards escorted us to the holding area, they'd seen the pretty young women. The devil was undoubtedly in their minds, making their mouths water for a chance to act, to take anyone they desired into those scrubby pines to rape them and kill them. No one would be any the wiser. At that moment my niece Tuyen began to shout, "They're pulling my leg, auntie!"
Khanh was also near me. I hit him on the arm, waking him. I said to hold Tuyen tight against him as if they were husband and wife. At the same time, I squeezed my finger hard against Thien's thigh, intentionally, to hurt him a little and make him cry and cause a commotion. Khanh whispered, his voice soft and scared, "They are pulling me out, they hit my leg, I'm scared."
I was upset, angry, scared, and worried all at once, for all the women in our group and their safety.
So, I became very brave, and I sat up high and screamed.
"Attention, attention. All the men in this group should know what to do. If you have a wife, a daughter, a niece, a sister, a mother with you tonight, you need to protect them. We have been through a lot to come this far, don't let these devils take your loved one away. Please wake up! Stand up and get your act together. We can fight back as a whole."
I instructed them, "Let's gather pine and make a campfire. The light will chase these devils away. Wake up. Stand up! Please, for your loved ones."
The men were scared because the guards had guns, and they were just lying there pretending they were still asleep. But after they heard me, they began to stretch and sit up. First one guy, and then another, two or three and more and more, all of them getting up and making a lot of noise, screaming and yelling "Go away, go away, devil." We started gathering the pine branches. Luckily someone had a match, and we lit a big fire that shone a light on the faces of the two guards. My plan worked. The flare of the fire and all the men standing there scared the guards off, and they ran back to their stations. As relieved as we were, none of us wanted to go back to sleep. They could come back. So instead, we stayed up all night, talking to each other.
The next day was very long for us. We were still fenced in on that beach, seated on the hot sand, under the hot sun after a sleepless night. We still had some food and water from the Thai village left on our boat, but no one had taken the provisions when we were escorted to shore. Now we were hungry and thirsty again, but we didn't know how to get back to the boat to get the food or drink. Instead, we started to walk around the fenced area hoping we could find something we could consume. We did find a little pond with some water, but it was very low. If you could scoop some water in your cup, you'd end up with one third of the water clean, two thirds of it just leaves and debris. All the same, we had nothing else, and we had to drink it. The water made us all sick. Sundown came again and still we were fenced in, hungry, and waiting. The guards announced that someone would come to take us to Pulau Bidong island, the biggest refugee camp and the closest to our location in Malaysia. But sundown came and we were still waiting. It was starting to get dark, and we were worried about spending another night here. Would there be more guards coming, too many to scare off? Would someone get raped or killed? We began to pray again.
It was about 8 p.m. on the fifteenth day of our journey. The guards came toward us. Behind them was the captain of the border patrol team calling out to us through a speaker, telling us to get ready to go with them. We were still scared as we followed him. Two of the other three guards were the men who'd tried to take our girls from us the night before. We walked for half an hour, with no idea where we were going. But - then it came! The happiest moment, the one we had been waiting for, the one some of us had begun to lose hope in, that moment came. You cannot imagine the feeling I had of relief and hope, because we had that moment after all! There in front of us were two big school buses with banners on the side that read "United Nations Refugee High Commissioner." We all broke out clapping, laughing, screaming with joy. Some of us broke down and cried. I did - tears of joy! We all lined up at the door of the bus, giving our names, date of birth, where we came from, as identification. The commissioner wrote everything on a sheet of paper with a number next to it.
There were 81 of us, stepping on to the bus. They gave us each a bottle of water and a package of snacks. We filled two busses. The guards were walking around, looking at us through the window with devil eyes. One of us on the bus gave them a thumbs down, and the guards started cursing. But we were saved. The busses began slowly moving out. It was almost midnight. But we were saved. We were saved from the Communists, the pirates, the shooting, the rapes, the waves of high tide, and these devils of border patrol guards. We'd survived 15 very tough days, two deaths, and the loss of four girls who were kidnapped at sea. We still had with us the man who was shot in his neck, but he survived. The bullet came very close to his spinal cord, so it is in him still. But as close to death as we had all come, we had our FREEDOM at last.
***Thank you very much to God! Thank you very much to Buddha! Thank you very much to our ancestors. Thank you very much to Hung, my beloved son, for helping us go through this. Thanks very much to the girls who were sacrificed for the rest of us.