The first time we tried to leave Vietnam, the boat sank. At that time, I was only 4, but I remember being on Dad’s back while he swam to the shore. Mum and Dad were separated, and one year earlier, she had left by boat for Hong Kong with the intention of supporting my...
When I was 10 months old, my parents bought tickets to escape Vietnam on an overcrowded fishing vessel with 363 people onboard. It was really scary for them because they had heard many stories of boats capsizing, and of pirates. They had got married just before the...
It took us 3 near death attempts to escape communist Vietnam. The first time, I was six years old. Of the three boats, one made it to resettlement, one completely sank, and ours started sinking, until luckily 5 hours later a fisherman’s boat came by and rescued us. My...
(2/2) At first, Mum joined Dad selling stuff outside the temple, but finally after six years, they decided to immigrate to Australia for a better life. Just before they left, Dad had this crazy idea of approaching a Japanese rice cooker company and saying “I’m going...
(1/2) My mum always says that she and my dad were fated to be together. His family weren’t rich. They sold noodle soup from a trolley cart at a train station. But Dad was the brightest of the kids, so when he got into university in Japan, his family invested all their...
