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Woman whose parents fled Vietnam calls attention to human trafficking
By Nguyen Huy Vu
May 18, 2005
It's nearly a month before Tammy Tran's trip to Taiwan, but her bags are
already packed. She will meet with a Vietnamese woman who had traveled to the
country to be a bride but ended up as a sex slave for her husband and his
friends.
Tran, 25, and a colleague will document the woman's story and other sexual
assault victims as part of an education campaign to try to eradicate human
trafficking. Her determination to help sexual assault victims was piqued when
she visited Vietnam for the first time as a 10-year-old and saw how rape
affected young women in the war-torn country.
Tran's family left Vietnam three years after the fall of Saigon. Here, Tran
shares her story about how the war affected her family's life:
What is interesting is that my parents left Vietnam when they were my age now.
I can't begin to imagine what it would be like going through a war, living
through war and making decisions to leave a country in unknown waters.
My dad was working as a pharmacist and my mom was working as a court clerk, but
they could no longer live under the communist regime.
My mom told me about cases of people being sentenced to death for stealing or
speaking out against the government. She couldn't take it anymore.
In 1978, my parents were married and escaped by a fishing boat. My mom had a
miscarriage on the boat. There was blood everywhere. They had nothing to treat
her with except water and not very clean water.
I remember my father talking briefly about how he promised to write a letter to
my grandmother once they got to shore. There were no writing instruments, so he
had to use my mom's blood. The letter said they arrived and were OK. My
grandmother still has the letter. My mom doesn't talk about it.
My parents and uncles landed in a refugee camp in Hong Kong and spent 10 months
there until a family in Laguna Beach, California, sponsored them to come to
Orange County in 1980. They later settled in Long Beach, California, where I
was born.
My parents owned a pharmacy in the heart of Little Saigon; my three sisters and
I would work with our parents after school.
For as long as I can remember, there were anti-communist demonstrations near
the pharmacy. Protesters would store things there and hang out with my dad. My
three sisters and I were recruited to assemble South Vietnamese flags and put
up posters.
I went to Vietnam for the first time in 1990 to meet my grandparents in Saigon.
I was only 10, but it was a turning point in my life. When my grandmother went
to church, I saw this little girl on the street who was just 14 or 15.
She was in a struggle with this man. I pointed to the girl and told my
grandmother that this man was hurting her. She just kept dragging me to church
and told me not to interfere with other people's affairs. It was 6 in the
morning. People were walking by and glanced and rushed away.
I later realized this girl was being raped. It was on the street, and no one
did anything. I still have the image in my head. I kept looking back, and she
saw me looking at her. I could see the tears and her crying. I never saw the
man's face. I never saw her again.
I asked my grandmother a few years ago why didn't she do anything. She said it
wasn't our job to interfere in other people's business. I asked her, "She was
being raped, right? Wasn't she being raped?" but she didn't say anything. That
really affected me.
After I came back, I tried to understand why my dad was so involved with the
Vietnamese-American community. I wrote reports on Vietnam every chance I got in
high school and college. The experience I had in Vietnam grew into a mission to
help young Vietnamese girls get out of the cycle of sexual assault, violence
and prostitution.
My dad is still involved with bringing democracy and human rights to Vietnam
and to eradicate communism. But that doesn't affect me as much as the problems
faced by a young girl who prostitutes herself. How can these things happen?
We need to change the situation, so this girl and other girls like her can have
different options in life.
My mom still inspires me to care about Vietnam. She graduated from law school
and gave up her dreams of becoming Vietnam's first female judge to give her
family a better future. I think that's the biggest motivation for me. I can see
the sacrifices she makes every day. The sacrifices should be for something.
The Orange County Register
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5-18-2005
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